ARmy Rumour SErvice

Originally Posted by seaweed

A more knowledgable student of military history may wish to correct me, but my understanding is that Irwin was the man who lost 1st Arakan with Slim only being moved in, under Irwin, after the campaign was well under way. Wavell sacked Irwin for losing the battle by fighting it otherwise than as Wavell had ordered. Slim recognised that one cause of failure was under-trained troops and set about putting that tight.

That's pretty much correct. Irwin commanded the initial Arakan operations starting in Dec 1942 directly from HQ Eastern Army (as it was then called), Slim's XV Corps only being brought in later, in April 1943. Wavell sacked Irwin after the failure of the campaign and replaced him with Giffard. With the formation of SEAC later in 1943 the command structure changed, Giffard became theoretically the overall land force commander as GOC 11 Army Group and Slim took over what had been the frontline element of Eastern Army as 14th Army. The other part of Eastern Army remained under C-in-C India as Eastern Command.

Wingate was certainly barking. When at Sandhurst his drill instructor was always screaming at him to slap his rifle hard enough to break it. Wingate replaced the screws with matchsticks causing heart failure on the next parade.

Originally Posted by Cuddles

I sometimes am amused by those who criticise Montgomery lack of "brilliance" and grudgingly admire his methodical approach to building victories. His brilliance was perhaps in adopting a methodical approach in the first place and eschewing arme blanche strokes of manoeuvrism, he simply used the internal lines approach to ensure winning, little by little up until the breakout - either in N Africa or Europe.

Curiously you seldom hear one of his toms criticising his economic approach to the butcher's bill but a lot of us armchair generals!

I've said it before: Michael Howard is my guide in matters Monty. MH's judgment? "He was a very good First World War General" Praise, but faint praise. His greatest achievement might well have been getting his division out of France more-or-less intact, in 1940.

In Europe '44/'45, he did the best he could with an army whose morale he knew to be dangerously fragile, and he made the most of allied materiel superiority (Alamein was the last battle he fought without US assistance. He fudged the pursuit, and the Afrika Korps escaped. Cf. Falaise Gap and the [nominal] 'Race' to the Seine in late summer '44)

Bill Slim, by way of contrast, took a poorly led and trained army that had had its 'arris whupped, and turned it into an Army with the most extraordinary morale. An Army bigger than any commanded by Monty. An Army of more nations than any of Monty's. An Army in a more complex alliance than Monty was exposed to - which Slim negotiated with modesty, good humour and diplomacy, skills to which Monty was by nature a complete stranger.

Ask yourself this: all mistakes considered [did Monty ever acknowledge his own mistakes?] which man demonstrated the most efficient - the steepest - learning curve?

I'll vote for the son of a dodgy Brummy ironmonger.

And I'll cite his handling of the 'precious' prima donna Winn-git, with all his carefully cultivated pol/mil patronage, as a case in point.

Originally Posted by Pull-up-a-sandbag

Wingate was certainly barking. When at Sandhurst his drill instructor was always screaming at him to slap his rifle hard enough to break it. Wingate replaced the screws with matchsticks causing heart failure on the next parade.

Cocky, snot-nosed public school kid looking to make 'mere artisan' SNCO look foolish?

Jolly jape?

You choose.

Originally Posted by Stonker

Cocky, snot-nosed public school kid looking to make 'mere artisan' SNCO look foolish?

Jolly jape?

You choose.

Well, the mad old bastard did for one of my Great Uncles. Gallivanting in Burma - never came back and no word of his death for some time, apparently.

I suppose the measure of the man's activities is did he kill Japs or not? The unequivocal answer being yes. Was it strategically worthwhile? At that stage of the conflict who could bloody tell. Is it likely that men who had to endure what the Chindits had to would remain completely normal - sanity would have probably been a weakness under those circumstances. Wingate's proclivities stand out due to his rank.

Originally Posted by bigeye

Well, the mad old bastard did for one of my Great Uncles. Gallivanting in Burma - never came back and no word of his death for some time, apparently.

I suppose the measure of the man's activities is did he kill Japs or not? The unequivocal answer being yes. Was it strategically worthwhile? At that stage of the conflict who could bloody tell. Is it likely that men who had to endure what the Chindits had to would remain completely normal - sanity would have probably been a weakness under those circumstances. Wingate's proclivities stand out due to his rank.

If, after 70 years, it is not possible to say unequivocally 'the boy done good', then it is - to me - logical to say his contribution was, at best, marginal.

The associated butcher's bill is less equivocal.

Closest comparison I can think of would be with the strategic bombing campaign in NW Europe.

Difference is that we know fer shure, that without the bomber campaign, Speer woulda pushed even more Panzers out than he did.

Such clarity around Wingates ops seems to me to have been avoided.

Originally Posted by Pull-up-a-sandbag

Wingate was certainly barking. When at Sandhurst his drill instructor was always screaming at him to slap his rifle hard enough to break it. Wingate replaced the screws with matchsticks causing heart failure on the next parade.

I must say it doesn't sound like the kind of thing Wingate would do as he apparently had absolutely no sense of humour. And he went to Woolwich not Sandhurst.

Two rather contrasting views on Wingate:

There was a man of genius, who might well have become also a man of destiny
- Winston Churchill¹

Much of what he preached strategically, operationally, and tactically, was flawed, and some of it was downright nonsense.
Major General Julian Thompson

Both quoted at the beginning of Simon Anglim's thesis ORDE WINGATE AND THE BRITISH ARMY, 1922-1944:
Military Thought and Practice Compared and Contrasted which is worth reading.


http://www.google.co.za/url?sa=t&rct...mvBsaEiQWT1mlQ

Two more quotes:

Just as timing played so great a part in his rise to prominence, so the moment of his death may have been propitious for him. He was killed at the height of his career and was not called upon to face the inevitable fact that his dreams and ambitions could never have been realised.

Major General S Woodburn Kirby24

The whole assessment was no more than a hatchet job by little men who could not have competed with Wingate either in military argument or in battle. Not only has it failed but it has made him such a controversial figure that his reputation will live on forever.

Sir Robert Thompson25

Originally Posted by Pull-up-a-sandbag

Wingate was certainly barking. When at Sandhurst his drill instructor was always screaming at him to slap his rifle hard enough to break it. Wingate replaced the screws with matchsticks causing heart failure on the next parade.

Eh, Wingate was never at RMC Sandhurst, he went to RMA Woolwich.