I'm sinking in a sea of books!

I remain as addicted to books as I have been for some seventy years but, alas and alack, my actual reading of them has fallen away - bit like my sex life, really!  Consequently the pile of 'waiting to be read' books is actually blocking out the light round my armchair!  This old-age lark really is quite insidious as the energy cells empty themselves and defy replenishment.  Even as I tap this piece of non-news out on my computer-thingie, sitting on the desk before my eyes is a book by Kenneth Macksey entitled: Why the Germans Lost the War: The Myth of German Military Superiority.

The title really intrigued me because I have long believed that when it comes to the art and craft of warfare the Germans far exceed any others.  Actually, thinking about it, I suspect that it is the art of tactics at which they excel, strategy is beyond them - thank God!   For example, apart from loonies like Hitler, did anyone in the German High Command really believe they could conquer the entirety of Europe?  True, they did come close but when it comes to war, close is never close enough!

Anyway, I must give myself a kick and get reading again!

 

 

Comments

[Wigner’s Friend]

SoD,

The superiority of the EU laid bare:

https://www.timworstall.com/2021/01/death-by-solidarity/

Wiggers

[Bill Thomas]

Well Sir,
I've been waiting patiently,
for your Report on the 'Lincoln' book
you teased US with, during your last
lament about your tardy reading habit.
Respecty,
Bill
Ford Theater Actors Assoc.

[David Duff]

Bill, I am admonished and I deserve it! I began the Lincoln book and was looking forward to getting into the heart of it but, alas, was diverted by something else. The story of my reading life, I regret to say! Now, of course, I can't find the bloody thing! Life's a bitch and then it rains!

[Loz]

James Holland has an interesting revisionist patter around the "middle bit" between strategy and tactics, what he calls the operational, that was the Jerries undoing.

All that over engineered unreliable kit and the burden it placed on logistics to maintain it, meant the Jerries were only meant for knock-out blows, not attritional long-running fronts. Inferior but mass manufactured kit would grind them down if victory wasn't achieved PDFQ.

And so the better allied operational performance in the middle of the sandwich overwhelmed the tactical superiority of the Jerries below - those cheap as chips, robust, reliable Shermans, T-34's and Bren guns outperformed the Tigers, Panthers and MG-42's at the operational level and squished the Jerries' tactical advantages. And that in turn embarrassed their strategy by turning planned knockout blows into operational slugfests.

The operational level has been much ignored in the WWII book world, fork lift trucks being not as sexy as Tiger tanks. James Holland redresses that balance in his writings.

Just finished his book on operation Husky, invasion of Sicily. Really good illustration of his point: the allied logistics were awesome.

SoD

[Loz]

Wiggers, the 27 states call out the EU when it messes up, and the EU calls out the 27 states when they mess up. The confederation's two way conflict keeps all power players more exposed and honest, and the people therefore more informed and protected.

Blighty however is a different kettle of fish. The centralised model has failed by removing that two-way check and balance.

A federal Blighty with the old heptarchy, the seven states of England, plus Scotland, NI, Wales, Cornwall, and London (all the substrates that have historical precedent), now that would work well.

But as you know, it ain't gonna happen.
Which means we were better off getting our confederal oversight externally from Brussels since it was never on the radar internally within Blighty.

SoD

[David Duff]

"I hate to admit it, but my Eurosceptic father was right about Brexit
I called for a second referendum. But the new deal has turned me into a Brexiteer."

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/01/12/hate-admit-eurosceptic-father-right-brexit/

Wish I had a brainy son like that!

[Loz]

Hehehe, bull's eye Gaffer!

SoD

[Wigner’s Friend]

“ the 27 states call out the EU when it messes up” and it ignores them.

[Loz]

Like when the whole EU executive resigned in 1999 due to pressure from the states?

When was the last time anyone in the executive resigned in Blighty? Even after massacring 91,000 Brits they're still in there.

The EU confederation works well as a two-way feedback loop, keeping power under control at both ends: member states and Confederate centre. That simply doesn't occur in Blighty's lop-sided, centralisation only, system.

SoD