The End in Europe
I BEGAN to read this book with a feeling of pleasant excitement. Mr. Moorehead's three previous books about the war in Africa had been so good that one naturally wondered whether he could live up to the great reputation he had won. There was no doubt or hesitation in my mind when I had finished reading. Mr. Moore- head has been successfulagain. It would be futile at this stage to try to make comparisons between the four books ; they all deal with the same great theme in much the same way and Eclipse is a worthy companion to African Triology. Mr. Moorehead's great merit is that he is able to produce not the hurried jottings of a busy journalist but a finished work of art. Even though only a few months have gone by since the last of the events narrated in this book the reader is unable to sense the feverish activity that must have gone into its making. The author's art, too, does not lie in purple passages or in fanciful juxtaposition of ideas ; it is to be found in the selection of material and in construction. As an example, there is the exquisite ending of Chapter 16—an idyllic descnption of Hanover and a comparison of this countryside and its people with England and the English—followed by the chilling opening of Chaper 17—" Just before you get to the main entrance of Belsen concentration camp . . ."
The book is divided into four sections, dealing in turn with the Italian campaign, the fighting in France, the Rhine, and the final surrender. Personal experiences are skilfully mixed with a clear and acute sketch of the political and military background. We are introduced to the great figures of the war ; in particular, there is a brilliant portrait of General Dempsey, who is characterised as a technician and a manipulator of facts who never dealt, as Mont- gomery and Horrocks did, in terms of emotion. All through the book we are given obviously authentic pictures of ordinary people, for Mr. Moorehead has a flair for the concrete incident- or remark which opens up long vistas of thought. Nothing could be better than his description of the way in which the British soldiers he was with passed the weary hours before embarkation for D-Day - it was so characteristically British and so much in keeping with the matter and manner of Montgomery's pre-invasion speeches to them—no heroics, but simply cat-calls at girls on bicycles and suburban cricketers, and the hourly tea-waggon to which ran men with enamel mugs. Nor would it be possible to improve on the Frenchman's summing-up of the• significance of liberation: "I'D
tell you what liberation is. It's hearing a knock on my door at six o'clock in the morning and knowing it's the milkman."
Most people will read this book as a worthy record of a great achievement, but military students will also find in it much material for reflection. Mr. Moorehead is sparing of criticism and humble and restrained when he offers it, but his great experience of war entitles his views to respect. It is perhaps too early yet to know whether more could not have been done to keep open the road to Arnhem, and the author's judgement that "there appeared to me to be a fundamental lack of urgency in the new areas" is .put forward only tentatively. But on two points Mr. Moorehead puts forward views that are worthy of serious consideration. He is very critical of the policy which led to the destruction of so many Norman towns and villages. His views on this complete and apparently pointless destruction are in tune with General Fuller's plea for economy of force and protests against the wastefulness of modern war. Later, the chapter on the battle of the Ardennes is a miniature masterpiece of military appreciation. Few people as yet realise the decisive significance of this battle, when " the largest armoured spearhead the world had ever known" was first blunted and then destroyed. It is work of this distinction which makes this a book to be enjoyed now and to be treasured in the future.
S. H. F. JOHNSTON.
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