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Patton, Montgomery, Rommel: Masters Of War (2009)

by Terry Brighton(Favorite Author)

4.01 of 5 Votes: 3

ISBN

0307461548 (ISBN13: 9780307461544)

languge

English

genre

History & Biography

publisher

Crown

review 1: A comparative biography of Rommel, Montgomery, and Patton, although it might have been better titled Montgomery and two other guys, since Montgomery, by far gets the most coverage. It is an interesting choice to include all three, there are some similarities between Patton and Rommel, but Montgomery is very different. I do not know much about the three subjects of the book, other then what I know from watching Patton, so the book was quite interesting, however I do have a concern regarding it. Early in the book, Brighton attempts to make a connection between the three generals using Clausewitz’s Principles of War. He states that all three read it while in their respective military academies in the early 1900s, as it was the primary text for officer cadets. However, I am ... morepretty sure Principles of War wasn’t translated into English until the 1940s. Perhaps he was intending to refer to Clausewitz’s On War, although that book would be unsuitable for officer cadets and it is unlikely that any service academies would be using it as the primary text. Furthermore, Brighton describes an incident in which Patton was on his honeymoon in London, bought a copy of Principles of War, and then ignored his new wife while reading it. This does not make much sense if he had just finished using it as the “primary text” while at West Point. This makes me question the rest of the book, what other errors are there that I don’t know enough to see? [return][return]There was a review of this book in a relatively recent issue of the JMH. I waited until I finished the book and this review before reading it. It mentions the same issues I had regarding Clausewitz and ends with this quote, “This is a book that will result in a much distorted picture for the general reader, and extremely frustrating reading for the more knowledgeable reader.”
review 2: I would have given this four stars except for the amount of time spent on actual battles. As a reader of history, I am always more interested in the personal side of it. The author covered a sufficient amount of this for me to really like the book. I was surprised how likable Rommel came across while, of the three, I found the British General Bernard Montgomery the most pompous and disagreeable. As a personal figure, I found very little to admire about him. As I had known the most about Patton, there were no surprises there. For anyone who would prefer to learn about their history through movies, "Patton" would be a good match or even companion to this book. less

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