The Battle of Normandy, 1944: The Final Verdict
by Robin Neillands
The Battle of Normandy, 1944: The Final Verdict is a shockingly
bad book. Robin Neillands has a large ax to grind, and grind it he
does. So much, in fact, that there must not be any blade left on
the axhead. In a sense, this in and of itself is not really a
"bad thing". All authors need to have a motive for writing. However,
when the author's agenda becomes so strong that it blinds him (or her) to
reason, logic, and objective analysis, it indeed becomes a problem. In
this book, Neillands is very certain that the historical record on
the Battle of Normandy is incorrect. He is also very certain that any
critiques of Montgomery or the British forces in Normandy are incorrect.
This leads him to make absurd claims, to base his arguments on faulty
reasoning, to make gross misinterpretations, to engage in character assassination,
and finally to produce a book that actually does more damage to the historical
record on Normandy than anything else.
Neillands writes from a blatantly pro-Montgomery and pro-British point
of view. This is his reaction, as stated in his preface, to recent
Hollywood movies (Saving Private Ryan and U-571), as well as Stephen Ambrose's
books (although Neillands usually claims unnamed "American historians" are
to blame). Neillands is very concerned that the British contribution
to the war generally and the Normandy campaign specifically is being "written
out" of history. This is absurd, and is a very good example of Neillands's
penchant for straw-man argumentation. First, Hollywood has never made
(and will never make) a valuable contribution to the historical record; it
is an entertainment industry, which is something Neillands obviously fails
to realize. Hollywood is irrelevant, and Neillands simply does not
get it. Second, Stephen Ambrose, despite his popularity, was hardly
a scholarly historian, at least after the late 1960s and early 1970s. He
was more of a triumphalist chest-thumper, an over-the-top patriot. No
professional historian, nor any reader intent on getting more than casually
acquainted with the historical record, ever took his recent work seriously.
Ambrose's claim that the British were cowards is obviously wrong and
therefore it is easy to refute (which is the essence of a straw-man argument).
So, Neillands worries about problems that are not real or of much concern.
Of course, Ambrose's books are widely read, and since many
of his readers are only casually interested in the subject, his claims and
interpretations are certainly in need of correction. Two wrongs do
not make a right, however, and Neillands's book is just as pro-UK as Ambrose
is pro-US (although Neillands is a bit more diplomatic about it...no "gutless"
Americans appear in his book).
All of this means Neillands's book is unnecessary and comes off as tedious
and preachy. If that was the whole of the problem with Neillands's
book, then it wouldn't be worth reading, but it also wouldn't do damage to
the body of literature on the Normandy campaign. Unfortunately, Neillands
uses so many fallacies of logic (straw-man arguments, post hoc reasoning,
ad hominem attacks, circumstantial ad hominem attacks, appeal to spite, appeal
to authority, and even appeal to consequences of a belief) that his book
is a house of cards. And as a result, it gives a highly distorted view
of the Normandy campaign.
Neillands bases his book on two key arguments. First, he maintains
that Montgomery's original plan for the campaign was followed, that only
minor modifications were made, and that the results indicate that the campaign
basically went according to plan. Second, he argues that the British
were not as cowardly as "American historians" claim (he fails to identify
who these historians are), and that the British actually outperformed the
Americans in certain ways.
The evidence that Neillands offers for his first argument is sketchy at
best, and is a good example of post hoc reasoning. Although it is
true that the British and the Americans ended the campaign along the Seine
in roughly the positions projected in the plan (and even ahead of time!),
the actual campaign went nothing like planned. Neillands fits the facts
back to the plan, rather than assessing why the battle may not have developed
in line with the plan. In fact, the "plan" was for both the British
and the Americans, facing south originally, to "wheel around" to the east,
keeping a continuous line. The plan did not anticipate the British
being a non-moving "hinge" at Caen for the Americans to pivot on, nor did
the plan include a breakout and subsequent encirclement of German forces.
Neillands even tries to back-fit the German counterattack at Mortain
to Monty's plan. So, only in the absolute broadest sense did the plan
work as expected. Operationally and tactically, many adjustments and
improvisations were made, particularly in terms of shifting to a breakout
strategy (instead of gradually pushing the Germans back) and the mobile warfare
that unexpectedly developed for the Americans after COBRA. In defending
Montgomery, Neillands fails to recognize the value of shifting away from
the plan. He diminishes the flexibility and speed of the Americans
that was required to create the encirclement during the "mobile" phase (post-Mortain
counterattack). Indeed he dismisses Patton almost completely, claiming
his contribution to the Normandy campaign was negligible. Certainly
Patton did not win the Normandy campaign, and it is still fair to state that
his role was not as large as many other commanders, yet it was his forces
that closed the south part of the encirclement.
This sort of gross distortion occurs in the other direction regarding
British forces, and makes up the second key argument of the book. It
is easy to dismiss any claims of cowardliness on the part of the British.
But Neillands goes further, by making excuses for the bad performance
of the British army in Normandy. Neillands constantly claims that
none of the operations in the British sector were actually intended to break
through German lines, and instead were simply holding attacks. This
is incorrect, particularly for GOODWOOD, which Montgomery had hoped would
achieve a breakthrough. Subsequent operations were also intended to
produce a breakout and provide a more mobile battlefield.
What Neillands is trying to do here is to excuse the poor performance
of the British army, first in front of Caen, and then later when it was
trying to break out. By claiming that, in accordance to the plan,
all the British were trying to do was hold German armor around Caen, Neillands
refuses to acknowledge that the British army performed badly in Normandy.
Instead, he tries to deflect criticism in two ways. First, he
argues that the British were not "stuck", they were implementing the plan.
Second, he shows that by attacking repeatedly, it is unfair to call
the British cowards. The second claim he makes is certainly true.
The Second (British) Army was not cowardly, and for Ambrose to call
the British "gutless" is absurd and grossly insulting. Of course,
this is also a straw-man that Neillands sets up. The first claim Neillands
makes is more problematic. The British were stuck. So
were the Americans at first. And both were trying to push the
Germans back (in accordance with Monty's actual plan). Although the
Americans finally broke out, the British did not have comparable success,
and in fact made only modest progress in exchange for high losses. It
is fair to question Monty's leadership and the quality of British troops.
Many recent studies have examined the poor performance of the British
army (e.g. Military Training in the British Army, 1940-1944 by Timothy
Harrison Place; Clash of Arms: How the Allies Won in Normandy by
Russell Hart; "The British and American Armies in World War II: Explaining
Variations in Organizational Learning Patterns" by Eric Heginbotham;
Raising Churchill's Army by David French). Neillands rejects these
criticisms out of hand (in fact, he does not acknowledge their existence,
despite the fact that all were published during the time he researched his
book).
To be fair, the Americans also did rather poorly at first as well. Neillands
make a great deal of this. One way he does this is to offer comparative
casualty statistics for the first month, which show higher American casualties
(at a time when number of troops were equal). What Neillands fails
to do is offer any perspective for these statistics. First, Americans
were fighting in the bocage and the most of the British forces were
not. Second, most of the American force was comprised of infantry units,
while most of the British force was comprised of armored units. Casualties
are always heavier in the infantry, and this alone may explain the difference
(coupled with the heavier losses suffered on D-Day itself). Instead
of offering these types of reasons, Neillands chooses to emphasize that,
perhaps due to casualties, American forces had to constantly retrain in the
field to deal with the unexpected conditions in Normandy. Ironically,
what Neillands chooses to emphasize as a weakness is actually a strength.
Heginbotham and the others cited above show that American forces in
World War II were much more adept at learning from mistakes than the British,
and retraining in the field is a key element of organizational improvement.
In the end, Neillands seems to try to cover all bases. If he can
not convince the reader that the British did not do poorly (or that the Americans
did as badly as the British), he tries to show that the American success,
and the progress of the campaign overall, was due only to Monty's
leadership and planning. This leads to my biggest overall objection
to this book. Neillands makes a big show of his "impartiality" by
frequently reminding his readers that his account is based on the official
histories of the United States, the United Kingdom (and where appropriate,
Canada). This is supposed to impress the reader regarding fairness,
and Neillands claims that it automatically makes his book even-handed. This
is a textbook example of the logical fallacy of appealing to authority. Of
course, Neillands offers no background information on his "authoritative
sources". Had he, his readers would find out that the British official
history has been largely discredited by professional historians as an apologia
for Montgomery. Consequently, it is very easy for Neillands to "find"
that his arguments about Montgomery and the British army are supported by
his "authoritative" source.
Neillands's book is truly awful. It is extremely poorly researched
(almost exclusively relying upon the three "official histories" and a few
post-war memoirs). It adds nothing new to our knowledge of the campaign
(indeed many of the "myths" that Neillands covers have been directly addressed,
objectively, twenty years ago by D'Este and Hastings). It is
a blatant and embarrassing apologia for Montgomery and the British army.
It contains factually incorrect statements, errors of omission, faulty
logic, and willful misinterpretation. In the end, Neillands offers a
pathetic appeal to the consequences of a belief: he claims that if we continue
to write histories that point out the flaws, problems, and mistakes in the
prosecution of the war, we do a disservice to those who fought. This
of course is not true, and asks historians to drop their credibility and professionalism
in exchange for blind patriotism. I understand that many in the UK
have been stung by the writing of Stephen Ambrose. Certainly his drivel
is embarrassingly over the top. Yet it is unfortunate that Neillands
chose to respond the way he did, by radically skewing his interpretations
and conclusions in the other direction. In the long run, this does nothing
to set the record straight.
In a nutshell: hardly the "final verdict"
Email me with comments at mlicari@cfu.net
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