A Great Modern Soldier

REVIEWS 427 A GREAT MODERN SOLDIER* C. P. STACEY Field-Marshal Erwin Rommel is one of the genuinely legendary figures of the Second World War. He was idolized by his men and by the Gennan public. The British soldiers whom he fought, and frequently beat, in the North African desert had more admiration for him than for many of their own commanders; in the British House of Commons Winston Churchill saluted him, "across the havoc of war," as "a very daring and skilful opponent and ... a great general"; and a British brigadier wrote a laudatory biography of him which had a tremendous sale and was made into a film which Britons-and Canadians -lined up for blocks to see. He was Hitler's favourite commander ; and in 1944 Hitler forced him to commit suicide to avoid trial for treason. It is an extraordinary story; and it must be said that the legend is unlikely to be diminished by the recent publication of The Rommel Papers. Many who have been sceptical till now have been convinced by this book that Rommel was in fact exactly what Churchill called him in 1942. It is a remarkable volume, and an important contribution to the history of the Second World War. Rommel intended to write a book about his campaigns; and whenever a quiet interlude gave him the chance he made a practice of putting on paper an account of the most recent operations and a commentary upon them. Though he didn't survive to write the book, these preliminary papers have fortunately been preserved, as have most of his letters to his family. Together they make up the greater part, and the most important part, of this volume. The gaps have been filled by chapters written by General Fritz Bayerlein, sometime Chief of Staff of the Afrika Korps, and by Rommel's son Manfred. But about fourfifths of the book is Rommel, and fascinating stuff it is. Rommel wrote pungently; the translation is lively; and the editor, Captain B. H. Liddell Hart, has done a skilful and helpful job, though more attention to scholarly minutiae would have made it more valuable to the student. The narrative is subject to checking on points of detail, but the book's general significance is beyond doubt. From these pages Rommel emerges as a rather attractive personality and an extremely brilliant tactician-that is to say, battlefield commander. In this department, the war probably produced no abler general. The present writer must admit, however, that he finds little here to contradict Field-Marshal Montgomery's coldly laconic comment , "Rommel was no strategist." (In general, it is the commanders *The Rommel Papers. Edited by B. H. LIDDELL HART. With the assistance of LUCIE-MARIA ROMMEL, MANFRED ROMMEL and General FRITZ BAYERLEIN. Translated by PAUL FINDLAY. London and Toronto: Collins. 1953. Pp. xxx, 545. $5.00. 428 UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO QUARTERLY whom Rommel beat, rather than those who beat him, who have made the largest contributions to the Rommel legend.) But it is piquant to discover that a few weeks before his own death Rommel wrote, "Montgomery was undoubtedly more of a strategist than a tactician." Rommel's description of the campaign in France in 1940, in which he commanded the 7th Panzer Division, is one of the most illuminating accounts of that bizarre and dramatic episode. The worst crisis the 7th Panzer had to sunnount was apparently the British counterattack at Arras on May 21. French resistance ran the gamut from desperate courage down to total apathy. After the break~through, the German tank columns sometimes motored for miles past French troops who merely looked at them. An interesting point is that Rommel insisted on the advance being made across country, avoiding villages and main roads. One reflects that, had he corne to England, much of the effort devoted there in 1940 and 1941 to making towns and villages into what were known as "tank-proof localities" might have turned out to be wasted. In February, 1941, Rommel was sent to Africa, where the Italians had taken a terrible beating from Lord Wavell, to try to recoup the Axis fortunes. It was there that he really made his...