During the First World War, the British army's most consistent German opponent was Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria. Commanding more than a million men as a General, and then Field Marshal, in the Imperial German Army, he held off the attacks of the British Expeditionary Force under Sir John French and then Sir Douglas Haig for four long years. But Rupprecht was to lose not only the war, but his son and his throne. In Haig's Enemy, Jonathan Boff explores the tragic tale of Rupprecht's war--the story of a man caught under the wheels of modern industrial warfare. Providing a fresh viewpoint on the history of the Western Front, Boff draws on extensive research in the German archives to offer a history of the First World War from the other side of the barbed wire. He revises conventional explanations of why the Germans lost with an in-depth analysis of the nature of command, and of the institutional development of the British, French, and German armies as modern warfare was born. Using Rupprecht's own diaries and letters, many of them never before published, Haig's Enemy views the Great War through the eyes of one of Germany's leading generals, shedding new light on many of the controversies of the Western Front. The picture which emerges is far removed from the sterile stalemate of myth. Instead, Boff re-draws the Western Front as a highly dynamic battlespace, both physical and intellectual, where three armies struggled not only to out-fight, but also to out-think, their enemy. The consequences of falling behind in the race to adapt would be more terrible than ever imagined.

A prevalent view among historians is that both horsed cavalry and the cavalry charge became obviously obsolete in the second half of the nineteenth century in the face of increased infantry and artillery firepower, and that officers of the cavalry clung to both for reasons of prestige and stupidity. It is this view, commonly held but rarely supported by sustained research, that this book challenges. It shows that the achievements of British and Empire cavalry in the First World War, although controversial, are sufficient to contradict the argument that belief in the cavalry was evidence of military incompetence. It offers a case study of how in reality a practical military doctrine for the cavalry was developed and modified over several decades, influenced by wider defence plans and spending, by the experience of combat, by Army politics, and by the rivalries of senior officers. Debate as to how the cavalry was to adjust its tactics in the face of increased infantry and artillery firepower began in the mid nineteenth century, when the increasing size of armies meant a greater need for mobile troops. The cavalry problem was how to deal with a gap in the evolution of warfare between the mass armies of the later nineteenth century and the motorised firepower of the mid twentieth century, an issue that is closely connected with the origins of the deadlock on the Western Front. Tracing this debate, this book shows how, despite serious attempts to ’learn from history’, both European-style wars and colonial wars produced ambiguous or disputed evidence as to the future of cavalry, and doctrine was largely a matter of what appeared practical at the time.

Haig's Intelligence confronts a perennial question about the British on the Western Front: why did they think they were winning?

As a young officer in the prestigious 21st Lancers (motto 'Death or Glory') Douglas Haig played a leading role in Kitchener's bold expedition which ended in the defeat of the Khalifa of Sudan at Omdurman. He described the action, as he did the whole campaign, vividly in words and diagrams which survived virtually untouched at the family home Bemersyde in the Borders. These letters and diaries allow the reader to trace Haig's career and developing character. What they reveal may well surprise his critics. Field Marshal Lord Haig will remain a hugely controversial figure due to his pre-eminent role during The Great War. He was a hugely popular public figure in the post WW1 years and revered by those who served under him. His death in 1928 was a major occasion for mourning. Only later was he heavily criticised for the slaughter of the trenches.

This book sets out to expose and analyse a major historical fraud. The author's theme is the Western Front in Haig's time - from the Somme to the armistice. Using evidence that the documents from which previous histories have been written are tampered-with and often entirely rewritten versions of the truth - for example, a daily war diary was kept by all units up to GHQ and these were often altered by the Cabinet Office and crucial appendices totally removed. Cabinet war minutes were likewise rewritten, with reference to whole meetings often removed. Records such as Haig's own diary were also tampered with, and Denis Winter even claims to have found documents which the war's official historian thought he had deliberately destroyed in the 1940s.

The magazine of mobile warfare.

Originally published in 1985 The Decision to Disarm Germany offers a fresh approach to Britain’s First World War and Paris Peace Conference policy on the question of German military disarmament. It offers interpretations based on extensive research into unpublished records and private papers and provides important new conclusions about British policy. The book shows the interaction of domestic concerns and strategic considerations in the wartime development of British thinking on the issue of post-war German disarmament and in the post-Armistice formulation and implementation of Britain’s German disarmament policy. It establishes the crucial interrelationship in British thinking and policy between German disarmament and general disarmament. It also shows the interwar consequences of wartime attitudes and peace conference policy.