title: The Battle of the Generals: The Untold Story of the Falaise Pocket-The Campaign That Should Have Won World War II
author:  Martin Blumenson 
description: General Omar Bradley called it "an opportunity that comes to a commander not more than once in a century." General Dwight Eisenhower, in a letter to his wife, predicted that the war could be over in 10 days. Blumenson reveals how the two military chiefs, along with British General Bernard Montgomery, let slip an opportunity to destroy a large portion of the German army at the Falaise Gap in Normandy in August 1944 by failing to close the jaws of a trap as quickly as they could have. Though several thousand German soldiers were killed, wounded and captured in the Falaise pocket, the Allied victory was disappointingly incomplete, and the war continued for another eight months. Blumenson ( Patton ) analyzes the emotional dynamics among the three ill-matched generals, showing how their mutual antipathy affected the conduct of operations and led them to neglect the basic precept of warfare: instead of concentrating on destroying the enemy, they focused on capturing territory. His careful examination of General George Patton's role at Falaise Gap brings into clearer focus his skills as a high-level field commander. "Unlike most of his contemporaries whose reputations have steadily declined since the war," writes the author, "Patton's has continued to rise." Photos. <br />Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
zlib_text: About the Book
  ‘War is too important to be left to the generals,’ snapped future French
  prime minister Georges Clemenceau on learning of yet another bloody and
  futile offensive on the Western Front.
  The question persists: why did the First World War take so long to win and
  exact so appalling a human cost? In this major new analysis, acclaimed
  military historian Allan Mallinson provides controversial and disturbing
  answers.
  He disputes the growing consensus among historians that British generals
  were not to blame for the losses and setbacks and that, given the magnitude
  of their task, they did as well as anyone could have. He takes issue with the
  popular view that the ‘amateur’ strategic opinions of politicians such as
  Lloyd George and, especially, Winston Churchill, prolonged the war and
  increased the death toll. On the contrary, he argues, even before the war
  began Churchill had a far better grasp of strategy than any of the admirals
  or generals. And he repudiates the notion that Chur