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Originally Posted by The Reaper
And yet the services still use their works as solid historical references.
Are you referring to their professional rep among their peers, their critics, or their students?
TR
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TR--
This abbreviated post addresses the historical reputation of Liddell Hart.
He is, in a way, in the same boat as CSM Haney. Like Haney, he overstated his influence. Like Haney, he stretched the margins in describing his own experiences as a soldier. Like Haney, he disappointed members of his brotherhood.
In Liddell-Hart's case, the brotherhood he let down were his academic colleagues and students, in particular Sir Michael Howard, and his former student, Brian Bond.
Like Haney, Liddell Hart places his readers in a tricky situation. "Did this happen this way?" "Is this interpretation reliable?" "Can I used this to support a critically important recommendation?"
In Liddell Hart's case, these questions came to a head in the 1980s. At that time, the big debates centered around the efficacy of AirLand Battle, various notions of "deep battle," the maritime strategy, and escalation dominance. A group of political scientists sought to derail these discussions. (Their counter points can be found in most issues of
International Security published during the Reagan years and in many of the books in the Cornell Studies in Security Affairs series.)
One effort focused on discrediting Liddell-Hart. The inconsistencies of his scholarship had received attention at least as early as 1970 (once again, Michael Howard beat everyone to the punch). But in 1989, John J. Mearsheimer--yeah, that guy
--went to town. He cataloged every sin of omission and commission he could find on Liddell-Hart, up to the point where the reader is watching Liddell-Hart serve his students tea as he bends them to his will. (If he could, one senses that Mearsheimer would have exhumed Liddell-Hart's corpse, taken the body to the pet cemetery, reanimated it, given it an eight hour oral exam, and then killed and dismembered the zombie, burnt the remains, and scattered the ashes to the sea.)
The argument went like this: Liddell-Hart is regarded as the father of
blitzkrieg, AirLand Battle and deep attack are presented as updates to
blitzkrieg. But, if Liddell-Hart is a fraud, how do we really know what
blitzkrieg is about and can we trust it as a model for how we plan to fight our next war?
(The conclusion of these political scientists: you can't trust Reagan or the professional judgment of the American armed services, so let's stick with detente, please.)
Historians are still trying to figure out Liddell-Hart. In the January 2009 issue of the
Journal of Military History, Brian Holden Reid looks at Liddell-Hart and J.F.C. Fuller as military reformers. The essay points out:
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Liddell Hart (like Fuller) exposed himself to condemnation on the grounds of arrogance and sophistry, but above all, for immature and erratic judgment. As a result in later life, he became desperate for credit. (164-165)
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HTH.