B. H. Liddell Hart
Sir Basil Henry Liddell Hart (31 October 1895 – 29 January 1970), commonly known throughout most of his career as Captain B. H. Liddell Hart, was a British soldier, military historian, and military theorist. He wrote a series of military histories that proved influential among strategists. Arguing that frontal assault was bound to fail at great cost in lives, as proven in World War I, he recommended the "indirect approach" and reliance on fast-moving armoured formations.
This British surname is barrelled, being made up of multiple names. It should be written as Liddell Hart, not Hart.
Basil Liddell Hart
31 October 1895
29 January 1970 (aged 74)
St Peter and St Paul Churchyard, Medmenham, Buckinghamshire, England
British
Soldier, military historian
1914 – 1927
Captain
His pre-war publications are known to have influenced German World War II strategy, though he was accused of prompting captured generals to exaggerate his part in the development of blitzkrieg tactics. He also helped promote the Rommel myth and the "clean Wehrmacht" argument for political purposes, when the Cold War necessitated the recruitment of a new West German army.
Liddell Hart was an advocate of the notion that it is easier to succeed in war by an indirect approach.[17][35] To attack where the opponent expects, as Liddell Hart explained, makes the task of winning harder: "To move along the line of natural expectation consolidates the opponent's balance and thus increases his resisting power". That is in contrast to an indirect approach, in which physical or psychological surprise is a component: "The indirectness is usually physical and always psychological. In strategy, the longest way round is often the shortest way home".
Liddell Hart would illustrate the notion with historical examples. For example, Liddell Hart considered the Battle of Leuctra, won by Epaminondas, an example of an indirect approach.[36] Rather than weighting his army on the right wing, as was standard at the time, Epaminondas weighted his left wing, held back his right wing and routed the Spartan army. A more modern example would be the landings of the Allies at Normandy on 6 June 1944, as the Germans were expecting a landing in the vicinity of Pas-de-Calais.[37] By contrast, an example of a direct attack, in Liddell Hart's eyes, was the attack by Union forces at the Battle of Fredericksburg in 1862.[38]
Even more impressive in Liddell Hart's eyes was the further campaign by Epaminondas, his invasion of the Peloponnese, in which in winter and in separate columns, he invaded Spartan controlled territory.[39] He was unable to draw the Spartans into combat and so settled on freeing helots. He then built two city states as a break against Spartan power and so the campaign was successful. By breaking the Spartan economic base, he won a campaign without ever fighting a battle.
When analyzing the campaigns of Napoleon, Liddell Hart noted that his approaches were less subtle and more brute force as his forces became larger and that when his forces were lesser, he was more apt to be creative in his battles.[40] Constant victory seemed to have dulled his skills as a soldier.
According to Reid, Liddell Hart's indirect approach has seven key themes.:[41]
Controversies[edit]
Influence on Panzerwaffe[edit]
Following the Second World War Liddell Hart pointed out that the German Wehrmacht adopted theories developed from those of J. F. C. Fuller and from his own, and that it used them against the Allies in Blitzkrieg warfare.[51] Some scholars, such as the political scientist John Mearsheimer, have questioned the extent of the influence which the British officers, and in particular Liddell Hart, had in the development of the method of war practised by the Panzerwaffe in 1939–1941. During the post-war debriefs of the former Wehrmacht generals, Liddell Hart attempted to tease out his influence on their war practices. Following these interviews, many of the generals said that Liddell Hart had been an influence on their strategies, something that had not been claimed previously nor has any contemporary, pre-war, documentation been found to support their assertions. Liddell Hart thus put "words in the mouths of German Generals" with the aim, according to Mearsheimer, to "resurrect a lost reputation".[52]
Shimon Naveh, the founder and former head of the Israel Defense Forces' Operational Theory Research Institute, stated that after World War II Liddell Hart "created" the idea of Blitzkrieg as a military doctrine: "It was the opposite of a doctrine. Blitzkrieg consisted of an avalanche of actions that were sorted out less by design and more by success."[53] Naveh stated that,