The Face of Battle by John Keegan

Somewhere I saw this book highly recommended as one of the best books on war ever written. So I decided to give The Face of Battle by John Keegan a try. 

I'm not a huge fan of war books, but this one was interesting. 

He decides he will tell military history differently than it has been done in the past. He wants to look deeply into the face of the men who faced the battle. He states early on that he intends "to discuss wounds and their treatment, the mechanics of being taken prisoner, the nature of leadership at the most junior level, the role of compulsion in getting men to stand their ground, the incidence of accidents as a cause of death in war and, above all, the dimensions of the danger which different varieties of weapons offer to the soldier on the battlefield." (p. 77) He uses three battles as jumping off points for these discussion: Agincourt, Waterloo, and the Somme. He presents them in chronological order and also in order of magnitude. By starting with the much smaller, earlier battle of Agincourt, he provides a helpful place to compare later battles.

One plus, I got to read about battles I have only cursory knowledge of. And, he made it interesting.

He begins with the medieval battle of Agincourt on October 1415. It a small (by modern standards) battle that lasts only one day. It involves the French and the English and occurs at the end of the Hundred Years War. The killing and violence are horrifying, but Keegan makes note of the three most motivating factors: alcohol, King and religion, goods and glory. Although he thinks the last is probably the most important. At a time when even the battle-hardened looked to their priest for permission to kill, knowing that God and the King fought by your side was highly motivating. It didn't hurt (apparently) to be drunk, either. But knowing you would be rewarded in this life pushed men into a level of violence our modern sensibilities simply cannot comprehend. 

Then he moves to another French and English battle, Waterloo, on June 18, 1815. It's scope is much larger than the battle of Agincourt, covering over 2 square miles.  Despite the Duke of Wellington's desire to dismiss any literary or historical accounts of it, the battle looms large in the imagination. And it's no wonder. 

"For the first time in the history of the British army, each veteran of the battle was awarded a commemorative medal. He was to be known as a Waterloo Man and his single day of service on 18 June1815, was to count two years pension. This alone was sufficient to convince even the most unimaginative private soldier that he had survived an extraordinary event; officers were in no doubt of it from the moment the battle closed..." (p. 117). 

When Napoleon returned to France after his exile and the restoration of King Louis XVIII, the powers of Europe decided he would not return to power. They mustered four large armies to meet him, made up of the Austrians, Russians, Prussians, Belgiums, and an Anglo-Dutch army formed on a core English army. Napoleon, seeing the writing on the wall, decided to attack on of the first arrive, the Belgiums. After quickly dispensing them, he turned to the Anglo-Dutch army and attacked head on. That's exactly what the Duke of Wellington assumed he'd do. Although he initially tried a feint to the left, the battle commenced in the middle. The battle is generally considered to have five phases, although that was not obvious to the participants. Obviously in a battle this size the descriptions of the fighting and the wounded stagger the imagination. But once again, the French are dispatched and history moves on.

Moving forward into the future, Keegan describes the battle of the Somme. This is the horrifying trench warfare of World War I. Suffice it to say that this battle encompassed a much larger geographic location and lasted much longer than the others. 

From AI:

Core Themes of Keegan’s Analysis

The Brutality of Industrial Warfare: Keegan emphasizes how modern machinery—specifically automated machine guns and high-explosive artillery—turned the battlefield into a mechanized slaughterhouse that completely overwhelmed human endurance. [1, 2]
The Failure of the Bombardment: He details how the preliminary British artillery barrage failed to cut the thick German barbed wire or destroy deep underground concrete dugouts, leaving the defending German troops intact and ready. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
The Human and Institutional Cost: Focusing on July 1, 1916, Keegan notes the devastating loss of 60,000 British casualties in a single day. He highlights the tragic optimism and courage of the volunteer "Pals" battalions who advanced into certain doom. [1, 2, 3, 4]
The Role of the Officer Corps: Keegan explores how the British public-school ethos shaped junior officers, maintaining a fragile sense of duty and social cohesion even as entire platoons were wiped out. [1]

For a book about warfare, I liked it far more than I thought I would. Unfortunately I waited too long to summarize it and didn't want to actually re-read it to get this summary. Ergo the AI addition at the end.