Of course Montgomery's incidental connection to the Dieppe raid pales when
compared to his other failures like not getting his D-Day onbjectives,
failing
to clear the approaches to Antwerp and Market-Garden.


Which pale beside his achievements. Montogomery like Patton
was a prima-donna, a pain in the arse and an excellent
field commander. Like all generals he made mistakes but
got things more right than wrong.

Keith


Montgomery has no -real- achievements.

His "victory" over the Afrika Korps at El Alamein came only after he had
overwhelming superiorty and the Germans ran out of gas.

Montogmery's ideas advanced not one whit from 1918 until the day he died.

"I think it true that Montgomery was completely formed as a soldier at the end
of the First World War. He did not grow after that. He became
increasingly
efficient, but he did not absorb a new idea. At fifty he was the same man he
had been at thirty."

--"Churchill and the Montgomery Myth" p. 92 by R.W. Thompson

Thompson continues:

"He read everything he could lay his hands upon that was relevant to his
profession, but some things appear to have been against his nature.
Outstanding among these things was his failure to grasp the theory of the
'expanding torrent' expounded by Liddell Hart. His whole essentially tidy mind
liked the 'set-piece' attack, and all went well until the breakthrough demanded
exploitation. Again and again his senior military friends hammered home the
vital necessity of swift exploitation of the breakthrough. He accepts it but
he cannot --think-- it, and he cannot do it...

[Montgomery wrote in 1924]

"I have not mentioned exploitation anywhere. Perhaps I should have done so,
and if I ever get out a revised edition I will do so. I was anxious not to
try and teach too much. The first thing to my mind is to get them to understand
the elementary principles of attack and defense. But I think you are probably
right, and exploitation should have been brought out."

Thompson continues:

"Seven years later Montgomery was still fighting shy of exploitation and the
expanding torrrent. His draft for the new Training Manual was sent to Liddell
Hart for criticism by Brigadier Fisher, Chief of Staff to General Sir David
Campbell, G.O.C- in C. Again the problems of exploiting success were not dealt
with. Liddell Hart sent his detailed comments and Fisher wrote:

'September 7, 1930

I had a long talk to Montgomery and we went carefully through your criticisms
with the new Infantry Training--with the result that the great
majority of them
are being incorporated in the final proof. The importance of the expanding
torrent are being specially emphasized...'

Yet when the new Training Manual appeared the problems of exploitation were
neither neither emphasized nor understood. Indeed by omissions of passages from
the old manual and the substitutions of new, the tactics of the First World War
were preserved."

--"Churchill and the Montgomery Myth" pp 90-91 by R.W. Thompson.

"Montgomery's failure to destroy the enemy at Alam Halfa must be a measure of
his capacity as a general. Alan Morehead, writing soon after these events, is
as emphatic as Horrocks about Montgomery's intentions:

'On one matter the C-in-C was especially emphatic. This was to be a static
battle. Except in the fluid gap in the south no-one was to budge an inch in
any direction. It did not matter if the enemy were routed; there was to be no
pursuit. Everyone must stand fast. The enemy must be beaten off and then left
alone.
The reason for this was that the real conflict with Rommel was going to
follow later on when everything was ready.'

-"Churchill and the Montgomery Myth" p.103 by R.W. Thompson

So Montgomery later generated 13,000 casualties when he didn't have to. Had he
hit the Afrika Korps in September, before it had a chance to prepare
defensively, he might have spared many of his men's lives. His combat power
relative to the Axis in this time frame was not likely to grow enough warrant a
delay. But if your mindset is stuck in World War One, and you feel you
personally must control as much as possible of everything that happens, then a
delay might be indicated.

Also consider:

"The British had such superiority in weapons, both in quality and quantity,
that they were able to force through any and every kind of operation... For
the rest, the British based their planning on the principal of exact
calculation, a principal which can only be followed where there is complete
material superiority. They actually undertook no -operations- but relied simply
and solely on the effect of their artillery and air force."

--Erwin Rommel

Montgomery is the most overrated general of all time.

Walt