In this essay I will try and show how far all the sources in the booklet support the statement that Haig was uncaring and sacrificed the lives of his soldiers for no reason. I will give a balanced answer, showing both points of view, and reach a judgement.
Source A does support the statement, because it uses a cold and harsh tone, for example that the loss of soldiers was “teaching” the nation about the reality of war. It seems to suggest that he sees “heavy casualty lists” as an inevitability, and because he carried out the attack when he knew that many soldiers were going to die, we can infer that he did not care about the lives of his soldiers and was cold hearted.
However one could say that source a does not support the statement, because it does not explicitly mention anywhere that Haig did not care about the lives of his men, and one could argue that he is merely being a good general and preparing the nation and his men for what is going to happen.
One could also say that source B does not support the statement, because it mentions how well “instructed and informed” his men were before the attack, and this clearly does not support the statement because it shows how he cares about the morale and the preparation of his men. We can also see this because he mentions how the troops are in “wonderful spirits” after the attack.
However, we know from contextual knowledge that really the men were not well instructed and informed, because many of the 700,000 soldiers used in the attack were new recruits and had very little experience, and the only practice they had would not in any way prepare them for the realities of war. We also know that the attack was definitely not “very successful” on the first morning, by the end of the d...
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...for example source F is extremely explicit in its criticism of Haig, whereas with source A it is only through inferences that we are able to prove how it supports the statement. There are also many statements where support of the statement can be argued both ways, for example many seem to support it on the surface but when you take a closer look at their motives and provenance they are show to not be so reliable and therefore not support the statement so concretely, for example sources D and E which are both very critical of Haig but both are fictional. There is also the occasional source which doesn’t seem to support the statement at all, for example source H seems to be very positive when talking about Haig. However, when taking all of the above into account, I have reached the judgement that overall most of these sources do support the statement quite far.
war, ‘normal rules don’t apply’. He backs this up by pointing out that it was enemy who ‘tore up the
I believe that even though most of the sources tell us that Haig was a
This story brings back some harsh truths about warfare, and explains why so many naïve young men joined up, only to suffer deaths well before their time.
His heart may have been in the right place, but he did not have the
A judgement of Haig cannot be reached without an understanding of his context. Haig, in society today, is most commonly viewed as a foolish “butcher” who failed to grasp the basics of the battlefield and proceeded to sacrifice Britain’s ‘flower of youth’. But to blindly accept this perspective is to misunderstand the complexities surrounding interpretations of Haig. We must realise that the First World War was one of inherent contradictions: a war with unexpected 20th Century technology, a war of attrition rather than the traditional 19th Century one of movement. Commanders, including Haig, struggled with the advent of modern warfare. This inflexibility is one of the traditionalists’ main lines of argument – move this into a paragraph on the mini-debate of inflexibility, but then I’m unsure where the following paragraph fits, because it i...
nobody realizes how bad the soldiers actually have so he is forced to lie. He says “No,
... all involved. President Johnson was determined to have a limited involvement in the war without involving the legal approval of Congress or the knowledge of the people of America. McNamara and Taylor regularly lie to conceal actions. McMaster has written a thorough look at the decisions of all these men, which certainly shows a Dereliction of Duty.
The narrator opens the conversation with the white haired man by stating, “We had a mission today. Target was ten kliks south of here? (...) It was my first mission like that…” (284). It is important to note the way in which our narrator trails off at the end of his statement. The narrator purposely avoids specifying the contents of the day’s mission because he is haunted by guilt. The uncertainty of the narrator’s mindset is later reiterated when he expresses, “I just never killed anybody before. Neither have I, he says. But I did. I think. I mean, we just shot the rounds off” (284). The key words in this excerpt are “we just shot the rounds off”, so he feels as though he did not play a major role in the deaths of the enemies. This mindset can be connected to a conversation had earlier in the story between the narrator and his crew. In this situation, the crew is discussing who should receive recognition for killing the enemy. Our narrator is clearly uncomfortable with this debate and makes the claim that since the ammo for ICM came from the Marines, they should also be held responsible for the deaths of the enemy troops. We see our narrator try to divvy up the blame for the death of the enemy troops to lessen his guilt. This debate along with the dialogue between our narrator and the old gunnery sergeant further
The evidence used in this book is very accountable and reliable by the author using personal stories and experiences and himself going and visiting the Hawaiian bases attacked and pored over the maps. With thousand pages of
Are assertions in the source based on reliable evidence? Are sources cited? How are you able to tell? They do list where they get their info from within the paragraphs or quotes.
...a known source but usually the source is obvious. Lastly, black leaflets have a stated source which, however, is false. For example, the Allies invented non-existent anti-Nazi groups in Germany. On these leaflets Allied powers printed false information that attempted to challenge Hitler and the Nazis in attempt to lead others into rebellion.
"Dear Mom and Dad: The war that has taken my life, and many thousands of others before me, is immoral, unlawful, and an atrocity," (letter of anonymous soldier qtd. In Fussell 653).
...more sympathetic than Eaker to those who lost their lives in the Dresden bombing. Saundy believed “that the bombing of Dresden was a great tragedy none can deny”, and that it wasn’t necessary to the Allies efforts to win the War (187). However, he does defend those who directed the bombing, stating they “were neither wicked nor cruel”, but instead forced into making a tough decision in a decisive time in the War (187). Saundy presents a much more humane view of the bombing of Dresden than Eaker. Saundy doesn’t attempt to justify or condemn the bombing; he instead portrays it as one of the many horrors of war that can only be viewed in hindsight as such.
To answer some common question that are ask by the people who do not understand the soldiers. He presupposed that everybody knows the story, in which is not really possible and cannot be proven by any facts or evidence.
A true war story is never moral. It does not instruct, nor encourage virtue, nor suggest models of proper human behavior, nor restrain ...