"It did become a war of attrition, like most wars (including the jingoistically named "Great Patriotic War)."
Sorry - what the **** does that mean?]
Attrition is the wearing out of one side by rubbing it against the other - in this case, hurling one groups of human beings against another until one of them gave in - no tactics, just simple brute force.
It ever "became" that - it was that from the beginning - the man were never anything but expendable.
"Macmillan said they believed in it and were right to."
She said no such thing - she covered the recruiting campaigns fully in her book.
Give your quotes - in full and with their evidence for making such stupid statements.
If they had "believed in it" - there would have been no need for such tactics as emotional blackmail, inducement from employers at the threat of dismissal, no pantomimes, no recruiting campaigns, no white feathers and certainly no compulsory conscription.
Your bullying mate claimed the vast majority of volunteers came from the middle classes - if that is true - why didn't those who believed in ithe cause join up?
Paxman devoted a half programme to the techniques used to inveigle young men into joining up (want me to put up "The Man Wh Was John Bull again?
Do I claim they ware wrong - I am claiming that you are making things up again - just as you have never put up this shit before
"Here AGAIN are the answers to your questions Jim."
Utter bollocks.
And no - it doesn't answer my question -
If it was a war of attrition how can throwing one group of soldiers to their deaths against another group of soldiers possibly be described as anything but simple butchery - how was it "well led" THAT WAS MY QUESTION
And please stick your unread historians up your hole - you haven'rt read them, you don't understand them and you most certainly do not understand how history works.
History is accumulated knowledge gathered constantly between the event in quesion to the present day - no "modern historians only", no half dozen selected superstars, and certainly no eejit who can't tell the difference between historical fact and opinion - THE ACCUMULATED KNOWLEDGE OF ALL WORKING IN THE FIELD.
The selecting of out-of-context sentences from a minute handful of carefully chose, like-minded people
Fuck your historians - I haven't read them through, but what I have read from a couple of yours, what they say bears no relation to what you claim they say - your deliberate misrepresentation of Hastings proves that beyond a shadow of doubt.
Jim Carroll