Book Review: 'The Battle of the Generals: The Untold Story of the Falaise Pocket-The Campaign That Should Have Won World War II'
(C) 1993 William Morrow & Co. Martin Blumenson's The Battle of the Generals: The Untold Story of the Falaise Gap – The Campaign That Should Have Won World War II is an interesting, though never quite captivating study of the controversial Battle of the Falaise Gap, the climax of Operation Overlord in August of 1944. Blumenson, author of Breakout and Pursuit (1963) and an eminent military historian, focuses on the "big picture" as he focuses on what he frankly believes was the Allies' biggest blunder in the campaign in Northwest Europe: the failure of the Allied armies to close the Falaise Gap and trap the shattered remnants of two German armies west of the Seine River. Blumenson states point-blank that had Eisenhower, Bradley, and Montgomery paid more attention to the immediate goal of destroying the German army in Normandy instead of being diverted by visions of a triumphal march into Germany, many German troops and their equipment would have been se...