Extracts from Ironsides: a history of the British tank.
"Fullers position in the late 30's was was very difficult, as a theorist he may have had a place but his association with Mosley and attendence of parades in Hitlers Germany made him persona non gratta once war seemed inevitable. It now appears clear that after Churchill's return to the cabinet an approach was made in regard to the use of armour, and parts of the success of the 1941 breakout may be laid at his feet. He may have been an awkward, brittle man tainted with his flirtation with facism but his patriotism and influence on the '41 campaign perhaps redeems him. It is a personal tragedy for him that this did not become public knowledge until long after his death."
"The Char B1 Ter was supplied both to the French and British armies, after the Prime Ministers death it recieved the name the Chamberlain when in British use. The tank complimented the British Halifax and Cromwell tanks, and its use in 1940 allowed development time on both which would have been rushed if domestic product was required from the start. They were gradually phased out by UK forces but remained in French colonial use until the early 1950s"
"The prevalent view of the German army as supreme in mechanized warfare in the late 1930's is often lumped in with the idea that "the bomber always gets through" an understandabel conclusion to come to at the time but in hindsight a myth. The german forces tried to repeatedly project themselves as the masters of mechanized warfare but the breakdown rates of the early panzer models, the lack of raw materials and fuel and the armies reliance on the horse - particularly in comparison with the much more mechanized BEF- shows this to be a conjuring trick of Hitlers regime rather than having any real truth behind it. A famous
Daily Express cartoon in late 1940 showing a horse disguised as a cardboard tank has for many summed up the reality of the Nazi war machine, but there were genuine innovators within the German military, men like Guderian showed a clear understanding of how mechanized forces could be used, and for a time he was hailed as the German O'conner. He is a particularly popular figure in alternate history literature, and his writings perhaps point to what he could have achieved with the right resources.