alternatehistory.com

Monty is controversial in many ways.

He was probably the right person at the right time for North Africa. His planning of Overlord was probably also superb.

However:

1) Should he even have been named as CIGS? Why did they do it, considering his "way with words"?

2) What did he actually achieve?

3) Brooke was not a bad judge of people. Why did he push Monty into this?

From Wiki:

After the war Montgomery became the C-in-C of the British Army of the Rhine (BAOR), the name given to the British Occupation Forces and the British member of the Allied Control Council.[74] He was created 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein in 1946.[75] He was Chief of the Imperial General Staff from 1946 until 1948, succeeding Alanbrooke, but was largely a failure as it required strategic and political skills he did not possess. He was barely on speaking terms with his fellow chiefs, sending his VCIGS to attend their meetings[74] and he clashed particularly with Arthur Tedder, who as Deputy Supreme Commander had intrigued for Montgomery's dismissal during the Battle of Normandy, and who was by now Chief of the Air Staff. When Montgomery's term of office expired, Prime Minister Clement Attlee appointed General (later Field-Marshal) William Slim as his successor; when Montgomery protested that he had told his protégé John Crocker, a former corps commander from the 1944-5 campaign, that the job was to be his, Attlee is said to have given the memorable retort "Untell him".[76]


Ivan
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