Suchergebnisse

The primary mission assigned to the British Army from the 1950s until the end of the Cold War was deterring Soviet aggression in Europe by demonstrating the will and capability to fight with nuclear weapons to defend NATO territory. This is the first comprehensive account of how the British Army imagined nuclear war, and how it planned to fight it.

This article argues that the post-war military thought of Field Marshal Montgomery was much more progressive than is suggested by his biographers or by the literature on British military thought after 1945. A closer inspection of Montgomery's official, public, and private writings reveals that the Field Marshal was quick to acknowledge the rapidly changing character of land warfare. It is maintained that important considerations pertaining to the size and composition of land forces, tactical doctrine, command and control, and battlefield technique were reconceptualized by Montgomery against the new background of nuclear land combat.