The Battle of the Bulge

I have just finished Anthony Beevor's fascinating account of Germany's last-gasp offensive in the Ardennes in December 1944 - January 1945, and the book inspires several thoughts:

• First and foremost, I was struck by the extraordinary valour and courage shown by the American forces. They were up against a German army that may well have been exhausted after their experiences in the Eastern Front but at the same time were battle-hardened, ruthless and, if I may use the word, extremely "professional". On the Western Front at any rate, this was undoubtedly America's finest hour.
• At senior command level, I came away with an increased admiration for Eisenhower who, whatever his mistakes, somehow managed to control such over-powering prima donnas as Patton, Bradley and, worst of all, Montgomery. He also had to contend with a shamefully chauvinistic British press intent on exaggerating the role of British forces in a campaign which hardly concerned them at all.
• Another unsung "hero" was Freddie de Guingand, Montgomery's chief of staff, who managed to keep lines of communication open between his notoriously prickly superior and the Americans. The effort must have been enormous and his health suffered as a result.
• We tend to forget, too, the appalling suffering of the Belgian civilians caught up in the middle of the carnage. Here again, there is a similarity with the "killing fields" of eastern Europe, though to their eternal credit the Americans in Belgium showed themselves to be far more humane than the Germans.
• Mention of the Eastern Front reminds me of my time as a hospital porter in the early 1960s. My workmates included Leo, a Polish plumber, and a Ukrainian called Bruno. Even someone as self-absorbed as me could not help noticing their deep and abiding hatred of each other. How could it be otherwise? And how easy it is to revive this sort of hatred many years, sometimes many centuries, after the events that caused them.

• Perceived military prowess or weakness remains as central as ever to our sense of national pride and identity, and we are all adept at creating stories that place us in the best possible light.