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I think the best I've heard is this, reported in an article in OTF,Vol 20 No.2, reputedly a serious historical journal. The article is an interview with a Jeffrey Shaara, known for his 'historical fiction' novels. Talking of the reseach he had done for his latest novel, he was asked. 'What was the most surprising thing that you found out. What was the one thing that really grabbed you.
Shaara: 'Throughout it all was the significance of the Americans. I went into this when I was touring round. I mean, you're in France for the most part, and the French of course spent three years fighting the war before we got there, losing millions of men, and yet you don't get a sense there of what the Americans accomplished for them until you get away from it and step back. Once I really got into the research I was shocked to learn how important Black Jack Pershing was to the history of the First World War. Beyond being the American Commander, this man was responsible for the Allies winning the war, and that I will debate with any historian. That really surprised me when I began to realise it.' After more, which I can't be bothered to type out, in which he accuses Gilbert and Keegan of only mentioning the Americans at the end of their books, he goes on. ' Pershing is described as obstinate, stubborn, and uncooperative - and that is exactly right!. He was, and it was a good thing. Had he not been the Allies would probably have lost the war, That was an amazing surprise to me. What Pershing brought to the war, besides the energy and the influx of men and material, was a whole different spirit. The idea that the American soldier isn't trained to sit in a trench and defend himself. He's trained to move on a battlefield and trained to aim and fire a rifle, which is something the British and French were not trained to do.' Then, a little later, 'Had Pershing not arrived when he did and perform, along with the soldiers under his command, as he did, I think how the whole history of the world would be different.'
What amazing ignorance, and how insulting to the British, French and Belgian troops who had fought and died in over four years of war. Makes me wonder at the depth and quality of his research. He really should read a new book which has just come out: 1918. by Peter Hart. This covers, mainly in first hand accounts held at the IWM, the German offensives of the spring and early summer of 1918 and then to the end of the war. Some of the accounts of the attitude of the newly arrived Americans towards the people who had been fighting since 1914, need to be read by Mr Shaara. God knows what his novels are like.
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