Talk:B. H. Liddell Hart

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He arrived at his conclusions after studying the great strategists of history (especially Sun Tzu, Napoleon, and Belisarius) and their victories.

Did Sun Tzu *have* any victories? --Andersonblog 00:46, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Legendarily yes; but of course if you accept more modern theories that Sun Tzu is a fiction under which a school of strategists compiled their theories... yes and no (being a fiction, he could not have done anything; on the other hand, some of those strategists must have had some victories, so does that count?). More grammatically, the crucial bit here is the use of "and"; it's not being used in the logic sense but rather more as an "or": Hart studied the strategists or their victoriesn (and possibly both). --maru (talk) contribs 03:57, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

didnt he say the famous line the 2 hardest things in the world are get a new idea into a military mind and an old idea outBouse23 14:50, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

"Paradoxically, Liddell Hart saw theories similar to or even developed from his own adopted by Germany and used against the United Kingdom and its allies during World War II with the practice of Blitzkrieg."

In the english translation of the book "Achtung, Panzer!" [Gen. Guderian] is a part, where Guderian said he was inspirated from theories of Hart. But in the german original you can't find this part. The translator was by the way Liddell Hart!

This was found out by the Irish military historian Dr. Dermot Bradley.

Thus legends are made. Pantau, germany

I do not think John Mearsheimer opinion is really needed simply due to the fact that it is nothing more then an opinion. If other wikipedia articles were fulled with all the opinions people had of the such persons it would be chaos and get in the way of the facts.

What does this sentence about Mearsheimer above refer to? There is no thread to connect it to. I find it strange that this article does not give any credit to Mearsheimer for being the first to expose Liddel-Hart as a fraud. Mearsheimer's book, which appeared in 1988, is referenced but not quoted; instead, other's works are quoted although written ten years later, and add nothing new to Mearsheimer's research. It was Mearsheimer's book that first put together the puzzle of Liddel Hart's deceit with the German generals, and places it firmly in the context of LH's faltering career following his disastrously influential predictions about the nature of WWII in Europe, and his subsequent attempt to bury these facts and rebuild his shattered reputation by manipulating the historical record. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.9.202.53 (talk) 14:56, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

There is controversy surrounding Basil Liddell Hart and this is not addressed in this article making appear as a non-NPOV article. He is accused of plagerism, Paris, or the Future of War by Hart, is almost word for word, idea for idea, Fuller's The Reformation of War. see Gat A History of Military Thought p665 see also K. Macksey, Guderian: Panzer General, 40-1; The Tank Pioneers, 118,216 as well as Mearsheimer, LH, 160-7,184-201 subotai 10-26-2006

Just how much Liddell Hart influenced armored warfare is debatable to say the least. 72.24.129.24 21:41, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

I concur that the section "myths and controversy" (even the title) is non-NPOV. Unnamed "Historians" are repeatedly referred to but only one, Shimon Naveh, is actually cited. It uses very strong language ("distorted", "falsified", "deceit", "fabricated", etc) and the discussion about "planting" of passages in Guderian's memoirs is susceptible to quite different interpretations; for example, Hart may have felt that Guderian had not given him proper credit and was requesting that the record be corrected. The fact that Guderian agreed to the revision suggests that he didn't object to giving credit to Hart. It's also hardly suprising that a version for a British audience might give greater credit to british thinkers than a version for a german audience. James Haughton (talk) 03:16, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Liddell Hart and Eden

The anecdote about Hart, Eden, the inkstand and the wastepaper basket makes a lovely story, but it should really be deleted. According to Lord Owen’s article on “The effect of Prime Minister Anthony Eden's illness on his decision-making during the Suez crisis” (QJM: An International Journal of Medicine, Volume 98 (2005), No. 6, pp. 387-402 – available at http://qjmed.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/98/6/387#BIB30), the “story is pure fiction, as Liddell Hart’s wife and son confirm, since the men never actually met during the Suez Crisis.” (Tyler's Boy (talk) 11:14, 8 December 2009 (UTC))

Suggested move of article to "B. H. Liddell Hart"

This is, I believe, the name Liddell Hart is most commonly known by, and the one he used on all his books. Redirects can be left in place from the current title, and any double redirects corrected. Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:43, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

I agree, and thanks for improving the article. It still seems quite biased against the the subject, I would correct it myself only I dont have any of the bios, I remember from some of my grandads army friends that Captain Hart seemned to have a much better rep than this article makes out. FeydHuxtable (talk) 14:59, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

His reputation has waned with time, I think. --Gwern (contribs) 16:04 4 March 2010 (GMT)

I'm reading Strategy, and I have to say that I'm a bit put off by Liddell Hart's analysis of the American Civil War, where he portrays Grant as a stodgy hidebound proponent of old-school "direct approaches", while Sherman is lauded as a shining example of the efficacy of the indirect approach, completely ignoring that Grant and Sherman together came up with the overall strategy, and that Sherman's taking of Atlanta and his March to the Sea would have been totally impossible if Grant didn't have Meade fully engaging Lee, preventing him from sending any re-inforcements south.

I don't know if Liddel Hart was blinded by conventional British thinking about Grant, or if it's from a lack of scholarship, or what, but his faulty analysis in that particular circumstance, about which I know a small amount, makes me start to suspect his analysis of other situations that I know much less about. That's unfortunate, because I thought he was making sense, as far as i could tell. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:33, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

OK, since no one has jumped in to object, I'm going to start to make the move to "B. H. Liddell Hart", since it can always be moved back if necessary. Beyond My Ken (talk) 18:14, 7 March 2010 (UTC)

The change has been made, I've fixed all the double re-directs. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:21, 8 March 2010 (UTC)