Patton At Bay: The Lorraine Campaign, 1944
A detailed analysis of one of the few WWII campaigns led by General George S. Patton that could be called a failure.  Rickard, a Ph.D. candidate in military history at the University of New Brunswick, looks at the period from September through December, 1944, when Patton, fresh from his successes in Normandy, attempted to race through the French province of Lorraine and cross the Rhine river into the German homeland. Contested by various forces throughout history in endless wars, Lorraine was held in 1942 by the Nazis; Patton was delayed in getting there by inclement weather, stronger-than-anticipated German resistance, and a countryside not well suited to the large, offensive tank campaigns Patton favored. Rickards writing is ponderous and academic, but he makes many relevant points. Revered for his bold and decisive strategic armored troop maneuvers, in which he swiftly swept through large amounts of enemy territory with a flair for capturing headlines and enemy troops, Patton in this case didnt adapt his usually successful style to a new situation. The author faults the general for failing to learn how to wage war on a static battlefield where the enemy was firmly entrenched, and for failing to fully see that his forces engagement in Lorraine was in part intended as a diversionary tactic while the Allies captured the German industrial heartland of the Ruhr. The campaign ended when Patton pulled out of Lorraine to come to the aid of the beleaguered American army at Bastogne in the famed Battle of the Bulge; the general died a year later after a car crash in occupied Germany. A strictly academic study of Pattons generalship in one significant battle. (maps)  --Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.--This text refers to theHardcoveredition.