World War 2
The Warlords
The broad outlines of the war were determined by four men, Hitler, Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill. The two dictators, Hitler and Stalin, displayed some striking similarities, adopting personal regimes which turned night into day - to the exhaustion of their staffs - and immersing themselves in military operations, frequently with disastrous results.
As the war progressed Stalin reined in these tendencies and submitted to the advice of his military professionals of the highest calibre, the battle-winner Zhukov and the staff officers Antonov and Vasilevsky. Nevertheless, he remained in total control from first to last, ruling his commanders by fear, as he did the Soviet Union.
Hitler assumed personal control of German operations in December 1941, but it was a role for which he was not well suited. The easy victories of 1939 and 1940 had bred in him a contempt for his generals, the majority of whom had urged caution, and a corresponding reluctance to heed their practical advice. Sooner or later, those who stood up to Hitler, were dismissed or disposed of. From 1943 Hitler fought the war clinging to his map of europe, desperatly holding on to a statagy of trying to hold every inch of ground, and leaving his best commanders with little or no room for manoeuvre.
Churchill also displayed a tendency to meddle in operational matters, but most of his interventions were smoothly delivered by Field Marshal Brooke, the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, whose demanding task it was to translate his boss' strategic ambitions into hard reality, given Britain's stretched resources. The bond Churchill forged witjh President Roosevelt was crucial in co-ordinating Anglo-US strategy. In contrast to Churchill, however, Roosevelt remained aloof from the running of the war, retaining his peacetime routine after Pearl Harbor and leaving much in hands of his very able Chief of Staff, General Marshall.