Oh What a Futile War

Professor Gary Sheffield took up the Chair of War Studies at the University of Birmingham in October 2006. He has published widely on military history. A leading member of the ‘revisionist’ school of historians of the First World War, his latest book is Douglas Haig: War Diaries and Letters 1914-18, co-edited with John Bourne (2005). Other books include the best-selling Forgotten Victory: The First World War - Myths and Realities (2001) and The Somme (2003). In 2003 he shared the Templer Prize for Military History for an article on the Australians on the Somme. He frequently broadcasts on television and radio, and writes for a variety of newspapers and magazines.

Gary Sheffield’s lecture to Mill Hill is entitled “Oh What a Futile War?” In this controversial talk he reappraised the role of the British General Staff, Douglas Haig in particular, in the winning of The Great War.