FREE ESSAY ON BATTLE FOR HISTORY BY JOHN KEEGAN

BATTLE FOR HISTORY BY JOHN KEEGAN

In the book The Battle for History, John Keegan, talks of the many different views on
World War II. He takes into account other historical works such as Robert M. Kennedy's
The German Campaign in Poland, Christopher Duffy's Red Storm on the Reich, The Struggle
for Europe by Chester Wilmot and many others. He has already analyzed these other works.
He has summarized the authors' major points and used them to support his own theory,
although Keegan's theory about the written history of the war is quite unclear. The only
theory that I could derive, is that "[it] has not yet been written." (30)
What does he mean by this? The Works Cited in the back of the book number over one
hundred fifty. Numerous references are made to the works of other authors. Keegan does
not seem to tell anything from his perspective, but state what he has read. All good and
well considering this is history, but are the past events so clearly set in stone? Keegan
seems to bring up questions throughout the book such as: did Roosevelt know of the attack
on Pearl Harbor before it happened? "There have also been explorations of the allegation
that Roosevelt had foreknowledge but chose not to act on it, as a means of bringing the
United States into the Second World War on the anti-Axis side." (17) Keegan does not do
much to answer these questions, simply brings them into the picture. The book gives no
feel of ending or resolution to most of the questions he brings about. Maybe this was his
purpose.
Topics in the book up from one place to another. In one paragraph Keegan may be
discussing the use of the Enigma, a commercial cipher machine; in the next Keegan might
begin discussing the use of U-boats. Although there is some logical flow through the
book, for the most part the subjects are jumpy, causing the work to be choppy and
cluttered babbling. It seems like the author is trying to squeeze as much as he can into
as few pages as possible.
Keegan does, however, give a good overview of the major events and inside action that
went on during this significant period in world history. He speaks of rebellions,
strategic bombing, spies and other elements that played a part in the downfall of the
Third Reich. His overview is rather brief, not focusing on specific topics or elements
but trying to cover all of them as quickly as possible. This causes the book to lose...
something. It leaves a rather dull commentary on the events of the time period.
It seems as though Keegan, who worked as a military history lecturer at the Royal
Military Academy, took his lecture notes, typing them up and called it a book. Maybe this
is exactly what he did. I cannot say that I agree or disagree with the ideas Keegan
presents in the book. They all seem to be quite factual. I do not agree on the way Keegan
presented the information and ideas. I feel he should have focused more on specific
aspects of the war, elaborating on these aspects or he should have made the book longer.
The book is filled with dry facts and little support behind them except to say, this
author said this. It is like he wrote a column for a newspaper except that the column is
long enough to be the entire Sunday paper. 
Bibliography
Keegan, John. The Battle for History. New York, NY 1995. Vintage Books, a division of
Random House.