Talk:Strange Defeat

Bloch's conclusions?
The article in its preceding revision (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Strange_Defeat&oldid=344352166) stated that: 'Bloch's conclusion is harsh and forthright: "Whatever the deep-seated cause of the disaster may have been, the immediate occasion was the utter incompetence of the High Command."' That looks incorrect or at least incomplete. The sentence is not presented as a conclusion, but rather is part of the setup for chapter 2. In full it reads (p. 20, in French): 'Au retour de la campagne, il n’était guère, dans mon entourage, d’officier qui en doutât ; quoi que l’on pense des causes profondes du désastre, la cause directe — qui demandera elle-même à être expliquée — fut l’incapacité du commandement'. That is, Bloch is reporting the feeling of the "officers upon returning from the defeat". In a later section of the chapter, he returns to this point (p. 68) and this time added a footnote dated July 1942, about failures in lower levels of the command ("les cadres", i.e. the non-HQ officers). Chapter III broadens the scope of the criticism still further. I have revised the text of the article accordingly.Truth or consequences-2 (talk) 18:49, 17 March 2011 (UTC)