Books, Arts & Manners: Smelling the Ghosts

Rommel and the Rebel, by Lawrence Wells (Doubleday, 415 pp., $17.95)

What, early in World War II, were people to make of the sinister chivalry, the mysterious reputation, and the oddly compelling threat posed by Erwin Rommel, “the Desert Fox”? After all, it’s not every day that Winston Churchill would say to the House of Commons, “We have a very daring and skillful opponent against us and, may I say across the havoc of war, a great general.” Perhaps the prime minister shouldn’t have been so gallant as to speak the truth publicly; indeed, General Auchinleck once instructed his commanders and chiefs of staff to quit using Rommel’s name: “There exists a danger that our friend Rommel is becoming a kind of magician or bogeyman to our troops, who are talking too much about him. . . . Even if he were a superman, it would still be highly undesirable that our men should credit him with supernatural powers.” How much further could glory extend than so to dominate the imagination of the enemy, like Hannibal, like Napoleon? Rommel’s honor survived the war intact, and the Field Marshal was soon to be the subject of an admiring biography by Desmond Young and the popular movie derived from it.

JT

About the Author

J. O. Tate

Featured Tags

Rommel and the Rebel, by Lawrence Wells (Doubleday, 415 pp., $17.95)

What, early in World War II, were people to make of the sinister chivalry, the mysterious reputation, and the oddly compelling threat posed by Erwin Rommel, “the Desert Fox”? After all, it’s not every day that Winston Churchill would say to the House of Commons, “We have a very daring and skillful opponent against us and, may I say across the havoc of war, a great general.” Perhaps the prime minister shouldn’t have been so gallant as to speak the truth publicly; indeed, General Auchinleck once instructed his commanders and chiefs of staff to quit using Rommel’s name: “There exists a danger that our friend Rommel is becoming a kind of magician or bogeyman to our troops, who are talking too much about him. . . . Even if he were a superman, it would still be highly undesirable that our men should credit him with supernatural powers.” How much further could glory extend than so to dominate the imagination of the enemy, like Hannibal, like Napoleon? Rommel’s honor survived the war intact, and the Field Marshal was soon to be the subject of an admiring biography by Desmond Young and the popular movie derived from it.