Patton. I stand on shaky ground speaking about this American legend if I’m going to say anything negative about him. Luckily for me all of the men who served in his Third Army are now dead so I’m unlikely to get punched in the face for what I am going to say over the next few parts of this series about the man.

Carlo d’Este, in his biography of Patton, A Genius for War thought that this remark by the Emperor of the French, Napoleon Bonaparte, captured the spirit of Patton:

If the art of war consisted in not taking risks glory would be at the mercy of very mediocre talent.

Patton was certainly a general who was willing to take risks. So let’s see how Patton stacks up when looking at the war in Europe in those crucial months between the end of July 1944 and January 1945.

Tag words: Patton; Third Army; Carlo d’Este; A Genius for War; Napoleon Bonaparte; George C. Scott; World War II; Andy Rooney; General Omar N Bradley; A Soldier’s Story; Eisenhower; Adolf Hitler; Karl May; Westerns; Basil Liddell Hart; The Other Side of the Hill; Operation Cobra; Blumentritt; Pétain; Field-Marshal Rundstedt; God; Charles Codman; Compassionate; Ruth Ellen;