MEDITERRANEAN FRONT

The first front line reporting job, to my knowledge, on this battleground, but covering only the year from June 1940 to midsummer 1941, in the Middle East, Greece, Crete, Syria. He begins with a description of Wavell's army (Wavell is to Moorehead one of the great men of his times), -- a few men, virtually no material, bluffing their way through repeated successful offensives. The Libyan campaign, from Bardia to Tobruk and Dernia and Benghazi, as they come up against an army with no fight in them, frightened, cowardly Italians. Then the transfer of Wavell to Greece, before he had had a chance to consolidate his successes, again with insufficient numbers against an underestimated German force. Finally, the loss of Greece, of Crete, of part of the Libyan gains, as the Germans reverse Wavell's tactics and recapture Benghazi. Intelligent, objective, well-paced reading. But the timing is wrong. The book is too late -- or too early. The North African chapter has gone through too many phases since that date to make concentration on that phase of the struggle of wide general interest.