Haig tells us that a war cannot be won unless some men sacrifice their lives; this is true in a sense however putting your army down before the war is not the right way of doing things. Haig does show a little inconsideration for those fighting on the frontline, he should really be trying to boost their morale not dent it.
(B) Looking at both sources B, and C we can say that source C is a more reliable source. Private George Coppard was a man who actually fought alongside men on the frontline. He describes his experiences on the frontline as being quite horrific; he says that the barbed wire was so thick that you could not see daylight through it. He says, “How did the planners imagine that Tommies would get through the wire. “Who told them that artillery fire would pound such wire to pieces”. “ Any Tommy could have told them that shell fire lifts wire up and drops it down, often in a worse tangle than before.” This shows us the reality of the war; this source is coming from a soldier that knew what real war was like.
However source B comes from Haig’s dairy written the day before the battle and the first day of the battle. Haig seems to believe that everything is going perfectly fine, yet Haig is not exactly going to be informed from his sergeant-majors that men are being killed buy the thousands, and barbed wire has not been cleared. In Haig’s diary he says that the barbed wire has never been so well cut, and the Germans are surrendering freely. However the private does not mention anything about a success or failure, he does describe however “the hundreds of dead strung up on the barbed wire.” That day 60,000 men died, and at the end of day one, Haig manages to somehow conclude that this is a success.
Haig had obviously been informed wrongly by his sergeants, however he should have been there himself. If Haig would have seen the frontline for himself then maybe this source would have been different, however Haig failed to see the reality of the frontline. Some people might argue that Source B is coming from Haig who would be able to see the overall execution of the war. However private George Coppard can only comment on a section of the battle. We can almost say for sure though that Haig did not write this just to cover up the gruesome realties of the battle, because people write the truth in diaries it is a personal document, which is not viewed by the public so Haig needed not lie. As I said before though Haig would not have been informed that all his men were dying, so we can say that source C is a more reliable source.
