The book included Rommel's writings of the war, edited by the British journalist and historian
B. H. Liddell Hart, the former Wehrmacht officer
Fritz Bayerlein, who served on Rommel's staff in North Africa, and Rommel's widow and son. The volume contained an introduction and commentary by Liddell Hart. Liddell Hart had a personal interest in the work: by having coaxed Rommel's widow to include material favourable to himself, he could present Rommel as his "pupil" when it came to mobile armoured warfare. Thus, Liddell Hart's "theory of
indirect approach" became a precursor to the German
blitzkrieg ("lightning war"). The controversy was described by the political scientist
John Mearsheimer in his work
The Weight of History, who concluded that, by "putting words in the mouths of German Generals and manipulating history", Liddell Hart was in a position to show that he had been at the root of the dramatic German successes in 1940. ==Reception==