War of contrition

If anything good resulted from the slaughter on the western front in the First World War ( Was It Worth It?, November), it was that thousands of lives were spared in the Second World War. A group of young professional British Army officers, all in the early stages of their careers, served in the trenches in 1914–18. Captain (later Field Marshal) Bernard Montgomery was one of them.

The enormous casualties that arose through massive, unproductive onslaughts – the 60,000 Allied soldiers killed or wounded on the first day of the Somme offensive in July 1916 being an outstanding example – made them determined to keep the loss of life as low as possible insofar as they had any power in any subsequent war. Those who served under such leaders in the Second World War have good cause to remember it, including this writer. Bryan Samain, Suffolk