Some professors are idiot savants

[EmperorBatman999]

Its remarkable how many historians are so ignorant on military matters (and TBF how many military historians are out of touch with the current positions in general history).

I had a reasonably capable historian (who specialised in North American history) state in a second year university course lecture (so we were halfway to a degree) "Stonewall Jackson defeated the British at New Orleans in 1815". My hand went up and he winced poor bloke. To his credit he thanked me for the correction and made a note (and didn't fail me for being a smart****).

I recall one biographer of Talleyrand dismissing Napoleon's military talent as some sort of chicanery (not sure how you "cheat" a victory at Austerlitz but whatever) and on the flip side a positively hagiographic biography of Napoleon suggesting Talleyrand's sole role was adding mean comments to international correspondence.

Duff Cooper OTOH wrote an interesting biography of Talleyrand: he was a well credentialed diplomat himself and clearly admired Talleyrand (or much about him) but he seemed to produce a fairly balanced view of the period. He seemed to have a sensible grasp of most areas (at least to a rank amateur like myself) and as a specialist diplomat his observations about his subject's professional performance were enormously engaging. It seems (in Coopers opinion) that Talleyrand was as silver-tongued and gifted an ambassador/negotiator/diplomat as ever pulled on a silk stocking, and his performance at Vienna over the two negotiating periods before and after the 100 days was as brilliant as has been recorded. I guess he did not attempt a serious critique of military, economic of social history, but his framing commentary suggested he was sufficiently informed as to not have his view warped by over-specialisation.

From my experience as a graduate student in a history department at an American university, yes, military history is almost a swear word. Most non-military schools would prefer to think that military history has no relevance compared to cultural, social, or political histories. Normally these civilian historians accuse their military-focused counterparts for lacking intellectual nuance and being self-serving, as civilian historians don't see any application for military history outside of training future soldiers and officers. Of course, many civilian-focused historians hope that there will be more war at all, which would entirely render the study of military history functionally redundant.

I imagine the rift between pro-Napoleon and pro-Talleyrand authors has to do with the rift that Talleyrand made for himself between him and Napoleon, especially as he did more or less throw the ousted Emperor to the wolves once the Coalition's armies had crossed the Rhine into France.

[Dr. Croccer]

From my experience as a graduate student in a history department at an American university, yes, military history is almost a swear word. Most non-military schools would prefer to think that military history has no relevance compared to cultural, social, or political histories. Normally these civilian historians accuse their military-focused counterparts for lacking intellectual nuance and being self-serving, as civilian historians don't see any application for military history outside of training future soldiers and officers. Of course, many civilian-focused historians hope that there will be more war at all, which would entirely render the study of military history functionally redundant.

That's very interesting to hear as a European. Military history is still the runt of the litter over here, but it doesn't quite carry the same stigma it seems to do in the US by your description of it. From my own experience, it's considered a valid area to research in as long as it isn't done purely for it's own sake. I wonder in how far if it's the result of the different natures of the respective source material shaping the scholarly discourse, due to US military history being such a relatively recent but also a controlled and vital part of American national myth-making, meaning that it's an easy target for historical criticism; whereas European military history has had such a comparatively long and undeniably significant impact on political and cultural developments, that even the disinterested can't afford it to disregard its significance.

[athanaric]

Normally these civilian historians accuse their military-focused counterparts for lacking intellectual nuance and being self-serving, as civilian historians don't see any application for military history outside of training future soldiers and officers. Of course, many civilian-focused historians hope that there will be more war at all, which would entirely render the study of military history functionally redundant.

Which is funny considering that there are enough non-military historians who are lacking intellectual nuance and exhibit wildly unprofessional behaviour.

To be sure, there is a rather large subset among military history enthusiasts (usually laymen) that is certainly approaching the topic in questionable and scientifically unproductive ways, i.e. all the fanboys you see on internet forums sperging about their favourite topic (usually Alexander the Great or WW2, or something in between), but then again, the same applies to the non-military field as well, if you look at all the nationalistic and other tribal/ideologically driven myths that are popular these das.

[Cyclops]

The little I've seen of Australian military history is it not a very academic discipline, forgettable and vague when addressing anything other than strictly military matters. I've seen even less of US and British unit histories which are better but when they lift their eyes they also stumble into being stuffy or ignorant or even stupidly hagiographic.

I recently read Achtung Panzer by Heinz Guderian. Written in 1937 as a proselytic work for the cause of tank warfare in the Wehrmacht it has the occasional blue, but manages to be entirely rational and the author does not embarrass himself by his historical ignorance. His technical predictions are exact: as he suggests the French failure to concentrate armour is a tactical blunder with strategic implications, and the British armour detached from its infantry by intra-service rivalry is dangerous but has particular vulnerabilities (which in turn are revealed in the Western Desert). He even nominates the lack of natural oil resources as Germany's chief strategic vulnerability (and makes his one nod to slavish Fuhrer worship, by noting that Hitler has addressed the issue by promising a massive increase in synthetic oil production, which in hindsight we know was never delivered).

Aside from this Guderian is a clear eyed historian. He describes Germany's defeat in 1918 in very rational and technical terms: no Jew is blamed (despite his employer's frantic insistence), rather industrial production, the role of the Royal Navy and the tremendous courage of all participants is acknowledged. He is emotional, somewhat bitter about the huge resources allocated to cavalry when the tank was utterly neglected but his strategic vision is only flawed when he lacks access to relevant sources (and on one occasion he relies on Churchill's memoirs LOL rookie mistake).

This is consistent with the Prussian and Second Reich tradition of an apolitical specialist military with a strong tradition of self critical and comprehensive analytic thought. I think the shock of Jena and Auerstadt kicked off a reform that made the Prussian an honest thinker for many decades.

Edit: Just a footnote, I googled Capitoline Wolf whilst on a deep internet dive (it started with 3D printing machines) and found several articles stating the wolf is not an archaic Etruscan masterpiece (as i was taught) but some medieval PoS. Coping hard right now.

me in the bowtie

This is part of the problem for historians, various pieces of evidence can be critiqued across so many disciplines that an accepted view can be overturned in one and the news does not filter through to other disciplines relying on the overturned view for decades. Apparently a medieval art historian spotted the Capitoline Wolf was made using medieval tech not archaic in the 1990's but this valid point was flatly ignored. Then the science boys rolled out the C14 in the 2000's and the ancient fellas were "hmm, interesting..." and ignored it again and its only now a second round of testing has shown that the point seems to be gaining traction.

I'm rationalising hard, my fall-back scenario is there was an Etruscan Capitoline Wolf tha looked a lot like our one (and there's a few mentions in classical lit of a wolf statue in the Capitol or thereabouts), and a copy was made in the medieval period after the original decayed/was misused by some perverted pope.

Its easy to see how historians get hyper focussed on their subject and miss/ignore relevant outside perspectives as OP demonstrates.