Let me try, then, before I wind up these letters of mine, to bring out very shortly both some of the fresh points of view and the new detail which make the Despatch so interesting.

It will be seen, I think, that the general account given in my preceding letters of British conclusions on the war, when tested by the Despatch, may still hold its own.
In the first place, the Field Marshal dwells in words of which the subdued bitterness is unmistakable, on Great Britain's unpreparedness for the war.

"We were deficient in both trained men and military material, and, what is more important, had no machinery ready by which either men or material could be produced in anything like the necessary quantities." It took us, therefore, "two and a half years to reach the high-water mark of our infantry strength," and by that time we had lost thousands of lives, which, had we been better prepared, need never have been lost.
And, moreover, our unpreparedness, and the fact that we were not able to take a full share in the war till the summer of 1916, terribly wasted the man-power of France.

"The excessive burden," says Marshal Haig, "thrown upon the gallant Army of France during that period caused them losses the effect of which has been felt all through the war and directly influenced its length." Meanwhile, what might have been "the effect of British intervention on a larger scale, in the earlier stages of the war, is shown by what was actually achieved by our original Expeditionary Force." Who was responsible for this unpreparedness?
Sir Douglas Haig does not raise the question.

But those of us who remember the political history of the years from 1906 to 1914 can hardly be in doubt as to the answer.