'Outstanding . . . thought-provoking, readable and informative' Soldier

One hundred years on...

On 18 July 1917, a heavy artillery barrage was unleashed by the Allied forces against an entrenched German army outside the town of Ypres. it was to be the opening salvo of one of the most ferociously fought and debilitating encounters of the First World War.

Few battles would encapsulate the utter futility of the war better that what became known as the Battle of Passchendaele. By the time the British and Canadian forces finally captured Passchendaele village on 6 November, the Allies had suffered over 271,000 casualties and the German army over 217,000.

Passchendaele: Requiem for Doomed Youth shows how ordinary men on both sides endured this constant state of siege, with a very real awareness that they were being gradually, deliberately felled. Here, Paul Ham tells the story of an army caught in the grip of an extraordinary power struggle – both global and national. As Prime Minister Lloyd George and Commander Haig’s relationship deteriorated beyond repair, so a terrible battle of attrition was needlessly and painfully prolonged.

Ham lays down a powerful challenge to the ways in which we have previously seen this monumental battle. Through an examination of the culpability of governments and military commanders in a catastrophe that destroyed the best part of a generation, Paul Ham argues that Passchendaele, far from being a breakthrough moment, was the battle that nearly lost the Allies the war.

‘Paul Ham brings new tools to the job, unearthing fresh evidence of a deeply disturbing sort. He has a magpie eye for the telling detail.’ Ben Macintyre, The Times

Excellent * Spectator *
Outstanding . . . thought-provoking, readable and informative * Soldier *
In this centenary study, Australian military historian Paul Ham gives the strategic and political background to the battle. Which he sees as the defining tragedy in the greater disaster of the First World War * BBC History Magazine *

Paul Ham is the author of twelve books, including The Soul: A History of the Human Mind, Hiroshima Nagasaki, Passchendaele: The Bloody Battle that Nearly Lost the Allies the War, 1914: The Year the World Ended, Sandakan: The Untold Story of the Sandakan Death Marches, Vietnam: The Australian War and Kokoda.
Hiroshima Nagasaki is being made into a six-part radio drama by Goldhawk and Thoroughbred Studios, due out in 2026.
All Paul's books have won or been shortlisted for major literary prizes in Australia. Vietnam and Kokoda were made into ABC documentaries, which he co-wrote and presented.
A former Sunday Times correspondent, with a Master’s degree from the London School of
Economics, Paul now lives in Paris and devotes his time to writing history and (when possible) teaching a course in Narrative History at Sciences Po, France’s preeminent tertiary school for the humanities.