Cambrai: dawn of an era now ending?

In this presentation, which was delivered 'live' to an online audience, Brigadier Alexander Turner discusses - using the Battle of Cambrai as a backdrop - how modern ‘combined arms manoeuvre’ came into being in autumn 1917.

At a time when some defence and security commentators are questioning the value of tanks on a modern battlefield, Alexander returns to the era of their birth in search of the fundamental reasoning behind this extraordinary and predominant innovation. The tank was created to address deeply practical problems that mud and metal still impose. For all the promise of subsequent military innovations, the chimera of invulnerability is as elusive as ever.

The presentation highlights the challenges presented at the inception of the tank, and signposts the footprints from this ground-breaking Great War period that are still visible on the battlefields and training grounds of today.