Of all the grim, gallant and inglorious battles of the Western Front, Passchendaele is the name evocative of the "mud and bl ood" that pervaded World War I. The total gain - a few thousand yards of indefensible slough - cost about a million Allied lives. In this account of the Flanders campaign, Leon Wolff describes the whole nightmare business: Haig's initial plan; his determination to carry it out despite constant opposition from the Cabinet and the muddle of doubts and disagreement among the military staff; the early stages of the "great offensive"; and the scene of battle itself - the Flanders fields which "will forever haunt Western civilization".