Hackett, John Winthrop
Entry updated 12 September 2022. Tagged: Author.
(1910-1997) Australian soldier, academic and author, whose military career in the British Army extended from 1931 to 1968, when he retired as commander in chief, British Army of the Rhine, and who then became principal of King's College, London. His Future War texts, The Third World War: August 1985: A Future History (1978) and The Third World War: The Untold Story (coll 1982), both written with the help of a think-tank of soldiers, journalists and diplomats, together describe the course of a (largely) conventional World War Three fought between (mostly) NATO and the Warsaw Pact in a mock historical style. The books represent an attempt to alert the public to the complex dangers posed by war against the Soviet bloc, and remain interesting largely because of the authenticity and detail of their descriptions of what such a conflict might actually have been like. [NT/JC]
General Sir John Winthrop Hackett
born Perth, Western Australia: 5 November 1910
died Coberley Hill, Gloucestershire: 9 September 1997
works
- The Third World War: August 1985: A Future History (London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1978) [hb/]
- The Third World War: The Untold Story (London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1982) [hb/]
links
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