Montgomery never fought a fair fight. If the odds were fair, he refused to engage. His genius was in the patience to wait until the math was overwhelmingly in his favor.
Most generals obsessed over the "Tooth"—the tanks, the guns, the infantry. Monty obsessed over the "Tail"—the trucks, the fuel, the mechanic shops. He knew that a tank without fuel is just a pillbox, and a tank without a mechanic is just a statue.
Before El Alamein, he spent weeks reorganizing the supply lines. He created a massive logistical engine that could sustain a 12-day offensive without stopping. Rommel, by contrast, was constantly running out of gas.
// THE MONTY DOCTRINE
"You must not only beat the enemy; you must beat his logistics. You must strangle his supply while flooding your own."
Montgomery didn't just hide his real tanks; he built a fake army. Under "Operation Bertram," he created a massive dummy pipeline to the south to fool Rommel into thinking the attack would come later and from a different direction.
Monty treated battle like a stage play. Everyone had a script. He hated improvisation. He believed that if you drilled the plan hard enough, even terrified conscripts could perform like professionals.
This "Set-Piece" style was mocked by Americans like Patton, who preferred fluid movement. But for the British army—weary, under-equipped, and scarred by defeat—Monty's rigid scripts provided certainty in chaos.