Taylor, A.J.P. The First World War: An Illustrated History. Penguin Books (1963). 

[Jon Singer Sargent. 'Gassed.' 1919. @ The IWM.] 


The First World War began in 1914. It officially concluded on 11 November 1918. The war brought Europe to a new awareness of the consequences of modernity: the expendability of men, the ruthlessness of technology, and humanity's terrible ability to undertake warfare. Some of this, of course, was merely a reminder of age old problems. But some genuinely new horrors appeared during the First World War. Poison gas, submarine warfare, complex trench systems, and the widespread use of the machine gun all left an indelible mark on human thought.

Many nations were involved (though hardly the whole world) and the political actions surrounding the conflict can easily overwhelm the specialist and non-specialist alike. Therefore A.J.P. Taylor, one of the great popular historians of the last century, worked with Penguin Books to create The First World War: An Illustrated History, a book that aims at popularizing knowledge about the 'war to end all wars.'

To understand the causes and motions of the First World War, Taylor must paint a complex picture. Complexity is sometimes inhumane--we cannot process all the relevant facts. In the face of complexity (regardless of its honesty) the mind simplifies reality into a handful of abstract components; the human mind then easily creates, distributes, manipulates, misinterprets, and discharges these poor components. Taylor therefore inserts photographs into his narrative, for it is harder to forget a fact when it's tied to a face. The process amplifies themes otherwise forgot. The photographs bring home the disparities between the soldier's life in the trenches and the general's life in the tent. But they also effortlessly track the development of technology, the comforts of union work, the thrill of enlistment, and the uncertain motions of mass populations. [In a written summary, I cannot do justice to the effect of mixing photographs with serious history; suffice to say, 'It works.' It is not enough to look at the photographs; to understand their content and full meaning, one must closely read the book.]

Why did the war begin? The first gunshots flew into the body of the Archduke Ferdinand, heir to Habsburg Monarchy of Austria-Hungary, and his wife. The shots symbolized a threat to the increasingly moribund Austrian-Hungarian Empire, and its prestige as a Great Power of Europe. In pursuit of imaginary conspirators in the Serb government, Austria-Hungary invaded Serbia with the backing of Germany. These countries did not intend for the invasion to start the First World War. Against the views of other historians, Taylor argues that tension in international relations was relatively low at the outbreak of European-wide war, especially compared with previous years. So again, why did it happen? Was Germany war-mongering? Were France and Russia? Can we blame capitalism, or the generals?

"Men are reluctant to believe that great events have small causes," Taylor notes. "Therefore, once the Great War started, they were convinced that it must be the outcome of profound forces. It is hard to discover these [profound forces] when we examine the details. Nowhere was there conscious determination to provoke a war. Statesmen miscalculated. They used the instruments of bluff and threat which had proved effective on previous occasions. This time things went wrong."

After Austria-Hungary's violent (and supposedly face-saving) diplomatic maneuver, it was Russia's turn to act. Russia thought of itself as the defender of the Balkans, but also worried about Central Power dominance over Constantinople; in pursuit of secure access to the Mediterranean, Russia declared war.

"Now intervened a vital factor of high strategy... The plans for mobilizing [millions of conscripts] rested on railways; and railway timetables cannot be improvised. Once started, the wagons and carriages must roll remorselessly and inevitably forward to their predestined goal."

General mobilization could, conceivably, lead to defensive build ups along the border rather than outright war. But at the time, everyone believed in the value of offense over defense. They could have learnt otherwise from the Russo-Japanese war, or the Balkan Wars, or the American Civil War. Tragically, they did not. The most important country to partake in this error was Germany, for Germany believed it could not win a war on two fronts against Russia and its ally, France. The late General Schlieffen, Chief of the German General Staff from 1892 to 1906, had generated a plan to mitigate the problem of a war on two fronts. The Germans would put nearly "all their armed weight into the west to knock out France before the slow machine of Russian mobilization could lumber into action." So once Russia mobilized to threaten Austria-Hungary, the Germans looked at their timetables and determined that they must declare war on France and knock it out of the war before Russia could complete its muster.

Taken to caricature, the Schlieffen Plan calls for arguing with one fellow, and then immediately turning and slugging his silent little brother. Perhaps the French were not quite as innocent as a little brother. Anyhow, innocent or not, France got slugged.

The First World War, then, seems to have been imposed upon statesmen by railway timetables and grand strategies drawn up by dead men. Que será, será. Germany declared war on France; Germany's invasion of France required passing through Belgium; the Belgians refused; Germany invaded Belgium; Britain declared war on Germany; Germany invaded France; Britain sent over an expeditionary force; France mobilized; Russia mobilized; Austria-Hungary (eventually) mobilized; the Ottoman Empire entered the war; Italy entered the war; others entered the war; 37 million people died. ¿Que será, será?

The generals never intended to engage in trench warfare, and the men were completely unprepared. The railroads allowed generals to move men up to the front with unprecedented swiftness, but once there the soldiers could only slog through the mud to reach their objectives. Thus, the railroads could help the generals rapidly reinforce their defensive positions, but the railroads did not help nearly as much when going on the offensive. Stalemate ensued. By stalemate, I mean the inability to knock one's opponent out--sort of like a stalemate in chess, only with poison gas, mass bloodshed, and even more massive bombardments.

"The machine gun completed the contrast between the speed with which men could arrive at the battlefield by rail, and the slowness with which they moved once they were there. Indeed they did not move at all. The opposing lines congealed, grew solid. The generals on both sides stared at these lines impotently and without understanding. They went on staring for nearly four years."

Few generals, nevertheless, saw an alternative to offensive warfare; despite its near universal futility, the generals justified their offensives in various ways. Joffre wanted to keep the British under his wing, Haig wanted to prove his loyalty to the French, Nivelle 'formed a picture' of victory, and Ludendorff felt Germany was running out of time (though the Germans had, to their limited credit, rediscovered the lost art of surprise and tactical initiative).

The politicians and civilian ministers could not counter the generals; the generals could not influence the politicians. Thus, hare brained schemes were beaten back and forth like a tired pony rather than like a tennis ball; there was no play and much cruelty.

Incessant warfare required incessant support from home. Politicians rallied the masses to uncertain causes; later in the war, the masses would rally politicians to uncertain causes. Decisive victory, a useful promise for ensnaring support, also ensnared the promisee.

The Americans, meanwhile, preached peace and idealism from the other side of the world, and yet profited tremendously from the war effort. The Germans ineptly stumbled into war with the Americans, first by yielding to the German admiralty and allowing unrestricted submarine warfare, and second with the idiotic Zimmermann telegram that suggested (weirdly) that Mexico's revolution-weakened government declare war on the United States. The Americans eventually lost 88,000 men. Their excellent timing ensured they partook in Allied victory. Wilson, before the American congress turned on him, helped end the war with the idealistic tone with which it had begun. Clemenceau, the French Prime Minster, noted that while God only needed Ten Commandments, Wilson ambitiously suggested Fourteen Points.

Wartime turbulence led to social revolution in Russia and political revolution in Germany; it facilitated the Easter 1916 uprising in Ireland; Austria-Hungary tumbled into pieces; the Ottoman Empire collapsed into Turkey; Britain and France carved up the Middle East to protect their interests in the Far East and Africa. While Britain and France seemed to gain, it must be kept in mind that political revolution could and did happen in Europe in the early twentieth century. The idea of overturning the capitalist-democratic political order was much more alive at that time then it is today, and this influenced the actions of statesmen. Taylor does not play much with counterfactual, but he strongly suggests the contingent nature of history. France and Britain could not assume survival, much less complete victory, even as late 1918. Perhaps the most significant political event was the sudden emergence of Soviet Russia; many of the allies sent soldiers into Russia to prevent the communists from winning the civil war in Russia--they failed to stop Lenin, but they did create lasting animosity and distrust between Soviet Russia and the rest of the world.

Taylor writes history with characters, not just faceless social forces. And to that effect, Taylor constructs pen-portraits of the various leaders. He sketches the sad eyes of a helpless Kitchener, the highest ranking officer to die during the conflict. He tracks, in images and words, the clever political wheeling of Lloyd George on his way to becoming Prime Minister of Britain. He crosses the channel to present Joffre, Neville, and Petain, as well as Moltke and Hindenburg. It would be helpful to have a more thorough presentation of the leaders and the political forces in Russia and Austria-Hungary. But then again, a book intended as a quick read already stretches to 295 pages.

Taylor's sympathies lie with the "Everyman," especially the Everyman that served in the trenches; he holds less regard for the Everyman that worked in the factories, and perhaps even less for the countless bureaucrats that put together efficient timetables for troop deployments, but no timetables for withdraw (and certainly no realistic timetables for victory).

"In all countries, the majority served and suffered for unselfish causes which they did not fully understand. The war was beyond the capacity of generals and statesmen alike." Donkeys led lions.

With the war over, the Allies rejected Wilson's pleas for conciliation and demanded justice through retribution. In hindsight, the terms of justice left such a scar on Germany as to help bring Hitler to power. But no one saw this at the time. With the war over, Lloyd George needed votes, and so he led Britain in joining the call for retribution.

Taylor writes: "In the age of mass warfare, nations had to be told that they were fighting for some noble cause. Perhaps they were. At any rate, the peoples could not be told to forget their crusading beliefs merely because the war was over. The statesmen who had won the war had to make peace with the same emotions and the same weapons."

And so the cry rang out: 'Hang the Kaiser! Make Germany pay!' The Kaiser abdicated his power in the throes of revolution. Germany never proved able to pay very much at all. But the emotion of injustice never need stem from truth. Lloyd George did, however, persuade both allies and constituents to wait for quieter days to determine reparations; the interwar wrangling over reparations created much ill-feeling.

Paradoxically, even as the First World War "cut deep into the consciousness of modern man," it failed to dramatically alter the European way of life. States toppled, but not as many as one might expect for the unprecedented cost in flesh and blood. No nations were enslaved, and no capital cities erased from the map. The battles were largely confined to small geographic spaces, especially when compared with the Second World War, a massive conflict with truly global influence that broke out only twenty years later. 

A.J.P. Taylor. The War Lords. Published by Hamish Hamilton (1977) and Penguin (1978).

I am including this entry in my 'book review' series, but it differs in nature. Rather than judging A.J.P. Taylor's The War Lords as a history book, I merely attempt to capture his argument.  I also try to emulate his clipped prose, when appropriate.

The War Lords stemmed from a lecture series that Taylor presented on the BBC. In the series, Taylor spoke completely off-the-cuff and without notes, as was his custom. For the book, he merely adapted and edited the type-written transcript of his lectures. The War Lords touches upon themes that Taylor explores with greater detail in other books; thus, readers familiar with A.J.P. Taylor will find much of the material redundant.  But he also turns his gaze in directions that he otherwise ignored--especially at the power and personality of Franklin D. Roosevelt.

It seems impossible to connect Taylor's use of the term 'war lord' to any other era, even periods as recent as the First World War. Taylor himself states "In the First World War, curiously enough, there were no war lords." The only other war lords he names are Attila the Hun and Napoleon. The criteria remain unclear for the title 'war lord.' In Taylor's opinion, the five individuals under review arose from very particular circumstances. They share characteristics with the demagogues of Athens, for they each made exceptional use of boldness and public charisma to define a path up to and through the Second World War.

Taylor begins the book with a breathless preface that offers a window into his powers of analysis. A full quote better demonstrates the effect than any summary:

"Five of the lectures are biographical studies of the men who exercised supreme power during the Second World War; the sixth explains why there was no such man in Japan nor indeed any supreme direction at all. There is a deeper theme. Most wars in modern times have been run by a confusion of committees and rival authorities. The Second World War was uniquely different. In September 1939 the British and French governments declared war on Germany. Otherwise virtually every great decision of the Second World War was made by one of these five men except when the chaotic anarchy of Japan intervened. Each of the five was unmistakably a war lord, determining the fate of mankind. Yet each had an individual character and method that makes generalisation difficult.

          "Three were avowedly dictators; two exercised their dictatorship with an outward respect for constitutional forms. One, Mussolini, was lazy. Three ran the operations of war from day to day, Stalin almost from hour to hour. Roosevelt observed the war with casual detachment until the moment for decision arrived. All had served in the First World War, though Roosevelt served only in a civilian office. Four were prolific writers; Roosevelt never wrote anything, not even his own speeches. Four were masters of the radio; only Stalin owed his power entirely to other means. Two were amateur painters; one was an amateur violinist. One was the grandson of a duke. One came from a rich professional family. One was the son of a customs official. Two were the sons of humble workers. Only one received a university education. One was happily married. One ran after every woman who came in sight. One was unhappily married. One was a widower. The fifth married only the day before he died.

          "This was a bewildering variety. But the five had some things in common. Each of them dominated the service chiefs. Each determined his policy of his country. All five were set on victory, though of course not all could achieve it. They provided the springs of action throughout the years of war. This was an astonishing assertion of the Individual in what is often known as the age of the masses."

Taylor concentrates on the wartime decisions and personal characteristics of the major figures of the Second World War. He sketches rapidly, and without great detail. He adds a bit of background, and concentrates on the eyes--he wants to know where his 'war lords' are looking, and why.

Taylor argues more persuasively and more consistently in another of his popular history books, The Illustrated History of the Second World War. But here his task is entertainment, rather than serious learning. As with his Illustrated History series, Taylor fills the book with captioned photos that prove as informative as his text; yet here the photos are much more narrow in scope, for they center around his 'war lords.' And, despite the term 'war lord,' political leaders rarely engage in anything visually striking. For the most part, the leaders stand or sit in the company of mentors, peers, and ministers, and smile or grimace at the camera.

The photos of Mussolini make an exception--Taylor expertly captures the way the "Western world" saw Mussolini during the height of his power: the able sportsman and the every-man, the courageous warrior and the elite politician. And so we see how a man who looks like a clownish fraud in the present resembled a charming futurist in the past.

MUSSOLINI

Taylor begins the book with Mussolini. In a way, the entire era of the Second World War began with Mussolini's rise to power, for he initiated the conservative world's love affair with the illusions of a fascist modernity. Mussolini projected an image of constancy in a time of doubt and strife, yet a constancy perfectly in tune with ever-increasing wealth and power and technological advancement; the image appeared seductive enough that many individuals fell into the grip. He represented a self-confident alternative to socialism.

Like Hitler, Mussolini "served in the trenches--and the Italian trenches were perhaps the worst trenches in Europe, with the harshest conditions, where nothing was done for the ordinary men." The harshness of the trenches distilled his early socialist leanings into an entirely new form of politics--20th century fascism.  He fed off of popular discontent. He organized ex-servicemen and formed task forces to resist the working-class socialist movements. Mussolini and his 'Black Shirt' party began to march throughout the country. When the army refused to intervene against Mussolini, the king of Italy made him prime minister. Mussolini's party concentrated power around him with tools of coercion, including murder.

While other countries felt buffeted from winds of distress and open political conflict, Italy projected an image of unity and modernity.

Mussolini built an image of Italy as a powerful military leader; the image proved far too successful for his own good. The shows of force deluded Mussolini, and led him astray. "As he looked at these masses of marching troops shown to him on the screen, he really believed that Italy had an army of five million. The actual figure was not much more than a million when it came to the point." He played the role of the every-man, he played the role of peace-maker (at Munich), and eventually he played the role of war lord. But in the role of war lord (as with the role of peace-maker) he could only play and project--he could not execute, nor achieve success.

He entered the war against Britain just before the collapse of France. He hoped for a share in German glory. But Britain failed to negotiate a peace, and instead won the Battle of Britain; unable to strike at Germany, Britain turned on Italy in both the Mediterranean and Africa. Thus Mussolini finally swung a sword he had shined for twenty years, only to find that it shattered when actually put to use against another European power. Such delusions are the cost of dictatorship; the dictator mitigates the risk of lost power, but maximizes the risk of bad information. When no one gains for creating their own interpretation of events, they quickly learn to keep their mouths shut.

The Italians began to look for a way out of the war, but the Germans did not allow Mussolini to capitulate at a reasonable hour. So Mussolini carried on as his power evaporated. Eventually, a partisan communist gunned him down. The partisans hung Mussolini upside down beside his mistress, Clara Petacci.

The image of the defeated Duce resonated strongly--even theatrically-- back in Britain. Laurence Olivier made use of it at the Old Vic to represent the conclusion of Shakespeare's Coriolanus, and Kevin Spacey recreated the image a few years ago for the conclusion of Richard III.

HITLER

A.J.P. Taylor interprets Adolf Hitler as an exceptional propagandist with the typical interests of a world leader: respect, security, and economic growth; Taylor's interpretation thus widely differs from the popular idea of Hitler as a madman and ruthless xenophobic, solely responsible for the ills of the Second World War. I am not interested in making a determination one way or the other, though I would say that his behavior--even his cruel xenophobia--fits well within the framework of human behavior during wartime, even if it sits outside of the Geneva convention. This does not make it morally excusable whatsoever. But it does suggest that 21st century moral conventions cannot help understand the psychological processes that governed his actions.

Hitler--like many Germans--despised the peace settlement that concluded the First World War. The economic depression and period of hyper-inflation afforded him the opportunity to rise to power on a wave of bourgeois discontent. Unable to effect a political revolt in 1923, he learned to pervert the constitutional process of the Weimar Republic and eventually assumed the chancellorship. He succeeded Hindenburg in the presidency, and also assumed the mantle of war minister in 1938, thus securing all the major positions of political power in Germany. He further consolidated power using the methods of Mussolini and Stalin though, in comparison with Stalin, he killed fewer people in the process (but left a far greater scar on the Western psyche).

Hitler's forces invaded Poland on September 1, 1939. This brought France and Britain into the war. He personally made the strategic decision to invade France, as he wanted to confront 'the greatest army in Europe' on his terms rather than theirs. He defeated them with unexpected swiftness, but then failed to completely defeat Britain.

Now Hitler faced a dilemma. He had an army, well-trained and tested, but no continental battles to fight. He lacked the naval power to seriously contest the British Isles. "By 1941, he was absolutely convinced that unless he struck a  blow against Russian first and knocked the Russians out, they would, one day, when perhaps his conflict with Britain had got more acute, turn against him; they would betray him." But the strike at Russia did not appear desperate or paranoid at the time. Most expected Russia's quick capitulation. Perhaps they thought Stalin's tyranny left him atop a house of cards, much like Mussolini.

This proved the gravest strategic error of the war. Within the year, the German army halted within sight of Moscow. "This was the turning-point of the Second World War," Taylor averred. "In June 1941, Germany was the acknowledge victor, dominant over the whole of Europe. In December 1941, the German forces halted in front of Moscow. They were never to take it... and from that moment, Hitler appreciated that total victory could not be achieved."

Hitler appears never to have attempted a compromise peace--he never even seems to have entertained it. He found Japan's attack on the United States inspiring, and "for this and for no other reason, he plunged, at the end of 1941, the very time of his Moscow disasters, into the Japanese War."

As he declared war on America, "he made at this time the most extraordinary remark: 'We have chosen the wrong side; we ought to be the allies of the Anglo-Saxon powers. But providence has imposed on us this world-historical mistake.'" It should, perhaps, sober the self-righteous 'Anglo-Saxon powers' that Hitler felt more kinship with the United Kingdom and the United States than with any other nation; this was not delusional; he recognized the seeds of his own sources of power in these advanced industrial nations. Rising working-class discontent and xenophobia struck fear into the electorates of both the United Kingdom and the United States.

Hitler envisioned a collapse of the Soviet-British-American alliance. It never occurred. Their differing ideologies and regime-types did not result in open conflict. The more Hitler held together his own regime, the more the Allies had to lean together to destroy him. He became the centrifugal axis of the alliance.

The responsibility eventually broke him, and caused more damage than the assassination attempt that left him crippled. He weakened, physically and mentally. He indulged in fantasy.

Taylor places the 'inspiration' for the horrors of the Holocaust more on the shoulders of Himmler, rather than Hitler, "though Hitler took it up." Taylor does not explore Hitler's xenophobia any deeper than that.

Taylor ends his discussion of Hitler on a strange and sympathetic note. "With his death and disappearance, Hitler performed a final service to the German people--he carried with him into obscurity the responsibility for the world war and the guilt for the crimes and atrocities with which it had been accompanied. As a result, the German people were left innocent."

No other 'war lord' intervened more effectively in strategy, and with greater success. His initial successes left his generals and civilian ministers in a poor position to seize the reigns as Hitler's abilities broke down.

CHURCHILL

The war ruined the image of Mussolini; the war saved the image of Churchill. He served in high public office for most of the 20th century, and experienced war as a young soldier, a journalist, and a politician. In the First World War, Churchill's career nearly died on the shores of Gallipoli; he recovered, and towards the end of the war he followed in Lloyd George's footsteps as the Minister of Munitions, and then Secretary of State for War and Secretary of State for Air. In between the loss at Gallipoli and his return to power, he served briefly in the trenches as an artillery officer.

Taylor however skips much of this, and the interwar years, and instead begins in May, 1940, "after the unsuccessful British campaign in Norway--a campaign, ironically, for which Churchill was mainly responsible and the failures of which were due  more to him than to Chamberlain, the prime minister who was actually discredited." Nevertheless, Churchill became prime minister.

Taylor remembers Churchill's assumption of the premiership as a contentious and uncertain moment; the confidence and glory only came in hindsight. But Churchill possessed gifts that suited him to the task. He could look back into history and draw useful lessons; he could look into the present and demand the most of modern technology. And he could put his ideas together coherently, even if some of those ideas deserved less attention than they received. Roosevelt once said of him, "Winston has a hundred ideas every day. One of them is bound to be right."

Perhaps most importantly, Churchill determined the direction of the conflict: it would go on, even after the fall of France in 1940. He ensured that the British Empire would not sue for peace, though the British could not defeat Germany on its own. Ultimately, Hitler was probably destined to lose the war to Stalin, but Churchill's insistence on continuing the fight ensured a prominent place for capitalist-democratic governance at the war's conclusion.

During the prosecution of the war, Churchill loathed open opposition. As a consequence he sacked Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding, the victor of the Battle of Britain. He sacked Auchinleck. He sacked Wavell. Each general won major victories; each suffered relatively minor defeats, and often made do with minimal resources due to Churchill's incessant striving on ineffective campaigns. But a certain amount of 'sacking' proved useful, as generals tire during the course of a war; furthermore, a general well-suited to defense may prove incapable of forming an effective offense. So Churchill's habit of sacking generals on a regular basis proved a boon, rather than a burden, even if he acted unjustly to the individual officers involved.

After the Dunkirk evacuation of May-June 1940, a pall settled over the forests of northern Europe; the war shifted to the Mediterranean. "If you ask what the Mediterranean campaign was about, why the British were ever in the Mediterranean, one can give the simple answer of the Second World War, as of the First on some occasions: they were there because they were there--because they were there. And being there, then they had better stay there and fight." The British did not return to the continent until 1944. They had colonial and territorial holdings in the Middle East, and they had armies in place. They used these armies, for there was no other way to prosecute the war.

Churchill worked with relentless energy. He wore out those who could not keep up. He spoke with "a mixture of high rhetoric and humor. His speeches sound better now perhaps than they did at the time, when they did not always come across very well, though they were undoubtedly inspiring. The fact that he was always so lively also brought inspiration to others..."

"He made many mistakes. All war lords make mistakes. Churchill's mistakes were the mistakes of hurrying too much, of wanting victory too soon and wanting it with inadequate means... when he could not do something effective, he would do something ineffective... Nevertheless, on most of the great issues, though not on all, he was restrained."

Interestingly, the last great imperialist sacrificed much of the Britain's credit in the eastern empire to defend the Mediterranean. The fall of Singapore signified the end of Britain's ability to safeguard its colonial interests.

But on the other hand he did not hesitate to work with Stalin, despite having previously run the wars of intervention. He shared in the glory with the United States and the Soviet Union, and mitigated the shallow bickering that took place among the allies in the First World War.

"At a time when his physical powers were waning, Churchill still continued to survey the whole field of war, and even the most critical would hesitate to say that anyone could have taken his place... there was in Churchill, a combination of the profound strategist, the experienced man and the actor. Not always the tragic actor; there was a rich comedy about him as well. No other war leader, I think, had the same  depth of personal fascination as Churchill... he combined, to the end, imperial greatness with human simplicity."

STALIN

"Most people, I suppose, regard Stalin as a monster." Yet at the time of the Bolshevik revolution he seemed 'a grey blur.' No one anticipated that he would become the most powerful leader of the Second World War, nor that he would have the greatest longevity in office.

He fought as a Bolshevik general in the wars of intervention; during that conflict, he ignored Trostky's instructions with an impunity that he never accepted from his own subordinates.  

Stalin seized power after the death of Lenin. First, he attacked the enemies of his friends, and then he killed off the friends that disagreed with him, or that offered palatable alternatives to his own ruthless approach. "So in 1939, when the Second World War began, Stalin stood alone, puzzled, suspicious, with nobody whom he respected, nobody whose opinions he accepted, and hardly aware of the world outside the Soviet Union." Hitler and the British suspected Stalin's isolation would be his downfall. Stalin may have agreed with them to extent, for he did everything in his power to avoid war with Germany. Hitler invaded anyway. The Germans crossed the Russian frontier on 22 June 1941.

But Stalin overcame his isolation, and under his authority the Russians withstood the assault of up to four-fifths of the German army, and all of its best divisions.

Russia did not accomplish this easily. In the early days of the war, Stalin had under-performing generals shot under the auspices of a court martial. No other 'war lord' had his generals shot for failure in the field.

Stalin managed the war on three vast fronts, and remained absolutely involved in raising, equipping, and fielding his forces. He managed the war to an even greater degree than Hitler, who trusted an extensive professional staff.

Stalin's army failed to take advantage of its superiority in men and resources early in the war. He simply lacked the patience to withstand German offensives without immediately counter-attacking. He lost many of his forces due to his rashness. But at Stalingrad and Kursk he learned patience, and shattered the German armies as they exhausted their energy on his entrenched forces.

Taylor argues that Stalin did not seriously think of political conquest during the Second World War. His sole aim was to beat Hitler. In this way, he closely mirrored the mindset of Churchill: 'I have only one aim in life--that is to beat Hitler. This makes everything simple for me.'

The Soviets lost twenty million people in the war. "The Russians, and Stalin personally, were set on total defeat [of Germany], on exacting the unconditional surrender of the Germans, long before Roosevelt formulated this."

"A number of those who were at the conferences remarked on the fact that both Churchill and Roosevelt brought with them a whole host of advisers... [but] Stalin could do all the negotiating, he could discuss all the military problems, he could discuss all the political problems and had an absolutely tight grasp of them. Whatever he had been in earlier years, he grew up into being a statesman; one who, without doubt, was totally devoted to the interests of his own country, but also of very great gifts and, in some ways, of considerable sentiment and responsiveness."

He possessed a savage sense of humor. He joked about shooting diplomats, generals, and friends; it's hard to see the humor in this, especially since he really did shoot diplomats, generals  and friends. But still, he had, like the other leaders of the Second World War, a sense of humor.

"Stalin I think, assumed, as so many people do, that the relations based on war would go on when the war was over: that there will be the same feeling of 'Well, we must agree because we're allies in a great war.' But, of course, what happened is that, when the war was over there was no longer the same intensity of need to agree. And Stalin was very quick to respond suspiciously."

"We know comparatively little about his last years. He became increasingly suspicious and the gifts and brilliance which he had shown appeared to vanish. Indeed, many people think, in the end, he became mad with suspicion, and was proposing a vast new liquidation.

"When he died, he was treated as one of the greatest heroes Soviet Russia had ever known, but thereafter he was lowered and degraded. At first, his remains were placed beside those of Lenin; nowadays, though, they have a more modest position under the Kremlin wall.

"The last word, perhaps, goes to Averell Harriman, who was American ambassador to Moscow during the Second World War. He found Stalin better informed than Roosevelt, more realistic than Churchill--perhaps the most effective of the war lords."

ROOSEVELT

A.J.P. Taylor distrusts Roosevelt; had Taylor written more on him, we might have learned that Taylor distrusts the American Presidency as an institution. Americans hold their presidents accountable for perceived economic performance. Interestingly, presidents have little control over the economy. So the sort of person who assumes the office--weirdly--posses incredible powers over the conduct of warfare, but little over that with which he most concerns himself, namely the economy. The individuals who occupy the office look distinct (and odd) when contrasted with totalitarian or parliamentarian leaders.

Unlike the other 'war lords' of the Second World War, Franklin Delano Roosevelt did not see uniformed military service during the First World War. Instead, he held a political post, the assistant secrataryship of the American navy.

"Roosevelt was also the odd man out in another way; he was totally political. If you look at the others, you will see that they had other interests. All of them wrote books, though of different kinds. Roosevelt never wrote anything, except rather casual private letters... However, some of the finest phrases [of his speeches], such as 'the only thing we have to fear is fear itself,' were inserted by Roosevelt at the last moment."

"His background did not prepare him at all to be a war lord," Taylor wrote. He came to power facing 'perhaps the worst crisis that any modern country has ever faced" though America was perhaps uniquely suited to overcoming the Great Depression, with its vast natural resources, potential for advanced industrialization, cheap labor, and population growth.

"Roosevelt had no preconceived ideas about economics or, for that matter, about war... I am tempted to say that he had no principles. I do not mean by that that he was wicked, but that he operated only in response to a situation, and decided only at the very last minute." In that way he fundamentally differed from Woodrow Wilson, the American president that entered the First World War, and idealistically sought to end all wars altogether. Roosevelt did have hopes, however, and those hopes centered around economic prosperity and the American economic system. And though the American economy performed well during the war, it worked best during times of peace. So he looked forward to the construction of the United Nations as an "essential way forward for mankind, and that it would work." In other words, that it could prevent another world war. And the United Nations certainly proved a useful instrument for keeping the Cold War from getting any hotter than it did.

Roosevelt let the war come to him. Though some of his opponents and naysayers look for conspiratorial evidence that he sought to drag the U.S. into the war, this seems not only absurd but contrary to his character. He waited for situations to develop and chose political solutions to economic, moral, and social situations. Of the 'war lords,' he most carefully managed his country's economic prowess. While the other nations bent their economic power solely towards the immediate conflict, the United States profited tremendously from the war. "Although the Americans supplied the weapons of war, they also squeezed Great Britain dry economically; and that was Roosevelt's deliberate policy."

Roosevelt did not place Great Britain unequivocally on the side of good. He (and many other Americans) distrusted European imperialism intensely.

Roosevelt imposed an economic embargo on Japan, which Taylor refers to as "a delayed declaration of war." Yet if it was a declaration of war, the United States made little effort to anticipate any attack. And prior to 7 December 1941, a series of absurd bureaucratic military blunders in Washington led to complete surprise during the attack at Pearl Harbor. Both Admiral Stark and General Marshall failed to act efficiently when intelligence officers relayed fears of an impending assault.

Before America ever engaged in actual combat operations, the embargo began strangling the Japanese economy, while the lend-lease program upheld the British economy. War was clearly on the way. "Pearl Harbor solved Roosevelt's problem, for he would have had great difficulty bringing the American people in to the war if it had not been for the Japanese attack on it and the German ultimatum that followed... From that time, Roosevelt was commander-in-chief of the American armed forces in practice as well as in theory." In other words, he did not involve himself in military affairs until the war actually began; he became a 'war lord,' but he was not a warmonger. In this way he differed significantly from Hitler and Mussolini, Churchill and Stalin.

Upon entering the war, Roosevelt made a number of decisive, non-obvious choices. First, he determined to defeat Germany before going after Japan. Second, he sent the American army to fight in North Africa and Italy prior opening a second front in continental Europe. He wanted to start fighting immediately (or at least as soon as possible), but the invasion of Europe required a greater build-up of arms than the Americans could manage in 1942. Taylor cynically states that Americans fighting in battle (or at least clearly on the way to fighting in a battle) would help ensure victory in the 1942 congressional elections; Taylor is probably right.

When it came to strategy, Roosevelt took an economic approach, both simple and wise: he felt that the way to win a modern war was to have absolutely more of everything than your opponent. And though it took awhile to get going, eventually he did.

"By 1944, Great Britain had become much overshadowed by this American power, which Roosevelt had developed by always setting the targets higher than any American industrialist thought would be possible, and these being achieved."

Roosevelt worked hard to establish and maintain a close working relationship with the allies. Unlike many Americans, he did not regard the Russians as totally divided from them by a barrier of principle. "Relations between West and East were warmer in Roosevelt's time, not because, as people say, he made unreasonable concessions, but because he was the only Western statesman of that period who really treated the Soviet Union as an equal." This represented a wise political move, for the Soviet Union possessed far more raw military power than any other country during the Second World War. But Roosevelt did not realize this at the time; rather, his political approach to diplomacy simply rested on the assumed courtesy of equal treatment; for the same reason, the Chinese dictator Chiang Kai-Shek received far more serious attention from Roosevelt than Churchill or Stalin.

Roosevelt set the United States on track for becoming the greatest power of the 20th century, for he found a sustainable path towards maintaining a balance of economic and military might. Counting soldiers represents a reasonable way of assessing military strength during a battle, but the easy (and unburdeonsome) buttressing of those soldiers over a period of many years signals the country's strength in the long run. And Roosevelt established a precedent for balancing economic development and military power such that the maintenance of his military arms never sank his country into an endless pool of debt, nor crippled its industry with centralized micromanagement.

JAPAN: WAR LORDS ANONYMOUS

"The Japanese have some claim, I suppose, to the original war lords. Their country, for some hundreds of years, was under the control of war lords--the samurai. And yet, in the Second World War, the Japanese diverged entirely from the pattern which I have been presenting in previous lectures: there was no Japanese war lord--no single figure who led Japan into war, who directed the war, who made the decisions, and so on."

 Tojo is often mistaken for a war lord. But in Taylor's view he merely represented a wide class of generals and admirals and politicians who contributed towards Japanese policy-making.

The Japanese withdrew from the world until forced open by American gunboats in 1867. Within an astonishingly short period of time, they adopted 'all the lessons of Europe' on constitutionalism, industrialism, and parliamentarianism. They elevated their religious figure, the emperor, into the position of head of state. They adopted modern military practices. "Modern Japan grew out of European history, and the Japanese view was that if they loyally, carefully, pedantically followed the European patterns, they would be transformed into an acceptable member of the great power family." In the early 20th century, Japan fought against the Russians and emerged victorious. In the First World War, they joined the allied cause, and suggested that the League of Nations adopt a clause laying down racial equality as a principle; they assumed it would be accepted.

But it was defeated by none other than President Wilson. And then the Americans placed a total ban on the migration of Japanese into the United States. "The Japanese learnt a lesson: the rules which applied to white men did not apply to what Churchill used to call 'those funny little yellow folk.' Racial equality was far from being achieved. This, among other things, no doubt made the Japanese more sensitive and more aggressive."

Japans political structure bore some unique characteristics. To prevent the emperor from the embarrassment of ever being wrong, the ministers and generals had to arrive at complete consensus before presenting a matter for his opinion. In the face of absolute consensus and zero information, the emperor could only nod his head and agree with the supposedly obvious course of action. Just as crucially, military leaders were responsible for making all military decisions--not just of strategy, but of overall action. And the Japanese established the convention of an 'autonomous supreme command,' so that military leaders worked entirely independently of civilian leaders subsequent an initial engagement. Once the country stepped on the accelerator and towards war, they effectively cut the brakes.

Officers both young and old wanted Japan recognized as a great power. Patriotism fueled this desire. And war seemed the way forward. So when any minister seemed incapable of pushing the country further towards greatness, an individual took it upon themselves to assassinate that minister. The internal political violence of Japan thus differed greatly from the more centralized party violence of Nazi Germany. "In a short space of time, two prime ministers were assassinated, one after the other, [and] also a number of generals and leading officers. From then on, all those who followed a cautious, sane policy did so with great stealth. If they appeared to be too cautious, they would be certain to be assassinated. Not that the Japanese ministers and officers feared assassination in itself; it was that their assassination made their policies ineffective. Therefore, far from the leaders conspiring to bring about war... they conspired to bring about peace or, at any rate, to slow things down."

The greatest impulse for a Japanese war of conquest stemmed from Great Depression. The Japanese had embraced free trade. But at the onset of the Great Depression the United States and Great Britain raised enormous tariffs; while the Anglo powers maintained a lock on their own overseas holdings, Japan faced a strangle-hold. They turned to the rest of the Far East, most of which fell under a disorganized Chinese federalist state. They encouraged revolt in one part of China, and invaded in another. This received international rebuke, but no action.

The tension increased dramatically with the fall of France and the heavy fighting over the skies in Britain. Both Japan and the United States thought they might avert war by ratcheting up the tension even further, and thus threatening their Pacific rival into relative silence.

The United States placed an oil embargo on Japan in 1941. Japan had no oil of its own. "It was clear to the Japanese that, within not more than 19 months, Japanese oil would run out and Japan would collapse as a great power."

And so they attacked Pearl Harbor, seized the Pacific islands, annihilated British resistance in Singapore and slashed through Burma.

They did not expect American and British capitulation, but rather hoped America would tire and agree to a compromise solution. This did not occur.

"The Japanese owed their ultimate defeat to two things. One was the incredible economic strength of the United States, which enabled it, by 1943, to conduct both the war in Europe and the war in the Pacific. Against all Japanese calculations, the Americans were clearing up both at the same time. The other thing which led to Japan's defeat was its terrible mistake of neglecting to provide itself with anti-submarine devices. By 1943, Japans mercantile marine had lost three-quarters of its strength... By the beginning of 1945, most of the Japanese civilians and some of the more cautious generals recognised that the war was lost."

With the dropping of the first atomic bomb, the emperor finally intervened. He said: 'We have resolved to endure the unendurable and suffer what is insufferable." Shortly after he made the decision, the Americans dropped the second atomic bomb on Nagasaki.

MacArthur accepted Japan's unconditional surrender on 2 September 1945. The subsequent war tribunals spared the emperor of charges, but hung most of the high command, including Tojo.

So ended the Second World War.

                                                                          * * * * * *

A brief assessment:

While The War Lords lacks the incisive insight of A.J.P. Taylor's other books, it still suggests an interesting and thought provoking argument: Each of the 'war lords' of the Second World War wielded vast powers with surprising autonomy vis a vis the leaders involved in other major conflicts in the 20th century; yet despite this similarity, each of the war lords came to power in remarkably different ways. Two fascists, a totalitarian socialist, a parliamentarian, and a president all conducted the Second World War with autonomy and independence.

Taylor does not probe into the causes of these similarities. He simply acknowledges them. He also makes little effort to demonstrate the autonomy of each of the 'war lords,' though he does the show the steps which prevented the emergence of a war lord in Japan.

Did the war lords truly act with autonomy during the Second World War? Why were they able to act freely without reference to constituents? In other words, was the brief era of autonomous war lords just a mirage?

One can imagine, for example, that because each of the leaders rose to power with a commitment to non-negotiable peace, they therefore had to sustain a commitment to war to prevent their hitherto allies and henchmen from turning on them. That would seem like a powerful constraint on behavior. Yet it remains plausible that someone like Churchill or Hitler simply refuses to acknowledge the plausibility of compromise. In such a situation, their own mind offers the greatest constraint upon their actions.

Rankin, Nicholas. A Genius for Deception: How cunning helped the British win two world wars, 1914-1945. OUP (2008). 

In A Genius for Deception, author Nicholas Rankin uncovers the British use of camouflage, fraud, deception, propaganda, and counter-espionage throughout the First and Second World War. He builds his narrative in chronological order. Beginning with the First World War, Rankin depicts the personal efforts of dozens of unique individuals struggling against an enemy abroad. His narrative favors obscure misfits, such as painter-turned-camouflager Solomon J. Solomon, as well as legendary figures such as T.E. Lawrence, George Bernard Shaw, and Winston Churchill. The examination of disparate stories requires reeling narrative leaps across geographical space, such that one page focuses on creating dummy corpses in France while the next leaps to the Mediterranean to study guerrilla tactics. On all fronts Rankin locates protagonists with pluck and gumption--and occasionally enough luck to pull off their tricks. The British civilians and soldiers try just about anything once in order to defeat the Axis. The range of characters includes Joan Pujol, a double-crossing spy sending Hitler bad information, and Dudley Clarke, a fastidious and imaginative staff officer masking the true strength of the British armed services in Egypt. The story of A Genius for Deception partly becomes the story of Dudley Clarke, as no one besides Churchill in the Second World War seemed as intent to fool the Axis powers at every turn. Not all gambles paid off, but they certainly kept Rankin's protagonists occupied throughout the war. 

In the UK, the book's title changes to Churchill's Wizards: The British Genius for Deception 1914-1945. I suppose that Churchill's name might sell more books in Britain than in the U.S., but I think it is a misleading title. Churchill features prominently throughout the book, but more as one of many operators rather than leader of a coven. 
         
The book works best when Rankin describes the early battles of the British in the Second World War. Here, the author takes advantage of his own family history (he had two relatives fighting at the time) to place cataclysmic battles in personal perspective. The book works less well when Rankin attempts to defend his thesis: namely, that the British possess a cultural taste for cunning and deception that helped them win major global conflicts. He provides evidence of cunning and deception, but only weak explanations of why the British version of these traits surpasses that of others. More interestingly, I think he makes an error of causal inference; by that, I mean he attributes the use of deception tactics to helping win the war, but that the tactics more correctly helped save lives. If a German bomb struck a fake tank rather than a real one, it made little difference to the outcome of the war, but a tremendous difference to the individuals inside the tank.
           
Winning a war is hard to do. It better serves human imagination if we know that the Allies won both the First and Second Worlds Wars with sheer strength, and not sleight of hand.

In an earlier entry I reviewed The Viceroy’s Journal. The book made me a fan of its author, Viceroy Archibald Wavell. His frankness cuts ice like butter. And even when he finds himself on the wrong side of popular history, he paces himself through his actions with a disarming insistence on decency.

Like most generals of his generation, the First World War shaped his behavior in the Second, and in the intervening years. Many survivors of the First World War turned against the military and government service altogether, but Wavell’s early education and stoic coolness combined to ensure that he would serve his country for life. He could not speak off the cuff very well, but he wrote eloquently and effectively in private. He also published two popular works. The first was Generals and Generalship, derived from a pair of formal lectures he gave at Cambridge. The other was Other Men’s Flowers, a collection of all the poems that Wavell memorized throughout his life. Both of the slim books proved popular with soldiers during the Second World War.

Early on in his career, Wavell served as a personal liaison to General Sir Edmund Allenby. Wavell viewed Allenby as a mentor and role model. Allenby navigated a difficult political environment in Egypt at the close of the First World War. Much to Churchill’s chagrin, Wavell’s liberal tendencies and experiences under Allenby gave him the wherewithal to take an active role in Indian independence rather than passively waiting for the end of the Second World War. As Viceroy, Wavell saw his duty as careful balancing act: managing a transitional phase of Indian governance without undermining the precarious position of Britain’s war leader, Winston Churchill.

Serving under Allenby also gave Wavell the opportunity to see the value of experimentation and risk taking in warfare; Allenby led the allied forces to victory against the Turks with limited resources and a great deal of unconventional support.

Wavell played a crucial role in Wingate’s development as a battlefield commander. The start of this came in July 1937, when the Army placed Wavell in command of forces in Palestine and Transjordan. Arab unrest led to outbreaks of violence against both British troops and Israeli settlers shortly thereafter. Wingate, assigned to a relatively minor role as an intelligence staff officer, flagged down Wavell’s car and pitched to him his idea for Special Night Squads to defend Israeli settlements against violent attack. Wavell’s acquiescence to Wingate’s request provided Wingate his first opportunity to train unconventional forces and fight in combat.

Wavell made use of Wingate on two more occasions, first in Abyssinia against the Italians, and then in Burma against the Japanese.

The following notations about Wingate come from the book Viceroy’s Journal, as edited by Penderel Moon. I have shaped my quotes so that they demonstrate something of Wavell’s character and interests, and therefore the quotes are not as direct as they might otherwise be.

The following entries understate Wavell’s personal entanglement with Wingate and the Chindits. Brigadier Bernard Fergusson, mentioned in the December 29, 1943 and May 8, 1944 entries, later wrote a short biography of Wavell, as well as an account of Chindit operations called Beyond the Chindwin. Additionally, Wavell’s son, Archie John Wavell, was an officer in the Black Watch, one of the key units under Wingate’s command during Operation Thursday in March 1944. 

                                                                    ******

[Pg 15] August 23, 1943. 

Cabinet meeting with 2nd XI present, practically all 1st XI being still in Canada. Proposal to appoint Mounbatten to the S.E. Asia Command, with Stilwell as Deputy, and Giffard as commander of Land Forces, was announced. There was some criticism but general feeling was that appointment should be accepted since Chiefs of Staff and Americans approve.
            
P.M. is still in Quebec. I hear that Wingate has apparently ‘sold himself’ well there and his ideas are to havea  good run. I expect P.M. will now claim him as his discovery and ignore the fact that I have twice used Wingate in this war for unorthodox campaigns and that but for me he would probably never have been heard of. I gather they are at last realizing the difficulty of communications in Assam and Burma which I have been trying to impress on P. M. for nearly two years.

[Pg 37] November 17, 1943. 

M.B. [Mountbatten] came again on 15th to tell me about the Cairo meeting… we also spoke of the parachute demand; he still seems to think that to double the demand (from 100,000 to 200,000 [per month], the original demand having been 35,000) is a mere trifle for India; as it only meant giving up 2% total cloth: I pointed out that 2% of India’s population was 8,000,000 which was quite a large number to go short of clothes.

            Wingate left today after convalescing here for a week. He a little reminds me of T. E. Lawrence but lacks his sense of humour and wide knowledge, is more limited but with greater driving power.

[Pg 43] December 29, 1943. 

Bernard Fergusson turned up unexpectedly yesterday evening for an ight, and I had a talk with him about his experiences with 77 Bde in Burma. He says the venture was well worth while, and that Wingate’s theories are right, though the troops did not do all that Wingate claimed that they did. He said Wingate was, and is, extremely difficult—impossible at times—and he had many rows with him, but he still believes in his ideas. He was apprehensive about his forthcoming role, if he had to go in and come out again as he did not feel we could abandon the Burmans who helped us to the vengeance of the Japanese a second time…

[Pg 60] March 18, 1944. 

Saw both M.B. [Mountbatten] and [Lt.-Gen. Sir Henry] Ponwall and talked to them of situation on Burma frontier. It shows the respect they have for the Japaense tactics and fighting that though they have something like twice the Japanese strength available ion the Chin Hills-Chindwin-Manipur front and have known for months that the enemy were about to attack, they are both feeling rather apprehensive of the result; and have taken aircraft off the ferry route to China to fly into Manipur another division from Arakan. The 17th Division is being pulled back from Tiddim area by Japanese action against their communications, although in numbers we must be superior. How does the Jap do it? The simple answer ist hat we have a very ponderous L of C [Line of Communication] and the Jap has practically none at all; we fight with the idea of ultimate survival, the Jap seems to fight with the idea of ultimate death and contempt for it, when has done as much harm as possible. The flying in of Wingate’s two brigades [Operation ‘Thursday’] seems to have been a remarkable performance after an initial set-back in which there were about 150 casualties from crashed or lost gliders. But so far the Jap appears to have taken no notice of this force in his rear, his independence of communications is remarkable.

            M.B. is prepared to back me up on food problem and agrees that Americans must be told the situation officially if H.M.G. will not find imports. [reference to the Bengali Famine.]

[Pg 61-62] March 28, 1944. 

Last day or two comparatively quiet, usual interviews and papers, but I have actually managed to find a little time to work on the dispatch I ought to have written as C-in-C last year… The C-in-C spoke of the fighting on the Assam border where the Japs seem to be making headway. Large numbers of our troops are being concentrated in Assam, including I think 2nd Division; this will throw a very heavy strain on communications.

            Was told later in the morning that Wingate was missing from an air trip over Burma. I heard later that he had almost certainly been killed in an air crash between Imphal and Silchar.

[Pg 69-70] May 8, 1944. 

I got back yesterday from a short tour to Sikikim. A long days travel on May 2; left Delhi 6 a.m., landed Hassimara about noon and then had to cross a river by elephants, a flood having taken the bridge. Then a long motor drive to Gagtok were we arrived at 9 p.m…

            I left Gagntok on May 6th and flew to Sylhet in Assam. I spent the night at Sylet and visited H.Q. 3rd Indian Division—the headquarters of what were Wingate’s raiding columns, now Lengtaigne’s [Maj.-Gen. Lentaigne]. Lentaigne is good, I think, more orthodox and less highly strung than Wingate, who possible was killed at the right moment both for his fame and the safety of the division. But he was a remarkable man and I am glad that I was responsible for giving him his chance and encouraging him. My dealings with him, in three campaigns, were almost entirely official and I never knew him well enough to like or dislike him.

            I had hoped to see [my son] Archie John but he had flown into Burma a week before. Tired of waiting for vacancy in the Black Watch he had taken one in the South Straffords. I believe the column he has joined is likely to be flown out soon, but I expect Archie John will try to stay on with his own regiment or some other column. I hope his health will stand it. I saw Bernard Fergusson, complete with bushy beard, whose brigade had just been flown out. He was well, but a little upset by his failure to win his first pitched battle, at Indaw against the Jap airfield. He had had a hard time marching down from Ledo through the jungle, said it was surely the only recorded instance of a brigade marching 250 miles in single file.

            We had a long fly back, nearly 7 hours, as we were in a slow machine, and did not reach Delhi till nearly 7.45 p.m.

-------------------------------------- --------------------------------

Sources:

Fergusson, Bernard, rev. Robert O'Neill, and Judith M.  Brown. “Wavell, Archibald Percival, first Earl Wavell (1883–1950).” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. OUP 2004-2013.

Wavell, Archibald Percival. The Viceroy’s Journal. Ed. by Penderel Moon. OUP, 1973.

Sykes, Christopher. Orde Wingate: A Biography. The World Publishing Company, 1959.    

Orde Wingate redefined infantry operations in modern conflict. He was an artillery officer by training, but never cared much for the work. His methods, instead, helped infantrymen survive against the threat of artillery. We can find traces of his methods in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Modern military units such as the U.S. Army Rangers still train with his teachings in mind. 

My own training in Ranger School began with the following story from Judges, Chapter 7, verses 1-8:

"Early in the morning, [Gideon] and all his men camped at the spring of Harod. The camp of Midian was north of them in the valley near the hill of Moreh. The Lord said to Gideon, “You have too many men. I cannot deliver Midian into their hands, or Israel would boast against me, ‘My own strength has saved me.’ Now announce to the army, ‘Anyone who trembles with fear may turn back and leave Mount Gilead.’” So twenty-two thousand men left, while ten thousand remained... 

"But the Lord said to Gideon, “There are still too many men. Take them down to the water, and I will thin them out for you there. If I say, ‘This one shall go with you,’ he shall go; but if I say, ‘This one shall not go with you,’ he shall not go.” So Gideon took the men down to the water. There the Lord told him, “Separate those who lap the water with their tongues as a dog laps from those who kneel down to drink.”  Three hundred of them drank from cupped hands, lapping like dogs. All the rest got down on their knees to drink. The Lord said to Gideon, “With the three hundred men that lapped I will save you and give the Midianites into your hands. Let all the others go home.” So Gideon sent the rest of the Israelites home but kept the three hundred, who took over the provisions and trumpets of the others."

Wingate used the story of Gideon to inspire the men he led in Israel, Abyssinia, and Burma. He adopted the name "Gideon Force" in Abyssinia, and tried to do so again in Burma, but the GHQ India prevented it. Still, he told the story over and over again. He wanted his men to believe they were select, and that they were specially chosen--if not chosen by God, then at least chosen by Orde Wingate. 

No one at Ranger School mentioned Orde Wingate's name, but they repeated the story of Gideon nonetheless. It stuck me as odd at the time, because soldiers in the infantry rarely quote the Bible. They might makes jokes about God and Satan, but they do not use the Bible for its parables or stories. 

This is a very small example, but it shows the seeping sort of influence Wingate had on modern armies.

                                                                           ******

Professors and career soldiers sometimes use the term "military science" to describe the process wherein soldiers study, adapt, utilize and teach new strategies and tactics. Wingate himself certainly found the idea of 'military science' attractive--his education at the Woolwich Royal Military Academy taught him to look for discernible patterns in warfare, and the British military training manuals of the period resemble engineering textbooks, with piles of tables and charts, and in-depth studies of munitions.

Many authors have attempted to chronicle Wingate's strategic innovations and their subsequent importance to military science. Yet Wingate bore a complex personality that marked every action he took in his short life. He ruthlessly castigated incompetence, yet playfully encouraged insubordination. He brandished a zealot's faith to rally his men, yet abandoned his religion (and sincere belief in God) at an early age. He modeled his life after the Old Testament prophets, yet earned a reputation for his cutting-edge use of modern technology. Reducing his life to a handful of 'strategic innovations' mis-characterizes the nature of his experience. 

                                                                         ******

The seemingly polar tendencies found within Wingates' personality represent external tensions, not internal contradictions; a human being is not limited to the simplistic set patterns handed down through history and myth. Every time we examine the life of a human being, we should expect to see a story of variation, not conformity. 

After a few weeks in the archives, I feel I am in a great place with the Wingate research. With my training in qualitative methods, psychological analysis, political philosophy, and military operations, and find myself well suited to apply my skill set to understanding Wingate's life in a unique way. Already I have come across new evidence that previous studies have either ignored or missed. Wingate, for example, wrote extensively on human nature and on war as an extension of politics--no other authors have tried to reconcile his stated philosophical views with his actions on the battlefield, and so I have a unique opportunity to study Wingate from a new angle. 

I plan to write about him in two ways. First, I will examine his life in a work of comparative biography. I will examine a series of most-similar cases; the juxtaposition will describe the commonalities between each individual, but I will highlight the unexpected differences. In doing so, I can help us understand the individuals that initiate 'special operations', and the people who voluntarily join such units. Second, I will write about Wingate for the stage. 

With my work on Wingate, I am glad to shift away from the more theoretical terrain of modelling evolutionary science as well as the explicit application of psychological models to empirical cases. Instead I can embrace a more humanistic approach to understanding life. In my case, the techniques fro playwrighting have always borne a strong resemblance to biography. For my plays, I spend hours and years closely studying historical documents, sifting through apparent contradictions, and finding the through-line that allows one person to house seemingly opposite beliefs. American Volunteers, The Priceless Slave, and Westhusing in the House of Atreus all make use of this technique. Then I find the shape and form that brings out the elements of the story that most people tend to ignore. By placing my emphasis on the most unusual elements of character, I believe I free up my imagination to contradict my assumptions regarding human behavior; instead of forcing an individual into my cookie-cutter conception of life, I allow them to dictate the terms of the game. 

Human beings go to great lengths to both encourage and destroy diversity; they obsess over preventing 'deviant' behavior. But we also reward individuals who think 'outside the box.' These tendencies are an essential part of human nature.

Orde Wingate left Egypt in March 1933. Aboard the ship home, he met a Mrs. Alice “Ivy” Patterson and her daughter, Lorna. Lorna was sixteen at the time. Upon returning home, he and Peggy Jolly broke off their engagement, as he bashfully admitted he'd fallen in love with someone else. The army assigned him to the Royal Artillery Regiment at Bulford Camp, Salisbury Plain. 

Wingate eventually married Lorna in Chelsea on 24 January 1935. 

In the Wingate files at the IWM archives, I found a letter written to Lorna's mother that betrayed an unusually close intimacy between Orde Wingate and his future mother in law, Alice Ivy Hays. Hays later attempted to shape Orde's legacy in a positive direction when she wrote a book called There Was a Man of Genius: Letters to my Grandson, now out of print. The following letter sheds some light on the unusually close nature of their relationship--it's not the sort of thing a prospective son in law typically writes. I found the letter in folder OCW /3/4  1934.

Below, I've typed out the contents of the letter. [I've put my own notes, as well as illegible words, in brackets.]

The letter shows something of his zeal--and his ability to drive hard at those who care for him. There's clearly some feeling between Orde Wingate and his mother in law--enough to driver her into approving of the marriage, and then to write a book about her son in law. 

David Rooney, Wingate and the Chindits: Redressing the Balance. Arms and Armour Press, 1994.

Orde Wingate served in the British military as a determined battlefield commander, but he found himself drawn to the uneven virtues of his Old Testament heroes: David and Saul, Job and Moses. He lived a life close to the earth. He chose tactics and strategies that ensured his own body would drip sweat and blood—along with those of his men. Despite the unequivocal support of Winston Churchill, Wingate remains one of the most controversial generals of the Second World War, and David Rooney directs his squarely at the center of Wingate’s historical reputation.

Rooney argues that Wingate’s memory suffered a posthumous attack from jealous officers in the Indian Army. The chief offender, Major-General Stanley Woodburn Kirby, wrote the Official History of the war against Japan, shaped Field Marshal Slim’s autobiography, and marked and altered Christopher Sykes’ biography of Wingate; in brief, he held exceptional influence and dramatically effected the memory of Wingate’s strategic and tactical prowess, as well as his psychological fitness. Rooney aims to correct the record, and show that a smear campaign did in fact take place.

Rooney’s book begins with a conventional biography of Wingate. The story opens with the trauma of Wingate's birth in India, which very nearly killed his mother when she suffered a dangerous hemorrhage. She recovered, and they moved to England. Wingate’s family belonged to the Plymouth Brethren, where he and his brothers and sisters received love and encouragement from their parents even as the Bible threatened them with eternal damnation. 

Wingate attended Charterhouse as a young man, and later the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich. Rooney then passes through the many distinct phases of Wingate’s life, and usually agrees with Christopher Sykes and other Wingate biographers in his interpretations. As a young officer, Wingate's first loves were hunting, horses, and brashness. He loaned money freely, especially to his own soldiers. He developed his best male friendship to David Tulloch, who later served under him in the Chindits in Burma. Wingate dragged one young woman, Peggy Jolly, through a multi-year engagement, before bashfully abandoning her to marry a much younger woman. With the help of family connections, he escaped the doldrums of artillery camp life through a course in Arabic and a trip to Sudan. There he gained valuable leadership experience directing patrols against poachers.

Wingate eventually posted to Palestine as an intelligence officer, and this is where his life accelerated into violence at a drastic pace. Upon reaching Palestine in 1936, he found the country in the midst of an Arab revolt against British governance and Jewish settlements. Unlike the British establishment, his sympathies stood with the Jews, rather than the Arabs. He began actively campaigning for the Zionist cause. With the support of General Archibald Wavell he formed tactical units known as Special Night Squads to protect Jewish settlements. The Special Night Squads consisted of British officers, British non-commissioned officers, and Jewish soldiers. They met with some success, at least tactically, and represented one of the first serious uses of force on the part of Jewish settlers. He proved an outstanding battlefield leader.

“You have a lot to learn,” Wingate told his soldiers, “and a lot to forget, but I shall give you a basis for your study of the art of war. Do not take notes—just listen and digest. Great soldiers are serious, diligent and of outstanding moral character. In war personal qualities are the most important—a coarse and savage man makes a bad soldier.”

Wingate stressed surprise, economy of force, and security as the principles of SNS warfare—in fact, he would insist on these three elements throughout his remaining campaigns. Of course, nearly all battlefield commanders say something to similar effect. But Wingate met his principles with a disciplined set of operating procedures that personally showed his men how to conduct such warfare with modern weapons. He loved the details of map-reading and the employment of machine guns, but he could also step back and offer an appreciation of the wider strategic picture.

From there on out, a short-lived pattern emerged: Wavell posted to a new assignment, and tasked Wingate with finding a way to take the fight to the enemy. Shortly after deploying Wingate, Wavell would find himself reassigned, and Wingate’s support from GHQ would slowly evaporate.

As the Second World War began to grip the world, Wingate aggressively took the fight to the enemy during a time when the much of the world found itself back on its heels. He possessed uncanny powers of imagination that allowed him to see the enemy’s blind spots, as well as Britain’s own untested strengths. He did so with the SNS in Palestine, and then Gideon Force in Ethiopia.

His most famous battles came with the units he formed in India and took into the jungles of Burma—the “Chindits.” After his first Chindit campaign, his fame exploded and Churchill took Wingate to Quebec to meet the American military leaders as an example of a British officer eager to fight the Japanese. The Americans (at least in Quebec) loved Wingate, and offered him tremendous support via aircraft; the Americans also formed a unit later known as ‘Merrill’s Marauders’ as their own version of Wingate’s “long range penetration” columns.

Wingate returned to Burma and led an expanded Chindit force back into the jungles. The forces at his disposal reached their height—he began executing the largest Allied airborne operation prior to D-Day, and disrupted Japanese operations throughout the area.

His battlefield opportunities as a commander, however, met with a sudden end. Travelling back and forth over the jungles of Burma, his transport aircraft crashed into a mountainside. The impact killed all aboard. Command of Wingate's Chindit forces fell into the hands of detractors and ineffective military leaders; many died in the subsequent battles. Time and again, outsiders such as General Joseph Stillwell ordered the Chindits into battlefield actions that defied Wingate’s strict procedures of engagement, which he designed to minimize exposure and maximize concentration of firepower. Curiously, Wingate’s best friend, Brigadier Tulloch, foolishly recommended one General Lentaigne as Wingate’s successor. Lentaigne despised Chindit tactics. Morale plummeted as Lentaigne repeatedly denigrated the Chindit approach and grew ‘windy’ to the tempestuous orders that inevitably fall from above during any battle.

While the bulk of Rooney’s book simply recounts the story of Wingate’s biography, his critical contribution manifests itself at the end of the book, as he shows the influence Kirby had on British history. For Rooney, Kirby stands as the most obvious example of jealousy within British forces for the fame and success of Orde Wingate, a man who rose in ranks from captain to major general in less than eight years. Kirby and the Indian army military establishment accused Wingate of forming a ‘private army.’ Kirby also discounted Wingate’s strategic and tactical innovations, and undermined his reputation through a series of sleight-of-hand psychological portrayals of Wingate as a madman and loose cannon, a man with poor grip on strategic possibility. Rooney shows that Kirby’s version of Wingate appears not only in the official history, but also in General Slim’s autobiography, and—most importantly—in the Christopher Sykes biography of Orde Wingate, perhaps the most thorough and detailed record of Wingate’s life. If Rooney is right, then Sykes’ biography—which appears objective at first glance—actually misleads. Rooney found, among other items of evidence, record of Sykes thanking Kirby for his careful reading of a draft of the Wingate biography, and his numerous corrections.

Rooney won the match with Kirby. Wingate was not a loose cannon. He worked hard to work with others, though not to get along well or be liked. It remains a little less clear if Wingate had quite the positive impact on modern strategy that his supporters insist upon. Rooney notes that Wingate’s strategies served as forerunners to the strategies used extensively in Vietnam. Vietnam, of course, was no more successful than the Chindit campaigns. Wingate's strategies also make an appearance in the modern firebases in Iraq and Afghanistan. Yet again, one cannot call these operations victories without outrageous equivocation. Such operations work best when used in conjunction with standard, sweeping campaigns of organized political violence designed to uproot and annihilate opposing political positions by any means necessary, but that’s not what happened in Burma (not while Wingate lived), and did not happen in Vietnam nor Iraq nor Afghanistan. In each case, scattered patrols supported with air power and good logistics failed to destroy the political opposition. I am not arguing that Wingate anticipated any of these campaigns—he kept his eyes on the battle in front of him, so much so that he did not have a plan ready in case of his own death, much less any serious shift in the strategic outlook in Burma (or world politics). I argue that Wingate introduced tactics that seem effective only within a hopeless strategic environment. His methods buy time, and bring out courage and willfulness in the troops involved. But clear political victory must remain elusive without stronger methods involving greater material resources. Wingate’s tactics tempt political leaders into initiating conflicts they lack the strategic vision to win.

Hence it is possible that Wingate was a good commander, and yet that his military innovations did not actually contribute to winning any war. Wingate’s battlefield maneuvers, however, represent an instance of aggressive action at the height of British difficulties in the Middle East and Far East. Churchill was not mistaken about that, and that is why Churchill found Wingate such an attractive figure, one worth taking to Quebec and granting personal support. If an interesting brand of madness effected Wingate’s mind, it did not lessen the psychological usefulness of Wingate’s actions. Men and material (and mostly material) win wars, but human beings need leaders with confidence and verve who possess the guts to say that victory remains possible. Courage invents confidence, and confidence begets courage; the two characteristics loop together among the minds of the many.

Rooney’s book provides a welcome correction to the history of Orde Wingate. Rooney’s most important contribution probably rests in showing the extent of the smear campaign that discredits Wingate as a human being and effective leader. It represents a tragedy of written record that such distortions influenced the Sykes’ biography of Orde Wingate. (Even with the distortions, Sykes' biography probably remains the best available). Wingate stands as one of the most interesting soldiers of the Second World War, one who died in action for his country and earned the respect of both his commanders and his men. He deserved better than he got.

Archibald Wavell, The Viceroy's Journal, ed. by Penderel Moon. 1973, OUP. 528 pp    

The Viceroy's Journal records the first-person impressions, calculations, and musings of Archibald Wavell, a great man given the shoddy task of serving as the second-to-last viceroy of India, 1943-1947. Just prior to the book's opening moments, Wavell led the defense of British Middle East and British Asia, always with limited resources and virtually no proper support from Churchill's cabinet. Churchill thrusts Wavell, a one-eyed soldier with no active political experience, into the civilian appointment of Viceroy of India to avoid giving the popular general further military commands. Instead of riding out the war in comparative luxury (as Churchill expected), Wavell immediately sets to work with intelligence and enthusiasm, helping to end the famine in Bengal, release Gandhi from prison, and lobby His Majesty's Government (H.M.G.) to transfer Indian political power before the end of the war. Wavell records the government’s callow responses with frank and adroit perception. In the viceroy's account, Indian politicians do not fare any better. Gandhi and Jinnah appear as political demagogues, each clumsily manipulating the respective Hindu and Muslim masses. They seem more devoted to party approval than to the competent dissolution of the Raj. "They do not understand how the machinery of Government works in practice," Wavell avers, "and think entirely on the lines of all questions being decided by party votes."

Wavell addresses his readers with roughly three types of journal entries: amusing anecdotes of political machinations, annoyed dismissals of pomp and ceremonial lunches, and engaged analysis of India's economic and political problems. He writes with a calm voice and courageous enthusiasm, even when the task assumes a difficulty of quixotic proportions. Editor Penderel Moon, a former colonial administrator, provides footnotes and appendices that offer an approving assessment of Wavell's influence and understanding of Indian politics. Wavell, a career soldier, also demonstrates an apt mind for interpreting the dialectical highs and lows of British parliamentary politics. Inexpert readers might find Wavell's frequent use of acronyms and titles a little difficult to follow, and updated footnotes would help preserve the book's usefulness for future generations. That said, Wavell evinces a remarkably calm sense of duty and self-understanding, which allows the book to serve as a profound guide to the closing days of the British Raj.

Robert Graves. Good-Bye to All That. Anchor Book Editions, 1998 [1957].                       

Robert Graves, upon reading a 1929 edition of his own memoir of the Great War, remarked "I wonder how my publishers escaped a libel action." Good-Bye to All That perhaps escaped libel action through its outrageous candor: Graves tells a soldier's story so brutally, comically honest and accidentally heroic that any attempt to legally discredit the author could only appear as aggrandizement of a war that left a bad taste in the mouth of survivors. Other literary accounts of the First World War, such as Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms or Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front, strive for tragedy. Notably, both books are novels, not memoirs. Graves' account embraces dark and irreverent comedy. He spins ghost stories he does not believe, and as gladly relates gossip from the trenches as he does any factual account of the fighting. He strikes a dismissive tone of courage, tactics and strategy, and yet takes pride in his own stoicism and poetic observations. Friends and fellow soldiers enter the scene, deliver a line to Graves, and then walk into machine gun fire and die, or catch a mortar shell and die, or go mad (or catch venereal disease) and live.

The author assumes a knowing audience. He never bothers to explain technical military terms, or particular references to celebrated friends and acquaintances; as such, the book would make a difficult introduction to the subject and time period. Yet Graves' absolute, unfiltered humanity creates a startling and vital account of the First World War and the years immediately before and after. He never blushes to describe the erotic, Platonic boy-love of the English school system, nor his own struggle to walk the line between bodily courage and moral cowardice. Remarkably, he never highlights any one aspect of his early life as more important than another: his upbringing receives as equal treatment as his  exploits as a soldier. I should not use the word "exploits," because Graves never uses it. The author typically refers to battles as "shows," and seems to smile when people he dislikes die in combat. He shrugs when good soldiers fall in pain and agony, and sighs (and gurgles) with relief when he receives a lung-wound dangerous enough to send him back to England for a few months of convalescence. He leaves England at the end of the book, just as his marriage falls apart and his friends seem to run out of patience with his heavy-hearted laughter. The reader should be glad to have read his book, and thankful not to be in it.

George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia, 1952.                                                         

George Orwell speaks of his catalytic impulse for violence in plain terms: he wants to kill Fascists. He travels to Spain during the opening movement of its Civil War (1936-1939), and joins a social-anarchist militia. In doing so, Orwell sets himself against not only the fascists, but also the powerful Stalinist strains of Spanish communism. He moves to the frontlines with little equipment, and significant uncertainty. Along the front, the militiamen sleep little and fight less, and Orwell portrays the war with candor and humor. In the process of killing fascists, he sleeps with lice, eats ice-crusted beans, side-steps death, and bombs parapets. Ironically, the book's great climax of Barcelona street fighting occurs hundreds of miles from the frontline action. The communist police agents eventually hound Orwell out of Spain, and back to England at the dawn of the Second World War. Orwell tried his best, and it did not do any good: "If this was history," he complains, "it did not feel like it." Orwell admittedly failed to achieve military or political victory, but he succeeds with words, and therein gives voice to the violent heartache of twentieth century soldiering and revolutionary ideals.

Orwell's account remains the best English-language book on the Spanish Civil War because he combines a soldier's romanticism with an intellectual's idealism, and then skillfully cuts the two perspectives to ribbons. Like the smooth and colorless puzzles of an M.C. Escher drawing, Orwell's unaffected grace paradoxically simplifies Spanish political tensions while showing their intractable nature. Orwell holds a clear perspective, and it leads nowhere: Fascism approaches, jingoes lie, and politics smells worse than war. Orwell's book, ultimately, feels like the work of a cartographer. He marks the intellectual ground in a tremendous rush, as though he knows the churning tide of Fascist conflict must come further up the shore, and he wants to preserve a moment in time in which he chose to act. Yet he saw that action amount to no more than wet sand. The British public largely ignored Homage to Catalonia at its initial release, but Orwell's book speaks with a strong and nuanced voice, and continues to attract a steady stream of readers who prefer their disillusionment to come from the pages of Orwell's book rather than from battlefields.