A Reassesment of Sir Henry Wilson's Influence on British Strategy In
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SOLDIER-DIPLOMAT: A REASSESMENT OF SIR HENRY WILSON’S INFLUENCE ON BRITISH STRATEGY IN THE LAST 18 MONTHS OF THE GREAT WAR JOHN SPENCER BA, MA A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the University of Wolverhampton for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy January 2018 This work or any part thereof has not been previously presented in any form to the University or to any other body whether for the purposes of assessment, publication or for any other purpose (unless otherwise indicated). Save for any express acknowledgements, references and/or biographies cited in the work, I confirm that the intellectual content of the work is the result of my own efforts and of no other person. The right of John Spencer to be identified as author of this work is asserted in accordance with ss.77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. At this date copyright is owned by the author. 1 ABSTRACT Sir Henry Wilson remains one of the most controversial British Army generals of the Great War. A colourful character in life, he attracted admirers and detractors in equal measure; in death, his reputation was ruined by a biography based on his personal diaries. The Wilson of the historiography is, at best, a politician rather than a soldier, at worst an ambitious Francophile intriguer. This thesis looks beyond this accepted characterisation, reassessing his role in the formation of British and Allied strategy in the final months of the war. Wilson attained influence, and subsequently power, when Lloyd George consulted him after failing to persuade Britain’s leading generals to change their strategic focus. The thesis re-examines Wilson’s policy critique, which led to the creation of the Supreme War Council, and negated plans for a major Allied offensive on the Western Front in 1918. This thesis aims to shine new light on Wilson’s work on the Council, with an analysis of its policy recommendations. The research will also explore the manpower crisis, the key issue for the entente in this period, and Wilson’s contribution to the establishment of Allied unity of command. The diplomatic skills Wilson deployed to defuse serious strains between the entente powers will be examined, with particular reference to his time as Chief of the Imperial General Staff. His contribution to the debate on Britain’s post-war imperial grand strategy will also be evaluated. The thesis will refute the long-established one- dimensional view of Wilson and suggest that he played a more influential role in British strategic development than has hitherto been acknowledged. 2 CONTENTS Abstract 2 Acknowledgements 4 Abbreviations 5 Introduction and Literature Review 7 Chapter One: Wilson and his Networks 39 Chapter Two: Future Strategy Paper 79 Chapter Three: The Supreme War Council 124 Chapter Four: The Manpower Crisis 168 Chapter Five: Unity of Command 211 Chapter Six: Wilson and British Grand Strategy 257 Conclusion: 299 Bibliography: 310 3 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis would not have been possible without the support and assistance of a large number of people. In particular, my supervisory team of Professor Gary Sheffield and Professor Stephen Badsey have been hugely helpful, patient, and wise. My thanks to the staff at the various archives I have visited, especially those at the Imperial War Museum, London, the Liddle Hart Centre for Military Archives at King’s College London, and the Churchill Archives Centre, Churchill College, Cambridge. I am particularly grateful to Dr Paul M. Harris who was kind enough to share with me his database of Staff College graduates, together with other insightful advice. Others, who at one time or another have offered valuable counsel or simply a listening ear, include Professor John Bourne, David Budgen, Brian Curragh, Jonathan Grun, James Halstead, Timothy Halstead, John Hussey, Dr Spencer Jones, Phil McCarty, Paul Potts, Professor Peter Simkins, and Dr Andy Simpson. Most of all, my gratitude goes to my wife Jean, for her graceful and unflinching support for this, the latest in a lifetime of obsessions. 4 ABBREVIATIONS AC Army Council ADC Aide-de-Camp AEF American Expeditionary Force AG Adjutant General BEF British Expeditionary Force BGGS Brigadier-General General Staff BLO Bodleian Library Oxford CB Companion of the Order of the Bath CAC Churchill Archive Centre CIGS Chief of the Imperial General Staff C-in-C Commander-in-Chief CoS Chief of Staff DCIGS Deputy Chief of the Imperial General Staff DMO Director of Military Operations DMI Director of Military Intelligence EEF Egyptian Expeditionary Force EWB Executive War Board FM Field Marshal GHQ General Headquarters GOC General Officer Commanding GQG Grand Quartier General GS General Staff IWC Imperial War Cabinet 5 JN Joint Note OH Official History LHCMA Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives MGO Master General of Ordnance MP Member of Parliament NLS National Library of Scotland PA Parliamentary Archives PMR Permanent Military Representative PPS Parliamentary Private Secretary QMG Quartermaster General SWC Supreme War Council TNA The National Archives WO War Office 6 INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE REVIEW This thesis is a re-examination of Sir Henry Hughes Wilson’s impact on British strategy in the First World War. It concentrates on the final 18 months of the conflict, from mid-1917 until the end of 1918 and considers his impact at this crucial point in Allied relations. The period was chosen because, for the first time, he combined influence with power. Until then, Wilson’s wartime career had been, for him, an unsatisfying succession of advisory and liaison-related roles, punctuated by an undistinguished period as a corps commander. Wilson’s fortunes changed during this period because senior politicians in Britain and France were searching not only for new ways to bring the war to a victorious conclusion, but also for senior military figures prepared to develop and implement such a strategic change. Wilson’s ability to speak the politicians’ language, and apparent willingness to do their bidding, improved his fortunes and ultimately led to his appointment as Chief of the Imperial General Staff (CIGS), the British government’s principal military adviser, in February 1918. There was, however, no inevitability about Wilson’s rise to prominence. Britain’s Prime Minister David Lloyd George led a shaky and problematic coalition government. Sir Douglas Haig as Commander-in-Chief (C-in-C) of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) on the Western Front, and Sir William ‘Wully’ Robertson as CIGS, were a formidable partnership, popular with Unionist politicians, the public, and, for the most part, the Press.1 At the same time, Wilson was no politicians’ cipher, a mere catalyst through 1 Haig was C-in-C from 19 December 1915 until the end of the war; Robertson was CIGS from 23 December 1915 to 18 February 1918. 7 which non-specialists got their way in steering Allied strategy. As this thesis argues, he had clear strategic views of his own, the result of important pre-war roles at the heart of the British Army’s strategy-making system. This was dominated by his unshakable belief in the need to maintain the strongest possible links with Britain’s principal ally, France. This conviction was developed in the years preceding the outbreak of war in 1914 and Wilson pursued it doggedly thereafter. Wilson has suffered more opprobrium than most Great War British generals. In his case the brickbats were thrown not because he was viewed as a ‘chateau general’, one of the so-called ‘donkeys’ leading lions to destruction in a ‘futile’ war. Instead his detractors were, initially at least, colleagues and contemporaries. The focus of their criticism was not his talent, or otherwise, for leading men, planning offensives or tactical doctrine, but his character. The British official historian of the Great War, Brigadier-General Sir James Edmonds expressed ‘contempt and dislike’ for Wilson.2 Lloyd George, who bestowed on him both power and influence did so only, he wrote with the benefit of hindsight, because there was no obvious alternative. Wilson, said Lloyd George, was ‘a shrewd politician’; a back-handed compliment from one of Britain’s canniest parliamentary pugilists.3 Wilson’s reputation was undone not by his actions, which for the most part were not unusual in the higher echelons of the British Army at the start of the 20th century, but by his writings. Like 2 Ian F.W. Beckett, (ed.), The Memoirs of Sir James Edmonds (Brighton: Tom Donovan Editions, 2013), p. xxiii. 3 David Lloyd George, War Memoirs of David Lloyd George (2 vols.), (London: Odhams, 1938), (vol. II), pp. 1688, 1713. 8 many of his class and education Wilson kept a journal for much of his adult life. In it he scribbled thoughts and impressions of the day’s events. Had he not been assassinated in 1922 it is likely he would have joined in the ‘battle of the memoirs’ and used both the diaries and his extensive correspondence, especially that from his time as CIGS, to write his own epitaph.4 As it was his reputation was left to the tender mercies of his friend and biographer C.E. Callwell and his widow’s naïveté.5 While the diaries are a goldmine for the historian, the publication of a selection from them in 1927 created an image of their author which has stood the test of time. The expressions of irritation, outrage, and abuse, aimed at foe - and often ‘friend’ - with which Wilson peppered his jottings ruined his reputation. Two years later, the Great War veteran Sir Andrew MacPhail demolished what remained of Wilson’s character in what was effectively an extended review of Callwell’s book.6 For almost a century, the cacophony of late-night scribbled exclamations drowned out any opportunity for a more even-handed analysis.