Joffre and the Origins of the Somme: A Study in Allied Military Planning Roy A. Prete The Journal of Military History, Volume 73, Number 2, April 2009, pp. 417-448 (Article) Published by Society for Military History DOI: 10.1353/jmh.0.0266 For additional information about this article http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/jmh/summary/v073/73.2.prete.html Access Provided by Southern Mississippi, Univ of at 09/25/12 1:53AM GMT Joffre and the Origins of the Somme: A Study in Allied Military Planning I Roy A. Prete Abstract This paper examines the origins of the Battle of the Somme within the context of French Commander-in-Chief Joseph Joffre’s effort to coordi- nate Allied military operations in 1916 and to mount a combined Anglo- French offensive on the Western Front. The French chose a joint opera- tion on the Somme, in which they would play the major role, as a means of leading the British into battle. But a major British attritional operation preceding the offensive was dropped, and ironically, the French Army bore the brunt of Allied wastage in the German attack at Verdun until the Somme offensive began on 1 July 1916. he literature on World War I continues to flourish as scholars comb the Tarchives and rethink the issues in quest of new and more satisfying interpre- tations.1 For the British, the Battle of the Somme, the first great battle of the war 1. Volumes of note include Hew Strachan, The First World War (New York: Viking, 2004); David Stevenson, Cataclysm: The First World War as Political Tragedy (New York: Basic Books, 2004); George H. Cassar, Kitchener’s War: British Strategy from 1914 to 1916 (Washington: Brassey’s Inc., 2004); Gary Sheffield and John Bourne, eds., Douglas Haig; War Diaries and Let- ters 1914–1918 (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2005); Robert T. Foley, German Strategy and the Path to Verdun: Eric von Falkenhayn and the Development of Attrition, 1870–1916 (Cam- bridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005); Robert A. Doughty, Pyrrhic Victory: French Strategy and Operations in the Great War (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University, 2005); Elizabeth Greenhalgh, Victory through Coalition: Britain and France during the First World War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005). Roy A. Prete is a professor of history at the Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston, Ontario. The author of several articles on Anglo-French military relations in World War I, he is completing a trilogy of books, Strategy and Command: The Anglo-French Coalition on the Western Front, 1914-16, of which the first volume on 1914 will be published by McGill- Queen’s University Press in 2009. The Journal of Military History 73 (April 2009): 417-448. Copyright © 2009 by The Society for Military History, all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored, or trans- mitted in any form or by any means without the prior permission in writing from the Editor, Journal of Military History, George C. Marshall Library, Virginia Military Institute, P.O. Drawer 1600, Lexington, VA 24450. Authorization to photocopy items for internal and personal use is granted by the copyright holder for libraries and other users registered with the Copyright Clearance Center (CCC), 121 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923 USA (www.copyright.com), provided the appropriate fee is paid to the CCC. ★ 417 ROY A. PRETE dominated by British forces—a bloodbath of unprecedented proportions—holds a particular fascination.2 The commemorative events of 2006 marking its ninetieth anniversary, including academic conferences and on-site remembrances, have long since come and gone.3 Several scholars have made recent contributions to the subject. Robert A. Doughty has helped us understand the developing concept of attrition in French staff thinking and the ongoing opposition of General Ferdi- nand Foch, the Northern Army Group Commander, to an operation he deemed unlikely to produce decisive results. Elizabeth Greenhalgh has underscored the tendency of the French staff to consider the French and British forces as one army in their strategic planning, and has noted the divergences between British and French perceptions and plans as the battle approached. And Robin Prior and Trevor Wilson have underlined the important role of the British War Committee in the formulation and control of British strategy prior to authorization of the joint offensive, without, however, having delved into the French role in the planning of the offensive.4 Several questions on the origin of the Somme offensive, nonetheless, remain unresolved, particularly as to the role of the French staff and Anglo-French inter- action in the planning process, despite a spirited controversy between two scholars on the reasons for British participation in the offensive.5 Such unanswered ques- tions and controversy are enticing invitations to further research and appraisal. The purpose of this paper is to trace from archival sources the origins of the Anglo- French Battle of the Somme in relationship to French Commander-in-Chief Joseph J.-C. Joffre’s wider attempt to coordinate the Entente coalition, consisting of France, Britain, Russia, Italy, Serbia, and Belgium. This task, which he undertook in the latter part of 1915, must be considered in addition to the role of de facto 2. See, for example, Robin Prior and Trevor Wilson, The Somme (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2005); Peter Hart, The Somme(London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2005); Mar- tin Gilbert, The Somme: Heroism and Horror in the First World War (New York: Henry Holt and Co., 2006); Christopher Duffy, Through German Eyes: The British and the Somme 1916 (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2006). 3. Of particular note: The 90th Anniversary of the Battle of the Somme, International Conference, University of Kent, 17–19 July 2006; Western Front Association, Great War Con- ference, 4–5 November 2006, National Army Museum, Chelsea, United Kingdom; and several Battle of the Somme Commemorations in 2006: Western Front Association, U.S. Branch, “90th Anniversaries of Verdun and the Somme Commemorative Events [including several on loca- tion].” 4. Doughty, Pyrrhic Victory: French Strategy and Operations, 250–90; Greenhalgh, Victory through Coalition, 43–63; Prior and Wilson, The Somme, 15–69. Prior and Wilson have not con- sulted any French sources (Ibid.). 5. Elizabeth Greenhalgh, “Why the British Were on the Somme in 1916,” War in History 6 (1999): 147–73; William Philpott, “Why the British Were Really on the Somme: A Reply to Elizabeth Greenhalgh,” War in History 9 (2002): 446–71; Elizabeth Greenhalgh, “Flames Over the Somme: A Retort to William Philpott,” War in History (2003): 335–42; William Philpott, “The Anglo-French Victory on the Somme,”Diplomacy and Statecraft 17 (2006): 731–51. 418 ★ THE JOURNAL OF Joffre and Allied Military Planning for the Somme coordinator of Anglo-French forces, which he assumed in August 1914 and continued to exercise. The essay will also consider the relative impact of French and British government policy and political oversight of joint military planning with regard to the 1916 offensive. For almost a generation, British his- toriography has shifted its focus from emphasis on the strategic debate between “easterners” and “westerners” to the broader issue of how to best manage the Allied coalition.6 The latter half of 1915 is partic- ularly crucial in this discussion relative to the Entente powers since, for the first time, Joffre, the French Commander-in-Chief, with the assent of France’s Allied partners, undertook to coordinate the strategic plan- ning of the Allied armies, to produce first a General Joseph Joffre, French Commander- coordinated effort for the fall of 1915, and in-Chief, August 1914–December 1916 then a unified Allied offensive in 1916 to [Courtesy of the Service historique de deliver the knockout blow that would force la Défense, Vincennes, France.] the Central Powers—Germany, Austria- Hungary, Turkey, and Bulgaria—to their knees. Joffre faced the additional task of coordinating the efforts of Allied forces on the Western Front. The concept of obtaining the maximum return from French allies inherent in these endeavors was not new in French planning, the entire pre- war strategy for victory over the Central Powers having been based on the effective operation of French alliances. A closer look at the initial planning of the Battle of the Somme, with evidence gleaned from in-depth archival research in French and British archives, reveals that the Battle of the Somme was the culmination of a long series of measures, ploys, and discussions, by which the French had attempted to draw the British more fully into the war effort in France. Entering the war in August 1914 with a lim- ited commitment to continental defense, the British government had reluctantly increased its commitment of troops and resources by degrees, as crisis succeeded crisis in the field. During the summer of 1915, the British government decided, largely in the face of French and Russian weakness, to send their “New Armies” of recently trained volunteers to France, and ultimately, for many of the same reasons, 6. See, for example, Keith Neilson, Strategy and Supply: The Anglo-Russian Alliance, 1914– 1917 (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1984); David French, British Strategy and War Aims 1914–1916 (London: Allen and Unwin, 1986); Kathleen Burk, Britain, America and the Sinews of War, 1914–1918 (London: Allen and Unwin, 1985). MILITARY HISTORY ★ 419 ROY A. PRETE to engage them fully in battle in the fall Loos-Champagne offensive. By 1916, with “westerner” Sir William Robertson as Chief of the Imperial General Staff exercis- ing the dominant influence on British strategy, the British government was willing, though with some hesitation, to pursue a Western Front strategy and to engage British forces in the great battles of the war in 1916.