MECHANISED WARFARE

[Stanley]

MECHANISED WARFARE

One of the major problems confronting any historian when looking at the development of new equipment and tactics after the Great War is to try to understand why it was that the upsurge of innovation during the 1914/1918 war which led to the first use of tanks seemed to fizzle out after the war with the consequence that when we were plunged into another world war in 1939 our tanks in particular were so far behind modern practice in the Russian and German armies that the Germans referred to them as 'Tommy Cookers' because they were so easy to penetrate and set fire to. Some progress was made during WW2 but even so, at the end of the war our equipment was still inferior to the Russian T34 tank, the German Tigers and in particular, the 88mm Anti Tank gun used by the Germans.
One of the problems I have discovered which led to this state of affairs is that the leading tactician advocating armoured warfare in what the Germans called 'Blitzkrieg', Brevet Colonel J T C Fuller, clearly identified the new tactics in a paper he wrote for the War Office in 1919. Versions of this and subsequent papers were published and it is almost certain that the Russians, and in particular, the German Heinz Guderian read these and took notice with what turned out to be devastating results. The puzzle to me was why the War Office totally ignored Fuller. For some reason Fuller lost favour completely and eventually left the army. I later found that this was connected with his personal life, for many years he was a disciple of the notorious Aleister Crowley, or 'The Beast 666' as he styled himself. This became public knowledge, Fuller became even more weird and in consequence was totally dismissed as was his work on armour and tactics.
The question remains however as to why his ideas didn't still have force because of their internal logic. I am not a military historian but one thing that strikes anyone looking at attitudes in government and the armed services in the inter-war years is that, to a large extent, thinking was still rooted in ideas of empire. There was also the unavoidable fact that the country was broke and this inhibited any new expenditure. In the round of deep cuts following the war the Army fought the Navy for their share of the funds and both attacked the nascent RAF and in effect wanted it abolished and air power incorporated and controlled in the two 'senior services'. The only way the RAF survived was by advocating air power as a method of colonial policing which could be cheaper than boots on the ground and so save money. (If you are interested in the details of this struggle look in Google Books for 'Air Power and Colonial Control' by David Omissi.)
Part of the RAF case for this tactic was the need for light armoured cars for pilot rescue, aircraft recovery and ground support. In their original plan it was assumed that the army would provide this but they refused to have anything to do with it on the grounds that to do so would be to recognise the RAF and this was not War Office policy. The upshot was that the RAF supplied their own light armoured cars based on the Rolls Royce chassis, so in effect this gave them a mechanised and armoured arm. It begins to look as though this affected any development of mechanised armour at the War Office as the 'Colonel Blimp' attitude which was still alive and well in the senior ranks avoided the question of mechanised warfare because it would be seen to be an indirect nod in the direction of RAF tactics. There is a good case for assuming that this was yet another thread militating against any serious development of armour inside the War Office.
There was of course the political attitude in 1919, everything was geared towards cutting expenditure and in addition, the Members of Parliament were well aware of the fact that there was no public appetite for rearmament of any kind, the country was sickened by war. It wasn't until the late 1930s that this attitude started to change and rearmament came back on to the agenda as developments in Europe made it quite clear that the unfinished business of 1918 was to be reopened. 20 years of neglect had to be repaired and unfortunately there wasn't enough expertise or will to adopt the latest technological developments. We did too little, too late and started the war with equipment that was no match for the Germans who had taken notice of Fuller's theories and applied them to their tactics and equipment. They concentrated on firepower and speedy mobility and the results became all too clear in the Blitzkrieg that overran France in 1939.
These negative and reactionary attitudes weren't the exclusive province of the British. A friend of mine in the US told me the story of how his father decided Hitler had to be stopped in 1939 and had the courage of his convictions, he joined the US Army. For the first part of his training in Oregon guess what he was taught.... How to ride a horse and use a sabre as part of the US Cavalry! Needless to say, like Britain, the US had to quickly revise its tactics and what a good job they did. In the event, it was their Sherman Tank with a British 17Pdr gun that was the mainstay of the Allies armoured response to the Germans by the end of the war.
What of the Navy? It was a very similar story in that they refused to countenance the RAF as a separate arm and wanted it to be abolished as a separate service. This led to opposition to any RAF proposals for changes in naval strategy. One example of this was the discussion about the defence of Singapore, the navy proposed expensive batteries of 15.5 inch guns as the primary defence against a sea borne landing. The RAF proposed heavy bombers as they were cheaper and more accurate than either the 15.5 inch or the 9.2 inch naval armament. As part of the decision making process, the Committee of Imperial Defence (note the name!) decided to clarify the technical issues. They arranged a trial at Portsmouth and Malta in which 9.2” guns fired on the target ship Centurion. The Navy failed to achieve a single hit with 72 rounds. In September 1929 the RAF conducted a bombing trial against the Centurion. Attacking from a mean height of 5,000 feet they scored 56 hits with 308 bombs. The following month, spurred on by this the navy conducted a second trial using a triple 9.2” battery and scored 10 hits out of 193 rounds. Even though these trials were deemed to be 'inconclusive' the coastal defence of Singapore was provided by naval guns but in the end were powerless to halt the Japanese. Incidentally, some historians have dismissed as myth the oft repeated story that the guns were facing the wrong way. As to what transpired later in the war, Trenchard was proved to be correct. The large warships proved to be terribly vulnerable to air attack and the whole of naval strategy had to change to the use of air power operating from the new aircraft carriers.
History is complicated isn't it! I feel I am getting closer to a complete understanding of the inter war years but I am not there yet! Onward and upward, Excelsior!


SCG/02/06/14

[Tizer]

Allow me to make a quick plug here for Radio 4's `Britain at Sea', a series of 15 quarter-hour programmes on the history of the Royal Navy during the 20th Century, presented by Admiral Lord West. The first is today, 2nd June, at 13.45 but podcasts will be available for download.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b046czzn

[Stanley]

Bumped on Remembrance Day.....

[Stanley]

Bumped again. Essential reading if you want to understand what was happening (or not happening!) in the inter war years.

[Stanley]

Still essential reading as we look at a troubled world and realise once again that we have neglected our armed forces.....