Greenhalgh E. Victory through Coalition Britain and France during the First World War

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Contents

List of illustrations page x

List of maps xi

List of tables xii

Preface xiii

List of frequently used abbreviations xv

1 Coalition warfare and the Franco-British alliance 1

2 Command, 1914–1915 12

3 The Battle of the Somme, 1916 42

4 Liaison, 1914–1916 75

5 The Allied response to the German submarine 102

6 Command, 1917 133

7 The creation of the Supreme War Council 163

8 The German offensives of 1918 and the crisis in command 186

9 The Allies counter-attack 228

10 Politics and bureaucracy of supply 265

11 Coalition as a defective mechanism? 281

Bibliographical essay 286

Index 297

Illustrations

4.1 Interpreter Jacques Vache´’s drawings of ‘ANZACs’ page 80

4.2 General Huguet in formal pose 81

4.3 Captain Ge´meau, Haig’s personal French liaison

officer and ADC 85

5.1 Curve showing the net difference between new

construction and vessels lost by enemy action 121

5.2 Commemorative bust of Etienne Cle´mentel 131

6.1 Front page of the Daily Express, 13 November 1916 135

8.1 Facsimile of the Doullens Agreement, 26 March

1918 194

8.2 Facsimile of the B eauvais Agreement, 3 April 1918 201

9.1 The members of the Military Board of Allied Supply 238

9.2 The four commanders-in-chief 249

9.3 Commemorative statue of Marshal Foch 261

10.1 Diagram of Allied war organisations, 1917–1918 278

Maps

2.1 The Western Front, showing position of Antwerp page 18

3.1 The Somme campaign, 1916 53

8.1 The Western Front showing German attacks,

spring 1918 187

Tables

3.1 Meetings between British and French Somme

commanders, March–June 1916 page 57

8.1 The events of 21–26 March 1918 193

xii

Preface

The Franco-British coalition – the only combination of Entente great

powers to see the war through from start to end – was both young and

inexperienced. It had no history of cooperation, quite the reverse; and the

scale of the confl ict was unprecedented for all combatants. Yet the coali-

tion was victorious. This fact demands an answer to the question of how

the vast problems were overcome.

This book examines how these two countries managed to create a

workable alliance that lasted until the Armistice. It does so by considering

the problems that arose and the mechanisms that were put in place to deal

with them. Those problems occurred on land and at sea, and required

resolution of difficu lties in the command relationship and in supply of

food and raw materials vital for the prosecution of the war. Its focus is

essentially practical, eschewing any consideration of war aims or of

finance, or (for reasons of space) any front other than the main one in

western Europe.

The sources are French as much as they are British. All translations

from the French are my own, unless stated otherwise. I have translated

‘anglais’ consistently as ‘British’, since the French used the word inter-

changeably with ‘britannique’, and British reflects the many nationalities

who made up the British Expeditionary Force rather better than

‘English’. For the same reason I have preferred Franco-British to

Anglo-French. As for the BEF’s first commander in chief, I have referred

to him simply as ‘Sir John’ to avoid any confusion with his French ally.

My debts are numerous. Robin Prior got me started on the First World

War; and my husband and children saw me through to the end of this

book with good humour and patience. I thank my colleagues in the

University of New South Wales at the Australian Defence Force

Academy for the grant of study leave to take up several hardship postings

in Paris. Librarians and archivists in both Britain and France were unfail-

ingly helpful, as were the staff of the Academy Library. Professor Hew

Strachan, one of the general editors of this series, was kind enough to

suggest that I submit this work to Cambridge University Press; and all at

xiii

the Press who have dealt with it have rendered admirably prompt and

professional assistance.

For permission to quote from material whose copyright they hold I am

grateful to: le Service Historique de l’Arme´e de Terre, Vincennes; les

Archives nationales, Paris; les Archives diplomatiques, Paris; la

Bibliothe`que de l’Institut, Paris; les archives de´partementales du Puy-

de-Doˆme, Clermont-Ferrand; I thank also the families of General

Roques and General Weygand for permission to consult their papers. In

the United States I thank the Library of Congress, Washington DC, and

the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, Stanford,

California. In the United Kingdom I thank The National Archiv es

(Public Record Office), Kew; the Bodleian Library, Oxford; the

Churchill Archives Centre, Cambridge; the House of Lords Record

Office, London; the Trustees of the Imperial War Museum, London;

the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, King’s College London;

the National Army Museum, London; the Trustees of the National

Library of Scotland, E dinburgh. I am grateful to Earl Haig for permission

to use the Haig papers, and to the Warden and Fellows of New College,

Oxford (Milner papers). The letters to King George V were reproduced

from photographic copies in The National Archives of original letters

preserved in the Royal Archives and made available by gracious permis-

sion of Her Majesty the Queen.

xiv Preface

Frequently used abbreviations

AEF American Expeditionary Force

AFGG Les Arme´es Franc¸ aises dans la Grande Guerre, cited with

tome and volume number (thus AFGG 4/1)

AG Archives de la Guerre, Service historique de l’Arme´e de

Terre, Chaˆteau de Vincennes

AMTC Allied Maritime Transport Council

BEF British Expeditionary Force

CCC Churchill College, Cambridge

CenC Commandant en Chef

CGS Chief of the General Staff

CIGS Chief of the Imperial General Staff, War Office,

London

CinC Commander-in-Chief

DMO Director of Military Operations

EM Etat major (general staff)

FRUS Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States

GHQ British Army headquarters

GQG French Army headquarters

HC, Debs House of Commons, Parliamentary Debates

HLRO House of Lords Record Office, London

IWM Imperial War Museum, London

JODC Journal Officiel, De´bats, Chambre des De´pute´s

JODS Journal Officiel, De´bats, Se´nat

LHCMA Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, King’s College

London

MAE Archives diplomatiques, Ministe`re des Affaires

Etrange`res, Paris

MMF Mission Militaire Franc¸aise pre`s l’Arme´e Britannique

(French Military Mission)

NAM National Army Museum, London

NLS National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh

PMR Permanent Military Representative (at the Supreme War

Council)

PRO The National Archives, Public Record Office, Kew

SWC Supreme War Council

xvi List of frequently used abbreviations

1 Coalition warfare and the Franco-British

alliance

Britain and France had no history of cooperation, yet the Entente they

had created in 1904 proceeded by trial and error, via recriminations, to

win a war of unprecedented scale and reach. In the vast and growing

literature of the Great War this victory through coalition has not received

the attention it deserves, mainly because so many scholars view the war

from various national perspectives.

The two countries overcame the multifarious problems of coalition

warfare because fighting a war of survival made patent the necessity

to overcome the centuries of mutual antagonism complicating an

already complex alliance relationship. They put in place mechanisms to

overcome those obstacles and complications, deriving from differing

language, customs and organisation. This book examines the huge prob-

lems that the war created between 1914 and 1918 and the solutions that

were proposed, fought over and finally agreed. It demonstrates that

victory was achieved because of, not in spite of, coalition.

Problems with coalitions

As Baron Jomini put it in 1836, ‘Of course, in a war an ally is to be desired,

all other things being equal.’ This ironic maxim underlines the fact that

allies are valued only in proportion to the scale of the external threat.

Thus the unlikely Franco-British coalition of 1914–18 survived over four

years of war because the Allies feared that a victory by the Central Powers

dominated by Prussian militarism would constitute an overwhelming

threat to their great power status and their evolving democratic institu-

tions (something that France and Britain did have in common).

Alliance politics are ‘woven’, according to one historian, from four

strands: ‘muddled perceptions, stifled communications, disappointed

expectations, paranoid reactions’.

All four strands were present in the

Richard E. Neustadt, Alliance Politics (New York / London: Columbia University Press,

1970), 56.

young and inexperienced military coalition that ranged its forces against

the Central Powers in August 1914. The temporary nature of the coali-

tion was unremarkable, because all military coalitions change with chan-

ging circumstances. They are constituted either for offensive or for

defensive purposes, and the partners support each other practically

(with men and munitions), financially and morally, thus ensuring that

in combination each might survive longer than in isolation. Clausewitz

was sure that coalitions were the ‘proper means to resist a superior

power’. ‘What better way is there?’, he asked rhetorically in 1803, at a

time when French power in Europe was at its height and it required a

coalition to bring Napoleon down.

The great benefit of mutual support in any coalition relationship is

attenuated by a number of problems. They include questions of sover-

eignty; the reconciliation of different, if not actually conflicting, interests;

personal and power relationships; language; and the management of

unilateral action by one coalition partner which might be seen by one or

more of the others as dangerous to the com bined endeavour. All these

coalition problems were present in the Franco-British relationship which

sought to overcome the habits of ten centuries of enmity and to unite in

the face of the common danger posed by German militarism.

Coalition solidarity is often difficult to maintain, because one of the

most corrosive problems facing its members is that most destructive of

emotions, suspicion. The fear that one member might leave the group

and come to an arrangement with the enemy, to the disadvantage of those

remaining, is ever present. Thus French fears of the failu re of Russian

support, for example, contributed to France’s decision to accept the risks

of war in July/August 1914; and Britain was so afraid that French political

instability would lead to a ministry that might make peace with Germany

that London was reluctant to quit Salonika despite wishing to do so. Fears

were widely expressed among the French that Britain was deliberately

prolonging the war because of the economic profits that they believed

were being made. Such suspicions led to, but were not allayed by, the

agreement, made but one month after the outbreak of war, that none of

the three Entente partners should conclude a separate peace.

Given the lack of any history of harmonious relationship between the

Entente powers, it is not surprising that the question of who was to lead

the Entente predominated and bedevilled relations. Despite enormou s

manpower reserves, Russia was too backward economically and too dis-

tant from the main theatre of the war to pretend to the title of coalition

Carl von Clausewitz, Historical and Political Writings (ed. and trans. Peter Paret and Daniel

Moran) (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992), 238.

2 Victory through Coalition