Haig's Post War 'Rewards' ?

[Guest]

I think it was not a matter simply of the troops - in fact the troops per se were not the problem: tremendous potential. The problem, surely, was the inexperience up the rank structure, which impacted on everything else.

I wouldn't disagree, but surely this was also experienced by the French and German Armies.

That this was a factor, some 18 months into the war is largely a reflection on the small size of the original standing Army (again a political decision going back decades) and the horrendous attrition in 1914-15. If one buys the arguments that high casualties were an inevitable part of continental wars, the political decision of committing a small Army to such an enormous task becomes central to the subsequent problems. One might reasonably argue that Haig's challenges had their origins in the pre-war period and the demands of an Imperial strategy. The original plan was that it would take 6 months to bring the TF up to the required standards and also train a New Army. It seems to took at least three times longer and arguably more; the standards required were constantly rising, so the training was chasing a moving target.

Slightly related to this is the top-heaviness of British infantry battalions - arguably over-loaded in 1914 with highly motivated young officers who were systematically destroyed in 1914 and 1915. If one could try and identify a factor that had disproportionate repercussions, the rapid destruction of the leadership at Battalion, Company and Platoon level might be one. The 1914 Star and 1914-15 Star Officers' medal rolls, when populated with casualty data are a very depressing read. It was probably the same for the NCOs, however the data is much harder to pin down.

It is interesting that the critical juncture of deciding British strategy for 1916 coincided with conscription and the step-change in commissioning men from the ranks. From Feb 1916 the Army effectively stopped commissions by patronage and mined the ranks of NCOs for its officer material which effectively robbed Peter to pay Paul. It would be interesting to see a study of the command vacuum left by the departing NCOs for Officer training. In battles where command and control were paramount and communication was done within eyesight and earshot, I would imagine that the role of junior NCOs was a fairly critical part of the chain of command. MG

[Guest]

Thanks for the responses, Martin. May I make a point about the casualty figures above? The figures, which are essentially deaths per day of battle, seem a bit misleading though I appreciate they are "ball park figures" in bracketed dates. There seems to have been more continuous action after March 21st than July 1st and a rough count of British battalions seeing days in action gives 349 for 1-15/7/16 and 602 for 21/3 - 5/4/18. That would indicate a much lower casualty rate for the latter period in terms of deaths per battalion per action day.

Short Version: If the BEF sat in their trenches and did not engage in offensive operations they still lost tens of thousands of men and hundreds of thousands of casualties.

Long version: I am not sure one can look at it as 'deaths per battalion' or 'casualties per battalion' without an enormous amount of 'analysis-paralysis' of which units were engaged on which days. Jame's Battles and Engagements of the British Armies in France and Flanders 1914-1918 (based on the Battlefield Nomenclature Committee Report and the subsequent Battle Honours), identifies

The Battles of the Somme: - 54 Infantry Divisions and 2 Cavalry Divisions

The German Offensive: - 43 Infantry Divisions and 3 Cavalry Divisions.

The extent to how many divisions, brigades or battalions were engaged on each day would be quite complex to calculate. As an example I have tried to do this exercise for the Somme and none of the published detailed studies can agree on which units were engaged, even on the 1st July. The variance is very large which perhaps indicates just how difficult it is to quantify. It is impossible to try and reconstruct from the diaries as the majority of battalions failed to record the figures. Quite recently I went through every Battalion, Brigade, Divisional and A&QMG diary to attempt this and I am pretty convinced it is impossible to rebuild, so we are left with the OH data which does not provide breakdowns by days except for 1st July.

I take a far more simple view: that the much maligned Haig was C-in-C for both periods and these were by far the most dominant episodes during these dates (casualties were taken elsewhere in France and Belgium at the same time) but the total fatal casualties were in the same order of magnitude. The CWGC data consolidates all fatalities in France, not just the Somme or the area of the German Offensive, so there will be some distortions.

I don't doubt for a second that the 1st Jul was more costly, but it was part of a long campaign. Note that the data is not adjusted. A defender should have a natural advantage and should (in theory) make an attacker pay the price. This is not factored into the data. I am not sure how one would do that without a high degree of subjectivity.

The comparisons are subjective of course, however a number of authors have attempted to compare the Somme and Passchendaele with battles from different wars such as the Normandy Landings. This particular comparison was Hankey's who was highlighting the human cost of the largest offensive and largest defensive battles in an attempt to mitigate some of the criticism levelled at Haig. Given Hankey was present at every discussion, and thought it worth highlighting, it seemed quite relevant as we can safely assume this was discussed by the War Cabinet at the time. I was simply trying to quantify it in broad terms.

Any mistakes are mine. MG

Edited for typos.

[squirrel]

I think it was not a matter simply of the troops - in fact the troops per se were not the problem: tremendous potential. The problem, surely, was the inexperience up the rank structure, which impacted on everything else. Insufficient quality NCOs - in the sense of battle experience; insufficient quality platoon and company commanders, with battlefield experience; insufficient quality battalion commanders, ibid; insufficient quality brigade commanders, brigade majors and staff captains, ibid; insufficient experienced divisional commanders (one of Haig's bugbears), ibid; insufficient quality Corps commanders and, very importantly, their staffs ibid; there was a chronic lack of major battlefield experience at all levels and in all arms (notably important, of course, the gunners, with the added issue of problems of numbers of suitable guns and suitable fuses). I think this is what he meant.

From my post #198 - "Also bear in mind that any man could make decisions, or not make decisions, resulting in the death of other men and this goes for every rank from the humble Private up to Field Marshal". Lack of experience at all levels as Nigel says.

[nigelcave]

I wouldn't disagree, but surely this was also experienced by the French and German Armies.

Quite; I agree. However:

1. The French and German armies were both continental, conscript armies - vastly bigger than the pre war British army and much more concentrated geographically as well. Joffre had the luxury, as it were, of being able to fire corps and divisional etc commanders on the grand scale in 1914: very difficult for the British and for some months, if not years after the war began.

2. The French and Germans had already been fighting huge battles, compared to the British, prior to the Somme. Thus there was already this 'leaven' of experience which the British quite simply lacked on 1 July 1916 and for a few months into the fighting.

3. Similarly both of these armies had more of the right sort of equipment - particularly as regards artillery and its ammunition - than the British; and, perforce, men who were more experienced in its use.

I am not in any way trying to 'justify' the situation, it is just that is where things were and I think it is to this that Haig was referring when he was wanting more time to train his men. After all, many had been in the army fro getting on for two years by the time that the Somme opened and had had plenty of training (how useful discuss - another topic, perhaps) but relatively few of them had any experience of putting that training into the reality of a major action. The French and German formations, by and large, had.

[Guest]

More relevant research and a particularly interesting article can be found in "Facing Armageddon:the First World War Experience" edited by Hugh Cecil and peter H Liddle. The relevant chapter is;

"British Decision Making 1917: Lloyd George, the Generals and Passchendaele" by Trevor Wilson and Robin Prior. It opens;

"It is part of the mythology of the First World War that Britain's military strategy was determined not by its responsible political leaders but by the military command. In this view there were always far sighted civilians in and out of Government proposing a more fruitful and imaginative way of conducting the war than that adopted. Their insights availed to nothing. The nation's military chiefs always secured the last word...... There is no warrant for this view. At every stage the fundamental decisions about Britain's involvement in this war and the manner of its participation were reached in accord with orthodox constitutional practice. That is they were made with the nations's civilian rulers after consultation (where appropriate) with their service chiefs"

It covers much of the vital ground of the arguments in the Haig debate and explains in detail the mechanism by which decisions were made and who was ultimately responsible. It also addresses the question of why the political executive allowed the military strategy to run in the face of mounting casualties. One pertinent quote of Lloyd George;

" Haig does not care how many men he loses. he just squanders the lives of these boys. I mean to save some of them in the future. .... I am their trustee"

Wilson and Prior make the wry observation that;

"Lloyd George would still be Prime Minister six months later when British troops went over the top on the first day of Third Ypres and three and a half months after that when the campaign came to its miserable conclusion on Passchendaele Ridge. It is unlikely that the boys whose trustee Lloyd George had declared himself to be were profoundly conscious of any attempts made by him to preserve their lives - where, that is, they remained conscious at all"

Well worth reading. MG

[phil andrade]

Considering only the death statistics is rather meaningless, isn't it? What does the total loss of human resource, in killed, wounded and captured, tell us?

The vast majority of the wounded and captured lived to come home and tell the tale. The killed " paid the ultimate price".

Forgive this statement of the bleeding obvious, but it does impinge on how people perceive the record of a commander : it certainly accounts for a very strong emotional reaction, and this accounts for much of the opprobrium about Haig.

A quarter of a million casualties in one series of battles ; a quarter of a million in another. In the one case, a third of that quarter million die ; in the other, only one fifth of them die. The difference will, I think, make a big impact on how people perceive the battles, and the men who commanded.

Phil (PJA)

[US Cavalry Trooper]

While we're comparing loss of life on the Somme in July 1916 compared with that of March 1918, let it be suggested that more German soldiers were killed by Haig's men in the first couple of weeks of the Kaiserslacht, than the number of British troops killed by the Germans in the first two weeks of the Somme.

I say " suggested" because I'm not sure ; but if pressed, I would take a bet on it.

It also serves to remind us that Haig was not uniquely profligate in the lives of his men ; and he certainly was not callous.

Phil (PJA)

Phil, Thanks very much for pointing out the subject of German casualties. This critical information is too often omitted in the discussion of allied losses.

[speake]

I don't think I'm naive by putting the number of casualties of The Somme into perspective by comparing it to some of the US Civil War battles. Then, the battlefields were more compact and the action occurred over a shorter timeframe (Gettysburg, Chickamauga, Spotsylvania and Chancellorsville), and the number of causalities as a percentage of the fighting forces involved were horrific—and the chances of surviving wounds was much, much less. I believe the US has settled its internal debate about the costs in men and tragedy for both sides. It has reconciled the errors of leadership and mistakes. It acknowledges and analyses the errors generals did on both sides BUT as a nation it is dedicated to seeing something like that never happen again. No accusations. No finger-pointing or blaming. Lincoln summed up that attitude at Gettysburg. So, I don't understand this current debate about The Somme and looking for someone to blame. It was No-win regardless of who was in charge
Let the abuse begin!

[phil andrade]

No abuse will come from me.

Haig and Grant are often compared.

Huge casualties and relentless fighting are associated with both.

Had the US engaged in another civil war twenty one years later, I suspect that the casualties of the Wilderness and Cold Harbor would have aroused a greater storm of resentment than they actually did....and in the event the very name of the latter place still evokes a chilling memory in popular perception.

Phil (PJA)

[keithmroberts]

We have had this debate several times, as have historians. The "casual" attitude to life that I saw some pages back has been well and truly exploded by academic historians as well as in the GWF on several occasions. Britain started the war with an army designed to manage an empire, and while other powers had troops elsewhere, I suppose especially the French in North Africa, their perspective, planning and training was surely always intended for a European war.

Hankey among others shows how much British commanders worked to the requirements of government, and to separate or blame any British commander for the policies of government is surely ridiculous. Earl Haig rose to a challenge that French could not handle, he had to operate the largest task faced by any British commander in history, without as was pointed out any having previous experience of the new scale of industrialised warfare. We can count casualties, and respect every one of them, but there has been no serious suggestion that any other commander, working to a government in London, and committed to work with allies would have achieved more, and many would probably have achieved much less.

A commander accepts responsibility. Haig did. We can argue about the detail or policy, much of which was dictated by political requirements, logistics, and the quality and development of supporting staff. The two latter clearly contributed to ultimate victory as the administration of civilian and military life in the UK slowly rose to the challenge. It is clear that Haig encouraged, supported and used developing technologies as they became available while shouldering the immense responsibility that he was charged with.

Undoubtedly he was not perfect, who ever has been, but he accepted responsibility, and with the support and sometimes handicap of governments at home commanded our forces to victory. Disregarding the cynical rubbish published by Lloyd George, his main critics seem to have come from the poets of the late twenties, and the wave of sixties historians. The former had experience at a sharp end, but never at a strategic level and the latter did not have access to the documentation at all levels that is now available and that has largely demolished their views.

I don't have the time or the will to devote to the statistics, although they are clearly interesting, not least when we count the human cost of war, but, and in no sense casually, I can't see that the "butcher" argument retains a shred of credibility. It seems to be supported these days primarily on an emotional level. Emotion is fine so far as it goes, and my family were fortunate to escape with no fatalities, but two men wounded, one of whom was afflicted by the effects of the war until his death in the 1960's, but the discussion, without ever becoming "casual" is about a war launched by government, and in which service personnel at all levels had to deliver the result required and pay the cost.

Haig has been demonstrated to be a general who accepted the greatest burden, and saw it to a successful conclusion. The respect shown him by the men who served him is surely as important as the revulsion of the poets generation. Whether he was the greatest general, the best or whatever is surely immaterial. He was the general who rose to the task, and professionally delivered what was required of him in a struggle of a unique sort.

Keith

[Steven Broomfield]

The vast majority of the wounded and captured lived to come home and tell the tale. The killed " paid the ultimate price".

Forgive this statement of the bleeding obvious, but it does impinge on how people perceive the record of a commander : it certainly accounts for a very strong emotional reaction, and this accounts for much of the opprobrium about Haig.

Phil (PJA)

Sorry, Phil, but that's not helpful: in the GW, casualty evacuation and treatment, while better than in, say Wellington's time, were still poor when considered by today's standards. A man wounded in Afghanistan could be n Birmingham receiving top medical care within a matter of hours. A man wounded on the Somme might lie in No Man's Land for days.

If successfully ut into the chain, a man in the GW would then run the risk of gas gangrene, shock, or any of half a hundred ways of dying that we now would consider minor problems. In 1944, we had rudimentary penicillin, air evacuation and far better surgical processes, so a man wounded in Normandy had a far better chance of survival.

The obsession you show with death count is, I'm afraid, a red herring: the casualty rate is more important if we're using losses as a guide to a general's capability.

[phil andrade]

Death count is not a red herring if we're trying to understand why British people are unable - or should it be unwilling ? - to view Haig's record with equanimity.

Bear in mid, Steve, that more than eighty per cent of BEF men who were wounded in France and Flanders were returned to duty of some kind.

About one in every fourteen died from his wounds.

A very good record, I would think, bearing in mind the intensity of the fighting and the power of the weapons.

I feel uncomfortable with your disapproval of my obsession....I can see how morbid it must appear. How can we appreciate the impact of the Great War unless we countenance that it was an exercise in mutual slaughter ?

To my mind, the arithmetic of killing and the Great War are synonymous ...I do try hard to get some kind of grip on that arithmetic.

I think it matters : the historiography certainly demonstrates that....and never more so that when we're discussing Haig's generalship.

Phil (PJA)

[Guest]

There's an ongoing casualty count per day featured on the Western Front Association website, with a spreadsheet you can download (up to Jan 1916 so far) of casualties. Click

Mike

[Chris_Baker]

The vast majority of the wounded and captured lived to come home and tell the tale. The killed " paid the ultimate price".

Forgive this statement of the bleeding obvious, but it does impinge on how people perceive the record of a commander ...

The effect upon public perception of a commander was not really my point. I was alluding to his ability to wage war being affected by the total loss of human material, whether dead, wounded or captured.

But actually I question whether public perception was, as you suggest, largely driven by the lists of dead. Just look at any full-page casualty list in the "Times". It shocks me even now, having seen too many such pages. It surely must have shocked the 14-18 generation even more. But 90% of the page lists the wounded; the public would see the wounded; very large numbers of soldiers were of course themselves wounded. And they, surely, were opinion formers.

[phil andrade]

Thank you, Mike. This will be most helpful.

A brief glimpse indicates that these are deaths only...again, we're in the realm of conflating casualties with deaths.

Phil (PJA)

[Steven Broomfield]

There's an ongoing casualty count per day featured on the Western Front Association website, with a spreadsheet you can download (up to Jan 1916 so far) of casualties. Click

Mike

Good God! Is the Great war really to be reduced to a total number of dead? Does it have no other measure by which it can be judged?

[Guest]

It is important to understand that Hankey's memoirs were published in 1961 - the same year as Charles Chilton's radio play the Long Long Trail which spawned the first stage production of Oh! What a lovely War in 1963. The timing of his memoirs is interesting as the introduction indicates that he had thought long and hard before publishing them - 30 years after he first considered the idea...... I wonder if the timing had anything to do with changing public perceptions of the Great War during the early 1960s and whether his memoirs were intended as a corrective.

I have highlighted fatalities rather than casualties simply because that seems to be the simplistic focus of many of Haig's detractors, particularly those in the media who, as we know, often conflate fatalities and casualties. The comparison of fatalities based on Hankey's criterion is simply a retort to those who criticise Haig for the fatal human consequences of his offensive operations. This might indicate that Hankey felt his intended audience in 1961 was still focused on this aspect.

Casualties and fatalities are an occasionally unpleasant but necessary part of research into the Great War. To analyse a battle and its consequences without them would seem to rather miss important factors. However they are only one of many ways of measuring the consequences of battles. Most would agree that they are not the only measure and if used without context they can often lead to distorted perceptions. Stats need to be handled with extreme care. I often feel that casualties have to be discussed in order to get it over with and then the debate can move on. There are many other considerations in this particular debate One simple example is how fewer French casualties there were when the British Offensives drew German troops away from the French lines for example. It is impossible to calculate but perhaps illustrates how casualties and fatalities can not be used in isolation. It is rather more complex.

Dare I say, we have probably thrashed this aspect to death.

MG

[Steven Broomfield]

Dare I say, we have probably thrashed this aspect to death.

MG

Yes.

[squirrel]

Keith Roberts post #335 - spot on.

[PhilB]

You clairvoyant, Squirrel?

[squirrel]

Edited....

[PhilB]

To revert to the OP, I've been looking to see what USGrant was gifted by a grateful nation after winning the Civil War to see what our cousins' attitude was. Although he seemed not short of job offers, I've been unable to find any awards from the government. Any US members care to comment? What have I missed?

[Guest]

Good God! Is the Great war really to be reduced to a total number of dead? Does it have no other measure by which it can be judged?

I was simply adding a source of statistics for anyone who wishes to use it.

Mike

[phil andrade]

I was simply adding a source of statistics for anyone who wishes to use it.

Mike

And damned grateful I am for it, too.

Phil (PJA)

[Steven Broomfield]

I was simply adding a source of statistics for anyone who wishes to use it.

Mike

Not having a go at you, Mike. Sorry for any offence. I am just amazed at the obsession with dead people.

Incidentally, one of the "Great Captains" was Napoleon. He did a pretty fine job of killing lots of Frenchmen.