and British Intervention in the War
xv + 611 pages
Full bibliography, notes and index
Laminated card cover, 5¾" x 8¼"
ISBN 0 85958 690 1
Published 1999
 

The full text is available on-line at www.the-millstone.co.uk

• That Grey was more aware of what was settled by the secret military conversations than he pretended to be.
• That the situation created by the German naval programme gave Britain no option other than to evacuate the Mediterranean.
• That Anglo-French naval co-ordination and strategic planning remained chaotic.
• That the Cabinet could not have prevented Britain’s entry into the war; all they could have done was to prevent the formation of a coalition Government.
• That the pledge to France and consideration of British interests were the sole determinants of Britain’s entry.
• That the German promise in August 1914 not to attack the French coast was irrelevant.
• That, far from informing the German Government of the pledge given to Cambon as he claimed, Grey was determined to conceal this fact until Monday, 3 August.
• That the issue of Belgian neutrality was used in August 1914 to assuage consciences and prevent the formation of a coalition Government, but was not crucial to the decision to intervene.
• That the Continental policy, committing British troops to fight in Europe, was decided upon in August 1911 by a small inner circle of the Cabinet who knew precisely what it would entail.  

THE MILLSTONE
British Naval Policy in the Mediterranean, 1900-1914, the Commitment to France and British Intervention in the War

Introduction

On the morning of Wednesday, 20 December 1905, Major General James Grierson mounted his charger, settled his large frame in the saddle and commenced his constitutional ride in the crisp winter air of Hyde Park. As he trotted along Rotten Row another military figure on horseback came into view. The dapper, almost dandified, rider whose delicate features were accentuated by an ornate, waxed moustache was soon revealed to be Major Victor Jacques Marie Huguet, the French Military Attaché. It was, so Grierson claimed a few weeks later, a chance encounter. At most other times, Grierson’s word might have been accepted; however, with Germany engaged in a periodic bout of sabre-rattling, and with the threat of a Franco-German war over Morocco pervading the diplomatic atmosphere, the meeting was anything but a coincidence. Grierson, the Director of Military Operations at the War Office, had had a brilliant career, including a spell as Military Attaché in Berlin. Untypically, he spoke French ‘with ease and fluency,’ and, in the opinion of General Sir John French, ‘he used to astonish French soldiers by his intimate knowledge of the history of their regiments, which was far in excess of what they knew themselves.’ Feeling completely at ease in Grierson’s company, Huguet expressed the anxiety felt in Paris that Germany may soon attack. However, when Huguet then inquired about the current British war organization, Grierson alleged that he did no more than refer Huguet ‘to the Army List, which shows [the war organization] and actually gives the composition on mobilisation of a division which does not exist in peace.’ Huguet, apparently satisfied by this less than revealing answer, then inquired if the General Staff ‘had ever considered operations in Belgium’, to which Grierson replied that he himself had worked out such a plan of operations the previous spring, though only as a ‘strategical exercise’. And that, maintained Grierson, to the best of his recollection, ‘was all that passed between us’.

Grierson’s memory, which also put the date of the chance meeting ‘about the 16th or 18th December’, was conveniently faulty. As the French reports show, the Wednesday encounter was the first of two meetings and, far from simply referring Huguet to the Army List, Grierson in fact confirmed that up to 120,000 British troops would be available for Continental operations, although the force lacked the most up-to-date field artillery. Grierson also dismissed the Admiralty’s proposed plan of operations in the region of Schleswig-Holstein in the event of war as ridiculous. Encouraged by what he had heard, Huguet arranged to meet Grierson on the following day. At this subsequent meeting Grierson, effusive and indiscreet in equal measure, informed Huguet of the latest General Staff study which envisaged reinforcing the available British force with two divisions currently serving in the Mediterranean. Tactically, Grierson favoured operating in Belgium; however, when pressed, he admitted that the British force could land at Calais where it would ‘unite with the French forces, of whom it would, for example, form the left wing.’ Grierson then added a cautionary provision, which would become a familiar litany to the French: the General Staff deliberations should not be interpreted as prejudicing the decision which the British Government might take at any given moment.

This exchange was neatly to encapsulate the sorry history of Anglo-French naval and military planning during the following eight years. Plans — detailed plans — could be formulated; plans which would allow of no last-minute tinkering, and of no last-minute faint-heartedness. But these plans were not to be put into operation until a political decision had been made. Events on the battlefield would have to await Cabinet deliberations in London. However, with the lack of overt Cabinet scrutiny before the war (neither the Foreign Secretary, Sir Edward Grey, nor the pre-war Liberal Prime Ministers, Campbell-Bannerman and Asquith, showed any interest in considerations of strategy) assumptions tended to be made — assumptions which could never be admitted. It was assumed by the General Staff that the British Army would operate in Northern France or Belgium; but this could never be admitted. It was assumed that, if the British withdrew their battleships from the Mediterranean at the same time as the France transferred theirs into the Mediterranean, that France would undertake to guard British interests in return for an implied guarantee of her Northern Coasts; but this could never be admitted. It was assumed that, so long as France was not the aggressor, British support would be forthcoming in a Continental War; but this could never be admitted. No wonder Grierson’s memory failed him.

This need to disguise the actual extent of Anglo-French military and naval co-operation would be evident throughout the pre-war period. As a result of Grierson’s activities (and a simultaneous, though independent, series of meetings instigated by the Secretary of the Committee of Imperial Defence) Grey, the incoming Foreign Secretary following the fall of the Conservative administration, acquiesced in January 1906 in the commencement of officially recognized though informal Anglo-French staff talks. It has always been accepted that Grey then left the military and the naval planners to get on, with a minimum of political interference; this was simply accomplished by virtue of Grey’s own lack of interest and by his deliberate action in not informing the majority of his Cabinet colleagues that the secret talks had commenced. Such an interpretation has been emphasized by Grey’s own comments. When, in April 1911, to protect his own position Grey was forced to acknowledge that the ‘military experts then convened [in January 1906]’, he added, ‘What they settled I never knew’. There is evidence however that, in so far as military planning was concerned, Grey knew more of what was being decided than he admitted to (with regard to naval planning Grey’s genuine ignorance was more a product of the fact that there was no naval planning to speak of, merely a succession of half-baked schemes).

While Grierson and subsequent Directors of Military Operations, particularly Sir Henry Wilson, further integrated military strategy with their French counterparts, despite the official go-ahead from Grey in January 1906, Anglo-French naval co-ordination and strategic planning remained chaotic. The blame for this can be placed squarely at the door of that most colourful of First Sea Lords, Sir John Arbuthnot Fisher. An abysmal strategist and a born centralizer, Fisher’s undoubted gifts in other areas were balanced by his refusal to countenance the formation of a naval war staff. Similarly, the saga of joint war planning by the Admiralty and War Office from 1905 till 1914 exhibits a depressingly marked failure to co-operate. In the early years of the century, while the Army was tarnished by its performance in the Boer War, the Navy, overwhelmingly strong and with no threat yet to appear on the horizon, held sway in the nascent Defence Committee. Within a few years the position was reversed. While the War Office adapted to new realities, the Admiralty under Fisher remained locked into a narrow range of strategic options whose common denominator was their impractical, if not suicidal, nature. During 1905 the Admiralty and War Office could not agree on a joint plan of operations in a future war. When the War Office version prevailed, Fisher took his bat home. Then, in 1908, he thoroughly confused the French with his invitation for them to assume overall control in the Mediterranean. Fisher’s excesses resulted in his opinions being discarded, even when he had a legitimate grievance: ‘Are we or are we not going to send a British Army to fight on the Continent as quite distinct and apart from coastal raids and seizures of islands, etcetera, which the Navy dominate?’ he complained in 1909. The accusation was a valid one; it went unanswered just the same. Unfortunately, Fisher’s faults were also evident in his successor, Admiral Sir Arthur Wilson.

So long as the German challenge remained a threat on paper (and Fisher was fortunate that the launch of Dreadnought severely disrupted the German ship-building programme) there could be no real winner between the Admiralty and General Staff whenever strategic options were debated, although greater weight was given to the General Staff appraisal. By 1910, with Fisher’s departure and the German naval programme now a reality, it had come to a showdown. With the coming of the next major crisis, the Admirals and the Generals would have to fight it out until one of them won. The date for the bout was 23 August 1911; the setting, a meeting of the Committee of Imperial Defence to which only the inner core of the Cabinet were invited. Both protagonists were called Wilson — General Sir Henry Wilson and Admiral Sir Arthur Wilson. There the similarity ended. The one fluent, confident, a master of his brief with a detailed and convincing answer for every question; the other hesitant, inarticulate, unsure of himself in cross-examination. By the time the meeting had finished late that afternoon the naval view of how a future war would be fought had been comprehensively demolished. Admiral Wilson had gone down for the count. From that moment onward, despite some Cabinet ructions by the Radical wing of the Liberal party, tacit approval was given to the scheme by which a minimum of four of the six regular divisions of the British Army would operate on the left wing of the French Army. Subsequently, any proper discussion of the momentous new strategy would become submerged in the minutiae of troop movements, railway timetables, shipping requirements. The Continental commitment, for that was what it was, like the debates in the first winter of the war leading to the Dardanelles Campaign, had developed a momentum of its own. Grey acknowledged his powerlessness to control the situation: it ‘would create consternation’, he declared soon after the C.I.D. meeting, ‘if we forbade our military experts to converse with the French. No doubt these conversations and our speeches have given an expectation of support. I do not see how that can be helped.’ Nevertheless, it remains the case that the Continental policy, committing British troops to fight in Europe, was decided upon in August 1911 by a small inner circle of the Cabinet who knew precisely what it would entail.

Another signpost on the road to war was Churchill’s transfer to the Admiralty late in 1911. In response to the proposed new German Navy Law, one of Churchill’s first acts after settling in to the position he coveted was to propose, in February 1912, the withdrawal of the Mediterranean battleships. The German initiative had, in Churchill’s view, rendered ‘the formation of an additional Battle Squadron in Home waters necessary. We cannot afford to keep fully commissioned battleships abroad during these years of tension,’ Churchill argued, as the first days of war ‘would require the maximum immediate development of naval power in the North Sea and the Channel.’ The proposal by the new First Lord of the Admiralty was a further indication of British naval overstretch in the face of new challenges and proof of Admiral Sir John Fisher’s dictum, that ‘We cannot have everything or be strong everywhere’. With the German building programme continuing apace, and with dreadnoughts being constructed in Italy and Austria-Hungary, British command of the Mediterranean could not be guaranteed by the force of elderly battleships stationed at Malta in 1912. The French meanwhile realized that their original plan, to base the main part of their fleet on the Atlantic coast so as the defeat Germany first before then entering the Mediterranean was no longer tenable. They could, naturally, have reacted to altered strategic conditions by unilaterally moving their fleet into the Mediterranean; much better, however, if the move could be made at such a time that it appeared contingent upon the planned British withdrawal of the Mediterranean.

Although Churchill’s initial scheme, to denude the Mediterranean almost completely, was over-ruled and a compromise force of British battle-cruisers was to be stationed at Malta from 1912, it was still open to the French to argue, as they did successfully in 1914, that the transfer of their battle squadrons was dependent upon the British evacuation and would not have been taken without the presumption of British assistance to protect the now denuded Atlantic and Channel coasts of France. In London the Cabinet fought against this presumption. As Churchill continually insisted, ‘The present [naval] dispositions represent the best arrangements that either power can make independently. It is not true that the French are occupying the Mediterranean to oblige us. They cannot be effective in both theatres and they resolve to be supreme in one.’ Ultimately, this battle of words was lost. Semantics had been overtaken by reality. The situation created by the German, Italian and Austro-Hungarian naval programmes, and the failure to reach an accommodation with Berlin over the limitation of warship building, gave Britain no option other than to denude the Mediterranean. And this, despite the specific injunction contained in the exchange of letters between Grey and Paul Cambon, the French Ambassador, in November 1912, was generally regarded as part of a reciprocal arrangement with the French.

The heat which had built up during Sunday 2 August 1914 succeeded eventually in setting off a series of heavy downpours, one of which resulted in breaking up the meeting of Socialists in Trafalgar Square. The cause for which they had congregated was already a lost one. Earlier that afternoon, the Foreign Secretary had informed Paul Cambon, of the decision which had just been arrived at by, or rather, had been forced upon, the British Cabinet after days of rancorous debate. Despite not yet being at war with Germany, Grey declared that if the German fleet ‘came into the Channel or entered the North Sea … with the object of attacking the French coasts or the French navy and of harassing French merchant shipping, the British fleet would intervene … in such a way that from that moment Great Britain and Germany would be in a state of war.’ It was to be Grey’s defence, both at the time and after, that this assurance, ‘did not bind us to go to war with Germany unless the German Fleet took the action indicated, but it did give a security to France that would enable her to settle the disposition of her own Mediterranean Fleet.’ The disposition of the Mediterranean Fleet had, in fact, been settled in 1912. This was clearly just another example of Grey’s strategic ignorance — or was it? It continued to suit Grey to deny any awareness of what had been decided by the military and naval planners. Grey would also claim that the German Government was made aware of the pledge; in fact, Grey was determined to conceal this fact until the afternoon of Monday, 3 August. For Cambon, when he was informed of the pledge, the feeling was similar to that which would be experienced by Churchill twenty-seven years later when news was brought to him of the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor. ‘So we had won after all!’ was Churchill’s immediate response in December 1941. In August 1914 Cambon also knew precisely what Grey’s declaration meant: ‘The game was won’, he subsequently stated. ‘A great country does not make war by halves.’
What led to the giving of this pledge? Was there an obligation on Britain’s part, or merely a commitment, moral or otherwise, to intervene in certain circumstances? Grey was to insist in his memoirs that the promise to the French ‘did not pledge us to war.’ The Foreign Secretary was, however, wrong — once the promise was made, as Cambon appreciated, British entry into the war was certain. Despite this, a group within the Cabinet would then spend the remainder of the afternoon and evening of Sunday 2 August desperately searching for an issue around which they could group, and which would provide a more convenient excuse for British entry into the war than one based upon a moral commitment to France, of which the public was generally unaware; that excuse was to be Belgian neutrality. However, despite protestations to the contrary, the issue of Belgian neutrality was a blind: it was used to assuage consciences and to prevent the formation of a coalition Government but it was not crucial to the British decision for intervention.

In what follows I will attempt to show that two circumstances and one overriding fact guaranteed British entry in the war in August 1914: the two circumstances were the secret Anglo-French military and naval conversations, and the naval position in the Mediterranean. The overriding fact was the consideration of British interests. The problem of contending with the superior numbers of the German Army was not going to be solved immediately by French planners merely by the dispatch of a British Expeditionary Force. Yet the French realized that if one British soldier set foot on French soil, others would follow. Indeed, so confident were they that there was no attempt made to conceal the intention. For example, General Sir Henry Wilson spent the afternoon of 14 January 1910 at the École Supérieure de Guerre being lectured by General Foch on the functioning of the college. With the lecture completed, Wilson and Foch then ‘talked at great length of our combined action in Belgium’ in the event of a war with Germany. ‘What’, Wilson inquired of Foch, ‘would you say was the smallest British military force that would be of an practical assistance to you in the event of a contest such as we have been considering?’ Foch did not hesitate: ‘One single private soldier’, he replied instantly, ‘and we would take good care that he was killed.’ Furthermore, with British military support assured, France could then count upon the full might of the Royal Navy.

With British command of the Mediterranean in doubt, the French, similarly over-extended, were unable to protect both their Atlantic and Mediterranean coastlines. From strategic necessity came political expediency. The convergence of British and French interests, which had commenced with the signing of the Entente Cordiale in 1904, had continued gradually until 1911, after which it accelerated. By 1914 British and French interests were inseparable. Although, between 1906 and 1911, the main push for closer Anglo-French military co-operation was provided by the French (Cambon would become a familiar sight at the Foreign Office in times of crisis), a change was evident from 1911 following the most serious of the many pre-war crises, when a German gunboat was dispatched to the sleepy African port of Agadir. In 1906, in the aftermath of the First Moroccan Crisis, the German naval challenge, which had not yet made any serious inroads, was dealt a huge blow by the launch of HMS Dreadnought. ‘We can protect ourselves of course,’ Grey declared emphatically at the time, ‘for we are more supreme at sea than we have ever been.’ By 1911, and the Second Moroccan Crisis, the Cabinet had already weathered a first class naval scare when, in 1909, it was thought, erroneously, that Germany would achieve parity with the Royal Navy in dreadnoughts within a matter of years. ‘Splendid isolation’ was no longer a feasible option. The consistent theme running through the deliberations in London in the wake of the Agadir crisis was fear of French weakness and how this would impact upon the British position. This would not have mattered so much had the Royal Navy maintained its earlier lead over the German High Seas Fleet. Following the very real scare, the conclusion to be drawn from the 1911 crisis was obvious to some: the Entente had outlived its usefulness; it was time to replace it with an alliance. But the Cabinet could not bring itself to accept this conclusion; heads remained buried in the sand.

When war erupted on the Continent in the summer of 1914 the Cabinet suddenly had to ask itself some searching questions — questions which should have been posed years previously. Was there at the very least on the British side a moral commitment to France? If so, could the Cabinet have refused to honour it? Did this commitment (whether moral or not) entail an obligation? Was the unwritten pledge to France to be the sole determinant of British intervention in the war or was the consideration of British interests to be paramount? Did the two in fact coincide? As the great Continental armies mobilized, the Cabinet deliberated, at once destroying Henry Wilson’s scheme for simultaneous Anglo-French mobilization. To the Cabinet debates must be added some further, more speculative, queries: Realistically, could Britain have remained out of the war? If the commitment had been formalized, and replaced by a specific obligation, would the same decisions have been taken in the last week of July 1914? Was the outcome of the British refusal to conduct military conversations openly with the French a lack of British influence upon French war planning, with the result that the disastrous French Plan XVII went unchallenged? Could the Cabinet have prevented Britain’s entry into the war or, with the unrelenting pressure of ‘events’, could they have done no more than to prevent the formation of a coalition Government? What bearing did operational orders issued unilaterally by Churchill and the Admiralty in the final days of peace have on Cabinet deliberations?

But the questions do not end there — how had this situation arisen in the first place? Symptomatic of the Liberal administration from 1906 to 1914 was its ambivalent attitude, with certain key exceptions (principally Churchill and Haldane), to the overall issue of defence. This same attitude explains in part Grey’s hesitancy in divulging the opening of Anglo-French military conversations. In the political culture of the day, the General Staff and Admiralty were given a free hand — too free a hand — in the belief that they knew best. Exacerbating this, in so far as the Admiralty was concerned, was the genuine sense of awe in which Fisher was held. This allowed his malign influence in the question of a Naval War Staff and his refusal to co-operate with the War Office on joint planning to go unchecked. In view of Fisher’s early pronouncements in favour of a Naval War Staff, what explains his subsequent antipathy? Fisher’s legacy was to be a distinctly unhelpful one. With serious naval war planning virtually non-existent, the strategic impetus shifted by default to the War Office. Would the General Staff have won the battle in the C.I.D. on 23 August 1911 quite so easily had the First Sea Lords been Fisher since 1904 and then Wilson since 1910? These faults could have been put right following Churchill’s transfer to the Admiralty in 1911; however, Churchill had faults of his own.

Naval policy, which could have been simplified if a formal Anglo-French convention had been concluded, was instead complicated by the conditional nature of joint planning, by the emergence of new challenges, and by the financial priorities of the Liberal administration. The response was to be decidedly ad hoc, so that the Government reacted to events and not in anticipation of them — this helps to explain the numerous defence scares which punctuated the political scene. Furthermore, without a Naval War Staff before 1912, and then with an emasculated one until the outbreak of war, there was no systematic approach to the problem of overstretch. So, was the stationing of the battle cruisers at Malta after 1912 an inspired compromise or an admission that these ships had no part to play in the North Sea? Was the 1909 German dreadnought scare a ploy to prod an administration perceived as financially stringent and intent on diverting funds to social causes? Were the Anglo-German naval talks of 1912 bound to fail in the face of German and British suspicion and French unease and pressure? What was the rationale behind the Austro-Hungarian dreadnought building programme? Was Churchill correct in his assertion that the French and British moves into and out of the Mediterranean were made independently of each other? What effect did the German spy in the Russian Embassy in London have on naval planning in Berlin? Was there, as Nicholas Lambert asserts, a secret policy of ‘substitution’ in place at the outbreak of the war by which dreadnought construction would give way to an increased number of submarines?

Indeed, Lambert goes further, and argues the case for a ‘major revision of our understanding of pre-1914 British naval policy.’ Basing this finding on his own research and that of Jon Sumida, Lambert claims that ‘the strategic thought of Britain’s naval leadership has been fundamentally misrepresented. In addition, a reappraisal of naval thinking is almost certain to produce significant changes in the understanding of British defense policy before the First World War. There must be serious doubts over not only the accuracy of the currently accepted historical narrative but also the methodology used to produce it.’ Was the substitution policy, if it can be dignified by that name, a genuine shift in tactics or merely a possible reaction to British dreadnought preponderance in the North Sea? Is Lambert’s contention supported by the evidence? Although he used the excuse of increased Italian and Austrian building to help justify an increase in the Naval Estimates, what was Churchill’s own view of the Mediterranean situation? If answers can be provided to these questions, it may then be possible to decide whether British interests in the Mediterranean were capable of being safeguarded adequately, or whether, by virtue of the obligations it entailed and the threats posed elsewhere, Britain’s continuing presence in the Middle Sea was, in the words of a noted nineteenth writer on naval affairs, a ‘Millstone Round the Neck of England’.
 

Please be aware that this is a long document.

Summary and Conclusion
The Moral Commitment

I have contended in the preceding chapters that, on occasion, what matters is not the so-called facts (for these, in themselves, are capable of differing interpretations depending upon the perspective of the viewer), but the perception of the facts by the various participants. Nowhere is this more apparent than in trying to answer the question of whether there was a moral commitment to France in August 1914 and, if so, how binding was it? Writing in 1911, the German General, Friedrich von Bernhardi, declared that ‘England can never be involved in a great continental European war against her will.’ It could not be argued that Britain went to war on 4 August 1914 with the Cabinet absolutely united. Indeed, the deep divisions of only a few days previously appeared, by Saturday 1 August, to have ruled out immediate British intervention. When, apparently against the odds, the Cabinet reluctantly came round to Grey’s position on Sunday, the accusations subsequently levelled by the likes of Loreburn and Ponsonby would reverberate and intensify, centring on the person of the Foreign Secretary. Grey, it was claimed, either actively, by encouraging Cambon and the French, or passively, by his failure to control the military and his unwillingness to impose himself upon his own permanent officials, was, at the very least, responsible for a moral commitment to France. And it was this commitment to France, rather than the obligation to Belgium, which first (and decisively) caused the Cabinet to shift from its non-interventionist stance.

This is a deceptively simplistic argument which must, in so far as Grey himself is concerned, be heavily qualified. Was the need for French diplomatic or military and naval support so great that Britain’s freedom of action was constrained? Would another Foreign Secretary have followed an altogether different line? Grey, who was, after all, not in office when the Anglo-French Entente was negotiated, was always loathe to enter into conversations unless pressed by the French. The requests for closer co-operation in 1906, 1908, 1911 and 1912 were all at the instigation of Paris. Furthermore, if not in 1906, certainly by the time of the Agadir crisis of 1911, Grey was in control of the Foreign Office and its officials rather than the reverse. The influence, for example, of Eyre Crowe has consistently been over-stated, while Nicolson was a spent force. Grey’s greatest failure was allegedly the free rein given to the military planners. Did he not appreciate the hostage to fortune he was creating, or did he in fact realize and not want to be confronted with the logic of the situation? A third interpretation is also available: that Grey knew more or less what the military planners were up to but, to protect his own position, feigned ignorance in the knowledge that, should France be threatened with unprovoked aggression, British interests alone would necessitate that she should be supported.

Two themes run consistently through pre-war Anglo-French relations: in an Entente, just as much as an alliance, the stronger partner is at the mercy of the weaker. The French were able to capitalize on the fact that Grey assumed office committed to the maintenance of the Entente. Any attempt by Grey to limit the military and naval conversations was met with the French charge that the Entente counted for nothing. The second theme is a corollary of the first: the British fear, which became pronounced after 1911, of French military weakness in a Franco-German conflict. It was widely believed at the time that a French defeat at the hands of Germany would be an unparalleled disaster for Britain. This fear was particularly acute following the dreadnought scare of 1909, when serious questions were raised regarding British naval supremacy. The certainty of 1906 had given way to doubt and anxiety. If France was successfully to be used as a buffer between Britain and Germany therefore, the French army had to be strong enough to hold back the German legions until such times as newly raised British divisions could be dispatched to reinforce the small Regular army. Grey had been warned in 1906 that ‘80,000 men with good guns is all we can put into the field in Europe to meet first class troops’, and this, he appreciated, would not ‘save France unless she can save herself.’ The perceived French weakness, and the German attempts to exploit it in Morocco, threatened not only to negate the very basis of the Entente — the settlement of colonial differences — but also to drag Britain into a Continental war. It would be a heavy price to pay for the avoidance of Anglo-French friction in North Africa unless there was some deeper rationale underlying the relationship.

The first German attempt to drive a wedge through the burgeoning Anglo-French Entente came as early as the spring of 1905, following the Kaiser’s visit to Tangier at the end of March, eight months before Grey acceded to the position of Foreign Secretary. Intent on fomenting trouble, on the evening of 10 June 1905 the German Chancellor, Prince Bülow, claimed to have proof that ‘England had made an offer to France to enter with her into an offensive and defensive alliance against Germany’, but that the French had refused.. The German accusation sent Lord Lansdowne, then the Foreign Secretary, and Thomas Sanderson, the Permanent Under-Secretary, scurrying to find evidence to refute the charge. Eventually (in the form of a dispatch from Lansdowne to Frank Bertie in Paris) Sanderson came upon a record of Lansdowne’s interview with the French Ambassador, Paul Cambon, on 17 May 1905. Lansdowne had then informed Cambon that: ‘ …our two governments should continue to treat one another with the most absolute confidence, should keep one another fully informed of everything which came to their knowledge, and should, as far as possible, discuss in advance any contingencies by which they might in the course of events find themselves confronted.’ This, Lansdowne supposed, ‘was the origin of the offensive and defensive alliance’ to which Bülow referred. Indeed, there is evidence that, following an expression of gratitude by Cambon on 24 May, Lansdowne realized that his statement had been conveniently misinterpreted by both Cambon and Delcassé who believed it to imply, if not an offer of alliance, that British support would be forthcoming in a Franco-German war. Lansdowne immediately attempted to put matters straight with Cambon, by repeating the declaration of the previous week, which had arisen, he maintained, during a discussion of ‘the attitude assumed by the German Gov[ernmen]t in Morocco and in other parts of the world’.

I do not know [Lansdowne added] that this account differs from that which you have given to M. Delcassé, but I am not sure that I succeeded in making quite clear to you our desire that there should be full and confidential discussion between the two Gov[ernmen]ts, not so much in consequence of some acts of unprovoked aggression on the part of another Power, as in anticipation of any complications to be apprehended during the somewhat anxious period through which we are at present passing.

Lansdowne had sought to place a limit upon the extent to which a ‘full and confidential discussion’ would commit either Government. Yet who was to say whether a heightening of the ‘somewhat anxious period’ would not result in an act of ‘unprovoked aggression’? The division between the two categories as framed by Lansdowne was, to all intents and purposes, invisible. Writing in 1922, Sanderson attempted further to refine the extent of the commitment by contending that Lansdowne had done no more than lay stress ‘in conversation on the need for frank and intimate communication and consultation with a view to harmonious action in opposition to any designs of Germany to acquire a port on the West coast of Morocco.’ However, this is nowhere made clear in the records of the conversations. There was never any intention, Sanderson alleged, ‘to supplement the Entente of 1904 by an agreement of the nature of the Franco-Russian Alliance’, although it was possible ‘that M. Cambon may have taken down in writing the phrases used by Lord Lansdowne’. The French desire to ‘have something in writing’ would be, with one exception, in distinct contrast to the prevailing attitude in London. Through most of the following years there would be a marked reluctance on the British side to put anything in writing, until constant French pressure resulted in the Grey-Cambon letters of November 1912. Perhaps, in view of the French propensity to misinterpret statements to suit their own cause, this was no bad thing. If Lansdowne, who negotiated the Entente, could not avert such a misapprehension at so early a stage, it boded ill for his successor. The confusion of motives would bedevil the covert Anglo-French conversations until the outbreak of war.

The other major cause of concern was centred upon the surreptitious activities and hidden agendas of the Admiralty, the War Office and the Committee of Imperial Defence. Initially, Admiral Fisher was not interested in the subject of closer Anglo-French co-operation. When, during the crisis in the summer of 1905, the Director of Naval Intelligence advocated an exchange of views with the French to avoid misunderstandings, Fisher was content to ignore the advice. This was certainly not the case at the War Office. Deeply antagonistic to the Admiralty proposals to divert German troops from the French frontier by a threatened invasion of Schleswig-Holstein, Captain Grant-Duff compiled a report on "British Military Action in the Case of War With Germany", while Major Fasson prepared two pages of objections to the Admiralty scheme. With domestic political considerations (the imminent fall of Balfour’s administration) impinging upon the formulation of naval and military policy the field was left open for these relatively junior officers, whose actions might then commit the General Staff — and the Government. Also getting in on the act was Sir George Clarke, the Secretary of the C.I.D., who, following Balfour’s resignation in December 1905, convoked a series of secret meetings to examine the subject of direct military aid to France. Symptomatic of the belief that politicians (and politically motivated staff officers) were best excluded from such discussions, Clarke privately admitted that it was ‘very necessary to do nothing that would alarm the Govt. and besides the W.[ar] O.[ffice] would balk’.

A separate strand of discussions also ensued following the ‘chance’ meeting between the Director of Military Operations, Major-General Grierson, and Victor Huguet, the French Military Attaché in London, in whom Grierson confided his personal belief that a small British force could be landed at Calais to ‘unite with the French forces, of whom it would, for example, form the left wing.’ Thus, in the political hiatus caused by the General Election called by the interim Liberal administration, by the beginning of 1906 a military camarilla was meeting to determine policy without, as yet, the knowledge of ministers. The extent of the rapidly developing covert continental commitment was made clear when the Director of Naval Intelligence, who was attending Clarke’s extramural meetings, reported on 13 January that ‘It was settled between the Military Officers that, in the event of our being forced into war (by a German violation of Belgian neutrality or otherwise) — our proper course would be to land our Military forces at the nearest French ports’. With these various clandestine discussions occurring in difficult political circumstances, it was a singularly inopportune moment for the new Foreign Secretary to step into Lansdowne’s shoes. Faced with these behind-the-scenes contacts, once he had been admitted into Clarke’s confidence, the dilemma for Grey was whether or not to confirm Lansdowne’s assurance of British support of the previous May, which the French had chosen to misinterpret. Indeed, indicative of the continuing French desire to read more than was justified into the unofficial conversations, Huguet would later maintain that, as he believed Grierson’s initial meeting was not a chance occurrence, the subsequent talks carried the Government’s imprimatur.


Paul Cambon also was not going to let the opportunity slip of utilizing the prevailing disorder caused by the January 1906 election campaign. On 10 January the Ambassador put ‘the great question’ to Grey by inquiring whether Britain would underpin her diplomatic support of France with force if necessary. It was only on the previous day that Grey had been made aware by Clarke, however imprecisely, of the unofficial conversations. Unfortunately, Grey agreed with Clarke that it was ‘impossible to approach the French through official channels to ascertain what their views on co-operation are, as this would give the idea of an offensive and defensive alliance which does not exist.’ How much this was genuinely Grey’s own view, and how much he was being led by Clarke (or Sanderson, for that matter), is open to question. It would have required a sure sense of the possible pitfalls for Grey to have ignored the advice of the Secretary of the C.I.D. Grey therefore authorized the continuation of the unofficial talks, and, at Clarke’s prompting, both men agreed that it would be best, at this preliminary stage, not to inform Campbell-Bannerman.

With the military talks in progress, and remembering the German accusation of the previous summer, Sanderson was anxious to prevent a recurrence of the rumours of a possible alliance. It was for this reason that he objected to the involvement of ‘intermediaries’ (specifically, Colonel Repington) in the ‘unofficial communications’ which the French might take ‘as being authorized by our General Staff.’ However, what Sanderson was apparently objecting to was not the unofficial communications per se so much as the impression which would be created by Repington’s association with them. Sanderson immediately contacted Grierson, who denied that there had been any official contact other than the ‘chance’ meeting, and who urged that ‘informal communication should be opened between the General staffs on both sides’. He saw ‘no difficulty in such communication being made on the express understanding that it commits the Government to nothing.’ Grey thereupon sanctioned the opening of the military conversations. Once under way, Sanderson, as Lansdowne before him, then attempted to set restraints upon Cambon. First, Sanderson informed the Ambassador, there should no secret agreement which pledged London and Paris ‘further than that if a certain policy agreed upon with another Power were in any way menaced, the two Powers should consult as to the course to be taken.’ Second, ‘it was not wise to bring before a Cabinet the question of the course to be pursued in hypothetical cases which had not arisen’, as a ‘discussion on the subject invariably gave rise to divergences of opinion on questions of principle’. Third, the Cabinet could give no ‘pledge which would morally bind the country to go to war in certain circumstances,’ without informing Parliament.

In the circumstances Grey may have decided to withhold knowledge of the talks from the Cabinet in the hope that the current crisis would soon abate and the pledge would not have to be redeemed. In this he had the tacit support of the Prime Minister, Campbell-Bannerman, who remained resolutely unperturbed by what had transpired, and who showed no inclination to encourage a broader debate on the subject. Grey was subsequently to regret this omission which, in view of subsequent events, tended to indicate that he had something to hide. S. R. Williamson has summarized the most frequent explanations advanced to account for Grey’s secretive behaviour:

Grey was an inexperienced Cabinet minister in the midst of an election campaign and did not realize the full importance of the French demands;
the conversations were merely a logical extension of the terms of the 1904 accord and thus involved no question of policy;
the conversations had begun in the Lansdowne period;
Campbell-Bannerman as Prime Minister, not Grey, had the final responsibility for bringing the talks before the Cabinet;
the death of Grey’s wife on 1 February detained him so long at Fallodon that the issue was forgotten when he returned to London; and
the talks were purely departmental matters and thus permissible if the responsible ministers were informed.

A further reason, clearly foreshadowed by Sanderson, was the expectation of the opposition which would surface in the Cabinet. This was certainly the impression formed by Cambon, who believed that, if the matter was brought before the Cabinet, ‘certain Ministers would be astonished at the opening of official talks [another French misapprehension?] between the military administrations of the two countries and of the studies which they have worked out in common.’ In another instance of perception playing a crucial rôle, in addition to the twin strands of clandestine activity (Clarke’s and Grierson’s) Grey believed, erroneously, that Admiral Fisher was also engaged in talks with his French counterparts. The fact that such conversations had not taken place is irrelevant. By mid-January, it was Grey’s belief that the Admiralty, the War Office and the C.I.D. were all engaged in discussion with the French for the purpose of the formulation of joint war plans which could commit the Government. Such ignorance was especially dangerous, as it appeared already that the talks were out of control — Clarke admitted on 18 January that Grierson may have ‘been permitted to go further than is considered wise’. This had serious implications for, as Clarke also noted, ‘one department of state commits all.’

By 13 January Grey had spoken to Haldane, who also consented to the commencement of ‘non-committal’ talks. Quoting Haldane’s autobiography, John Terraine notes that the Minister for War was asked ‘whether it could be made clear that the conversations were purely for military General Staff purposes and were not to prejudice the complete freedom of the two Governments should the situation the French dreaded arise.’ Haldane then ‘undertook to see that this was put in writing’ and a letter was duly signed to the effect that ‘the conversations were to leave us wholly free’. Terraine continues: ‘There is something pathetic, even at this distance, in this belief in the virtues of putting peculiar arrangements "in writing" — something odd in the fact that an acumen like Haldane’s should accept such a device. No amount of ‘writing’, no signature to a piece of paper, could alter the impression of the transaction on the second party — France.’ In support of his argument, Terraine uses as evidence the opinion of the very same French officer, Huguet, whose chance meeting with Grierson first provided the impetus for the talks. After agreeing that it ‘was understood that the (British Government) retained full liberty of action and that … the Government of the day would be the sole judge of the line of action to be taken, without being tied in any sense by the studies which might have been previously undertaken’, Huguet then tries to have it both ways. ‘Nevertheless,’ he continues, ‘we were somewhat surprised in 1906 to see the readiness with which the authorisation asked for by the French Government was granted. Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, Sir Edward Grey and Mr Haldane were all three, as politicians, too shrewd and wary not to realise that the studies which were being entered upon — no matter what the reservations — constituted nevertheless an undertaking of sorts, at any rate a moral one.’

Trevor Wilson profoundly disagrees with Terraine’s analysis. What Huguet’s claim seemed to show, according to Wilson, was that ‘the French had formed, not one impression but two, and that these impressions flatly contradicted each other. That the French should then have attached importance only to the impression which suited their book, and ignored the other which did not, is no cause for wonder. What is surprising is the assumption that the British were bound to accept the French view, even though this meant rejecting an equally plausible impression and one which "conforms to the traditional British attitude to foreign affairs" ’. This ‘equally plausible impression’ was the one referred to by Huguet: ‘There was nothing surprising in this reservation [to attempt to preserve freedom of action] which’, Huguet declared, ‘conforms to the traditional British attitude to foreign affairs — a policy which has always and which will always consist in finding a means to keep the balance of power between any and every possible Continental alliance or agreement so that in this way her own security may be guaranteed.’ This reservation was outlined by Grey:

Diplomatic support [for the French] we are pledged to give and are giving. A promise in advance committing this country to take part in a Continental war is another matter and a very serious one: it is very difficult for any British Gov[ernmen]t to give an engagement of that kind. It changes the entente into an alliance and alliances, especially continental alliances are not in accordance with our traditions. My opinion is that if France is let in for a war with Germany arising out of our agreement with her about Morocco, we cannot stand aside, but must take part with France. But a deliberate engagement pledging this country in advance before the actual cause of the war is known or apparent, given in cold blood goes far beyond anything that the late Gov[ernmen]t said or as far as I know contemplated. If we give any promise of armed assistance it must be conditional.

 
Conditional upon what? Certainly British support would not have been forthcoming if France herself committed an aggressive act. Was there something which would have made the provision of armed assistance acceptable? What did Britain hope to gain from the Entente? Was it the guarantee of ‘her own security’ referred to by Huguet? How can this have been when, as Grey noted on 15 January 1906 (less than month before the launch of HMS Dreadnought), ‘We can protect ourselves of course for we are more supreme at sea than we have ever been.’ What other benefit, therefore, might accrue to Britain? Within days of Cambon’s approach Grey was actively engaged in seeking a reciprocal engagement. Writing privately to Bertie, he admitted: ‘I think too we should have some quid pro quo such as a promise that, if we get into war with Germany over any question of our own France will at least remain neutral if she cannot support us, and keep other European Powers neutral.’ If French aggression was viewed as unlikely, in return for a pledge of British support which Grey probably appreciated would be automatic in case of a German attack, the Foreign Secretary was seeking to limit any hostile combination which Britain might have to face. Grey was, however, unable for the present to go any further: ‘all this must remain in the air’, he noted, ‘till the elections are over: all my colleagues are fighting their own or other election contests and I am alone in London and cannot consult them or get them together.’ And, when the election was over, the death of Grey’s wife in February understandably distracted him.

There was no doubt that Grey realized the moral force created by the talks. ‘The Entente’, he argued in the following month, ‘and still more the constant and emphatic demonstrations of affection (official, naval, political, commercial Municipal and in the Press), have created in France a belief that we should support her in war. The last report from our naval attaché at Toulon said that all the French officers took this for granted, if the war was between France and Germany about Morocco. If this expectation is disappointed the French will never forgive us.’ However Grey’s proposal ‘to find out what compensation Germany would ask or accept as the price of her recognition of the French claims in Morocco’ immediately ran into opposition and was shelved. These tentative musings of early 1906 would appear to be the only serious attempt Grey made to confront the logic of the situation. Similarly, Campbell-Bannerman also appreciated the difficulties which might arise: ‘I do not like the stress laid upon joint preparations,’ he declared, for it came ‘very close to an honourable understanding’.

German suspicions did not evaporate following their diplomatic defeat at Algeciras. Speculation that an Anglo-French military convention had been concluded continued throughout 1906. Yet, having forced the issue, the French themselves were not entirely satisfied with the outcome. ‘The present elastic situation’, Hardinge (the new Permanent Under-Secretary) declared in September, ‘is more satisfactory for us although the fact that we are not bound hand and foot to the French makes the latter nervous and suspicious.’ As the international situation quietened in 1907 and naval attention focussed on the German naval build-up, the Admiralty began to contemplate the contribution which the French navy could make in any future war. Already, the increasing threat posed by Germany was dictating naval strategy; it was time to declare an Entente dividend. In contrast to the desire of the General Staff to assist the French, the Admiralty had suddenly realized that the addition of the French ships could make the position absolutely secure. No longer wary, the subsequent naval War Plans noted that an ‘arrangement by which France could be entrusted with the responsibility of conducting operations in the Mediterranean, and Great Britain those in northern waters, would provide a satisfactory division of labour by giving to their respective navies separate and distinct spheres of activity.’ If, therefore, complications of a serious nature arose, the French could undertake – with the full use of British bases – all offensive operations in the Mediterranean as well as the protection of their own and British interests; of the British Mediterranean Fleet only the torpedo boats would be left on station. Whatever validity lay behind Churchill’s subsequent charge that Anglo-French naval dispositions had been arrived at independently, here was a clear example of a proposal for a reciprocal, and mutually beneficial, arrangement. A further strengthening of the commitment was being advocated. The extent of this new commitment was made clear late in 1908 following a succession of new crises in North Africa and the Balkans.
 

As he was wont to do in moments of international tension, the French Ambassador spoke to Grey on 24 November 1908 (at the height of the Bosnian annexation crisis) to urge the resumption of the desultory naval conversations. Grey’s refusal to meddle in naval and military matters (could it be that he was in awe of Fisher?) was to continue to have unfortunate repercussions. As the first tangible result of the 1908 talks, the French were presented with the "three conventions": the French Fleet would be concentrated in the Mediterranean, responsible for the defence of the western basin. All British ships would be withdrawn for operations in the North Sea and Baltic. Not content with this division, Fisher then proposed that the French should assume responsibility for the whole of the Mediterranean. Although the French Admiralty eventually balked at the suggestion, it was indicative of the state of mind which had arisen following the opening of the military talks. Fisher’s bizarre conversion owed more to his paranoia regarding the North Sea and his desire to circumvent any detailed investigation of his Baltic schemes, yet the alluring logic of the French guarding the Mediterranean while the British patrolled the North Sea was to ensnare both the Foreign Secretary and a future First Lord of the Admiralty.

Persuaded at the time to appoint a sub-committee of the C.I.D. to examine the "Military Needs of the Empire", Asquith, by now the Prime Minister, showed as little interest in the surreptitious activities of the War Office as his Foreign Secretary. The General Staff had not deviated from their earlier conclusion ‘that the only feasible option was to afford direct support to the French Army’. Asquith gave grudging approval to the General Staff’s plans but attempted to maintain the fiction of freedom of action by declaring that, ‘in the event of an attack on France by Germany, the expediency of sending a military force abroad, or of relying on naval means only, is a matter of policy which can only be determined when the occasion arises by the Government of the day.’ Naval and military planners could continue to formulate schemes to allow for the contingency, but this would not commit the Government until the Government of the day had determined that it wished to be committed. Presumably, while it was coming to a decision, German troops would already be on the move through Belgium and Northern France. According to this scenario the French were to base their own War plans on the half expectation of British assistance, and, while half an expectation may be better than none, not only would the French be unsure of military assistance until a political decision had been made in London; even then, it was still up to the British Government to decide to wage war by ‘naval means’ alone. Thus, the French logically would have to develop plans to provide for the contingency of fighting Germany unaided, or with British naval assistance, or with British military and naval assistance. Each plan would then have to be held in readiness until after a German attack as it was only then, according to Asquith, that the matter of policy could be determined. In view of this refusal to face the issue squarely, the basic premise that the Continental strategy would prevail in time of war was not seriously questioned.

Could Grey (or Asquith) have prevented the War Office hegemony of strategic thinking? Or, as the pusillanimous conclusion of the sub-committee indicated, were they already aware of the commitment created by the ongoing military contacts — a commitment they did not want questioned? With Fisher’s concern about the North Sea position permeating the higher echelons of Government, the prospect of French naval assistance was seductive, so long as the concomitant was appreciated: the call which would be made for British assistance should France be threatened by unprovoked German aggression. The failure to control the military element was serious enough; yet Grey always appeared content to leave Fisher to his own devices, for whatever reason. This hardly mattered in January 1906 when Grey mistakenly believed that the non-existent naval talks were supposedly shadowing the military talks. It was altogether different when Fisher, apparently on his own initiative, proposed a move (the British evacuation of the Mediterranean) which the French must have assumed had official backing. In the discussions of December 1908 the French would have had every reason to believe that, as soon as they were able, the command of the Mediterranean would fall to them.

Following a run-in with the C.I.D. sub-committee, Fisher wrote querulously on 15 March 1909, ‘Are we or are we not going to send a British Army to fight on the Continent as quite distinct and apart from coastal raids and seizures of islands, etcetera, which the Navy dominate?’ By virtue of Asquith’s conclusion this question remained unanswered — officially. Unofficially, a plan for intervention was to be worked out by the General Staff, ‘in which the British Army shall be concentrated in rear of the left of the French Army, primarily as a reserve.’ The arrangements made with the French Army would be accelerated by Henry Wilson when he became Director of Military Operations in 1910. Asquith meanwhile was as content as Grey to let matters drift. Whenever quizzed about the existence of a secret Anglo-French convention, as he was in the House on 21 March 1910, Asquith was able to reply, in a correct formal sense, that ‘no treaty or convention of the nature specified … exists between this country and France.’

The following year (on 30 March 1911) Grey, as Asquith had done, would provide a similarly contrived answer in the House on the nature of the British commitment to France. This time, however, the French, again wishing to consolidate the Entente, refused to let Grey off as lightly as his parliamentary colleagues. Cruppi, the French Foreign Minister, approached Frank Bertie on 5 April 1911 to inform the Ambassador that he intended to read a statement in the Senate to the effect that Britain and France ‘would remain friends and united in the presence of every eventuality, and they would entrust to their respective Governments the care of giving a precise form to their entente when the moment came.’ When Bertie objected to the proposed language, Cruppi surmised that there was no longer whole-hearted support in Britain for the Entente. In another of those ‘coincidences’ which punctuate the history of the conversations, General Foch chose this very moment to engage the British Military Attaché in a lengthy discussion which revolved around the extent to which the French depended upon a guarantee of British assistance. On a purely practical level, argued Foch, rolling stock would have to be specially reserved for the transport of British troops, but this could not be done unless the French Government ‘had received a previous assurance that it could count with certainty on the arrival of the British contingent.’

Having thus laid the groundwork, a further approach was made to Bertie on 12 April requesting that matters should be carried further ‘as regards possible co-operation in certain eventualities than had hitherto been done.’ Grey faced a predicament — he had no desire to be constrained either by renewed French ardour or by a repeat of his earlier actions in January 1906, when he failed properly to disclose the opening of the military talks. He therefore informed Asquith, Morley and Haldane of the renewed French approach, reminding them also what had happened in 1906 when the ‘French then urged that the Mil[itar]y Auth[orit]y should be allowed to exchange views — ours to say what they could do — the French to say how they would like it done, if we did side with France. Otherwise, as the French urged, even if we decided to support France on the outbreak of war we shouldn’t be able to do it effectively. We agreed to this.’ The use of "we" by Grey denoted a collective responsibility which was wholly absent. Despite this, the argument, by itself, was hardly contentious if Grey had decided to keep a tight rein on the War Office; however, the opposite was the case. In an apparently staggering admission, Grey then declared that the ‘military experts then convened. What they settled I never knew — the position being that the Gov[ernmen]t was quite free, but that the military people knew what to do if the word was given.’ Unless, he added, ‘French war plans have changed, there should be no need for anything further, but it is clear we are going to be asked something.’ Was Grey really this lackadaisical? Not according to General Nicholson. By October 1906, Nicholson subsequently recounted, the original scheme for embarkation of the B.E.F. needed revision on account of changes in the organization of the Home Army. Intimation had also been received of certain changes in the French plans of mobilization and concentration, which affected the ports of disembarkation and the railway transport therefrom. A revised scheme was therefore prepared, but before communicating it to Colonel Huguet Sir Neville Lyttleton, then Chief of the General Staff, approached the Foreign Office and on July 26th, 1907, submitted a covering memorandum indicating the action which it was proposed to take. In this memorandum it was clearly laid down that the scheme was not binding on the British Government, but merely showed how the plans made in view of the situation in 1906 would be modified by the changes made in the organization of the Home Army in 1907. The memorandum with a few verbal amendments was approved by Sir Edward Grey, and Colonel Huguet was informed accordingly.

Furthermore, Grey was a permanent member of the C.I.D. He was present at the 103rd meeting, on 24 July 1909, when the Report on the Military Needs of the Empire was tabled. He would be present at the 144th meeting, on 23 August 1911, when the principal topic was ‘Action to be taken in the event of intervention in a European war’. Was Grey really as innocent as he claimed? Although Grey did refuse to meddle in military affairs, this should not be construed as implying that he was unaware of what was going on; the confusion between these two distinct positions has worked to Grey’s benefit ever since.

What the French wanted was ‘something more visible to Germany and useful to France than the existing Entente.’ For the time being, however, Grey remained immovable on the subject and the French feelers ceased until the crisis at Agadir that summer prompted another inquiry into Britain’s ‘vital interests’ in the Mediterranean. Once more confusion was evident. Did the Panthersprung really affect British interests, or was the genuine scare in London simply a reaction to perceived French military and naval weakness? When pressed by C. P. Scott, for example, Lloyd George could provide no clear answer to the question as to ‘what interests had we for which in the last resort we were prepared to go to war and was the prevention of a German naval station at Agadir one of them’? Asquith admitted that it would not be ‘worth our while to go to war about Agadir’ but that ‘we should strongly resist the acquisition by Germany of a port on the South Mediterranean coast’, while Grey was apparently unconcerned about the prospect, so long as the proposed base remained unfortified. The net result of Scott’s investigation was that Lloyd George objected to a German naval base at Agadir; Asquith would not object to a German port at Libreville, but did not think it worthwhile to risk war over Agadir; while Grey was relatively unconcerned at the prospect of a German presence at Agadir but would strongly resist any attempt by Berlin to obtain a Mediterranean base.

In view of this strategic ineptitude, perhaps the underlying cause of the fear felt in London was the opinion ‘repeatedly’ voiced by Lloyd George, namely, ‘France’s weakness and terror in the face of Germany.’ France, according to the Chancellor, ‘had her eyes fixed on "those terrible legions across the frontier … [which] could be in Paris in a month and she knew it." The result would be the end of France as a Great Power, leading possibly to German hegemony in Europe on a scale similar to Napoleon’s.’ Lloyd George with the wind up was not an attractive sight — did he have cause to be anxious this time? General Bernhardi wrote, soon after the crisis, that Germany

must defeat France so decisively that she would be compelled to renounce her alliance with England and withdraw her fleet to save herself from total destruction. Just as in 1870-71 we marched to the shores of the Atlantic, so this time again we must resolve on an absolute conquest, in order to capture the French naval ports and destroy the French naval depots. It would be a war to the knife with France, one which would, if victorious, annihilate once for all the French position as a Great Power. If France with her falling birth-rate, determines on such a war, it is at the risk of losing her place in the first rank of European nations, and sinking into permanent political subservience. Those are the stakes.

Even Churchill, who might have been expected to take a more relaxed view of the matter, asserted that ‘One cause alone c[oul]d justify our participation — to prevent France from being trampled down & looted by the Prussian junkers — a disaster ruinous to the world, & swiftly fatal to our country.’ In January 1906 Grey had declared ‘We can protect ourselves of course for we are more supreme at sea than we have ever been.’ By 1911 this was no longer the perceived reality. The dreadnought scare of 1909 had come and gone, but the residue lingered. Lists were endlessly being drawn up as to which country would have how many dreadnoughts by which date. And, which ever way the lists were drawn up, the British position was in no way as secure as it had seemed in 1906. In the final analysis, French military weakness had not mattered as much in 1906 when the German fleet was unable to mount a creditable challenge to the Royal Navy. By 1911 the strategical position had been transformed by the German naval challenge. If Germany ever could establish hegemony in Europe she could then devote all her energies to an even more rapid naval build-up.

Another indication of the extent to which foreign policy was being dictated by military considerations was provided by the actions of Henry Wilson who, with his ‘perfect obsession for military operations on the continent’, hardly needed a spur such as Agadir to confirm his belief that ‘we must join France.’ Already Hankey was warning that, at the forthcoming meeting of the Committee of Imperial Defence on 23 August 1911 to which only the inner core of the Cabinet had been invited, if Wilson could get a decision ‘in favour of military action he will endeavour to commit us up to the hilt.’ It was hardly surprising then that the principle recommendation of the General Staff was that Britain ‘should mobilise and dispatch the whole of our available army of six divisions and a cavalry division immediately upon the outbreak of war, mobilising upon the same day as the French and Germans.’ This would compel Britain at once to follow an inescapable course of action in any Franco-German dispute which threatened to escalate and was a clear advance upon the 1909 formula in which the political decision was to be made following the first clash of Franco-German arms. The more that politicians such as Churchill and Lloyd George could be made to accept the necessity for the British Expeditionary Force to operate on the Continent, whether in conjunction with the Belgian army, as Henry Wilson would have preferred, or on the flank of the French army, which was still the preferred War Office option, the more that policy would become subservient to the technical aspects of military planning. Such was the size and detailed nature of the military commitment that, once the finer points of either military strategy were settled, the question of policy would become irrelevant. Henry Wilson, following up his success in the C.I.D., redoubled his efforts to ingratiate himself with the French, travelling to Paris at the end of September 1911 for consultations with the new Chief of the General Staff, Joffre, and his staff. ‘They were most cordial and open’, Wilson confided to his diary: ‘they showed me papers and maps … showing in detail the area of concentration for all our Expeditionary Force … In fact, by 12.30 I was in possession of the whole of their plan of campaign for their northern armies, and also f