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Winston Churchill had a longer and closer relationship with the Royal Navy than any British statesman in modern times, but his record as a naval strategist and custodian of the nation's sea power has been mired in controversy since the ill-fated Dardanelles campaign in 1915. Today, Churchill is regarded by many as an inept strategist who interfered in naval operations and often overrode his professional advisers - with inevitably disastrous results.
Churchill and Seapower is the first major study of Winston Churchill's record as a naval strategist and his impact as the most prominent guardian of Britain's sea power in the modern era. Based on extensive archival research, the book debunks many popular and well-entrenched myths surrounding controversial episodes in both World Wars, including the Dardanelles disaster, the Norwegian Campaign, the Battle of the Atlantic, and the devastating loss of the Prince of Wales and
Repulse in 1941. It shows that many common criticisms of Churchill have been exaggerated, but also that some of his mistakes have been largely overlooked - such as his willingness to prolong the Battle of the Atlantic in order to concentrate resources on the bombing campaign against Nazi Germany.
The book also examines Churchill's evolution as a maritime strategist over the course of his career, and documents his critical part in managing Britain's naval decline during the first half of the twentieth century. Churchill's genuine affection for the Royal Navy has often distracted attention from the fact that his views on sea power were pragmatic and unsentimental. For, as Christopher M. Bell shows, in a period dominated by declining resources, global threats, and rapid technological
change, it was increasingly air rather than sea power that Churchill looked to as the foundation of Britain's security.
- Sales Rank: #1139239 in eBooks
- Published on: 2012-10-25
- Released on: 2012-10-25
- Format: Kindle eBook
Review
"Bell's important study leaves the reader with a sense not just of Churchill's prowess as a naval strategist but of his wisdom as a grand strategist. In taking the long view of Churchill's career, Bell puts Churchill's views on sea power, whether operational or strategic, into a larger context. In the many positions he held, Churchill evaluated what the nation needed for its national security in a world of rapid geopolitical and technological changes, and he accepted that those needs went far beyond sea power." --Journal of British Studies
About the Author
Christopher M. Bell is Associate Professor of History at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He has published widely on twentieth century naval history, and is the author of The Royal Navy, Seapower and Strategy between the Wars (2000) and co-editor, with Bruce A. Elleman, of Naval Mutinies of the Twentieth Century: An International Perspective (2003).
Most helpful customer reviews
11 of 12 people found the following review helpful.
Naval policy at a very high level
By Andrew S. Rogers
When I write that this book approaches the topic at a very high level, I don't mean that it's a survey view or that it doesn't go in depth. I mean that this isn't a book about booming guns, whirring torpedoes, or screaming dive bombers. It's not really about naval warfare. "Churchill and Seapower" is a book about national policy, about strategic principles, and about politics. Its battlefields are committee rooms, its weapons are notes and memos passed around Whitehall. Nor is this, really, a biography of Churchill, although The Man of the [Twentieth] Century's personality certainly comes through. I wouldn't necessarily recommend this book for the general reader. For the specialist in relevant Churchillian and/or naval matters, though, this has a lot to recommend it.
So many new books about Churchill come out every year that it's a more or less admitted obligation for the writer of such a book to defend why he or she thinks their book adds anything to the discussion. Christopher Bell addresses this right up front, in the second paragraph of his Preface: "[W]here Churchill is concerned, the biggest challenge for historians in the twenty-first century will be to question what we think we already know -- to go back into documents long available to us, test our underlying assumptions, and if necessary reject well-worn and time-honoured arguments that do not hold up to close scrutiny" (p. vii). It might be technically correct, therefore, to describe "Churchill and Seapower" as a "revisionist" work ... but that term is often more loaded than would be justified here. Instead, I will say that Bell confronts many of the current "things we know" about WSC and naval policy, and shows the extent to which they do, or in some cases do not, "hold up to close scrutiny."
Bell of course reviews well-known controversies like the Dardanelles campaign and the Norway expedition, but I was interested to see how much emphasis was given to issues like shipbuilding rates, the disposition of landing craft, and the allotment of aircraft between Coastal and Bombing Commands. Those were the really big, if behind-the-scenes questions at the time, and Bell's discussion recalls the phrase attributed to various people that "Amateurs think tactics but professionals think logistics."
Bell's final chapter is called "The Verdict of History" -- a phrase that instantly left a sour taste in my mouth (see also: Pearl Harbor: The Verdict of History or Pearl Harbor : Final Judgement). Aside from anyone claiming to be able to render a definitive historical "verdict" on issues still within living memory, we are also reminded by the great Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddin in Liberty or Equality that "the judgment of history and the judgment of historians is not the same thing." Here the historian whose judgment Bell takes on most directly is Stephen Roskill, whose Churchill and the Admirals and related work make up an early and influential part of the "Churchill loused it all up" school of thought. Indeed, Bell writes, "the trend of historical scholarship over the last sixty years has undoubtedly been towards a negative verdict of Churchill as naval strategist. Unfortunately, broad judgements on this subject have become stuck in well-worn grooves" first laid down by Roskill (p. 337). With the author's synthesis of old and new sources, solid reasoning, and an admirable historical balance, Christopher Bell's Churchill is neither infallible hero nor blundering busybody. That should, I hope, allow us to make some new and more accurate judgments in place of the old.
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful.
A Flawed but Valuable Book!
By Mark R. Jorgensen
You may like this book but please do not claim it is good history because of it, at least not until you have considered Roskill, Barnett, Marder, Reynolds and others. Professor Bell's thesis presented a challenge -- that historians have been unduly harsh of Winston Churchill's strategic and tactical skills and that a re-assessment was due. And do not confound Bell's thesis with an evaluation of Churchill as a wartime leader - which the author seems to do in several places! To my knowledge no serious person disputes Churchill's leadership ability, force of personality and energies - as a wartime prime minister he was superb - he was the right choice for the path the British chose in May 1940. Thus this book concurrently presents a history of Churchill and seapower in light of a re-evaluation of his strategic and tactical sensibilities.
To re-examine my own beliefs and consider Bell's thesis, I re-read Roskill and Barnett, whom Bell specifically cites as being hostile to Churchill, and consulted a number of other sources with special attention to WSC's role in events. Since I had first read some of these books several decades ago it was an enjoyable task.
I will supply additional details of my analysis and critique as I expand this Amazon review but here is my conclusion: Bell's "Churchill and Seapower" is flawed in its reasoning, its selective use of evidence and, hence, its conclusions. Yet I found it a good read though in some sections Churchill seemed almost a bystander in narratives that were largely of his own making.
In my initial research I decided to focus specifically on the Dardanelles Campaign (1915) and the Norwegian Campaign (1940).
There is nothing in Bell's chapter on the Dardanelles Campaign that I disagree with. It is not original to Professor Bell the observation that Winston Churchill was disproportionately blamed for the fiasco of 1915 in the decades that followed - though he is not blameless, either. As an ambitious young politician and First Lord of the Admiralty Churchill became a convenient scapegoat while more senior and more culpable participants successfully distanced themselves from reproach. Who was it that said: "Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan"? -- in the case of the Dardanelles Campaign Churchill was for a period of decades the unwilling adoptive father. To his credit he never minimized his role in events and though he faulted the Allied decisions as operations unfolded he still defended the initial campaign rationale -- and it did have merit, as Bell correctly points out.
It is, however, in the chapter on the Norwegian Campaign (April - June 1940) and the full history of it -- pre-war thinking as well as wartime evaluation and planning during 1939 and 1940 -- that I found Professor Bell's recounting particularly deficient.
The reality is that in the British Cabinet Winston Churchill was an unrelenting and driving force that there be a Norwegian campaign of some sort, obsessed as he was that "offensive measures" be taken and overly enamored with the interwar concept of strategic warfare. In this latter fascination he was joined by many others. I grant that the Norwegian port of Narvik and the Swedish iron ore fields were a tempting target for British interdiction though the neutrality of Norway and Sweden were obstacles to British action. Thus was borne Operation Wilfred, to initially mine a critical passage of Norwegian territorial waters, wait for German reaction and then decisively respond to it -- and whose execution was to occur in early April 1940. Though Norway and Sweden strongly resisted British overtures and insisted on their continued neutrality, the British were seeking a way to stimulate a Norwegian request for assistance from the German reaction to mining. One way or another the British (and French) were determined to access Norway and ultimately interdict iron ore shipments.
The bold and risky gamble by the Germans to invade Denmark and Norway on 8 April 1940 was matched by the British Admiralty's -- including Churchill's -- mis-estimation of German intentions and capabilities. After all, the British were the world's leading seapower and the German Kriegsmarine puny by comparison. It was on this basis that an optimistic complacency arose in the British Admiralty, British Chiefs of Staff and the Norwegian government regarding German capabilities. Professor Bell makes much of Captain Ralph Edward's recollections to claim that WSC believed there was to be an invasion and that is to his credit. The First Sea Lord, Sir Dudley Pound, and other opinion in the Admiralty accepted the belief that it was to be breakout of raiders to the Atlantic and made ship dispositions accordingly. Thus when the facts of the invasion were later acknowledged the intervening time lost was to prove unrecoverable.
The German's speedy occupation of strategic points in Norway and the quick establishment of operational airbases for the Luftwaffe in central and southern Norway put the British-French-Polish-Norwegian forces at a significant disadvantage throughout April and May. In a future paragraph I will provide some details of how Churchill's choices before and during the campaign had harmful consequences for the Allied efforts in that theater.
The ability to project the power of the Luftwaffe throughout the operational area of central and southern Norway was something the Allies could not counteract or compensate for. In this period British ship-borne anti-aircraft fire was largely ineffective for a variety of reasons including armament, limited angles of elevation, rates of fire, training and fire control. These deficiencies were part of a costly learning process the Royal Navy endured for the first several years of the war. And, by the way, for none of these naval matters was WSC responsible. Commanders on the scene were quick to appreciate these harsh facts while those not present in the operational theater including the First Lord of the Admiralty were slow to accept the new realities.
The failure of the Norwegian Campaign is not solely Winston Churchill's fault though his imprint is present throughout. Underestimating German intentions and capabilities was a shared blame, but then almost haphazardly trying to inject the Allied forces into central Norway and at Narvik compounded the difficulties. I and others believe that speedy and sufficient injection of British naval and army forces at Trondheim might have yet secured central Norway and isolated the German forces at Narvik -- but when that attempt did occur it was too little, too late. The preponderance of German advantages along with the German determination to evict the Allies from northern Norway made the Allied evacuation from Narvik in June 1940 seem tardy in retrospect. It seems that the supremacy of the Royal Navy was not to prove the trump card many assumed it would be. And had not the Germans experienced numerous torpedo failures during the campaign it might well have been a disaster for the Royal Navy. That this tardy recognition took as long as it did was, in part, due to Churchill's own determination to prolong and salvage something from this ill-conceived episode. In May 1940 the Allies properly assessed that France and Belgium were to be the decisive operational theater and Norway became moot, though not for the Norwegians who were to be occupied for the next five years.
That British and French forces moved to Norway in April 1940 was largely due to Winston Churchill's efforts from September 1939 to April 1940 -- he was the catalyst more than anyone else. The French were willing partners in the planned campaign for their own reasons, not the least domestic politics. Because the German invasion caught the British (and French) off-guard the actual course and nature of Allied deployments to Norway had that haphazard aspect to it, and Churchill was certainly part of that decision-making. And finally that the Allies stayed as long as they did in Narvik was in large measure due to Churchill's reluctance to give up on this adventure -- at some cost to the Allied naval forces (British, French and Polish). The reader of "Churchill and Seapower" would not know or appreciate these aspects solely by reading this book.
Much is made by other authors and somewhat less so by Professor Bell that the Allies -- and especially the British cabinet -- had no clear strategic aims for their Norwegian incursion, though it is often asserted that Churchill's thinking on this was far clearer. While he was more focused on Narvik and interdicting Swedish iron ore shipments to Germany he was clearly part of the strategic and operational muddle -- and on the issue of whether to concentrate on Trondheim versus Narvik his apologists have found an area to salvage his reputation. We can see more clearly now that control of central Norway -- and its airfields! -- would be the key to ultimately also controlling northern Norway and Narvik.
And if you should still have doubts I provide a quote from Thomas K. Derry, himself an early and noted historian of the Norwegian campaign. Derry quotes Churchill in a letter from Churchill to his friend and most trusted senior military advisor, General Ismay. In 1946 Churchill wrote, "The brief and disastrous Norwegian campaign, if campaign it can be called," was one for which he "certainly bore an exceptional measure of responsibility." (quote on p. 79 in T.K.Derry, "British Plans and Operations," Pp. 63-83 in Narvik, 1940: Five Nation War in the High North, Karl Rommetveit (ed.).
If readers of my review consider my reasoning and evidence insufficient let me also mention Operation Catherine (briefly mentioned by Bell), Jupiter (the idea of a second front in Norway in 1942 and not mentioned by Bell), and the Dodecanese Campaign (1943 and briefly covered by Bell). In fact the long pattern of Churchillian ideas during World Wars I and II -- including those emanating from "his" selected military advisors after September 1939 -- is quite convincing in my mind that Churchill's strategic sensibilities were flawed - and he never had the self-awareness to realize it.
In a future revision of this review I will explain some other defects of this book. Still this book is an able piece of scholarship, flawed though it is, and I respect the author's knowledge of the sources and debates and his meticulous documentation. But as a history it is incomplete and Bell's thesis regarding Churchill's strategic abilities is not persuasive. I encourage all those interested in this subject and period to read "Churchill and Seapower" in conjunction with those books by Roskill, Barnett, or any of the others who have covered this ground. The subject remains far from closed and I am grateful for Professor Bell's important contribution. Judging from the posts and other feedback I have received this subject obviously remains a historiographic minefield.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful.
Good book, flawed thesis.
By Mr Campbell
Christopher M Bell here sets out to refute much of the post war cannon of naval history, some of it written by people such as Roskill with first-hand knowledge of the events and personalities in questions, as suggested in the blurb of this book, the current historical record stands such that [i] Churchill is still regarded by many as an inept strategist who interfered in naval operations and often overrode his professional advisers--with inevitably disastrous results.[/i] Bell sets out to disprove this thesis.
He attempts to do so by a well end noted survey of the principle naval policies and events in which Churchill was involved, from the earliest days when appointed first lord of the Admiralty in 1911, though to his days in the mid 1920's as chancellor of the exchequer stridently enforcing, and indeed expanding the scope of the ten year rule, to his wartime reprisal as first lord, and then in the premiership. In laying out this case Bell, in gristly detail, fails miserably to make his point and does in fact reinforce the conclusions of those historians like Roskill that he means to disprove, and lays out in great detail the errors in judgement, and chaos in operations that characterises Churchill's tenure as a minister for the navy.
What seems to escape Bells understanding is that in his role as a politian and minister appointed by parliament and the prime minister of the day, is under the conventions of the Westminster system entrusted with the duty of enforcing government policy and making policy decisions. It has never been, in the conventions of the Westminster system the role of a political appointment to usurp complex technical advice and decision making from the professionals trained to make those decisions and advise the minister. Yet here we have case after case, clearly presented by Bell, where Churchill constantly usurps technical decisions, fails to listen to professional advice and also from time to time usurps operational matters too, possibly the greatest problem with Churchill's administration. What Bell fails to see is that on each occasion Churchill crossed this line, in his unprecedented way from a policy maker to a hands on decision maker; where there is a resulting disaster, and there were many, the fault is clearly, indubitably nailed to the Churchilian intervention that caused the problem.
Glossed over too in this account - but not in the others Bell tries to refute, were Churchill's abominable work habbits - by day refusing to take advice, throwing out staff assessments, demanding different answers to the same problems better suited Churchill's own vision that was then followed by a boozy dinner followed by Churchill stalking the halls of the Admiralty or the WWII war room in the middle of the night, glass of brandy in hand, badgering the junior staff officers and operations men to get his way while the senior officers Churchill should have been operating through were in bed, exhausted from his unreasonable daytime demands, and their real jobs of trying to run a wartime navy trying to get a few hours rest. Churchill's wartime first sea lords, Fisher and Pound had an unenviable task trying to salvage some form of operational control over Churchill's unprofessional, even reprehensible methods.
We see clearly too, in those disasters where Churchill usurped operational matters from the hands of those qualified to undertake them, a consistent set of operational failings, each one leading to disaster. We have the escape of the Goeben, the Battle of Coronel (1914), The Dardanelles(1915), Norway (1940), the operations in Greece and Crete (1941) and the destruction of Force Z (1941). All characterised by the same symptoms, indicative of the same disease. Divided command, confused lines of responsibilities, changing scope and objectives for operations, unrealistic orders, division of force and fatalistic obedience from the officers in the field trying to carry out these orders, all concluded with military disaster, disproportionate losses and with no military objective achieved. Yet that is all okay by Christopher M Bell.
The book also loses stature by indulging through the early chapters in the authors unseemly row with Lambert and "Sir John Fishers Naval Revolution," a much better and more interesting book.
Churchill was an amazing, inspiring historical figure. It is probably true that his defiant and memorable leadership as prime minister - not first lord - from the fall of France to the end of the Battle of Britain was all that stood in the way of a dishonourable peace with Germany at that time. This was his great moment and we should all be thankful. This does not mean, however, that we should gloss over his failures. It is indeed through the study of failures like this that we learn anything from history at all. Perhaps then Christopher Bell, in writing a well-researched book that effectively refutes his own revisionist thesis, is doing us all a service. Two stars.
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