Futile Exercise?: The British Army's Preparations for War 1902-1914

by Simon Batten

According to the official historian Brigadier-General James Edmonds: ‘In every respect the Expeditionary Force of 1914 was incomparably the best trained, best organized, and best equipped British Army which ever went forth to war’. There has been considerable debate over the extent to which Edmonds’ claim was justified, and to which the British Army had learnt the lessons of recent events (above all, its chastening experiences in South Africa). Conventional wisdom has it that the British Army in 1914 was utterly unprepared for the development of trench warfare from October 1914 onwards, and that it took many lives and a costly ‘learning curve’ for the British to come to terms with the new conditions of warfare. Given that war was expected in the decade before August 1914 - and that a great deal of time and money was spent preparing for that war - it seems obvious to ask why the British Army was not better prepared for the war when it came. This raises important issues about how armies learn from their experiences and how they prepare for the unknowable - namely, a war - without employing bullets and shells. How realistic and useful were the exercises and maneuvers the British Army used in the period between the end of the Boer War in 1902 and the outbreak of war in August 1914? The approach of most historians has been either to ignore them, or to dismiss them as a waste of time and money. The maneuvers carried out between 1902 and 1913 featured large forces – sometimes as many as 45,000 men and 12,000 horses – as well as guns, trucks, trains and the first sizable force of military aircraft ever employed in Britain. Many of the names later familiar from the Western Front were involved – Haig, French, Rawlinson and Allenby – as well as a great many of the troops who would cross to France with the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in August 1914. Their efforts were witnessed by large crowds, as well as politicians, representatives of foreign armies and journalists (some of them ‘embedded’ with army units); there was comprehensive and opinionated coverage in the newspapers of the time.

What lessons were learnt, what value did these maneuvers have and how do they relate to the events of the war - especially, its opening months? How does the British experience compare with those of the continental armies, who also made extensive use of maneuvers in this period?

235 pages, Hardcover

First published November 19, 2017

Reviews

[Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Historians of the First World War have long noted and discussed the significance of the large scale maneuvers fielded by all of Europe's major powers in the years leading up to the First World War. Although they often featured in the social calendars of Europe, they also reflected the growing transformation of the traditional military class into modern professional armies - with varying degrees of success. Simon Batten presents an excellent account and analysis of the British experience in this area, especially as the war itself neared. Britain had both an advantage and a disadvantage here given the small size of its army. Essentially, the British Expeditionary Force fielded in its ranks 4 divisions that had fought alongside and opposite each other in these annual exercises. This familiarity had to have its benefits when the 'Old Contemptibles' found themselves in the field against the German armies advancing across Belgium and in to France. The author discusses the shared experience, the lessons learned or not learned, the personalities who transitioned from the maneuver field to the battle field. There is also discussion of the contrasts with the various European maneuvers of the period. Highly recommended.

[Colin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This offers a very clear analysis of the British Army's exercises and manouevres prior to the First World War. The book is well constructed, illustrated and referenced and it explains the strengths, weaknesses and impact of the Army's preparations.

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book read more like an essay but nevertheless, was quite an interesting read.

The book is all about the debate surrounding whether the British Army was adequately prepared in 1914 for the Great War, with so many lives ultimately lost.

Key to preparation is training:
“We do not rise to the level of our expectation, we fall to the level of our training.”
Miyamoto Musashi, Japanese swordsman.

The time between the close of the South African War and the outbreak of the great war was one of intense change in the training and organisation of the army. Important lessons were indeed learned from the large scale Annual manoeuvres and in the absence of conscription, the British were never initially going to compete with the Continental Armies in terms of numbers. By October 1914, the problem was that mobile warfare had given way to trench warfare for which the British were no better or worse prepared than the army of France or Germany.