The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke Volume II Part 42

On December 19th Lord George Hamilton moved a resolution "that a considerable addition should at once be made to the navy." Mr. Gladstone regarded this proposal as a vote of censure on the Government, and delivered an indignant reply. Dilke deprecated making the navy a subject of party controversy, and made an appeal to his Liberal friends:

"All naval experts who have been consulted on the question have always laid it down that, for safety, you must have a supremacy of five to three in battleships, that you require that supremacy for the policy of blockade.... If ever we engage in war ... it is a necessity of the position of this country that our frontiers should be at the enemy's ports.... I know this is not a popular policy, but the existence of the Empire depends upon it.... Liberals should give up thinking of this question of national defence as a hateful one, and as one against which they ought to close their eyes and ears. I know that, in these days of great armaments on the Continent, the old tradition of the Liberal party, that they should look to the possibility of using the forces of this country on behalf of Continental freedom, has become a dream of the past. They must remember that our liberties at home depend upon the efficiency of our fleet, and that, beyond this, the very existence of our Empire is concerned in the question which the House is at this moment debating."

The sequel to this debate was Mr. Gladstone's retirement in February, 1894.

Early in the autumn of 1893 Dilke had talked over with Spenser Wilkinson the line to be taken in Parliament by the service members. Wilkinson had urged as a preliminary some effort to obtain agreement among the "experts," suggesting that Chesney as the ablest of them all should first be approached. On November 8th Chesney and Wilkinson dined at Sloane Street, and, Chesney having expressed his general concurrence in the views as to administration explained in _Imperial Defence_, Dilke proposed that Wilkinson should draft a letter to the Prime Minister, embodying the main points, to be signed by all three and by Arnold- Forster, if he should be in accord with them, and to be sent not only to Mr. Gladstone, but to the leaders of the Opposition. The result was the following letter, which was eventually signed and sent on February 12th, 1894, to Mr. Gladstone (then Prime Minister), to Lord Salisbury, the Duke of Devonshire, Mr. Balfour, and Mr. Chamberlain:

Sir,

The late debate in the House of Commons on the subject of the navy was one of many symptoms of a widespread uneasiness with regard to the defences of the Empire. There is a doubt of the sufficiency of the naval establishments and of the efficiency in some respects of the systems under which the navy and the army are administered. This failure of confidence has been of gradual growth. Those who think it justified do not attribute the responsibility for it to any one administration or to either party in the State. Yet it seems difficult to discuss these doubts in Parliament without, at least, the appearance of censure upon the Government of the day, a result which is unfortunate, for the subject should unite rather than divide parties, and upon its paramount importance there is no difference of opinion.

For this reason a service may perhaps be rendered by the communication to the Prime Minister and to the leaders of the Opposition of suggestions which commend themselves to men of different parties who have from different points of view for many years given attention to questions relating to national defence.

No arrangements which aimed at or resulted in a subversion of the principles which experience has shown to be essential to the working of const.i.tutional government could be seriously considered. But no system of defence, however const.i.tutional, can avail unless it be shaped with a view to war. It is to the conciliation of these two necessities, that of compatibility with the const.i.tution and that of adaptation to the purpose of war, that our attention has been directed.

If the preservation of peace depended upon the goodwill of the British Government, there would perhaps be little need for a navy or an army. The existence of these services implies that this is not the case, and that safety in time of war depends upon forethought and preparation in advance. Such preparation involves a view of the nature of a possible war and an estimate of the intensity of the effort it would impose, this view and this estimate furnishing the standard for the quant.i.ty and quality of the means to be kept available.

The design, without which even a defensive war cannot be carried on, and in the absence of which preparations made during peace must fail to serve their purpose, is properly the secret of the Government.

Yet, where the Government is responsible to a Parliament, it is indispensable either that so much of the design should be communicated to Parliament as will enable it to judge of the necessity and of the sufficiency of the preparations for which supplies must be voted, or that Parliament should know who are the professional advisers upon whose judgment the Government relies.

Neither of these conditions seems to us at present to be fulfilled, and as a consequence of the omission there has arisen in the public mind that distrust to which we have alluded.

The leading decision in the administration of the national defence, governing the whole course and character of any future war, is that which settles the total amount of expenditure upon preparation and apportions it between the naval and military services. For this decision the Cabinet is, and must ever be, responsible. Yet in the distribution of the business of the Cabinet into departments there appears to be no office specially entrusted with the consideration of war as a whole, embracing the functions both of the navy and of the army. Of the sums usually devoted each year to warlike preparations, the larger part is spent upon the army, and only a lesser part upon the navy, upon which the maintenance of the Empire and the security of Great Britain must ever chiefly depend. It is difficult to believe that this apportionment is the result of deliberate examination of the requirements of war. It would seem more probable that the separate existence of a department of the navy and a department of the army leads in practice to the management of each for its own sake rather than as an instrument serving a more general purpose.

In order to secure the special consideration by the Cabinet of national defence as distinct from and superior to the administration either of the navy or of the army, we would suggest the appointment of one and the same Minister to the two offices of Secretary of State for War and First Lord of the Admiralty, or the amalgamation, with the consent of Parliament, of these two offices.

We would further suggest that the Cabinet should select for each service an officer whose professional judgment commands its confidence, to be at once the responsible adviser of the Cabinet upon all questions regarding the conduct of war so far as his own service is concerned, and the princ.i.p.al executive officer of that service.

We understand by a responsible adviser one who stands or falls by the advice which he gives. He would, of course, have at his disposal, in the formation of his views, the best a.s.sistance which the professional staff of the navy or of the army could supply. But the opinion which, after mature consideration, he would submit to the Cabinet, and formally record, would be his own and would be given in his own name. It follows that a difference of opinion between the Cabinet and its naval or its military adviser upon any important matter of naval or military policy would lead to the resignation of the latter. In our view, the essence of responsibility for advice is that the officer giving it is identified with it, and remains in the post only so long as his judgment upon the professional matters with reference to which he is consulted is acceptable to the Cabinet which he serves. In order to facilitate his independence in this respect, provision should be made, in case of his resignation, for his employment in another post or for his honourable retirement.

If these suggestions were adopted, the pa.s.sage in case of need from peace to war would take place without personal or administrative change. The adaptation of the whole service, whether naval or military, to the necessities of war, as understood by a competent officer studying them with full responsibility, would be a.s.sured.

The House of Commons and the public would have in the person of the naval and of the military adviser a guarantee of the sufficiency and of the efficiency of the navy and of the army. The authority of the Cabinet and the control of the House of Commons would be unimpaired.

We are, sir,

Your obedient servants,

Charles W. Dilke.

George Chesney.

H. O. Arnold-Foster.

Spenser Wilkenson.

In December, 1893, Dilke had communicated to Mr. Balfour the draft of this letter and his plan for sending it to the leaders of both parties.

Mr. Balfour thought the best plan for co-ordinating the two services would be by a Defence Committee of the Cabinet, of which Dilke put his finger on the weak point, that it gave no guarantee of meeting the requirements of war. [Footnote: The letters printed in Appendix I., p.

451, embody the substance of previous conversations between Dilke and Mr. Balfour. In Appendix II., p. 456, are given the replies of Mr.

Gladstone and the other leaders to the joint letter, which was afterwards published in the newspapers.--Ed.] It was after these communications that Mr. Balfour made his speech at Manchester on January 22nd, 1894, in which he said:

"It is responsibility which is chiefly lacking in our present system. If anything goes wrong with the navy, you attack the First Lord of the Admiralty. If anything goes wrong in the army, you attack the Secretary for War. If anything goes wrong in the Home Department, you attack the Secretary to the Home Department. But if the general scheme of national and imperial defence is not properly managed, there is n.o.body to attack but the whole Cabinet; and the Cabinet as a whole is not, in my opinion, a very good body to carry on the detailed work of that, any more than of any other, department of the State."

These private discussions between Dilke and Mr. Balfour foreshadowed the actual course which reform was to take. It began in 1895 with the adoption of Mr. Balfour's plan of a Committee of the Cabinet; it ended in 1904 by Mr. Balfour as Prime Minister adopting Dilke's plan, and undertaking himself, as chairman of that Committee, the co-ordination of the two services. Then and not till then the fundamental principle of the primacy of the navy in the defence of the Empire was formally recognized.

The next step of the signatories to the joint letter was action in Parliament. Dilke gave notice that, on the introduction of the Army Estimates, he would move the following resolution:

"That this House, before voting supplies for the maintenance of military establishments in the United Kingdom, seeks an a.s.surance from Her Majesty's Government that the estimates for that purpose submitted to it are framed upon consideration of possible war by sea and land, and upon a consideration of advice tendered in that behalf by such officer of either service as is fitted to command in war Her Majesty's forces of that service."

The debate took place on March 16th, 1894. In the course of his speech Dilke said:

"What I want to know, and what the Cabinet in framing the estimates ought to know, is this: Are the proposals before the House those which alone are capable of securing the safety of the country and of the Empire?... I wish to know whether the Government present these estimates as representing the least, but still what is sufficient, for the needs of the country for the next twelve months, not only for the protection of the whole country and the Empire, but for the protection of our trade in all parts of the world....

"The Cabinet must obtain the best advice possible. I, for my part, should prefer that the advice should be concentrated for each service, because I think it is far more responsible advice if it comes mainly on the responsibility of a single man as regards the army and navy respectively than if you dispersed it among a great number of people.... As far as I am concerned, form in this matter is immaterial. I have stated what I want to secure, and I will put two or three different ways of securing it which would very often come to the same thing. What I ventured to suggest at first was that the Prime Minister should be brought to take more personal concern in the defence of the country than is the case at the present time; that he should consider himself mainly responsible for the joint consideration of the whole defence proposals; that he should hear the Secretary for War, the First Lord of the Admiralty, and their advisers, if he is doubtful, and that they together, more seriously than has been the case in the past, should go into the difficulties of the problem, and he should then advise with them as to the estimates.... There was another suggestion made--that a Defence Minister, a Minister who should represent the army and navy, should be the person charged specially with the responsibility to this House.... But I am not wedded to any particular form. Whether the Prime Minister specially undertakes the duty, whether it is undertaken by a Defence Minister, or whether the suggestion is adopted--which, I believe, is that of the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Balfour)--that a Defence Committee of the Cabinet, which I have heard was inst.i.tuted by the late Government, should be provided with a more avowed and distinct position, armed with permanent responsible advisers, and equipped with records so as to hand over its work to those by whom they might be succeeded in office--all these plans would come at the present moment to very much the same thing."

The resolution was seconded by Arnold-Forster, and supported in a clear and relevant speech by Sir George Chesney. In the debate which followed, Mr. Balfour expressed his adherence to the third of the plans described by Sir Charles Dilke. "I rather contemplate," he said, "that the Prime Minister, with or without his colleagues, or a Committee of the Cabinet, with or without the Prime Minister, should const.i.tute themselves a body with permanent records and confidential advisers." Campbell-Bannerman expressed general agreement with the object Dilke had in view, and added: "I entertain almost identically the opinion which has been expressed by the Leader of the Opposition." Having thus obtained the concurrence of both parties to one of the plans which, it was thought, might fulfil the purpose in view, Dilke withdrew the motion.

In 1895 (March 11th) a resolution couched in the precise words of that of 1894 was moved by Mr. Arnold-Forster on the introduction of the Navy Estimates. In supporting it Dilke said:

"The sole purpose of all this very large expenditure was to enable us to achieve victory at sea, which was essential to our very existence as a nation; and what the resolution asked was an a.s.surance that the Government had had under its consideration the nature of the efforts that would be called for to secure victory and the distribution of these efforts between the land and sea forces."

On March 15th, in the discussion of the Army Estimates, Dilke raised a doubt "whether there was in our system of military administration any security that those we put into positions of high command, where they were able to get military experience, were only those men who were fitted for such posts and would hold command in time of war."

On June 21st, 1895, Campbell-Bannerman announced the retirement of the Commander-in-Chief, the Duke of Cambridge, and his own intention to adopt the main lines of the scheme of the Hartington Committee. He would appoint a Commander-in-Chief with reduced powers who would be the princ.i.p.al military adviser of the Secretary of State, and he, with the other heads of departments, who would each be directly responsible to the Minister, would const.i.tute a deliberative Council, so that the Secretary of State, when he gave his decisions, would be guided and supported by the express opinions of all the experienced officers by whom he was surrounded.

Thereupon Mr. Brodrick, now Lord Midleton, moved to reduce the salary of the Secretary of State by way of a vote of censure on the insufficiency of the supply of cordite ammunition. A brief debate followed in which Campbell-Bannerman failed to convince the House that the supply was adequate, and in the division this vote of censure was carried by 132 against 125. This division overthrew the Liberal Ministry. Dilke took no part in the debate, but voted in the majority. For this vote Campbell-Bannerman never forgave him.

In the new Ministry formed by Lord Salisbury as Prime Minister, Mr.

Balfour became First Lord of the Treasury and Leader of the House of Commons, Lord Lansdowne Secretary of State for War, Mr. Brodrick Under-Secretary of State for War, and Mr. Goschen First Lord of the Admiralty. The first act of the new Government was to remodel the general arrangements for national and imperial defence. The scheme was described in general terms by Lord Lansdowne in the House of Lords on August 26th, and more specifically by Mr. Brodrick in the House of Commons on August 31st. There was to be a Defence Committee of the Cabinet under the presidency of the Duke of Devonshire. Mr. Brodrick's words implied that the creation of this body was due to the action of Sir Charles Dilke, who, in the debate on the Address, had again urged his views on this subject.

Of the army Lord Wolseley was to be the new Commander-in-Chief. But, instead of being at the head of the military departments of the War Office, he was to have charge only of the intelligence and mobilization departments, and to be the President of an Army Board of which the other members were to be the Adjutant-General, the Quartermaster-General, the Director of Artillery, and the Inspector-General of Fortifications, each of whom was to be directly responsible for his own department to the Secretary of State. "The main principle of the change," said Mr.

Brodrick, "is the separate responsibility of the military heads of departments to the Secretary of State for their departments, and the focussing of military opinion by means of the Army Board presided over by the Commander-in-Chief." When Mr. Brodrick had finished his statement, Dilke immediately rose and said that

"he had listened to the statement with something like dismay, for some of the changes made had been in his view entirely in the wrong direction.... There certainly had not been, during the many years he had been in the House, any debate in which the issues presented to the House had been so momentous.... To that portion of the Government's scheme which involved the position of the Duke of Devonshire in relation to Imperial defence he was fully favourable.

He believed he was the original suggester of the proposal in 1888.

What had been said by the Undersecretary went to suggest the creation of a Committee of the Cabinet only, which had been formed, they were told, by the late Government. If so, the matter was minimized, and there was less security given to the country than they had hoped. The first thing to be secured was that there should be the individual responsibility of one great member of the Cabinet rather than the collective responsibility of a considerable number.

"In regard to the reorganization of the War Office itself, he viewed with dismay the further explanations given to-day by the Under-Secretary. What had been the main objection to the past management of the army in this country? It had been that responsibility had been frittered away among a great number of different Boards.... He hoped that the new man chosen to be the head of the army would be in practice the real head of the army and the real adviser of the Secretary of State. What he feared they were doing was to create a copy of the Admiralty in those particular points in which the Admiralty itself had been the subject of criticism.... The Government, he contended, ought to recommend the one man, the Commander-in-Chief, and in the first instance take his opinion and regard him as ultimately responsible. Having picked out the most competent man, he hoped the Government would put the arrangement under that man and not under the civilian Secretary of State.... It was a mistake to give the Commander-in-Chief a department; he ought to be above the departments, and the departments ought to report to him. He had ventured for many years to ask in the first place that the Cabinet should consider the whole problem of Imperial defence, and in the second place that they should pick out the best man and trust him."

In reply to Dilke, Mr. Balfour said:

"If you put the Secretary of State for War in direct communication with the Commander-in-Chief alone, I do not see how the Secretary of State for War can be anything else than the administrative puppet of the great soldier who is at the head of the army. He may come down to the House and express the views of that great officer; but if he is to take official advice from the Commander-in-Chief alone, it is absolutely impossible that the Secretary of State should be really responsible, and in this House the Secretary of State will be no more than the mouthpiece of the Commander-in-Chief. It seems to me that the differences in this branch of the subject between the right hon. gentleman (Sir Charles Dilke) and the Government are of a more fundamental character than I antic.i.p.ated."

The difference was indeed fundamental, for Dilke was thinking about war, and Mr. Balfour was thinking only of Ministerial responsibility. In case of a war in which the welfare, possibly the independence, of the nation would be at stake, what civilian Secretary of State would wish to be personally responsible for victory or defeat, or to be more than the mouthpiece of a great soldier at the head of the army?

The Commander-in-Chief had been a military officer whose function was to co-ordinate the work of the heads of the several military departments.

The change made in 1895 transferred to the Secretary of State this duty previously performed by the Commander-in-Chief. Sir James Stephen's Commission had reported in 1887 that it was morally and physically impossible that any one man should satisfactorily discharge the functions which at that time belonged to the Secretary of State. To them in 1895 the Government added those of the Commander-in-Chief. The result was that in 1899 the Secretary of State failed to fulfil the most important of all his functions, that of maintaining accord between the policy of the Cabinet and the military preparations. The Committee of Defence, which was appointed in 1895, might perhaps have performed this essential function if it had ever taken a serious view of its work. But it in doubtful whether it ever did any work at all.

II.