Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research 99/397

‘ MACHINATIONS ’ OF A ‘ MILITARY CLIQUE ’?

187

incapable of bringing the war to a successful conclusion, while the latter regarded Lloyd George as a civilian amateur whose insistence on alternative theatres of operations was as useful as ‘chasing after butterflies’. 22 A showdown between the two men was inevitable, especially after Lloyd George ensured that Allied commanders were obliged to submit their campaign plans to the Supreme War Council (SWC) for approval. Such was the hostility that existed between Lloyd George and Robertson thereafter, that the SWC’s decision in January 1918 to form an Allied General Reserve, controlled by a board of permanent military members from which Robertson was to be excluded, inevitably escalated the feud between the two men. Nevertheless, though Robertson was determined to challenge the SWC’s decision on the basis that it was ‘ridiculous to think that control over strategical reserves could be separated from control over operations’, 23 there is nothing to suggest that a ‘military party’ conspired to bring down the government. One should note, for example, Haig’s refusal to support Robertson and threaten Lloyd George with his resignation. Cassar regards this as a betrayal on the part of Haig, whom he insists was concerned only with ‘the preservation of his own position’ and had ‘no compunction about deserting faithful supporters when it suited his purpose’. 24 This seems unfair, since Haig had threatened to resign in 1917, when the Calais Conference proposed placing the BEF under French command. A more realistic assumption is that, unlike Robertson, Haig did not allow the animosity he felt towards Lloyd George to cloud his vision. He knew perfectly well that the General Reserve need not be a resigning matter since, as he was to prove in 1918, the proposal could be killed in its crib by a simple refusal to authorise the transferal of divisions from the BEF. 25 The principal ‘evidence’ for a coup produced by the War Memoirs is that Charles à Court Repington, the military correspondent of The Morning Post , leaked the proposal for a General Reserve to the press in February 1918. Lloyd George claimed that Robertson was ‘on intimate terms’ 26 with Repington and had leaked classified information to the press to create a scandal that would reverse the SWC’s decision, hence the Morning Post insisting that the SWC’s proposals were of ‘so strange a character’ that ‘a parliamentary committee should examine them at once’. 27 Recalling Repington’s leak, Lloyd George claimed that he knew of ‘nothing comparable to this betrayal’ and that it proved the existence of a ‘formidable conspiracy’ to bring down the government and make Robertson a ‘virtual dictator for the rest of the war’. 28 Most historians agree, however, that Robertson did not, in fact, orchestrate the leak to Repington and that the latter’s telegram should be viewed in the context of the extensive support which the

22 Robertson, From Private to Field Marshal , p. 284. 23 Ibid., p. 330. 24 Cassar, Lloyd George at War , p. 232. 25 Suttie, Rewriting the First World War , p. 159. 26 Lloyd George, War Memoirs , p. 1671. 27 Ibid., p. 1670. 28 Ibid., pp. 1673-1676.