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George was determined to prevent what he saw as a criminal wastage of men on the Western Front, to such an extent that Haig was wont to comment that the BEF had ‘won the war in spite of Lloyd George’. 60 Consider the fact that George V, feeling he had a duty to protect his senior officers from political interference, wrote to Haig when the latter was appointed Commander-in-Chief, promising support and hoping that Haig would ‘from time to time write to me freely’. 61 Lloyd George, aware of the court’s readiness to side with Robertson and Haig in their disputes with the government, made sure not to tell the King about decisions likely to provoke a critical response. In 1917 for example, he told George V about the Calais Conference’s proposal to place the BEF under French command only after the War Cabinet had agreed to it, something that Elizabeth Greenhalgh regarded as a ‘shabby trick’. 62 Though Lloyd George was ultimately unable completely to loosen the grip of ‘Westerners’ on Allied strategy, he was able to use the government’s manpower policies to restrict Haig’s capacity to launch offensives, especially after the losses the BEF suffered at Passchendaele. In December 1917, the Cabinet Committee on Manpower imposed severe limitations on the manpower budget for 1918, with Cabinet Secretary Maurice Hankey admitting that the policy was designed to keep ‘the War Office short (of men) to compel the soldiers to adopt tactics that will reduce the waste of manpower’. 63 Woodward may claim that Lloyd George ‘was not guilty of hoarding men in uniform in 1918’, 64 but the evidence suggests that the opposite was true. Even Cassar’s sympathetic portrayal of Lloyd George concedes that he was ‘determined to deny Haig any more men than was required to hold the line’ and that, even then Lloyd George ‘and the War Cabinet (did) not provide Haig with the necessary forces’. 65 The establishment of the SWC and the debate over the formation of an Allied General Reserve can also be seen through the lens of Lloyd George’s willingness to oust Robertson regardless of the constitutional implications. Robertson, shortly before his resignation, had insisted that his remaining as CIGS with reduced powers or going to the SWC was irrelevant when compared to the dangers involved in establishing a ‘dual authority for the military direction of the war’, ultimately concluding that his resignation was due to Lloyd George wanting ‘a CIGS whose strategical views might be in more conformity with his own’. 66 Sir Douglas Haig’s Command similarly claimed that Lloyd George had intervened ‘despotically against the advice of his own military leaders’ to further his agenda of establishing the predominance ‘of statesmen in military management’. 67 60 Elizabeth Greenhalgh, ‘Myth and Memory: Sir Douglas Haig and the Imposition of Allied Unified Command in March 1918’, The Journal of Military History , Vol. 68, (July 2004), p. 818. 61 French, ‘“A One Man Show?”, p. 90. 62 Greenhalgh, ‘Myth and Memory’, p. 777. 63 Woodward, ‘Did Lloyd George Starve the British Army of Men?’, p. 244. 64 Ibid., p. 252. 65 Cassar, Lloyd George at War , p. 206. 66 Robertson, From Private to Field Marshal , p. 335. 67 Dewar & Boraston, Sir Douglas Haig’s Command , p. 9.