Dark Earth: A New Jerusalem

Steve,

You are most welcome as always. I quite agree that social investment is required as part of the creation and maintenance of a successful and prospering nation; Stanley Barton having slightly different priorities is more of a function of exploring uncharted political territory for the 1960s, looking at different motivations and really treading a different road. This is all occurring on the back of distinctly different historical development through the 19th and 20th centuries in particular and some earlier moves towards measures of welfare; in addition, there is a slightly different background to the Poor Law and related general situation with a wider role for the Church and monasteries with Henry's dissolution.

His general aim is to invest a lot in education, cover expanded and indexed pensions through a dedicated fund, try to cover welfare through National Insurance and provide for a strong, decent health budget at a sustainable level of expenditure. In line with politicians across the board, his first order of business and priority is defence and foreign policy. In order to achieve all this, he sees the way forward as pushing for maximal growth, along with trying to copy Kennedy's tax cuts in some areas and making the most of the current boom.

South Georgia (it may end up somewhere else with better geology, being a Southern Hemisphere parallel to the Svalbard Vault in @)

There isn't really any notion of global warming and there is more of a fear of global cooling (coming from some of the alarmist popular science/mystery programmes of the 1970s). However, there is an earlier push for fusion and solar power satellites, among other solutions such as more nuclear plants.

On habitat destruction and pollution of all sorts, the elves, druids and other groups are onto it and have the ears of the major Western governments. As you say, a little bit of prevention saves many, many problems. We have already seen this with different policies on whaling, overfishing, air pollution, deforestation and desertification and a fair bit more is coming in regard to water pollution, preservation of animal species and more. Sometimes, like the Great White Shark, it will be too late; but on the other hand, the example of Godzilla/the Pacific Monster is already causing some quiet thought in more than a few circles.

Simon

A New Jerusalem Part 6

“It is more than just a White Paper, Richard. If we get this right, the national security policy of Britain and the security of the whole Empire will be set for a generation! We can set the path for even the Tories to follow along and emulate us, knocking them off their perch as the natural party of defence.”

Secretary of State for War Sir Richard Pendragon had seen Stanley Barton in what he characterised as his charged mood on several occasions and, as then, the cause generally tended to be his expansive interest in military grand strategy. According to some of the older mandarins at the War Office and the Admiralty, the intensity of the flow of ideas and new concepts was reminiscent of Mr. Churchill in his days as Minister of Defence before the war, albeit delivered in a far less ebullient fashion.

“I can definitely see the potential, Prime Minister, although I’d perhaps be a little more sanguine about the full extent of its secondary effect. When the Tories took their new look back in 1961, they wanted to consolidate to save money, to trim the fat; ultimately, some of their cuts went down into the flesh and bone and cost them at the ballot box.”

“You’re right enough. My thinking is simple, though - fix the funding issue before it erupts down the line, and we get the benefits to our position as one of the superpowers and get more effective hard power to keep our areas of influence. What is needed is a hard critical look at what we need to do and what forces are needed to do it. That is why I had you take your little tour last week.”

“The regional commanders and their staff were extremely forthcoming with the answers you were after, Prime Minister and that helped me put together what we needed from Home Forces.”

“Good. It is here that we’ve got to make some decisions, rather than simply paring back on our commitments in the Empire and overseas.”

“Cut backs, Prime Minister?”

“Not as such; more a case of making sure we can honour all our commitments and cover for contingencies whilst not trying to fight the last war, or the one before that. We’ve got to get ahead of the wave of development.”

“Naturally. We’ve had the same number of divisions since 1957, with the exception of the 1960 mobilisation, and before that, the same general force deployments since the end of the war. The only significant drawdown we’ve seen is from India, on account of them no longer requiring us. The same can’t be said about the Far East as long as Indonesia is a threat and there are the broader wars across the region. In the Middle East, the Arabs don’t necessarily want us there, but that is part of the reason for our presence.”

“Indeed. There will be no significant reductions in MELF and FELF at all, at least not while this Vietnam business is brewing up further. But what more is needed on top of them and around the edges? That is where we’ve got to take a hard look. We need three armies, Richard: the heavy armoured one for Europe, the lighter British Mobile Force for Scandinavia and the force for the Middle East and Orient, which lie somewhere in between. That leaves us with the strategic reserve.”

“Yes, Prime Minister. That has shifted a bit over the last few years, but the fundamentals remain the same from when the corps was pulled out of India and combined with whatever wasn’t designated for European missions from Home Forces. 1st Airborne and one of the home based Royal Marine divisions on immediate stand by and the two ready reserve infantry divisions, the Guards and the Light Division, for follow up. One heavy division, one medium and two light.
It gives us an ideal force for something in Africa or Persia, but the main idea behind it has been rapid deployment, whether for reinforcing Malaya or Burma, or for the Mediterranean and Middle East. It has to be light enough to be fast, but heavy enough to stay put. With the right support from artillery, aircraft and warships, they can do it.”

“Undoubtably, Richard. Give them the tools and they’ll finish the job. The issue goes beyond capability, though, to the question of duplication of capacity. What level of force does Field Marshal Anderson think he’d need in the Middle East?”

“It does depend, Prime Minister. If it were simply the Arab Union, Egyptians or the Turks kicking off, as he said, then they could be handled with an extra two divisions on top of what he has on the ground and the Commonwealth troops, even if the Israelis didn’t join in. If the Soviets come south through Iraq and Persia, he envisaged needing two more corps to stop them, along with the Israelis and everything the Saracs and Anzacs can get there. We wouldn’t have those two corps without full mobilisation of the reserves and Territorials. The Indian agreement only goes through to the end of next year and I’m not confident we can rely on it for more than that. However, I’m not sure that quite so many divisions are needed. Anderson’s end force there is the same size as in 1950, and I should know - I was out in HQ there when they called me back up after Korea started! It was an article of faith, almost: two divisions for Suez and two for the Nile delta; two infantry, one airborne and one armoured in Israel; and five infantry, two armoured and one airborne for Iraq, plus everything that India could send west. Things have changed a lot in fifteen years, though, not the least of which is what one modern division can do; the jump in capability from ‘50 to ‘56 was large enough, but what has been done in the last few years dwarfs that.”

“It is somewhat instructive, is it not, that none of those numbers include the Royal Marines?”

“Of course, but a large part of that simply reflects the arm wrestling over the budget share. Even without factoring them in, I'd estimate that the Army’s Middle East projections are at least double what we need.”

“I think you see where I’m getting at. What I would like to see is a reappraisal of force requirements and planning across the board, with nothing being viewed as sacrosanct simply because it is what we've done for decades. It seems to me that at the moment, we're simply not getting enough value for our money or impact from our numbers. If we have an excellent strategic reserve force in Britain, why do we keep airborne and Royal Marine divisions in Egypt and Malaya?”

Pendragon paused to choose his words carefully. “In general, Prime Minister, the rationale for the forward deployed airborne divisions has been to react rapidly to regional crises, such as a repeat of Persia or a blow up in Africa.”

“And that is exactly the case that the Admiralty makes for having a full division with each fleet. Yet we’ve got the better part of 60,000 men up in Yorkshire and Scotland for the same mission. If we can cut that type of duplication of men, money and effort, then we open up the door for being able to do more.”

Or to cut them altogether. thought Pendragon. One of the bon mots he’d picked up in his initial briefings at the War Office and his flying visits to Alexandria and Singapore was that the Army brass didn’t regard the Soviets as their greatest threat, nor even the Royal Navy (although there was a substantial amount of vigorous competitiveness with the latter) but rather the Treasury. To that end, there had developed a distinct preference for keeping certain types of contingency forces such as the Paras and the Commandos deployed away from the British Isles where possible, else they raise the ire of bean counters by seemingly “sitting around”.

Yet his loyalty was to the man in front of him, the Party, the Crown and the British people, not his department. It did make a lot of sense, the more he thought about it. The consolidation of Imperial deployments into regional brigades had been supposed to deal with exactly the same issue, yet provided another level of what had been nobly intended as insurance of security but turned out as duplication of effort. There was also a very significant technological change occurring with the advent of supersonic air travel, whereby the prospect of flying troops to Singapore in under half a dozen hours was now on the cusp of being reality.

Balancing this up would be an interesting task.

“If we choose to go down that path, Prime Minister, we could save a great deal in money and effort, whilst also raising up some questions about whether we need the same force level that we do now. I see your earlier meaning on cut backs - it is and it isn’t.”

“A shame Herr Schrodinger is dead, Richard. We could get him to write the White Paper.”

..................................................

Stanley Barton looked down at his tea. That had gone as expected, really. Richard Pendragon was a solid enough fellow with a decent mind and had been able to make the right inferences and connections. To really push forward the Grand Design, and shore it up against competing priorities, there would need to be a comprehensive and bold White Paper. Bold, but not dangerously so, mind you.

The logic had been quite inescapable, though, and he was glad he was not the only one to see it, even if glad was perchance not the best word. He had come to office on the back of arguing for the expansion of the armed services and halting what he had criticised as unnecessary cuts. Now, as he sought to justify those steps, he instead found himself contemplating the opposite; cutting overall size and numbers to build up power and capacity. On the base level, it seemed to be a quite straightforward line of logic, leading towards cutting down some of the extraneous numbers around the edge as a first step: bring home the airborne divisions and Marines from permanent foreign deployments and perhaps reduce some of the Imperial brigades in favour of the central reserve. But that wouldn’t be the end; it never was. The next targets would then be the higher numbered infantry divisions, as they were simply carrying out a role that the newly returned forces could do, all quite logical. After that, the airborne and marines themselves would once more be a target, then the wasteful notion of having two expeditionary forces or entire divisions of Gurkhas. All of which would be true and would reduce spending, allowing more to focus on extremely agile and powerful forces. Salami tactics, he’d heard it called. Slice by slice. Once past a certain point, commitments would have to be reduced and abrogated and the legions would come home, firstly in a trickle and then faster and with more momentum.

Without meaning to do so, he would radically reduce the reach and weight of British power on Earth, for it was in the nature of the Empire as he saw it. It was not like the empires of old, where the heartland was all that mattered, nor the rapacious ones of the age of colonisation, where enrichment of the metropole drove the ravenous beast ever forward. No, this new empire had to be one of equality, of fairness, of the shared betterment of mankind, mutual benefit and mutual belief. It also had to be one with heartlands across the world, not confined to these islands, however sceptred they may be. If it combined those, then it could stand out fair and proud, combining the best of tradition and the best of modernity, secure in its place in the world, the mighty old lion and its fierce pride. This could then drive the world forward to the golden sunlit uplands of peace and freedom that had been his dream of the last twenty years.

To maintain the empire or Commonwealth or whatever it needed to be called, there had to be faith in its power and faith in its promise and promises. To keep that power, Britain needed to be able to punch well above its individual weight, use every advantage it had to the hilt and maintain belief.
If Australia and New Zealand didn’t see British forces ready to stand by them, then they would look elsewhere; if South Africa and Rhodesia didn’t see how they could benefit and flourish, then they similarly drift away. Most worryingly, if Canada and Newfoundland couldn’t see how continued membership of the Empire and Commonwealth made them richer, safer and greater, then there was an absolute likelihood that they would look to the south. The inner states of the Commonwealth, the old white Dominions, were the simplest cases - the vastly more complex matters would be India and Africa. In any case, they needed to be able to keep the promises made in all of the treaties and agreements, both public and secret, that had forged the modern alliance that made up the heart of the British Empire. If any of the Dominions called, then the motherland was honour bound to answer with fleets and men. This couldn’t be done if Britain looked to her own interests alone.

Thus, he had to cut as much as possible whilst also trying to not cut as much as possible. He had to reduce forces deployed to the Far East and Africa whilst crises brewed there that threatened the direct security of several Dominions. There were half a hundred contradictions inherent in the process ahead, which was one reason why it took rather more of his focus and thought away from the affairs of the nation at home than he’d prefer. Yet here was the opportunity to save both money and the bulk of necessary capabilities. It had to be taken and seen to be taken, yet not in a manner that emboldened Britain’s foes abroad and cast doubt into the hearts of her friends.

Barton saw his way forward through the warring objectives through several broad principles: reduce the cost of the Army but not reduce its nominal active strength; restructuring reserve plans and capabilities, with a reduction of 8 Territorial divisions; removing perceptions of duplication through introducing new capabilities; consolidating forward defence; exploring the reorganisation of long established structures; and engaging the Commonwealth for specific needs and agreements.

It all seemed rather clever as far as solutions to complex issues went, a sort of shell game of ideas. A good thing there were no major issues that would further complicate the process.

Apart from the war in Viet Nam, that is.

Yes, he died in 1961 as in @.

Now, in the second section, readers may notice how Barton isn’t particularly specific about his plans for the Army. This is because I’d like to see what others think within the broad framework that has been laid out there.

Lordroel,

There would be a mixture of gratitude from some quarters and disquiet from others, but in such a scenario, they’d have bigger fish to fry in the form of a Soviet invasion. Regardless of how they feel, they will be a battleground and there may be some who feel a bit like the Egyptian Army of WW2 in @.

Simon

They did close enough to nothing. My reference was to them being rather perturbed at becoming a combined battle front and massive logistical hub and many even developing pro-Axis sympathies as part of that.

The situation on Dark Earth was a bit different. Egyptian forces were used in Egypt and the broader Mediterranean, as well as the Far East later in the war. The King was pleasantly surprised that some of those officers a bit more strident in their opposition ended up as casualties of some of the nastier battles in Greece...

No, it did not occur as the change to a Wafd government wasn’t seen as needed. The British were also a bit more ruthless in dealing with pro-Axis members of the Egyptian government, being willing to use imprisonment and exile quite a bit. Naguib was one of those killed in Greece, along with Nasser, Sadat and Amer; in the latter cases, their deaths were the result of being junior infantry officers fighting against the Bulgarians, Austrians and Germans in a particularly bloody meat grinder phase of the Macedonian Campaign.

Some initial notes:

1. “Reduce the cost of the Army but not reduce its nominal active strength”
- This would potentially entail keeping a certain number of divisions, but reduce their active numbers
- Pulling some units back to Britain
- Alternately, replacing two airborne divisions with the “active reserve” divisions
- Considering the wider use and deployment of African troops; something akin to the Attlee era discussions of a British African Army from @ may be a basis
- Full consideration of Gurkha options

2. “Reducing reserve plans and capabilities, with a reduction of 8 Territorial divisions”
- Disbanding at least 8 and possibly more of the TA divisions tasked with home defence
- Considering all options for the remainder of the TA, including whether all should be tasked with a BAOR/Field Army role
- Reconsidering some aspects of the merger of the Army Reserve and TA

3. “Removing perceptions of duplication through introducing new capabilities”
- 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th Infantry Divisions to be potentially reworked as mountain, motorised, jungle and airmobile

4. “Consolidating forward defence”
- Reducing dispersed dedicated garrisons in favour of regional brigades with mobility

5. “Exploring the reorganisation of long established structures”
- Considering the number of active corps and their composition
- This would occur in concert with the Canadian Army for the BAOR

6. “Engaging the Commonwealth for specific needs and agreements”
- Formalising some deployments as joint Commonwealth divisions