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Towards a Wider War - British Strategic Decision-Making and Military Effectiveness in Scandinavia, 1939-40 (Hardcover)
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Towards a Wider War - British Strategic Decision-Making and Military Effectiveness in Scandinavia, 1939-40 (Hardcover)
Series: Wolverhampton Military Studies
Expected to ship within 9 - 15 working days
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Towards a Wider War examines British policy, grand strategy,
military operations and tactical execution in the critical period
of the `Phoney War' - culminating in Scandinavia and the forlorn
campaign in Norway. Recognizing that political and military leaders
rarely plan for failure, the work assesses the strengths and
weaknesses of British performance in the last year of peace and
during the first critical months of war. Fundamentally, major
problems were evidenced across the spectrum of war, but perhaps the
greatest failing demonstrated remained in the higher direction of
war and the mismatch between avowed strategy and operational
capability. Based on official and unofficial records - and a review
of the existing secondary literature - Towards a Wider War offers a
reasoned and balanced assessment of British war-making at the start
of the Second World War. Following a summation of the actual
experience of war, the work investigates and assesses the style and
manner of Britain's higher direction of war and the effectiveness
of each of the services at the strategic, operational and tactical
levels of war - as well as their abilities to cooperate in the
joint environment. Along the way, fresh insight is offered into the
centrality of economic warfare in British planning; the place of
the War Cabinet in executing oversight of the war; and the workings
of the Chiefs of Staff Committee and the role of the Joint Planning
Committee. Of the services, the Royal Navy was most prepared for
war in a European theatre in 1939. Force structure alone made this
so, yet German aggression against Poland demonstrated the
limitations of maritime power. Both the British Army and the Royal
Air Force were undergoing major expansion programs when war arose
and, for the former, it was thought three years would be required
before deficiencies were alleviated. Sustaining public support
during the interim was by no means assured - and in the background
stood the necessity to avoid another bloodletting on the Western
Front. These factors loomed large in London in late 1939 and that
Italy - a presumed belligerent - had opted for neutrality painted
initial strategic plans false. Increasingly, Britain (and France)
looked to defeat Germany by removing her access to those
commodities that made modern warfare possible: petroleum, iron ore
and finance. That it increasingly appeared Nazi Germany was allied
to Communist Russia only made the problem of making war more
vexing. Towards a Wider War offers a unique single-volume analysis
of British war-making at the pivotal beginning of the Second World
War when all remained to be won - or lost - in the far north.
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