The Grand Alliance (132 page)

9. Our relations with General de Gaulle and the Free
French movement will require to be reviewed. Hitherto
the United States have entered into no undertakings
similar to those comprised in my correspondence with
him. Through no particular fault of his own his movement has created new antagonisms in French minds.

Any action which the United States may now feel able
to take in regard to him should have the effect, inter
alia, of redefining our obligations to him and France so
as to make these obligations more closely dependent
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upon the eventual effort by him and the French nation
to rehabilitate themselves. If Vichy were to act as we
desire about French North Africa, the United States and
Great Britain must labour to bring about a reconciliation
between the Free French (de Gaullists) and those other
Frenchmen who will have taken up arms once more
against Germany. If, on the other hand, Vichy persists
in collaboration with Germany and we have to fight our
way into French North and West Africa, then the de
Gaullists’ movement must be aided and used to the full.

10. We cannot tell what will happen in Spain. It
seems probable that the Spaniards will not give the
Germans a free passage through Spain to attack
Gibraltar and invade North Africa. There may be
infiltration, but the formal demand for the passage of an
army would be resisted. If so, the winter would be the
worst time for the Germans to attempt to force their way
through Spain. Moreover, Hitler, with nearly all Europe
to hold down by armed force in the face of defeat and
semi-starvation, may well be chary of taking over
unoccupied France and involving himself in bitter
guerrilla warfare with the morose, fierce, hungry people
of the Iberian Peninsula. Everything possible must be
done by Britain and the United States to strengthen
their will to resist. The present policy of limited supplies
should be pursued.

The value of Gibraltar Harbour and base to us is so
great that no attempts should be made upon the
Atlantic islands until either the peninsula is invaded or
the Spaniards give passage to the Germans.

11. To sum up, the war in the West in 1942 comprises, as its main offensive effort, the occupation and
control by Great Britain and the United States of the
whole of the North and West African possessions of
France, and the further control by Britain of the whole
North African shore from Tunis to Egypt, thus giving, if
the naval situation allows, free passage through the
Mediterranean to the Levant and the Suez Canal.

These great objectives can only be achieved if British
and American naval and air superiority in the Atlantic is
maintained, if supply lines continue uninterrupted, and if

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the British Isles are effectively safeguarded against
invasion.

My second paper on the Pacific war was only completed after we had landed.

P
ART
II

T
HE
P
ACIFIC
F
RONT

December 20, 1941

The Japanese have naval superiority, which enables
them to transport troops to almost any desired point,
possess themselves of it, and establish it for an air-naval fuelling base. The Allies will not have for some
time the power to fight a general fleet engagement.

Their power of convoying troops depends upon the size
of the seas, which reduces the chance of interception.

Even without superior sea power we may descend by
surprise here and there. But we could not carry on a
sustained operation across the seas. We must expect
therefore to be deprived one by one of our possessions
and strong-points in the Pacific, and that the enemy will
establish himself fairly easily in one after the other,
mopping up the local garrisons.

2. In this interim period our duty is one of stubborn
resistance at each point attacked, and to slip supplies
and reinforcements through as opportunity offers,
taking all necessary risks. If our forces resist stubbornly
and we reinforce them as much as possible, the enemy
will be forced to make ever-larger overseas commitments far from home; his shipping resources will be
strained,

and

his

communications

will

provide

vulnerable targets upon which all available naval and
air forces, United States, British, and Dutch – especially
submarines – should concentrate their effort. It is of the
utmost importance that the enemy should not acquire
large gains cheaply; that he should be compelled to
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nourish all his conquests and kept extended, and kept
burning up his resources.

3. The resources of Japan are a wasting factor. The
country has long been overstrained by its wasteful war
in China. They were at their maximum strength on the
day of the Pearl Harbour attack. If it is true, as Stalin
asserts, that they have, in addition to their own air force
fifteen hundred German airplanes (and he would have
opportunities of knowing how they got there), they have
now no means of replacing wastage other than by their
small home production of three hundred to five hundred
per month. Our policy should be to make them maintain
the largest possible number of troops in their conquests
overseas, and to keep them as busy as possible, so as
to enforce well-filled lines of communication and a high
rate of aircraft consumption. If we idle and leave them
at ease they will be able to extend their conquests
cheaply and easily, work with a minimum of overseas
forces, make the largest gains and the smallest commitments, and thus inflict upon us an enormous amount
of damage. It is therefore right and necessary to fight
them at every point where we have a fair chance, so as
to keep them burning and extended.

4. But we must steadily aim at regaining superiority
at sea at the earliest moment. This can be gained in
two ways: first, by the strengthening of our capital
ships. The two new Japanese battleships built free from
treaty limitations must be considered a formidable
factor, influencing the whole Pacific theatre. It is understood that two new American battleships will be fit for
action by May. Of course, all undertakings in war must
be subject to the action of the enemy, accidents, and
misfortune, but if our battleship strength should not be
further reduced, nor any new unforeseen stress arise,
we should hope to place the Nelson and the Rodney at
the side of these two new American battleships, making
four sixteen-inch-gun modern vessels of major strength.

Behind such a squadron the older reconstructed
battleships of the United States should be available in
numbers sufficient to enable a fleet action, under
favourable circumstances, to be contemplated at any
time after the month of May. The recovery of our naval
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superiority in the Pacific, even if not brought to a trial of
strength, would reassure the whole western seaboard
of the American continent, and thus prevent a needless
dissipation on a gigantic defensive effort of forces
which have offensive parts to play. We must therefore
set before ourselves, as a main strategic object, the
forming of a definitely superior battle fleet in the Pacific,
and we must aim at May as the date when this will be
achieved.

5. Not only then, but in the interval, the warfare of
aircraft-carriers should be developed to the greatest
possible extent. We are ourselves forming a squadron
of three aircraft-carriers, suitably attended, to act in the
waters between South Africa, India, and Australia. The
United States have already seven regular carriers,
compared with Japan’s ten, but those of the United
States are larger. To this force of regular warship
aircraft-carriers we must add a very large development
of improvised carriers, both large and small. In this way
alone can we increase our sea powerrapidly. Even if
the carriers can only fly a dozen machines, they may
play their part in combination with other carriers. We
ought to develop a floating air establishment sufficient
to enable us to acquire and maintain for considerable
periods local air superiority over shore-based aircraft
and sufficient to cover the landing of troops in order to
attack the enemy’s new conquests. Unless or until this
local air superiority is definitely acquired, even a somewhat superior fleet on our side would fight at a serious
disadvantage. We cannot get more battleships than
those now in sight for the year 1942, but we can and
must get more aircraft-carriers. It takes five years to
build a battleship, but it is possible to improvise a
carrier in six months. Here then is a field for invention
and ingenuity similar to that which called forth the
extraordinary fleets and flotillas which fought on the
Mississippi in the Civil War. It must be accepted that the
priority given to seaborne aircraft of a suitable type will
involve a retardation in the full-scale bombing offensive
against Germany which we have contemplated as a
major method of waging war. This however is a matter
of time and of degree. We cannot in 1942 hope to

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reach the levels of bomb discharge in Germany which
we had prescribed for that year, but we shall surpass
them in 1943. Our joint programme may be late, but it
will all come along. And meanwhile the German cities
and other targets will not disappear. While every effort
must be made to speed up the rate of bomb discharge
upon Germany until the great scales prescribed for
1943 and 1944 are reached, nevertheless, we may be
forced by other needs to face a retardation in our
schedules. The more important will it be therefore that
in this interval a force, be it only symbolic, of United
States bombing squadrons should operate from the
British Isles against the German cities and seaports.