The best tank of World War Two… a debate

(Some of this is taken from a previous post on Statistical Issues.)

Left us start with the issue of tanks from the perspective of propaganda. More rubbish has been written about who had the best tanks during the Second World War than about any other topic to do with that war. Again and again you get supposedly serious historians talking about how the Germans started the Second World War with overwhelming tank superiority; that the Allies were only brought back into the race by the arrival of the Sherman tank; and how German technology leapt ahead again at the end of the Second World War to give them unrivalled vehicles. All these statements are of course completely incorrect.

One of the problems of course, is 'best tank when, and for what?'

Comparing what was available in 1939/40 to what was being produced in 1945 (say a Panzer III or Matilda II with a Centurion or Stalin), is worse than useless. There is no comparison. Only the Panzer IV was actually produced throughout the war: and the heavily armoured final version of the tank – with a long barrelled 75mm gun capable of taking on almost every tank yet operational in mid 1945 – bore only a passing resemblance to the lightly armoured tank with a short barrelled infantry support gun – of with minimal ability to do more than scratch the paint of a CharB in 1939/40.

The best tank in the world in 1939 was the French Somua 35 (closely followed by the FrenchCharB). These tanks were, for the period, the best armed, armoured, and most mechanically reliable vehicles available. They repeatedly demonstrated their complete invulnerability to the standard German tank and anti-tank guns, and were often able to destroy large numbers of German tanks, before eventually being themselves destroyed by hastily deployed German heavy artillery or anti-aircraft guns. There are records of single French tanks taking over 130 hits from German anti-tank guns, while blithely cruising around destroying German tanks, vehicles, and guns.

The main fault to be had with the French tanks however, was their one-man turret. It may have had a 47 mm gun capable of knocking out any German tank of the period, but it meant that the tank commander had responsibility for loading, aiming, and firing, as well as directing his own tank, and those of the other units in his squadron. Given that far too few tanks had radio, the magnificent equipment was always left down by command and control techniques.

Fortunately for the allies, the best tank of 1940 was the British Matilda II. Not only did it have armour invulnerable to any German gun except their heavy anti-aircraft artillery - the famous 88 mm - it also had a 40 mm gun capable of defeating any German tank of the period, and the magnificent advantage of a three-man turret with proper radio facilities. Unfortunately for the allies, there were only a few dozen of these available in northern France. Not nearly enough to turn the tide. They did however have the crucial effect of scaring the German divisional commander (one Erwin Rommel) into pulling back and re-fortifying his position rather than advancing after the Arras counter-attack; and an equally stellar affect on the German high command who froze Panzer operations for a few crucial days to let infantry catch up, and then refused permission for the Panzers to be wasted in the tax on the evacuating British and French forces at Dunkirk.

A minor sidelight here. I have always had trouble with history books, or indeed with graduates of various army training schools, who hold that Hitler should have allowed his tanks to roll over the Allies at Dunkirk. They manage to ignore several important details. The German blitzkrieg worked against second-rate troops, and only became a rout when they found their way into rear at areas with inadequate lines of defence. The German tanks facing the more professional Allied forces in Belgium were beaten off time and again with significant casualties. The idea that the Germans would have been effective in attacking the cream of the Allied forces, well-equipped with artillery, anti-tank guns, and tanks, in what would effectively become street fighting (the worst possible offensive terrain for tanks), is highly dubious. The fact that most of the German tanks had just completed several hundred kilometers of fast movement and now needed major maintenance was also an issue. As was Hitler’s quite sensible belief that it was more important to redeploy them to finish off France, than to waste them against desperate men in a fortified port.

The Matilda and its successor the Valentine would probably still the best Allied tanks in the world in early 1941, when they swept Italian forces before them, and several times fought the German African corps to a standstill. The German response to their shocking failures in 1940, had been to upgrade the Panzer III and IV with slightly improved armour, and the short barreled 50 mm gun. But they were still on a losing wicket engaging the British infantry tanks in any sort of close terrain, such as in the siege of Tobruk. Fortunately for Rommel, out in the open terrain of the desert he could deploy his tanks behind screens of high-powered anti- tank guns, which the British tanks lacked the long-range high explosive shells to engage effectively.

This is where the myth of the value of the Sherman tank comes from. The Sherman arrived at a time when it’s armour and weapon were on a par with the Panzer III and IV tanks that it was facing. Despite the fact that its 75 mm gun was greatly inferior as an anti-tank weapon to the new British six pounder guns that were starting to equip British tanks, the high explosive shell that the Sherman could fire was incredibly useful for engaging Rommel’s 88 mm guns at long-distance in the flat desert terrain.

For several months, it seemed as though the mechanically reliable Sherman would be a war winner, despite its notable tendency to explode in flames whenever it was hit. (Allied troops refer to it as a Ronson - “lights first time every time”. German troops just referred to it as a “Tommy Cooker”.) But this concept was fantasy, which could be easily demonstrated within a few months, though it took the US government another two years to admit it.

Within months of the Sherman arriving on the battlefield. the Panzer IV had been upgraded to a long barrelled 75, and the result, as many commentators have noted, "was more than a match for any contemporary Allied tank".

Worse was to be revealed in the Tunisia campaigns, where the Sherman’s came up against the Tiger tank (a response to the brilliant Russian T34), which was almost completely invulnerable to their 75 mm guns. (The British were very grateful that their more efficient six pounder anti-tank weapons were already being reinforced by the magnificent new 17 pounder anti-tank weapons which could deal with these monsters.) Nonetheless American authorities apparently learnt nothing from this campaign. (To be fair the British were also working on the assumption that a six pounder anti-tank gun would be adequate tank armament to see out the war at this point.) However the Italian campaign revealed conclusively that shorter range engagements against more heavily armed and armoured vehicles made the Sherman completely obsolete. Even the much more heavily armoured British Churchill, with it’s astonishing cross country ability and acceptable 6 pounder was not adequate.

The British response was surprisingly fast (considering how slowly things had changed in the past), not only designing and manufacturing 17 pounder version of the Cromwell from scratch in time to have some available for the D-Day landings; but also developing a version of the Sherman that carried the 17 pounder gun. This latter – the Sherman Firefly – was offered to the Americans, along with all the other ‘funnies’ that Percy Hobart had designed for the campaign, but again American military authorities - particularly General Omar Bradley - felt that none of this was necessary. (See casualties at Omaha compared to British/Canadian landings. For the rest of the war the Americans had to borrow British ‘funnies’ for assault operations.)

The campaigning Normandy showed even more thoroughly how ineffective the standard Sherman was as an assault tank, but still American authorities insisted that swapping from a 75 mm to a 76 mm gun would be enough to see out the war. The new gun was significantly better, giving the Americans and the equivalent anti-tank firepower to the British six pounder (which had been recognized as being insufficient for two years in British service) or the Russian 85mm. However the weapon was nowhere near as efficient as the 17 pounder which the British now had in more than half their tanks and self-propelled anti-tank guns. 

In all of this so far, I have barely mentioned the Russians at all. Their T34 tank was possibly the single most effective of the war, and was the breakthrough that forced everyone else to rethink their designs.  So we can say without a shadow of a doubt that the T34 was the best tank of the war for almost two years – from the time of Barbarossa (June 22, 1941) until the appearance of the Panther at Kursk (July 5, 1943). It certainly held this title unchallenged by the Sherman and Churchill tanks that appeared during its reign, and probably by the Tiger as well.

The Tiger is a problem for this sort of discussion, because it re-introduces the concept of 'what for' into the debate. The Tiger was a far superior heavy infantry support or assault tank to the T34, but a far inferior battlefield manoeuvre or pursuit tank. In fact the Tiger was so slow and limited in cross country ability, that it was actually more effective as a defensive weapon once the Germans were thrown back on that approach, than it had been for re-igniting their Blitzkreig glory days.

Which brings up another debate worth considering. Heavy versus medium tanks, and their roles.

The vast majority of western books are fixated on the 'best' tank, perhaps on the assumption that a single tank that will do all jobs is the best solution. Certainly there are loud complaints in many textbooks about the British division of their armour into Infantry versus Cruiser tank formations. For some reason it is believed that this was a waste of resources, that could have been better spent on a 'compromise' tank that could do everything required.

It doesn't seem to occur to such critics that the technology levels of most nations for most of the war were to up to a genuine 'all purpose' tank.  In the last days of the war, both the Americans and British rushed the new models to the front line. The American Pershing heavy tank had a very good 90 mm gun, and much better armour. It also unfortunately, had the same engine as the Sherman for much greater weight, so was as slow and difficult to manoeuvre as many of the underpowered German heavy tanks. It is not really an 'all purpose' design. By contrast to the British were moving the first of their Centurion tanks to the front line even as the war finished. The Centurion had an unrivalled balance of armour, gun, and manoeuvrability. Whereas the Pershing had a service life of only a few years, the Centurion is still in front-line service with several nations in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa, including Israel which has used them in many wars. (The South Africans have just announced yet another upgrade to keep the Centurion at battle standards). 

It should be noted though, that many people suggest that, technically, the first genuine all purpose tank – the Centurion – was actually a post war design, because the 6 operational tanks in Belguim when Germany surrendered had not actually engaged German tanks. (As opposed to the Pershing, the 20 operational examples having engaged German tanks at least twice…) This appears to be splitting hairs more than a bit considering the war continued for several more months in Asia against an opponent not worthy of redeploying Pershing's or Centurian's against – in fact incapable of facing even obsolescent Matilda's (Australians in New Guinea), Stuart's and Grant's (Burma). But it does reinforce the point that such designs were technically not possibly for most nations for most of the war.

The truth is that every nation that took tanks seriously in WWII had different categories of armoured vehicles. Every single one of them – French, German, Russian, Italian, British, American and even Japanese – had armoured cars for scouting; light tanks for more combat intensive reconnaissance and pursuit; medium tanks for open warfare and pursuit; and most had heavy tanks for infantry support and breakthroughs . (To be fair the Italians and Japanese never had heavy tanks…. and their mediums looked a bit 'light' by anyone else's standards.)

The writers who decry the British Infantry and Cruiser tank division seem unaware that almost everyone else had the same division. The Germans had Panzer III cruisers, and the early Panzer IV's with low velocity short barrelled guns as infantry support vehicles. Later this division was the Panther – whose 75mm high velocity high explosive shell lacked punch for anti-infantry or anti-artillery work – and the Tiger - the 88mm high explosive shell having much greater punch: but the principle was the same. The French had the Somua 35 for cruiser work, and the CharB for assault work. The Russians had a variety of heavy and medium tanks throughout the war on the same principles.

Only the Americans had a different division, with their preference being general purpose cruisers with low velocity 75's, and 'tank destroyers' with high velocity 76.2's, but based on pretty similar hulls. In some ways their division was prescient, in that the German 'Jagd' tank destroyers were just a more streamlined version of the same principle - heavier gun on specialist version of similar hull. But it left the Americans with a hole in the assault tank/infantry support category that was never adequately filled. (Whenever they needed heavy tanks to assault one of the fortified ports in France, it was the specialised Churchill's of General Hobart's 79th division that they had to call on.)

Having noted the necessary division between medium cruisers and heavy assault/infantry support tanks however, we can still make a fair summary.

So, in contrast to what many history books and documentaries will tell you, the French had the best tanks in 1939, and the British had the best tanks of 1940 and 1945. Also in contrast to what many history books will tell you, the Shermans effective front-line role can best be defined as the few months between the battle of Alamein, and the arrival of Tiger tanks in Tunisia. All attempts to use it after that in Italy or northern France just demonstrated how pathetic it was in modern engagements. Even the British Firefly version with the 17 pounder, was extremely vulnerable to any German tank. In fact it is amusing to note, that they came into their own for the blitzkrieg across open country in pursuit of the defeated German armies across France; which has a direct parallel to the inferior German tanks pursuing the defeated French in 1940. (The equally inadequate British Cromwell tanks, being significantly faster, were actually still better at this pursuit than the Shermans.) The best tank of the Sherman's period of functional use, of course being the T34.

So our list of 'best tanks' could go something like this.
1939 - Best cruiser - Somua 35, Best support - CharB.
1940 - Best support becomes Matilda II.
1941 - Best cruiser initially Panzer III/IV with short 50mm guns, becomes T34 when Russia enters the war.
1942 - Best support is Tiger.
1943 - Best cruiser is Panther.
1944 - Best support is Tiger II.
1945 - Best 'all purpose' is Centurion.

Rating General Percy Hobart

Major General Sir Percy Hobart is a much under-considered, and under-appreciated general in the history of World War Two. Partly because he was a bit of a nutter, and partly because the limited action he did see is hard to assess.

Nonetheless Hobart was one of the most important technical and tactical developers of Allied armour techniques, and was responsible for training the famed 7th Armoured Division (the Desert Rats) for its early Blitzkreigs in North Africa (though he didn’t get to lead it into battel); for training the outstanding 11^th Armoured Division – probably the best British armoured division of the D-Day to Germany campaign (though he didn’t get to lead it into battle); and developing and leading the extraordinary 79^th armoured division (Hobart’s Funnies) through that vital campaign. Liddell Hart said this 'hat trick' of the 3 best British armoured divisions of the war alone made him incomparable, let alone his influence on armour overall.

In between Hobart’s influence on the development of tank design, tank tactics, tank training schools, and the principles of all arms combined operations, meant that his impact on Allied tank forces during the war was probably greater than just about anyone else's. (Guderian too kept track of his writings throughout the interwar period, hiring someone personally to do the translations.)

Hobart’s background was as an army engineer, who learned his craft in India in the first years of the 20C. But his first significant role was as a combat engineer on the front line in France in 1915, where he expereinced the waste of bad plannig and leadership. This was reinforced immensely when he was transferred to the war against the Turks in what is now Iraq. Here he saw the nadir of bad planning and leadership in action, and here he developed his wilingness to speak boldly about things above his theoreticla pay grade.

His key lesson learned from the trench and desert fighting of WWI was that good planning and surprise were far more importnt than weight of numbers , attrition, or ‘porridge making’ artillery barrages. He also learned to value skill and potential over presumed experience and caution, and became keen on pushing the best candidates to higher ranks faster (rather than waste too much young talent in more exposed leadership roles before it could advance to a role to make a real difference).

Hobart’s war experience became more happy when the War Office finally got sick of the inadequate older generals India command was sending to Iraq, and forcibly imposed the young and energetic Major General Stanley Maude. Maude was one of those rare new officers, who was actually a Staff College graduate (at a time when few were). He was an enthusiastic and well read professional, very hard working, and dedicated to centralised control and training. As Hobart’s biographer Kenneth Macksey put it in Armoured Crusader ‘here was a man Hobart could emulate’.

Students of the later stage of the war against the Turks under Maude, and then under Allenby, will note that incompetence and inertia was replaced with professionalism and mobility. Hobart was at the forefront of this improvement, and his work with improving the effectiveness of cavalry and logistical movement brought him into early contact with the new motorised tracked gun tractors that would inspire him to throw his energy into tanks from that time on.

But his experience with swift advance also led him to emphasise the importance of close contact with the front, and to realise the flaws of that close contact seperating the middle commmanders too far from the rear commanders. On one notable occasion in Palestine, there is supposed to be a time when Hobart blocked a belated change of orders being passed ot the front line when he feared they would do more harm than good. After the attack had gone through successfully in its original plan, he is supposed to have indicated that the risk of distant and untimely intervention would have been very negative. There appears to be no recorded record of this event in British army files, but it was nonetheless a commonly held belief amongst many officers that it really happened. Whether it did or not, it was exactly the sort of thing that everyone believed that Hobart would do if he felt it necessary. After all, it is exactly the sort of behaviour that was to cause him repeated problems with his superiors through the interwar period.

After volunteering to join the Tank Corps in 1923, Hobart spent much of the interwar period vying with Lidell Hart as the prophet of the new armoured forces, but with two differences. First, whereas Liddell-Hart was dedicated to armoured striking power as a deciding factor on its own, Hobart was dedicated to effective combined arms operations as the best deployment of armoured power. Second, whereas Captain Lidell-Hart retired from the army and preached from outside, Lt-Colonel Hobart’s campaigning continued within the army.

After completeing Staff College with the likes of (later Field Marshall’s) Wilson, Wavell and Brooke: he was on the staff at Quetta. Here instructor Hobart put together the true list of elements needed for armour to succeed: light tanks for reconnaissance, medium tanks for general purpose, heavy tanks for breakthroughs, artillery carriers and infantry transporters (both prefferably tracked and armoured if possible), tanks to act as communication centres and command posts, mine layers, minesweepers, gas and smoke producers… these were the things he wanted. Plus integrated air support and logisitics and repair facilities that could keep up. (Those knowledgeable about ‘Hobart’s Funnies’ will note that by 1944 he was actually producing AVRE’s and engineer tanks, as well as bridgelayers and flail and fascine carriers, and flame throwing tanks, and amphibious tanks and anti-aircraft tanks, and everything his heart would have desired for 1939. But it would take four or five years of war to loosen the government’s purse strings and the weaken the inertia of senior officer opposition… in peacetime it was pipedream stuff.)

One interesting point to note is that Hobart’s sister married another Lt-Colonel in the late 1920’s and brought Hobart a brother-in-law called Bernard Montgomery. Monty was enough junior to Hobart, and an infantry specialist to boot, that he later admitted that he was well behind Hobart’s understanding of combined arms… “militarily I had not yet grown up”. But this was to bring into limited conjunction the two outstanding trainers and developers of tactics of the British army for World War Two at a time when Hobart’s ideas were fully developed, but still seemed dangerously radical to the more conservative Montgomery.

One success of the army in the late 1920’s over the politicians who were trying to disarm, and scrap ‘offensive weapons’ like bombers and tanks via fanciful ‘treaties’, was the Experimental Armoured Force. Hobart served as a staff officer in this, and he and Lt-Colonel Pile (later to command AA command in WWII), pushed the formation to impressive results considering its somewhat ramshackle structure. Hobart was offered a permanent position on the staff as a result, but he turned it down believeing he could pressure for even more outside the restrictions of the unit.

Unfortunately Hobart’s crusading spirit (he made Montgomery and even Wingate look very moderate indeed); and tendency to treat professional disagreement as personal emnity (bringing him into sometimes unnecessary dispute with Wilson, Wavell and Brooke amongst many others): led to entirely too many opportuntities for more conservative elements to sideline him, and feel justified when he railed against his enemies undermining his vision. In propaganda terms he was his own worst enemy.

His consistent refusal to allow armour to be downplayed simply meant that he was eventually bypassed in rank, not only by his contemporaries, but also by many juniors (like Montgomery). In some ways he was lucky to be selected and assigned to create and perfect the 7th Armoured division in Egypt in time for it to win the most outstanding – and one of the few –  of Britains early wartime victories. But his disfavour amongst his contemporaries saw Wilson request his replacment, and Wavell (whose wife notoriously disliked the scandal Hobart had created a decade earlier by running off with another Indian army officers wife and marrying her) forcibly retire him before it went into action.

In fact Churchill was later to warn Brooke – specifically in regard to the employment of Hobart – that the army could not afford to dismiss every forward thinkier just because he had detractors in the old boys network. Churchill had been looking for an armoured warfare expert, and was shocked to discover that Britain’s leading exponent had been sacked and left to recreate himself as a Corporal in the Home Guard (and later a deputy area organiser).

Churchill insisted Hobart be brought back, at which point Hobart promptly refused Churchills’ suggested role of inspector of armoured formations because he wanted a more significant role of cammander of all armour created. In the end Hobart had to settle for 11^th Armoured Division command under Montgomery’s Corps level command. 

The inspector of armour role was therefore given to the self confessed ‘inadequate leadership’ of Giffard Le Quesne Martel instead. Martel had been a visionary along with Fuller and Liddell-Hart in the 1920's, and had often worked with Hobart in the 1930's, but he lacked Hobart's drive. His most interesting impact on WWII was to organise the British armoured counterattack at Arras which drove Rommel's Panzer division back 8 miles before running out of steam. he could have been a very good armoured commander, but his overly cautious impact on churchill's 'tank-parliaments' may have contributed to delaying the ‘catch up’ of British armoured units (11^th Armoured excepted of course) for a couple of crucial years.

Nonetheless Hobart’s work behind the scenes continued to have impact. 11^th Armoured became the benchmark of operational skill, and after the breakout from the Normandy beachhead, 11^th armoured ran – according to some – the fastest advances in the history of warfare. Faster than Patton’s army to their south in France (who had a theoretically easier run with less opposition), and faster than Hobart’s original formation – 7^th armoured – against the Italians in North Africa.

By the end of the war the standard British armoured division looked suprisingly like the design of integrated arms that Hobart had been promoting in the 1920’s.

Meanwhile Hobart, having been deprived of command of 11^th armour before it was sent into action, was only sweet-talked into raising and training 79^th Armoured division, and then converting it to specialist use, on condition that he would actually get to lead it into action.

In practice the division never served as a division, but its elements were so widely employed in France that it became by far the biggest armoured division of the war, with over 7000 vehicles, including more than 2200 armoured vehicles. It played a distinguished, and possibly vital, role in Allied victory. The ‘funnies’ that Hobart developed and trained for action became central to the success of various operations that could easily have failed. D-Day for instance.

Much is made of ‘Bloody’ Omaha in many histories, even though surprisingly little is made of the fact that the Canadians took proportionally almost as many casualties in their theoretically harder fight to breakthrough at Juno. The main difference of course being that Bradley had rejected all the specialist armour that Hobart’s funnies offered to the Americans (except for a few amphibious tanks), whereas the Canadians made copious use of them. The Canadians were also to run straight into the only German Armoured divisioin to counter-attack on D-Day (the 21^st  Panzer, which managed to block the British capture of Caen), and handily defeated its attempt to break back through to the beaches. If the 21^st Panzer had attacked the Americans instead, their chances of a successful breakthrough to the beaches would have been greatly improved by the inadequacy of the available armoured support in the area.

For the rest of the war in Europe Hobart’s Funnies were constantly called upon by both British and American commanders to solve otherwise impossible problems. The Churchill flail tanks, flamethrower tanks, and AVRE’s were particularly useful against German fortified ports, regularly demonstrating their ability to cross terrain that was impassable to other Allied tanks, and take punishment that other Allied tanks coud not face. Hobart’s units became the go to ‘fire brigade’ for almost everyone.

Biographers of Hobart, while giving thanks for his influence on armoured affairs, are torn on how he would have performed in combat. There can be little doubt that his armoured division would have run rings around any other of the British or Italian or Japanese army, and probably also of the American or Russian army. Whether it would have matched, or surpassed, German armoured divisions is the debate?  some have suggested Hobart was Britain's Rommel. Many others have suggested Hobart was actually Britain’s Guderian, and would have made easy conquests of the far less experienced Rommel in North Africa. An intriguing but completely hypothetical concept.

By contrast, many others have commented, with equal justification, that Hobart was a somewhat unstable and emotional visionary, who may have gone off the handle at the wrong time and damaged his own career and campaigns. (Patton being inspirational and still managing to shoot his own career in the foot, being their comparison.)

Both viewpoints are just.

So how do we rate Hobart as a general?

First, he was the paramount Allied proponent and trainer of armoured forces. Of that there is little doubt. He was an excellent divisional commander, and had few equals in the war on this front. So we can certainly say he was an above average 2 star general despite his rancourous relationship with some of his seniors.

Second, his influence on the eventual composition and role of armoured units is hard to ignore, but the idea that he would have been an effective commander of 'all armour' is a bit scary. As an ‘inspector’ he would undoubtedly have been far better than Martel, but he refused such a role in the purity of his idealised search for a freestanding Armoured Army. Such a plan was anathema to Brooke when he was CIC of the home garrison, and even more so when he was CIGS. As some sort of armoured supremo, Hobart would have possibly been a dangerously destabilising influence on the overall army. (Should we mention a godlike self righteousness delusion… MacArthur comparison?) So we can suggest he would have been very problematical as a 4 star general, certainly in 1941, despite his undoubted skills.

The question whether he would have developed into a good corps commander (3 star in 1941-2) and possibly a good army commader (4 star in 1943-4) thereafter, had he taken the slow learning through combat route that Montgomery or Slim went through (from divisional command in 1940) is the real question. Perhaps he would have been better (as a commander), and also worse (as a subordinate), than Montgomery? Or perhaps he would not have made it that far, by destroying his career even more finally than Patton managed?

What can be said with reasonable confidence, is that he would not have made a good Supreme Commander or CIGS. His temperamanet was even less suited to this role than Montgomery or Patton’s.

Frankly, without seeing him in combat, we cannot really rate him as a combat leader.

Still, we can be very grateful that he did the hard thinking in the 1920’s (when few were visionary); the proof of concept in the 1930’s (when few others – even in the German army – were following his lead); developed the first practical expression in the stunningly successful 7^th armoured (a unit certainly on a par with the Panzers in France); influenced the ongoing development of all British armour from there (dragging them up to a level suitable to compete with the battle hardened Panzers in time for the invasion of France); and made the breakthroughs in specialist armour that vastly reduced Allied casualties in the final campaigns.

Was he a great general? Yes… and no!

The Evils of Unreflecting Socialism

The concept of Socialism is a pretty good idea. It believes that there should be a safety net to support the needy.

No problem there. Anybody with a Judaeo-Christian or Buddhist based code of morality is more or less behind the ideas of simple charity and 'do unto others' bit that underpins social fairness.

(Theoretically Animism can also approach this concept, but like most other 'tribal' religions - from Marxist to Muslim to Labour to Greenie - the specificity of the 'them versus us component' makes this a bit problematical in application... And please note that there are many supposed Jews or Christians who have fallen into the trap of tribalism, and many Muslims or Marxists who honestly believe they can avoid tribalism without abandoning the tenets of their religion... None of them seem to have a clue about what their professed beliefs actually require of them.)

But I digress.

Socialism as an ideal of providing a safety net and an opportunity is a wonderful thing, and I, and many others, would fight to maintain that safety net.

Socialism as a political movement pursuing 'equality' however, is one of the great evils of human invention.

Humans cannot be made equal, no matter how ruthlessly this is attempted. Humans can be given equality of opportunity, but thy cannot be 'made' to be equal. (The best image of this recently was in the Joss Whedonfilm 'Firefly' where the government wants to create 'a world without sin',and where they will keep idealistically trying to make people 'better', no matter how appalling the results of their experiments.)

People who profess to be socialists in the last century include Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Mao Tse Tung, and just about every nasty dictatorship currently operating in Africa or South America. (Some of the nasty dictatorships in the Middle East and Africa and Asia - from Iran to Somalia to South Korea - are blatant religious dictatorships... but again with a tribal perspective, not any Judaeo-Christian concepts.)

Now, obviously, the answer there is that just because people say they are socialists, does not mean they really are. Politicians lying about their real motives to fool the gullible is about as traditional as it gets.

But there are many politicians who say they are socialist who really mean it. Unfortunately their definition of socialism is so distorted, that I find them far more dangerous the obvious liars.

Socialism as proposed by most of the political parties with the word 'socialist' in their title usually just means dictatorship under a cloak of respectability that they hope the ignorant peasants and stupid media will fall for. Anything called a ‘Soviet Socialist Republic’ or just a ‘Socialist Republic’ will inevitably fit this box… eventually.

There is an excellent and amusing section in one of Robert Heinlein's worse books – Time Enough for Love – that defines politicians. 

Heinlein says there are basically two types of politicians, Business, and Conviction. Business politicians rely on keeping their word, as their only saleable asset. They live or die politically by delivering or not delivering.

Conviction politicians by contrast, 'believe' in a 'cause'. They believe so passionately, that they can be easily convinced to change their promises by any new 'idea' or 'evidence' that comes along (at least if it fits their prejudices). The truly dangerous thing about such people is not that they reverse themselves 3 times before breakfast, but that each time they convince themselves (or at least can pretend to), that they are doing it for the 'good' of the people and cause they 'believe' in.

As a result they are more than willing to look their constituents (who are not necessarily the voters) in the eye, and claim their reversals were a genuine attempt to reach the goal that everyone is striving for... for the greater good of course.

The simple fact is that ‘business’ and ‘conviction’ politicians usually cannot understand each other's rationales or motives, as they are almost completely incomprehensible to them. Instead they both tend to assume that anyone with the opposite perspective is either mad, or just completely dishonest and working for completely different motives than their stated ones.

(Unfortunately, people being people, they will be right in enough cases to allow them the luxury of painting everyone they do not understand with the same broad stroke of tar. This sort of lazy self righteousness is what forms the basis of 'them and us' thinking, and is the bane of all political compromise through human history.)

It would be nice to think that willingness to change a viewpoint is part of education or just growing up. The amusing aphorism "If you're not a socialist at 20 you don't have a heart, if you're still a socialist at 40 you don't have a brain", would be less scary if it actually reflected a consistent pattern... but it doesn't.

The vast majority of humanity takes the childhood illusion they grew up with as unreflected gospel for their entire life, and is appalled that anyone could dare to disagree. (I use the word 'gospel' here with malice aforethought. The unreflecting religious being almost as dangerous as the unreflecting atheist in taking the most simplistic and childish understanding of their preferred viewpoint and trying to bludgeon everyone else with it. Religious wars are bad enough, the ‘crusades’ by Fascists and Marxists in the last century have added new meaning to repression and genocide.)

Reflection from adult understanding (particularly after the brain reaches the age of considering consequences at about 24 or 25... not at the extreme of idealistic illusion at University age of about 18 to 21) is absolutely vital to making a childhood preference into a reasoned position. Pity so few people take the time to do it...

One of the dangers of our democratic political system is that we let people start playing 'seriously' with politics at exactly the worst age. Political parties collecting university students is like shooting fish in a barrel, but the modern practice of recruiting them to the party structure in a straight line –  student politician, political staffer, party professional, safe seat – (with no real life experience to intervene), means that many modern politicians do not get the mental space to reflect on what they think they believe in until several years in office trying and failing to deliver their childish ideal finally convinces them that they were either very wrong, or at least very naive.

Unfortunately this can then have it's own problems. You sometimes get the overly simplistic from both sides responding to the discovery of the unreality of what they were attempting by veering widely (and almost equally unreflectingly) to the opposite perspective... Such people often adopt equally (or even more scarily) unrealistic simplifications of a world view. (In Australia the most famously pathetic example is the ex-Liberal Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser, but 'reborn' ex socialists or communists are often even more worrying in their fanaticism!)

Or, perhaps worse, they simply decide that they will keep mouthing the words they don't believe in any more, in a ruthless attempt to get power... Not that they really want to achieve anything particular any more... just get power.

So how to choose the lesser of two evils?

1. Given a choice of politicians who 'believe' unreflectingly in childish idealism, always go for the conservative, not the radical. It will slow progress to a pathetic crawl, but there will be a lot less bloodshed. (Shedding blood is necessary sometimes, but conservative reasons like 'defence of traditional liberties' – aka English or American Revolutions – is always better than blood shed to 'save the world and remake it in perfection' aka French or Communist revolutions, or almost any religious war...)

2. Given the choice of politicians who genuinely believe, after genuine adult reflection, they are working for the common good, again you should always go for the business one not the conviction one... you may not like the result, but it will at least it may resemble what they were originally talking about.

3. Give the choice between politicians who only pretend to believe in what they are promoting, go for the business politician anyway. They may only be in it to line their pockets and enjoy the fruits of power, but, because they live or die by keeping heir word, they will only stay in it by making the trains run on time. Corrupt but competent is always going to do less damage to the society than well meaning but incompetent.

A 'true believer' is always going to throw public money at anything that sounds good anyway, and is always surprised the result is often the opposite of what was intended. (Education 'improvements' that lead to mass illiteracy; workplace 'improvements' that lead to mass unemployment'; health 'improvements' that lead to failing hospitals; etc.) But a cynic pretending to be a true believer stays in power despite incompetence by throwing money at things they know won't work just to claim they are doing something. (And to buy voted of course... but they all do that...)

4. But given the choice between two socialists: one of whom says they accept the world is imperfect, but believe in the justice of a safety net; and one of whom really truly believes that equality in all things is both desirable and achievable... go for the sane one. The raving lunatic can only finish one of two ways. Disillusioned and corrupt, or so convinced in their cause that they eventually have to make themselves all powerful to make it happen because they can find no other way. (Stalin and HItler are great example of the first, and Cromwell and Mao are fun examples of the second. And note, I have chosen supposedly ‘right’ and supposedly ‘left’ versions in both samples to make the appropriate mockery of ‘right’ versus ‘left’.)

It is probable that through history the majority of so called Socialists who have achieved and grimly maintained power until their society collapses under the dead weight of extreme socialism (as Churchill said, 'the problem is they eventually run out of other people's money') have been the first... just corrupt shadows of their original so called beliefs. This would include almost any socialist government elected over too long periods in Southern and Eastern Europe (and Ireland, which counts as 'southern') or in Central or South America. They just slowly drag their countries down to a level of poverty and violence that it was their stated intention to replace with their idealised utopia. (Prime examples of mouthing without meaning would include Stalin, the Castro's, Chavez, and the current dynasty in North Korea.)

The real problem though, is the ones who continue to believe in their dream, and are willing to do whatever it takes, including seizing all power for themselves, to see it happen. Cromwell, Robespierre, Lenin, Mao, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Mugabe, and Adolf Hitler are all 'conviction' socialists (almost all of them with some sort of claim to be elected leaders of republican forms of government) who took their societies to the extremes they felt were necessary to achieve the purity they genuinely believed in...

Historically, socialism for the goal of a safety net will inevitably reduce the overall living standards, education, employment, and opportunities, of a society... but not necessarily destroy it completely. (Or at least not yet, in the cases of places like Scandinavia which are back-pedalling fast on the excesses that reduced the PIIGS –Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain - to basket cases with up to 50% youth unemployment). It can even be argued that some of this equalisation might be a good thing, but the long term reduction of living standards over the admittedly less pleasant chaos of more free flowing capitalism is the inevitable price.

But historically Socialism for the goal of a fantasy ideal of universal equality and wealth will lead to the nastiest and most bloody dictatorships in human history. (On a scale that would make even a tribal barbarian lunatic like Genghis Khan green with envy.)

If you love the idea of 'safety net socialism', as I do, and are willing to accept a limited diminution in overall living standards to achieve it: be very, very afraid of the 'ideal' of 'perfect Socialism'. The more people unreflectingly pursue an impossible dream, the less chance the reflecting have of achieving some sort of reality.

The 'Invasion of France in 1943' lunacy

I have been reading the recent biography of the British CIGS Alanbrooke, and been struck by the clear and concise explanation of the differences between the British and Americans over the ‘second front’ in Europe, and when it could be.

Even pre the American entry to the war, the ‘Germany first’ principle  had been agreed between Churchill and Roosevelt. After American entry, and despite the immediacy of the Japanese threat, the same principle was reinforced. And it was a principla that Marchall and his handpicked planner Eisenhower, thought very sensible.

One of the first agreements between the Allies was for ‘Bolero’, which was an American buildup in Britian in preparation for a future invasion. It was very clear in the dark days of early 1942 that this would be a long term proposition, but it was always hoped that circumstances might change enough to make it possible in the shorter term, and the intention was to have as much ready to go as possible, and as soon as possible.

A plan put together for the incredibly unlikely event of sudden German collapse, was Sledgehammer. This was the understtanding of Sledgehammer adopted by most Americans. A very limited offensive by very inadequate forces, which could only succeed had Germany already gone close to collapse. Given the circumstances this was somewhat delusional, but it never hurts to plan for eventualities, and the British were happy to go along with this sort of plan.

[Even in the dark days of March to April 1942 when the Phillipines and Malaysia and the Netherlands East Indies had fallen; Burma and New Guinea were under threat; Rommel wa advancing in North Africa; the German armies in Russia were closing in on the Middle East oilfields (which meant the British were actually withdrawing units previously assigned Egyptian and Burmese defences to concentrate them in Iran/Iraq to face the Germans); and the Atlantic war was in it’s second ‘happy time’ for U-boats.]

The more likely possibility of needing to take desperate action in 1942, and the one that the British were more concerned about as possible trigger Sledgehammer, was the possible need to distract the Germans to fend off iminent Russian collapse. Such a desperate and sacrificial move to keep a major ally in the war was depressingly familiar to the British higher command. They had been forced to do the same thing a coupe of times during the Great War to keep the French army from collapsing. (Some of these desperately needed sacrifices are now decried by ‘right thinking’ historians as classic examples of mindless stupidity, but nontheless the Somme  and similar actions did do what they were supposed to do at the time, and kept the French going.)

Any attempt at Sledgehammer would of course have failed. The German army had not yet been bled dry on the Eastern front, and the Luftwaffe was still a terrifying force which could be (and regularly was) easily moved from Russian mud to Mediterranean sunshine and back again in mere weeks.

Even ignoring the opposition, the British were gloomily aware that the Americans had not a clue of the complexities of such a huge amphibious operation. At the time of discussion – May 1942 – the British were using their first ever Landing Ship Tanks and troopships equipped with landing craft to launch a Brigade size pre-emptive operation against the Vichy French on Madagascar. (Another move many historians think was useless. But coming only months after the Vichy had invited the Japanese into Indo-China – fatally undermining the defenses of Malaya – and the Germans into Syria, it was probably a very sensible precaution. Certainly Japanese submarines based in Madagascar would could have finally caused the allies to lose the war at sea!)

The British deployed two modern aircraft carriers, and a fleet of battleships, cruisers, destroyers and escorts and a large number of support ships, on this relatively small operation. It was the first proper combined arms amphibious operation of the war, and was very helpful to the British to reveal the scale of amphibious transport needed for future operations. By contrast the US Marines hit Guadalcanal 6 months later from similar of light landing craft, and with virtually the same Great War vintage helmets and guns, that the ANZACS had used at Gallipoli. Anyone who reads the details of the months of hanging on by the fingernails at Guadalcanal against very under-resourced Japanese troops, will be very grateful that the same troops did not have to face veteran German Panzer divisions for several years.

So I do not know of any serious historian who imagines that an invasion of France in 1942 could have led to anything escept disaster. There are no serious generals who thought it either. (Only Marshall and his ‘yes-man’ Eisenhower consistently argued that it might be possible. And Eisenhower later came to realise – when he was incharge of his third or fourth such difficult operation himself – that his boss was completely delusional in his underestimation of the difficulties involved. See ‘Dear General’ for Eisenhowers belated attempts to quash Marshalls tactical ignorance about parachute drops and dispersed landings for D-Day.)

In practice no matter how much Marshall pushed for it, only British troops were availabe for such a sacrificial gesture, and the British were not unnaturally reluctant to throw away a dozen carefully nurtured and irreplaceable divisions on a ‘forlorn hope’, when they would prefer to save them for a real and practical invasion… When circumstances changed enough to make it possible.

Unfortunately Roosevelt told the Soviet foreign minister Molotov that ‘we expect the formation of a second front this year’, without asking even Marshall, let alone wihtout consulting his British allies who would have to do it with virtually no American involvement. The British Chiefs of Staff only had to show Churchill the limited numbers of landing craft that could be available, and the limited number of troops and tanks they could carry, to make it clear that this was ridiculous. Clearly this stupidity was just another example of Roosevelt saying stupid things without asking anyone (like ‘unconditional surrender’) that did so much to embitter staff relations during the war, and internationaly relations post war. But it seems likely that the British refusal to even consider such nonsense was taken by Marshall and Stimson as a sample of the British being duplicitous about ‘examining planning options’.

The British fixed on a ‘compromise’ to pretend that a ‘second front’ could be possible. North Africa, could be conquored without prohibitive losses. It was not ideal, and in practical terms not even very useful. But it might satisfy the Americans and the Russians. Nothing else could.

Marshall in particular spent the rest of the war believing that when the British assessment clearly demonstrated that action in Europe was impractical and impossible, they had just been prevaricating to get what they always intended… Operations in the Med. In some ways he was correct. The British had done the studies on France despite thinking that it was unlikely they would be practical, and were proved right. Marshall and Eisenhower had just deluded themselves into thinking an invasion might be practical, and could not accept that there was not a shred of evidence in favour of their delusion.

Which brings us to the debate about the possibility of an invasion in 1943 – Roundup. Something that a surprising number of historians, and even a few not entirely incompetent generals, have suggested might have been possible, and should have been tried.

There are some points in their favour. The invasions of North Africa definitely took resources that could have been built up in Britain, and therefore slowed things down. (And the withdrawal of the new escort carriers, escort groups, and shipping from the Battle of the Atlantic for the North African adventure, definitely did huge damage in the loss of shipping and supplies, slowing things down further.) As a result the huge buildup in North Africa was much easier to use against Italy before moving on to France. Certainly another distraction or delay… but only if you don’t think that knocking Italy out of the war would make Germany weaker!

But once Sledgehammer was abandoned, this operation was the only possible way to get US troops into combat in Europe, short of shipping some to Russia. It was also the only possible way of coming close to keeping Roosevelt’s ridiculous promise to the Russians.

Despite the belief by many that it was a British goal, Torch was really just Churchill’s method of getting Roosevelt out of domestic and international hole, and giving Marshall an advantage over King in the ‘Germany first’ debate. It can’t be said that the British Chiefs of Staff wanted it much. They would have preferred the resources to go to other fronts. It can’t be said that the American Chiefs of Staff wanted it. It was just the compromise they had to accept. It can’t even be said Churchill wanted it greatly, except as a sop to Stalin and a leg up to Roosevelt, he would have preferred other fronts too. Certainly it wasn’t the Russians who wanted it. The only one who saw it as absolutely necessary was Roosevelt, and he dragged  his Chiefs of Staff along for domestic and international political reasons, not for reasons of strategy.

Unfortunately, the US Chiefs of Staff apparently decided this was more British prevarication, designed to get America into protecting purely British imperial interests like the route to India, rather than a genuine addition to winning the war.

Again, there is some truth in this. The British, who were primarily responsible for moving supplies worldwide to – keep Allied populations fed and working; hold everywhere the Axis were attacking; keep Russia in the war; and move Americans to where they would be needed for an eventual operation in Europe – were absolutely fixated on the shipping needs. Brooke was always absolutely convinced that opening the Med to allied shipping – which would save the ten thousand mile diversion around Africa for everythig going to and from the Middle East (oil, military forces, supplies to Russia, etc), Russia, India and Australia – would save at least a million tons a year in shipping, and allow that resource to be used for building up for, and then having, an invasion. To this extent, the British fascination with ‘communications with India’ is exactly what was worrying the British Chiefs of Staff.

Knocking Italy, it’s army, air force, and particularly navy, out of the war, would also do more to release Allied forces to face the Japanese and Germans, than any other single act the Allies could realistically undertake on the short term. (This by the way, was what Churchill meant when he referred to Italy as the ‘soft underbelly’. They were an easy and soft target that would, and did, collapse quickly when pushed. The idea that he was referring to the Italian peninsular as an ideal way to fight your way to Germany is mischevious touble-making or outright delusion by far too many commentators.)

Brooke later wrote that he could ‘never get Marshall to appreciate that North African and Italian operations were all part of the strategy preparing for the ultimate blow’.

Nonetheless it is wrong to think that the British never had any intention of Roundup. Despite what Roosevelt and many other Americans convinced themselves, the British were, at the start of 1942, far more optimistic about the possibility of invading Europe through France in 1943 than they had been about Sledgehammer. Their studies seemed to show that Germany would only have to be weaker, not suddenly collapse, to make invasion in 1943 a realistic possibility. Realistic that is as long as the rest of the plans for training and shipping troops, building and concentrating invasion craft, and moving enough supplies to make it sustainable, all came together.

They didn’t.

For the British, the middle of 1942 revealed how little would be available in time for the middle of 1943. Even on the best assumptions of American training and preparation, there was no chance that the majority of forces for Roundup would not be British… assuming they could supply them either. In practice mid1942 saw the Axis continue to advance on every front. Burma collapsed; the Allied position in New Guinea was under threat; the Japanese were still expanding to places like Guadalcanal; Rommel was advancing in Egypt; the Germans were advancing on the Caucasian oil fields and towards the Middle East; and more and more was needed just to keep Russia in the war. As a result British troops, shipping and supplies were continuing to flow away from Britain, not towards it.

Much of the Royal Navy was trying to save the dangerous losses caused by King’s refusal to have convoys in American waters (too ‘defensive minded’ he thought.) These alone, the worst 8 months of the war, were threatening to scupper Roundup. The rest was so busily deployed in the Indian and Pacific Oceans against the Japanese, or North Atlantic trying to fight supplies through to Russia (a high proportion of tanks and planes defending Moscow were British supplied), that there was virtually nothing left in the Med to slow Rommels advance. The merchant ships surviving the fight across the oceans were actually more vitally needed to take men and equipment from the UK to other places than to bring in a buildup for the UK.

Nor was the American buildup going to plan. Less well trained troops were becoming available too slowly, could not be shipped in adequate numbers anyway, and were in no condition to face German veterans. (The very best US units to go into action in 1942 – the marines in Guadalcanal – and 1943 – the 1^st infantry and 1^st armour which were actually professional troops not conscripts in North Africa – had very steep learning curves. Particularly at Kesserine. They were clearly not fit to face German veterans yet.

And American resource buildup was also not up to promises. King and MacArthur were milking supplies far beyond what had originally been agreed under ‘Germany first’. In practical terms they were doing so for the same reasons the British were: an immediate desperate situation had to be saved before a future ideal one could be pursued.

Nonetheless I have read all sorts of apparently serious suggestions that after North Africa was cleared, or at the very least after Sicily was cleared, an invasion of France should have happened.

Delusional.

Before Italy had surrendered? While the Italian fleet was still threatening allied shipping. While the Italian air force was still threatening allied shipping. While 80 Italian divisions were available to garrison not only Italy itself, but the Balkans, and a large part of the Eastern Front!

Before the German army had suffered its great losses of the 1943-44 Russian Winter, which, backed on to the need to replace 80 Italian divisions and garrison the Balkans and fight in Italy itself, halved the re-deployable strength of the German army?

Before Kursk? So the Allied invasion would have arrived neatly in time to face all the powerful new German panzer divisions that had not yet been sent to the eastern front!

Before the Luftwaffe was gutted by being forced up to fight the American daylight bombing campaign over Germany? (Or German industry seriously damaged by both that, and the British night bombing campaign.)

Before the U-boat campaign had been defeated?

While the carrier battles in the Pacific were still in the balance, at a time when the Americans were twice reduced to a single carrier, and had to borrow a British one to make the Pacific fleet viable?

Before the American ‘buildup’ had achieved a fraction of the strength it needed?

Before enough invasion craft were even available? (In 1944 the May attack was abandoned and the entire British shipbuilding industry pulled off finishing new carriers and repairing merchant ships to make up the shortfall in landing craft. Marshall finally noted in 1944 that apparently the problem was a shortage of some thing he had never heard of called a Landing Ship Tank!)

While the Indian and Australian fronts were on the edge and still drawing reinforcements, not able to release them to other theatres?

That is when some lunatics think a second front should have been launched in France.

Brooke’s comment is still the best.

They are right in thinking it will end the war quickly, just not to our advantage.

The many modern problems of ‘an excess of democracy’.

The world is currently beset by the effects of an excess of democracy, but this means different things in different countries.

In fact an excess of democracy in some countries is often defined as a deficit by outsiders.

Whichever it really amounts to, excess or deficit, the issues of democracy being suffered by many countries at the moment are both dangerous and laughable.

In the newspapers at the moment are a veriety of countries suffering from: 1) unrestricted democracy driving them to stupid actions; 2) restricted democracy for fear of stupid actions; and 3) manipulation of limited democracy by regimes which are willing to commit stupid actions as long as it disatracts the unleashed tiger of democratic pressure.

What fun.

On the unrestricted democracy driving people to stupid actions front, we see the following…

The Ukraine being torn apart by every town council with – 1) a grievance; or 2) temporarily controlled by a thug who has been able to oust the more traditional leaders; or 3) willing to be bought off with a combination of threats and bribes – holding referendums on succession from the Ukraine and accession to the Russian Federation. (Read Putin’s Third Reich… oh sorry, I’m sure that word was supposed to be Third Empire…)

Amusingly the majority of the badly educated but extremely pompous and self righteous Western Media considers these votes to be anti-democratic, presumably because they are protest votes within the established nation state. (Modern journalists have never been able to cope with the concept of evil dictators not being allowed to mass murder their own people.. as long as it is within the borders of an extablidhed nation state, anything goes… doesn’t it Geoffrey Robertson?)

By contrast Scotland is being asked to carry out a similar referendum on succession, which many of the same journalists consider to be highly democratic, apparently because the British nation state, which has been around many centuries longer than the Ukraine nation state, is more evil or anti-democratic or something?

I personally have nothing against devolution. Smaller is better being a default position in government Although this should always be tempered by the ‘too small to defnd yourself means you better have good neighbours to help’. I presume Scotalnd would like the sort of free ride on defence that places like New Zealand and Canada and Ireland have always enjoyed at someone elses expense! But I wonder if Scotland, which is gloating over the prospect of getting sole control of  the North Sea Hebridean oil fields, has identified that the Hebrideans have never considered themselves Scots? What if they hold a referendum on independence from Scotland? Then what if the Isle of X wants to succeed from the Hebrides? Or the village of X from the Island? Where do our self righteous journalists consider we would be crossing a line?

Meanwhile the European Union, which is rightly terrified of a wave of similar independence movemnts amongst the Basque in Spain, and the northern states of Italy, and half of Belgium, and just about everywhere in the Balkans: would depserately prefer not to have to deal with a decision on whether Scotland would be able to stay a member of the EU. Their problem being amplified by the fact that the EU elections have just thrown up a significant percentage of anti-EU parties in their disfunctional parliament. (I have been trying to remember another disfunctional European parliament where a party with 25-30% of the vote wanted to tear it down… oh yes, that would be the Weimar Republic wouldn’t it? )

The comparison with fascists is not really fair here I suppose. Most of the anti-Eu parties are no where near fascists. Most of them have policies that are over the top socialism, or extremely left wing anti-immigrant worker lines similar to those pushed by Socialist and Communist parties throughout Europe for decades… But then the National Socialist Workers party was just that wasn’t it, even if some people imagine that it can be distinguished as extreme right from the extreme left for some reason or other… (I wonder what the distinction they identify really is? Command economy dictatorial nutters are command economy dictatorial nutters whether you call them Communists or Fascists. The only distinction I have ever been able to see between them is the quality of their tailors!)

Meanwhile the ‘restricting democracy to avoid stupid actions’ group has been joined by Thailand, where the military has very reluctantly come to the conclusion that – no matter how much they don’t want to repeat their previous efforts at running the place (all of which they acknowledge were dreadful failures) – leaving the current deadlock and steadily expanding violence to fester into a full blown civil war is probably worse.

Naturally most Western journalists consider the miltary intervention a bad thing, and refer to it as a coup or regime or junta. Not sure what they think the military should do instead? Presumably a violent and bloody civil war is OK as long as some democratically elected figure causes it? Wonder if they expect the military to then support the ignorant peasants who have voted en masse for the loonatic fringe party over the educated middle class who actually run the country and attempt to make it work (and who have been slowly dragging it out of the 14^th century).

I suspect the media think the miltary should bow to the party with 50.001 of the vote and do whatever socialist inspired lunacy they want… Wonder if those media types have noticed that A) the history of this sort of pandering to Communist and Socialist lunatic fringe parties in China nd Vietnam and Cambodia and indeed anywhere in Asia, is some of the most appalling bloodbaths in all of history (to say nothing of putting back economic advancement by decades or even centuries); and B) the military officers are all from the middle class that the loonatic socialist fringe parties immediately try to destroy (and often murder en masse). Good luck with that.

Makes me reconsider the poor Fijian military, which has had to intervene repeatedly when yet another attempt at democracy has led to chaos, rioting, repression, shop buring, and bloodshed. They too are learning they can’t actually run things better, and probably don’t want to be responsible for the mess. But they too face the problem of seeing exactly where it is going. (In Fiji’s case too much democracy will see all Indians treated rather like Jews have been on occasion in other parts of the world. What a good cause for the Western media to get behind!)

And the third group, the ‘manipulation of limited democracy by regimes which are willing to commit stupid actions as long as it disatracts the unleashed tiger of democratic pressure’ group is looking seriously scary.

Putin leads this movement (or thinks he does), and is bolstering his regime with the sort of pseudo nationalism and enrage the population against outside persecution crap that has been so attactive to so many appalling regimes that need to distract their people from their incompetence. Genreal Galtieri’s regime thinking a ‘nice victoriuos war’ to reclaim Las Malvinos would divert attention from their incompetence and give tham instant popularity is a good example. Or Saddam Hussein’s attempta ta a ‘short victorious war’ against Iran, or, when that didn’t work, against an easier target… Kuwait!

I don’t know how many terrible governments over the centuries have attempted to distrat their citizens from their own incompetence by convincing them that some innocuous outsider is simultaneously A) scheming to undermine them, B) a deadly and encroaching threat that must be stoped, and C) an easy victory waiting to fall into their hands. Certainly there are a few Anceint Greek plays that seem to mention the idea, and Rome’s conflict with its great North African trading partner fits. I would also posit that the Great War was as much caused by the German ruling classes attempts to redirect the stirring democratic pressures of the newly politically active middle classes – with their Naval Leagues and Colonial Leagues and Place in the Sun movements – as it was old fashioned territorial aggression by the old Junker class.

So the current Chinese attempts to calim every piece of land and sea ever occupied by, or sailed over by, Chinese forces over the last 2 millenium, is frankly terrifying.

For a change, stupid Western journalists seem to notice that this might be a problem. But their historical ignorance has not yet brought them to realise that every 'territory’ over 2 millenium includes all of Vietnam and Cambodia and several of the Central Asian states, and quite a few other places that China was loosely associated with for no more than a few years or decades over those 2 millennia.

There is no way that the Chinese attempt to play the ‘territorial self righteousness’ card…. “We have a moral right to conquor people who are vigorously opposed to being conquored because of some fanciful historical ideal”… is going to be any more successful than when it has been applied in the past. Previous illogical but bloody failures by the Irish Republicans; the Palestinians; the Pakistani’s (East Pakistan or Bangladesh); the French in Vietnam; or indeed any other colonial power trying to hang on to places that reach the point of not wanting to be hung on to: have deservedly failed.

The problem of course is that the more the Chinese try to distract their nascent middle classes dissatisfaction with the state of things by redirecting their attention to the dangers of ‘a conspiracy of encirclement’, the more they are going to scare their neighbours into banding together for self defense. Which in practical terms means their neighbours being forced into exactly the sort of co-ordinated and encircling response which the Chinese need to make their fantasies play well to their citizens. (Hey, it worked for the Soviet’s, and for the Cuban’s, and for the North Korean’s, didn’t it?… For a while anyway… Perhaps they should consult the Kaiser, General Galtieri, and the Soviet Socialsti Politburough on how it works out long term?)

In practical terms all these issues around the world come down to a misunderstanding of the role of democratic pressures within a developing state. Quite frankly, you cannot have a modern, educated, industrial economy, without unleashing the educated middle classes who NEED some sort of democratic input in the process. (As Imperial Germany and Soviet Russia found out, and is China is finding out now.)

On the other hand, imagining that instantly expanding the franchise to every ignorant illiterate peasant in the entire country will not lead to inevitable conflict between the middle class who is driving the process forward, and the ignorant peasants and manipulative old extablishments that want to hold it back, is pure fantasy. As literally hundreds of failed republics over the last 200 years can show, that way madness lies. (And dictatorship, and bloodshed, and civil war, and genocide… hurray for democracy and democratic pressures!)

In truth it is not possilbe to build a sensible and stable government on the basis of unfettered democracy, and it is not safe to let too much populist democratic pressure build within a state that does not have enough room for democratic expression to let off steam. Either approach will lead to disaster.

If you consider human government to be a cobbled together, delicate and unstable machine – which all human government certainly is – then you need to accept that a democratic component will be necessary as the system developes. But the corst visual is probalby of a crotchety old steam engine labouring noisily to keep the wheels turning. The democratic part is that absolutely vital installation, a safety valve. If you don’t have it, or don’t let it do its job adequately, there is going to be a very big explosion, no matter how much you try to temporarily ‘distract’ the pressure by redirecting it elswehere. On the other hand, if you let it expel as much steam as it could want, you finish with a lot of impressive sounding noise, but nothing left to actually make the wheels turn.

The Ukraine, Scotland and the European Union are pretty much the second problem. China and Russia are pretty much the first. Thailand and Fiji represent the points at which someone with some sense of responsibility has identified that they are headed towards an explosion the other way… from too much democracy leading to persecution of subgroups. (The kind of thing the Weimar Republic and the Irish Republic backed to disaster).

All three appraoches are inherently dangerous, but all three are virtually inevitable unless your government system starts with enough basic literacy, education, rule of law, and history of secure property rights, to allow something sensible to dvelope over time. Historically, only this combination has been able to succeed for more than a few decades. (Which is why the Anglosphere and a few other  Protestant states usually have the only stable and secure governments that have advanced beyond traditional monarchies.)

Which brings us to a pillar of light in the darkness. India. A place where educated middle class struggles to move forward, while the ignorant pesants and entrenched elites struggle to hold it back. For almost 65 yers since independence India has failed to find its feet, as too much dmeocracy held it back, and corruption and the decadent ruling castes undermined repeated attempts to continue the economic miracle that was wartime and post war India.

This latest election could break the nexus and let the economic expansion of India off the leash. If so, the backward looking socilism that has destroyed places like Greece might be abandoned before it collapses into fascism. (Stupid voters who don't relies that socialism is the problem, often turn to fascism as a more organised and motivated sounding version of socialism when the world starts delivering the inevitable effects of their previous stupid voting patterns. See the rise of Fascism in recent European elections in the many states that pursued socialism to economic ruin and are now facing severe cutbacks.)

On the other hand, the new Indian government has a fair number of the hallmarks of popular nationalism that have been a dead end trap for so many nations in the past. If the economy's revival doesn’t take hold, what might they resort to to ‘distract’ the voters? (I wrote a paper for the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre at ANU when I was a vacation scholar there 20 years ago pointing out that India would probably only be dangerous to Australia if they ever had a ‘Galtieri moment’…)

Maybe India has dragged itself out of the ditch, and can become a proper part of the Angloshpere miracle? Or maybe some minor thing might still cause it to fall apart?

History shows that far more fail than succeed.

But I still say (as I have for decades now) that given the populist delusion that command economy China will be the next dominant power, and that chaotic mostly capitalist India won’t compete, is tripe. (I like to point to how that worked out last time we saw a similar set of circumstances… Command economy Soviet Union being suggested as the inevitable victor ove chaotic capitalist United States by so many academics, intellectuals and media through the 70’s and 80’s. Not that most modern 'intellectuals' or media are bright enough to notice parallels that might challenge their preferred world views.)

Russia and China are on the Galtieri path. Unfortunately China at least might also be on the Kaiser’s path. But they are not going to succeed with their vain attempts to distract the democratic pressures they have to have to be competitive as modern economies.

Good riddance to bad rubbish.

India is at a crossroads, and might… might manage the corner without tipping over . And Thailand is even more interesting. The military has attemoted to harness the tiger, but we all know how that can end. You either tame it, or are devoured by it.

I wish them both luck. They are going to need it.