The Battle of Britain Five Months That Changed History, May—October 1940 by James Holland (z-lib.org).epub

emphases. An armoured – or panzer – division, for example, would have at
its heart a couple of armoured brigades – or regiments of several battalions
– while an infantry division would have as its core two or more infantry
brigades (in the British example), or infantry regiments in the case of the
German organization. The French system was also much the same, with
infantry divisions comprising around 16,000–17,000 men in total and
armoured divisions around 14,000.
The BEF contained about half a million men, and consisted of I, II and
III Corps, with – on 10 May at any rate – three, four and two infantry
divisions, and the equivalent of an armoured division attached to General
Headquarters. In another echo of the previous war, British Headquarters had
found a well-appointed French chateau in which to base itself, and an
excessive number of staff officers. Its Commander-in-Chief, General the
Viscount Gort, was also a hero of the First World War. His bravery was
legendary – not for nothing did he wear the ribbons of an MC, two DSOs
and Britain’s highest award for valour, the Victoria Cross. As a man whose
command abilities were widely believed to be suited to a division but no
higher, he had been a surprise choice when he took over as Chief of the
Imperial General Staff (CIGS) – Britain’s top military job – in 1937,
although no-one doubted either his work ethic or his enthusiasm. He was an
equally surprising choice when, on 3 September, he stood down to take
command of the BEF instead. Although, at fifty-three, he had age on his
side, he was no intellectual nor even particularly experienced in command.
The prospect of fighting once more was of great excitement, however.
‘Here we go again,’ he said with relish, ‘marching to war,’ then admitted, ‘I
can’t expect everybody to be as thrilled as I am.’ It seems likely that Gort
himself pressed his case for the appointment. The problem, however, was
that he and Henry Pownall, his Chief of Staff when he was CIGS, and who
he insisted should accompany him to France, were the two soldiers with the
greatest knowledge and understanding of British war plans. It might have
made more sense had they stayed in London.
That Britain could field 500,000 men at all was some achievement.
Having had the best army in the world by November 1918, Britain had,
after the armistice, forgotten most of the lessons learned at the cost of so
much of her young men’s blood. Rapid disarmament went hand-in-hand
with a reversion to its pre-1914 role: policing the Empire. Throughout the
1920s and 1930s, rebellions and upturns in violence in Iraq, Afghanistan