nks had been investigated by a Royal Commission, did
I learn to my astonishment that this matter had been brought by
Swinton before the War Office so early as the beginning of January
1915, and that his projects had then been "turned down" by a technical
branch to which he had, unfortunately, referred them. It does not seem
possible that the technical branch can have brought the question to
the notice of the General Staff, or I must have heard of it. The value
of some contrivance such as he was confident could be constructed was
from the tactical point of view incontestable, and had been
incontestable ever since trench warfare became the order of the day on
the Western Front in the late autumn of 1914. But the idea of the
land-ship appeared to be an idle dream, and there was perhaps some
excuse for the General Staff in its not of its own accord pressing
upon the technical people that something of the sort must be produced
somehow. Knowledge that a thoroughly practical man possessed of
engineering knowledge and distinguished for his prescience like
Swinton was convinced that the thing was feasible, was just what was
required to set the General Staff in motion.

Thanks to Swinton, and also to "Z," the General Staff did get into
touch with the Admiralty in May, and then found that a good deal had
already been done, owing to Mr. Churchill's imagination and foresight
and to the energy and ingenuity with which the land-ship idea had been
taken up at his instigation. But the War Office came badly out of the
business, and the severe criticisms to which it has been exposed in
connection with the subject are better deserved than a good many of
the criticisms of which it has been the victim. The blunder was not
perhaps so much the fault of individuals as of the system. The
technical branches had not been put in their place before the war,
they did not understand their position and did not realize that on
broad questions of policy they were subject to the General Staff. It
is worthy of note, incidentally, that Swinton never seems to have got
much satisfaction with G.H.Q. in France until he brought his ideas
direct before the General Staff out there on the 1st of June by
submitting a memorandum to the Commander-in-Chief. It is to be hoped
that the subserviency of all other branches to the General Staff in
connection with matters of principle has been established once for all
by this time; it was, I think, pretty well established by