the British military authorities as a whole after mobilization was
decreed. He would not seem to have been aware, when a conflict of
first-rate magnitude came upon us, that the creation of a great
national army was of far greater consequence than the operations of
the small body of troops which he took with him into the field. The
action taken in connection with the personnel of the General Staff in
Whitehall is significant evidence of the extent to which the whole
situation had been misinterpreted.

It may be urged that Sir J. French (as he then was) was not
responsible. He had--under circumstances which will not have been
forgotten--ceased to be Chief of the Imperial General Staff some four
months before war broke out. But Sir Charles Douglas, who had then
taken his place, although a resolute, experienced soldier, equipped
with an almost unique knowledge of the army, was a deliberate,
cautious Scot; he was the very last man to shirk responsibility and to
shelter himself behind somebody else, but, on the other hand, he was
not an impatient thruster who would be panting to be--in gunner's
parlance--"re-teaming the battery before the old major was out of the
gate." He accepted, and he was indeed bound to accept, the ideas of a
predecessor of the highest standing in the Service, who had made a
special study of campaigning possibilities under the conditions which
actually arose in August 1914, and under whose aegis definite plans
and administrative arrangements to meet the case had been elaborated
beforehand with meticulous care. Enjoying all the advantages arising
from having made a close study of the subject and from having an
Intelligence Department brimming over with detailed information at his
beck and call, Sir J. French entirely failed to grasp the extent and
nature of the war in its early days. Lord Kitchener did. Suddenly
summoned to take supreme military charge, a stranger to the War Office
and enjoying none of Sir J. French's advantages, the new Secretary of
State mastered the realities of the position at once by some sort of
instinct, perceived what a stupendous effort would have to be made,
took the long view from the start, and foretold that the struggle
would last some years.

It must have been about the 11th of August, three days before G.H.Q.
crossed the Channel, that I went in with Sir John to see Colonel
Dallas, the head of my Intelligence section dealing with Germany. One
had been too busy during the