Moretz, Joseph The Development of British amphibious Operations 1882-1914

The deployment of military forces to distant shores is now considered a typically British form of warfare. Certainly, many of these operations would today be classified as administrative landings, with fighting, if any, sometimes following later. Others, of course, deserve the designation landings under resistance. For contemporaries of the period covered in this study, these developments were referred to as joint or combined operations. Less important than their designation, however, are the considerations and intentions that led to these ventures. In the decades before the First World War, experts were aware of the countless difficulties and dangers associated with amphibious operations. Laymen, including statesmen, paid less attention to these issues, but could cite numerous examples of their occurrence before 1914. In fact, the operational shortcomings exhibited by Great Britain during the World War were the least of the problems. What are now referred to as joint amphibious operations were difficult because there was never just one type of them. Naval support for a defensive force, raids, feint attacks, blockade operations, river operations and, of course, landings under enemy fire were all part of a series of combined operations whose complexity was constantly increasing. Since every operation must come to an end at some point, even the manner of evacuation was regarded as a special type of combined operation that had to be understood and learned. Ultimately, it remained the case that in a large-scale campaign, examples of each of these operations could occur at different times. Landings before 1914 were difficult, and what military and naval authorities considered feasible in the field of joint operations before the outbreak of the World War is a neglected area of research a surprising omission given the amount of ink spilled over the debacles in Gallipoli, Mesopotamia and East Africa. Every campaign has its context operational and strategic, of course, but also political, doctrinal and bureaucratic. How Britain chose to wage war in 1914 was as much a result of these variables as the military and maritime capabilities it could muster. The main objective of this study, which takes 1882 and the British attack on Egypt as its starting point, is to tie together the threads of pre-war military experience and thinking in the field of joint operations. The choice is by no means arbitrary, as several individuals who would later play a central role in amphibious operations during the First World War earned their spurs at this time. Insofar as learning is more than the result of one's own experiences, this work devotes particular attention to the Russo-Japanese War. Thoughtful officers recognised that the nature and style of warfare were fundamentally changing. An educated public also appreciated this, thanks to works such as Ivan Bloch's Is War Now Possible? Regardless of what British officers understood on the eve of the World War, the problem of time and scale remained. This alone should give pause before criticising others for past mistakes. This study examines what was thought, taught and expected, and what happened in the thirty years before Britain faced a conflict on a scale not seen in a century.