Battle of the Somme centenary: 100 years on, who still stands with Britain?

Commemoration of the first day of battle tomorrow will be marked by soul-searching about the UK’s role in Europe, writes Robert Fox
British military personnel march in France a day before the the centenary ceremony in Thiepval, near Amiens
EPA
Robert Fox30 June 2016

Tomorrow, 10,000 guests will converge at Thiepval to commemorate the first day of the battle of the Somme — one of the bloodiest in British history.

Some 19,240 British and Dominion soldiers were killed on that day, with 35,943 injured, 2,152 missing and 585 captured. By November, when the battle ground to a halt after 141 days, 1,200,000 British, French, Allied and German soldiers were dead or injured.

To give it a more human, or inhuman scale, look at the battle at Beaumont-Hamel, where a smaller-scale commemoration will be held tomorrow. At 9am, 801 men of the Newfoundland Regiment left their trenches to move at little more than walking pace towards the German positions.

Within three quarters of an hour, the regiment was gone — only 68 were able to report for duty the next day. It was 143 paces, or about 200 yards, to death for most. “The German machine-gunners were vomiting at the sight of the slaughter,” a bright young Canadian guide explained as she walked me through the killing ground last year.

Getting 10,000 people to the Somme is a huge logistical operation. In 1916, there were railways and mule paths to get all million men to the battleground — which was to be repeated at Passchendaele on the Ypres front in 1917, and the huge, and equally bloody, manoeuvre campaigns of 1918.

No one planning tomorrow’s commemoration could have calculated the huge political freight it now carries. The Somme, Passchendaele and Normandy in 1944 are symbols of British commitment to the strategic fate of continental Europe. Now Britain is withdrawing from Europe’s latest essay in unity and amity. So who now are Britain’s allies and friends in Europe, and beyond and does it matter?

This an issue for France — the co-hosts tomorrow — which put 18 divisions into the field on the Somme in 1916, and took 194,000 casualties. If anything, French tactics, particularly the combined use of infantry and artillery, were more effective in the opening weeks. The matter of where Britain sits with its friends and allies was a powerful theme at this week’s Land Warfare conference in London. The US sent five generals to reassure British allies that they, their soldiers and expertise, were still valued. The Dutch, Danes, Germans and French did likewise, with no nonsense about spectres at the feast such as the Euro army.

The message from the commander of the British Army, General Sir Nick Carter, was subtle and clear. British serving men and women will support Europe through Nato and will back EU security and relief operations — such as helping refugees in the Mediterranean and countering piracy off the coasts of Africa.

But there are testing times ahead. The efficiency and prowess of British forces is to be questioned severely in the Chilcot report into operations into Iraq, and, by extension, Afghanistan, due next week. A day later, a Nato summit in Warsaw will discuss how much UK and European allies are prepared to contribute to the defence and security of the Atlantic–European region and its interests. Two years ago, in Newport, Wales, David Cameron asked the UK and its allies to pledge two per cent of GDP to defence and security, claiming Britain was leading the way. In fact, it is contributing about 1.7 per cent at most, and George Osborne has warned that more defence cuts are likely.

With all tomorrow’s solemnity, the last posts and bugle calls at Thiepval, there is a warning. Beware of grandstanding from the grandstands.

What worries me, as someone who has witnessed combat — sometimes uncomfortably closely — for 40 years, is the tinge of triumphalism in current commemorations of the Great War. Most of it was fought by young men who weren’t professional soldiers, who were utterly confused and frequently terrified, like my grandfathers.

The easy assumption is that we won’t be caught up again in conflicts and wars involving millions of lives. The most sobering, and appropriate, message from this week’s Land Warfare conference was: don’t be so sure.

Obviously, industrialised heavy metal war on the scale of the 20th century’s two world wars is unlikely. But at the Land Warfare conference, the buzz-words were continuous or perpetual conflict. Looking across at least three continents, including the fringes of Europe, that’s what we are in already, involving the lives and fate of millions. It means we are going to need all the friends and allies we can get.

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