bout de papier, Vol. 4, No. 3 (1986) — Fall 1986 // Automne 1986, pp. 25–27
A Hero of Our Time by Philip Ziegler
published by Collins, 1985, 700 pp., $25
Neither those who revere Lord Louis Mountbatten as a founder of the modern Commonwealth nor those who think of him as a dilettante and a lightweight will find their views fully vindicated in this well balanced biography of a man who helped to shape today’s world. In romantic with a mind firmly the end, Mountbatten was an old fashioned fixed in this century. This is the essence of Ziegler’s conclusions about his subject.
This book is rather long and many will find the details of Mountbatten’s early life and of his retirement years of little interest except in an “anecdotal” sense. Indeed, until he was appointed Head of Combined Operations in 1941 and put in charge of the pre-invasion harrassment attacks against the Nazis in occupied Europe, Mountbatten led a life not terribly unlike a lot of other wealthy military or naval officers. Somewhat luckier than many, and perhaps harder working, he was unique in the sense that his connections allowed him to be in the right place at the right time to catch the attention of one W.S. Churchill.
Ziegler divides Mountbatten’s public life into three broad periods: Combined Operations/Supremo, Viceroy, and High Command in London. The first part of his life, which runs from birth until his notice by Churchill and subsequent appointment as head of Combined Operations during the second world war is only of passing interest to the “student of history”. Ziegler relates numerous adventures and misadventures that quite rightly suggest Mountbatten might well have been a great leader of men without having been a great “ship driver” in the naval sense. That Mountbatten was good at the technical aspects of his profession is made quite clear. Yet, Ziegler is scrupulously honest in relating that his performance as a captain was not at all flawless. Perhaps it is a case of a reverse Peter Principle: Rising to the challenge. Mountbatten seemed to do better the more exalted his position.
Mountbatten first made his influence felt on the world stage at the time of his appointment to head Combined Operations. The appointment as captain of the aircraft carrier Illustrious, which he held immediately prior to Combined Operations, illustrates another aspect of Mountbatten’s career which Ziegler properly emphasizes – his luck.
Being at the right place at the right time has helped many a career and Mountbatten’s appointment to Illustrious while she was undergoing refit in the U.S.A. was just that. His visit to the U.S.A. laid the groundwork for the excellent relations with the Americans which characterized and helped his career until the end when he sought to lead the Royal Navy into the nuclear age with the help of the less-than-co-operative Admiral Rickover, father of the United States nuclear navy. illustrated – not for the last time – that a leader must be an adept bureaucratic player. Ziegler frequently makes the point that Mountbatten was not given to abstract conceptualizing. Rather, he always (or almost always) drew on the best ideas of others and got them through the system.
Mountbatten conceived and planned the first major combined operation of the war -Dieppe. Countless pages have been written analyzing what many consider to have been the criminal slaughter of Canadian soldiers. Ziegler places the responsibility for its planning squarely on Mountbatten but notes that others denied him the capital ships and the air cover he had recommended. In the end, Ziegler asserts that any blame must be shared by many players. This was, incidentally, the view adopted by Canada’s official World War Il historian, C.P. Stacey.
Mountbatten’s general performance at Combined Operations clearly pleased both Churchill and Roosevelt. They assured his place in the military history of W.W. Il by appointing him Supreme Allied Commander in South-East Asia, putting him on a par with Supremos MacArthur (South-West Pacific), Nimitz (Pacific Ocean Area and Eisenhower (Europe). To convey an idea of the size of Mountbatten’s command, Ziegler quotes Mountbatten as fidgeting about the accommodations of the 16 officers of Major General rank in his headquarters. As Supremo, Mountbatten had Service Commanders-in-Chief immeasurably more experienced and qualified in the arts of war than he was. His challenge was to get the right commanders in place and to incite them and their men to work together while ensuring his area was not forgotten and starved of direction, material and men by the U.S.-U.K. Combined Chief of Staff, who effectively ran the war under the strategic direction of Roosevelt and Churchill. He had to compete with the main priority, the war in Europe, and with the Supremo next door, General MacArthur. Ziegler cannot be faulted for expressing his admiration at Mountbatten’s success in taking an almost derelict command and making it into a more effective one. Here again, his people skills, his good relations with the Yanks, hard work and luck combined to re-enforce the general view of his having a golden touch.
After mopping up his area after the war, Mountbatten, says Ziegler, wished for nothing more than a return to the Royal Navy. Not an easy task because Mountbatten rose in six years (in Foreign Service terms) roughly from an FS-2 to an acting EX-5. After serving as Supremo, he reverted to the permanent rank of Rear Admiral and returned to London. In reading this part of the book, I was reminded of one of the last scenes of the recent television mini-series Shogun when the new Shogun admits what he had constantly and emphatically been denying – that his one real goal was to be Shogun. This thought is undoubtedly unworthy of both Mountbatten and of his biographer, yet for a man such as Mountbatten it is a bit difficult to believe that all he wanted was to run a squadron of ships. In any event, one of the most powerful appointive, and certainly the most glorious, positions in the world intervened.
Books have been written about the subcontinent’s advent to freedom and Mountbatten’s role therein. After noting Mountbatten’s “reticence” to take on the job of Viceroy, Ziegler again focuses on the people skills, luck and hard work that often combined to put him over the top. Mountbatten brought a fresh mind to the problem and, in the end, succeeded in divesting Britain of the most treasured part of its Empire. He did so by cajoling, bullying, charming, threatening and by playing on his kinship with the King-Emperor. it. Many have argued that he did so too quickly and in a manner that resulted in untold thousands of deaths. Even with the advantage of hindsight Ziegler (as will most readers) found difficulty in assessing that accusation. At this point in time, Britain was utterly exhausted by the war and it is doubtful that the stiff upper lip of the Brits in India and a largely native army could have held on much • longer. Ziegler ends his treatment of Mountbatten in India with a quotation from Nehru saying that he was leaving loved, respected, and indeed revered by millions of Indians – no mean feat and one which properly makes Mountbatten a founder of the modern Commonwealth.
After India, Mountbatten proved many of his detractors wrong and returned to the Royal Navy and served in a junior flag position in the Mediterranean fleet. He did well and became Fourth Sea Lord in 1950.
1952, he assumed command of the Mediterranean Fleet where his good relations with the U.S.N. stood him in good stead once again. The final stage of his career as professional head of the R.N. (First Sea Lord) and then as professional head of the U.K. armed forces as Chief of the Defence Staff marked a period of accomplishment equalled only, perhaps, by India.
The final part of Mountbatten’s public life is dealt with by Ziegler in his chapter on Mountbatten’s work as Chief of the Defence Staff. Aside from the numerous and important policy and procurement decisions inherent to Britain’s top military job, Mountbatten’s crowning task was to reorganize Britain’s centuries old military establishment to enable it to function in an environment totally undreamed of even by the generals and admirals who fought in World War II. Members of the Foreign Service will readily recall the agonies occasioned by the re-organization of the Department of External Affairs; in comparison with the effort to untangle the web of centuries between the Admiralty and the War Office, External’s restructuring appears to have been “a piece of cake”.. Given the enormity of Mountbatten’s accomplishment, Ziegler comments in some detail on the efforts required of Mountbatten and of his political master to ensure the creation of the position of Secretary of State for Defence with the authority and support to shape the totality of Britain’s defence policy. Again, in this phase of his life, hard work, luck, people skills and his connections, combined to make Mountbatten’s efforts successful.
Ziegler makes clear that Mountbatten’s useful life did not end with his departure from the Ministry of Defence and provides another three chapters on his work after retirement. By then, however, he was getting tired and his active influence on U.K. and world events ended when he stepped down as Chief of Defence Staff. Ziegler leaves us the impression that Mountbatten was the kind of man rarely seen in this century. The book’s last sentence captures this well:
“He flared brilliantly across the face of the twentieth century; the meteor is extinguished but its glow lingers on in the mind’s eye.”
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Originally published in bout de papier, Vol. 4, No. 3 (1986) — Fall 1986 // Automne 1986, pp. 25–27. Read the rest of this issue →
