The Butterfly Effect: A British AAR

[Davout]

An excellent update on the futility and waste of the campaign season. I almost expected Fortinbras to turn up.

I t is a shame that we will be leaving Spain soon ('soon' being a relative term in the Pipverse). You could have had a diversion about Dolores Ibarruri, the Basque communist, geeing up the masses, and her special friend, Nikolai Voronov, studying the effects of artillery fire.

 

[El Pip]

To be fair, the mistake to move up to Netherlands was a well calculated gamble, as it was part of the French high command desire to attempt to force Dutch army to fight for Allies side to bitter end, and to lessen the pressure on French manpower as at the time it was still thought that the WW2 would turn into a gruesome, slow, brutal war that WW1 was. After all, how could you have strategic planning against guys jumping out of airplanes, that merely 10 years before were hardly able to aim a flour bomb properly to ground below.

It was a gamble, but I would question how calculated. As I understand it the French plan was to fully commit almost the entire reserve to try and get to the Dyle, leaving nothing at all until new units were raised (or you strip them from elsewhere). Committing your entire reserve on the first day of the war means, in effect, you don't have a reserve and that is generally frowned upon. Not planning for new ideas, fair enough perhaps, but this was just neglecting basic, ancient, military theory.

...or even a faster response to the German Ardennes effort once it became clear. Even being a few hours faster could have made enough of a difference to prevent the unilateral withdrawal of Belgian and British forces in unhelpful directions.

Alas, for the world...that didn't happen.

I've said elsewhere, the sad thing for France was that, after all the money and effort they put into building fortifications, they were let down by their failure to finish the fortifications at Sedan. A faster response from the French High Command is pretty damn unlikely without major changes, just asking some of the chaps who did the Maginot Line to do their stuff at Sedan (instead of the lazy idiots they used in OTL) seems more reasonable.

It seems like the Carlists are losing on most of the peripheral fronts, and should the French decide that the CNT/FAI/Catalan coalition is worth supporting, I'm not sure how the Monarchists can reclaim the North without a gruesome struggle. Granted, wearing the Monarchists down might well be in France's strategic interest, especially if they can't rely on the United Kingdom to fight with them on the Continent (although Eden is probably seen, rightly, as much more likely to cooperate with the French). It seems that the war is very much up in the air at this point, (although I suspect the Republicans will win).

The Monarchists are losing at the edges, but advancing well through Central Spain so things balance out. There are a couple of issues with France supporting the CNT/FAI, some of which are obvious, some perhaps less so, though rest assured it will be the subject of a later update.

Eden is definitely more continentally minded than many of his rivals, with the Conservative Party somewhat split on the matter this is a blessing and a curse.

I'm pretty sure the monarchists win...just my read of how things will go.

Excellent I've kept things up in the air enough that people can argue either way. Just as I hoped.

It is (still!) debatable who is going to win. Which...eh, I can see why but knowing everything as we do, I don't really want the republicans to win (even though they should really, they are the elected goverment here). Best case scenario for them is moderstes (somehow) get control in Madrid when they win and Catalans get independance. Much more likely is they win (somehow) and then fight amongsy themsevles gor long ebough that the facists come back, this time with muvh more suppirt.

But generally, because of the powers involved, and the sides they picked, this civil war may well end up with a worse result for everyone, especially Spain. How...depressing?

At the moment things are slightly better than OTL for Spain, once you accept that being in a Civil War is pretty awful to start with. The presence of Britain, France and (to an extent) the US has forced both sides to dial things back a bit. There has been no Guernica or anything similar, the Communists haven't got their secret police force going on the Republican side and no-one is going around massacring people after they capture a town. It's not pleasant, but the nastiness is hidden in the shadows more and there is less of it. Post war, very different question.

Just coming at the same majestic pace and frequency of the updates.

Touche!

As to the chapter itself, as always a remarkably plausible blend of history and alt-history. There seems to have been much praise of Lister, bordering on hysteria - ‘Listeria’, perhaps? Probably has the same effects.

An excellent update on the futility and waste of the campaign season. I almost expected Fortinbras to turn up.

I t is a shame that we will be leaving Spain soon ('soon' being a relative term in the Pipverse). You could have had a diversion about Dolores Ibarruri, the Basque communist, geeing up the masses, and her special friend, Nikolai Voronov, studying the effects of artillery fire.

I had been unaware of those two meeting (or of Dolores at all) and it does sound a fascinating match up, but alas if I start exploring such things we will never leave Spain. And we must leave Spain or how else will we get the Tank Pron? Which I assume is still popular in these parts.

 

[Wraith11B]

Tank Pron. Taaank proooon.

Were it not so popular, you'd have long since had to shutter Spain and just move into discussing the local by elections in Leeds or something.

 

[Casko]

It was a gamble, but I would question how calculated. As I understand it the French plan was to fully commit almost the entire reserve to try and get to the Dyle, leaving nothing at all until new units were raised (or you strip them from elsewhere). Committing your entire reserve on the first day of the war means, in effect, you don't have a reserve and that is generally frowned upon. Not planning for new ideas, fair enough perhaps, but this was just neglecting basic, ancient, military theory.

well. the full plan WAS to build a defensive line after reaching the Dyle that would stretch from France to Netherlands with the army's back being guarded by Royal Navy and eventual British reinforcements. Not to mention that the German feint attack against the Dutch was to make it seem that it was the German main force attempting to push through Netherlands, then down to Belgium and France. so the French plan to move their main army up to Netherlands was the correct one according to the French Intelligence. However as we in hindsight know, the actual army attacking Netherlands was not the main push despite the intensity of the German assaults, and instead the main push came through the Ardennes in the form of the Blitzkrieg.

 

[El Pip]

Tank Pron. Taaank proooon.

Were it not so popular, you'd have long since had to shutter Spain and just move into discussing the local by elections in Leeds or something.

It is a popular subject and one which I found fairly easy to write about. (After I stopped being distracted by re-writing Chapter 13, Italian Navy policy and strategy from the 20s and 30s is both interesting and utterly irrelevant to the story given their fleet is now safely sunk...)

well. the full plan WAS to build a defensive line after reaching the Dyle that would stretch from France to Netherlands with the army's back being guarded by Royal Navy and eventual British reinforcements. Not to mention that the German feint attack against the Dutch was to make it seem that it was the German main force attempting to push through Netherlands, then down to Belgium and France. so the French plan to move their main army up to Netherlands was the correct one according to the French Intelligence. However as we in hindsight know, the actual army attacking Netherlands was not the main push despite the intensity of the German assaults, and instead the main push came through the Ardennes in the form of the Blitzkrieg.

I'm not faulting the general intent, as you say it was correct based on what they knew, but it was too ambitious based on the forces they had. If France lacked the troops to get to the Dyle and have a strategic reserves (and man the Maginot and the Italian border and everything else) then that should have rung alarm bells. Go back to the original plan with a line on the Escher River that way there is a strategic reserve that can be deployed for emergencies, like the Germans pushing through the Ardennes.

I also remain amazed at the failure to properly fortify Sedan, they knew it was a problem, war games had recreated the exact German plan and they had even started building extra forts there in 1938. If there was one thing the 1930s French should have been bloody amazing at it was building large fixed fortifications, but it was an unfinished mess.

 

[Casko]

I also remain amazed at the failure to properly fortify Sedan, they knew it was a problem, war games had recreated the exact German plan and they had even started building extra forts there in 1938. If there was one thing the 1930s French should have been bloody amazing at it was building large fixed fortifications, but it was an unfinished mess.

I hate to argue in defense of French high command. However the exact reason Sedan fortifications were never completed in time was due to Belgian protests of the forts, as it implied that French would not come to the Belgian aid in case a 2nd schlieffen plan and simply would let Germans through and ram themselves against French fortifications while Belgians were to be a mere speedbump to German offensive. So biggest problem lies with Belgians when it comes to Sedan fortifications and why they were never completed. and the extending of Maginot Line all the way to sea.

However considering that in this story, French have gone Communists, I'd imagine Belgian protests would not be listened, nor cared about so the Sedan fortification plan might well be completed this time around. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

(After I stopped being distracted by re-writing Chapter 13, Italian Navy policy and strategy from the 20s and 30s is both interesting and utterly irrelevant to the story given their fleet is now safely sunk...)

Yeah, the Italian navy seems to get destroyed by the British no matter what else they are doing (or not doing) which seems a little mean sometimes. I point to Talking Turkey, where they have done little else but sink the Axis combined fleet and then troll Italy by making them run around Africa far too much.

It needed to be laid out though at least to some extent because otherwise it makes the British seem like either invincible naval people (which...in this period, isn't really true) or the Italians as being really, really trigger happy idiots gambling everything with a hand full of pre-WWI cack. And also, you needed to say what ships they had that the British would be interested in stealing.

I hate to argue in defense of French high command. However the exact reason Sedan fortifications were never completed in time was due to Belgian protests of the forts, as it implied that French would not come to the Belgian aid in case a 2nd schlieffen plan and simply would let Germans through and ram themselves against French fortifications while Belgians were to be a mere speedbump to German offensive. So biggest problem lies with Belgians when it comes to Sedan fortifications and why they were never completed. and the extending of Maginot Line all the way to sea.

However considering that in this story, French have gone Communists, I'd imagine Belgian protests would not be listened, nor cared about so the Sedan fortification plan might well be completed this time around. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Hmm...well, aside from anything else, the French war plans should be different. They don't know what Britain is going to do in the case of war but they also know Hitler is probably going to attack them at some point, and they've faced him down before. Add this to the Little Entente and the war in Spain and France might actually start boosting its military and trying to make a go of actually fighting, not just hiding behind a massive screen for the entire war. Especially because Italy is weaker and France probably rates them even lower than they actually are. Their main problem is what to do about Poland and the others in eastern Europe. Staking their international reputation on keeping them defended means they'll actually have to do something as soon as war is declared to help save them.

This is all moot if the game boots them into the Comintern for some reason of course but still...

 

[TheExecuter]

There you go again, slagging the French with an assertion that just isn't true.

The French army WAS being boosted prior to WW2. The French plan was offensive, not defensive in nature...and it conformed to a strategy of war dictated in London, not Paris.

I know you back the British...but stop propagating the lies the Allies tell about 1940.

Seriously.

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

There you go again, slagging the French with an assertion that just isn't true.

The French army WAS being boosted prior to WW2. The French plan was offensive, not defensive in nature...and it conformed to a strategy of war dictated in London, not Paris.

I know you back the British...but stop propagating the lies the Allies tell about 1940.

Seriously.

...we or at least I am talking about HOI game france, in and out of universe, for the most part. This very defensive style of play is what i see them do all the time, sometimes succesfully sometimes not. I don't really know enough about the subject matter to make anything other than general comments or jokes about actual france.

But since we're going there, what was their offensive strategy besides going into Belgium, using their defences to blunt the first germans attack and then either holding out there or going forward to defend the Netherlands as well? Why did the British not want to go into Belgium? What was the allied plan, generally speaking? We can't point fingers and talk smack about individual countries when perhaps the entire alliance had no idea what to do aside from maybe build some defences and defend them. To question GB especially, if they werent going to go into belgium, what exactly were they going to do?

 

[Casko]

But since we're going there, what was their offensive strategy besides going into Belgium, using their defences to blunt the first germans attack and then either holding out there or going forward to defend the Netherlands as well? Why did the British not want to go into Belgium? What was the allied plan, generally speaking? We can't point fingers and talk smack about individual countries when perhaps the entire alliance had no idea what to do aside from maybe build some defences and defend them. To question GB especially, if they werent going to go into belgium, what exactly were they going to do?

French plan to at offensive was much akin to late-WW1 style superior-firepower and trench-warfare of slow, tactical maneuvers. With Artillery barrages, then armored support arm supporting Infantry attacks. quite literally push one inch at a time until you either break German morale or you reach Berlin. As with the Benelux region strategy for the French. It was to force Netherlands into a situation where they can not capitulate to the Germans and thus allow German army to swoop down to Belgium at much wider frontline that French could not react to fast enough without leaving critical gaps due to lack of British support at the time. And once the theoretical front was formed, the Belgian and Netherlands manpower was able to be used up to bolster French war effort and buy plenty of time for the Germans to exhaust themselves and for the British to get their act together.

British in general were quite traumatized by the WW1. hence why British army was shrunken massively in the interwar period. British were neither ready for continental war. Nor were the British really willing to send their armies to die for the French again, and French knew that. For the British their strategy was much akin to the start of the WW1. Send an expeditionary force to act as support for the French on defensive, and not go to offensive until the Empire had mobilized, and the Commonwealth troops were armed and ready to be shipped to the front. Thus leaving the main effort of British to be simply to blockade Germany and starve them out. With possible military action taken against both Norway and Sweden to force them to cut off their trade with Germany. be it blockade of Baltic sea, or by declaration of war and thus starve the two nations to bend the knee for the royal navy.

 

[Jaimie Wolf]

So...
El Pip you glorius, de-lurking, on of a kind writer...
Seems like you got another one.

Though I'm still not finished with this beast of an AAR, I wanted to take a quick peak at the current site to give you some late congrats for your little Pippettes* and to thank you for entertaining me for quite some time now.
I first stumbled upon you when I discovered Inevitable Defeat back at the beginning of the year. Then I took a peak at your other works, mainly this one**.
Just came from work, sat down a minute and felt the urge to write you this.***

I already dread the moment where I discover the actuall end of this AAR. Then I will have to wait for an Update just like all the other old faces here. Luckily by then I will still have for king dingsbums and the Fjords to read, but after that... *shudder*
I was thinking about asking you if you could just speed up a bit, but that's a lost cause I think. Also would steal a lot of the magic done.

So yeah, thanks a lot for all the fun, interessting Techporn (Boat-Faction by the way****) and all the other stuff. Feels like if known you for years now even though I just appered here the first time.
Please keep it up!

Jaimie Wolf

*: Quite a nice name by the way, sounds a bit frensh... I like it!*****
**: Also took a look at furius vengeance, but most of the pictures have been deletet. Guess that took a lot of Fun from that one...
***: BTW my first post here, also created the account mainly for doing this. Hope you do like getting offered my first time!
****: If there is currently a vote going on count me in for whatever is the most boaty. If not please do so nevertheless.
*****: Even though the danger of a lot of furius replys, I'm mostly a Frenshman. I remember the time there was a discussion here about francophilia, I can relate to that!

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

French plan to at offensive was much akin to late-WW1 style superior-firepower and trench-warfare of slow, tactical maneuvers. With Artillery barrages, then armored support arm supporting Infantry attacks. quite literally push one inch at a time until you either break German morale or you reach Berlin.

That...doesn't sound like a very good plan for countries who hate war and want to avoid war exhaustion and problems at home.

And once the theoretical front was formed, the Belgian and Netherlands manpower was able to be used up to bolster French war effort and buy plenty of time for the Germans to exhaust themselves and for the British to get their act together.

This though, is what most HOI players I've seen do, and that's with hindsight. So it must have been at least possible and good in theory. So what went wrong aside fron thr germans being very speedy?

Even though the danger of a lot of furius replys, I'm mostly a Frenshman. I remember the time there was a discussion here about francophilia, I can relate to that!

This is a good point to join in then.

(Mostly)?

 

[Casko]

That...doesn't sound like a very good plan for countries who hate war and want to avoid war exhaustion and problems at home.

That's why you want the Belgian and Dutch manpower. Similarly, it is a doctrine, that at the time was proven most effective and least costly at the time. After all, most other alternative war strategies that were theorized ended up being stopped by a well placed machine gun nest. and German Blitzkrieg was seen by Allies completely impossible in practice, that is before Germans managed to take Allies completely by surprise.

This though, is what most HOI players I've seen do, and that's with hindsight. So it must have been at least possible and good in theory. So what went wrong aside fron thr germans being very speedy?

The German operation was simply more successful.
First the German feint attack to Netherlands was completed without a single fault in strategic level. making it seem that German main army was attacking Netherlands, thus forcing French to hurry their troop movements faster than French high command was expecting, as French were afraid that Germans were able to force Netherlands to capitulate without French army even reaching Belgium proper, thus leaving the unfortified and undermanned Dutch-Belgian border to be easy assault point for the supposed German main army to simply evade all of Belgian fortifications on German border. However, in the end this hurry and faulty intelligence caused the French army to be cut off and destroyed.

2nd was the fact that Germans war doctrine was more modern compared to the French and Belgian doctrine. Battle of Fort Eben-Emael for example shows the German success of using paratrooper divisions to neutralize a modern fortification and then force the defenders to be unable to properly counter attack until German 18th army had managed to link up with the paratroopers and cause the fortifications to be efficiently lost and allowing the 18th Army to pass through unmolested to Belgium.

Lastly however. I'd like to add the fact that French high-command and French politicians were counting on stopping the Germans in Benelux, rather than allow Germans to move into French soil. as at the time French spirit and morale was still very much at low point. and if the frontline was to settle into French soil for months or even years like it was for most of WW1 would had no doubt caused either the French troops to desert, the French Commune attempt a revolution with anti-war rhetoric, or the Popular-Front to deem the government inept and cause a military coup in order to sue for peace and save the country. possibly with support of Italy so Mussolini would have an ally in the west.

 

[TheExecuter]

The Germans gambled on a narrow thrust strategy through the Ardennes...after a feint at the Netherlands. They banked on the French army being too slow to react and crush their Ardennes force before it crossed the Meuse. The timing was a near run thing, but the French reacted too slowly and we're unable to prevent the Germans from crossing the Meuse and placing most French reserves out of position to deal with the German dictated schwerpunkt. Once the British realized they were getting sucked into Belgium they precipitously withdrew...thus ending ANY hope of halting the exposed German forces.

The Germans made this gamble because they did not believe a war with the western Allies could be won conventionally. The German army did not possess the mobility, equipment, or supplies to fight a drawn out conventional campaign. The fear of the blockade and internal revolution meant Hitler and team gambled on achieving a quick war (either a win or a loss).

It is a common misconception that the German army succeeded by having better equipment or being 'faster' than the Allies. Neither is true. They succeeded because they exploited their ability to make decisions faster than a mulitnational command force...and because they gambled on this advantage.

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

The Germans gambled on a narrow thrust strategy through the Ardennes...after a feint at the Netherlands. They banked on the French army being too slow to react and crush their Ardennes force before it crossed the Meuse. The timing was a near run thing, but the French reacted too slowly and we're unable to prevent the Germans from crossing the Meuse and placing most French reserves out of position to deal with the German dictated schwerpunkt. Once the British realized they were getting sucked into Belgium they precipitously withdrew...thus ending ANY hope of halting the exposed German forces.

The Germans made this gamble because they did not believe a war with the western Allies could be won conventionally. The German army did not possess the mobility, equipment, or supplies to fight a drawn out conventional campaign. The fear of the blockade and internal revolution meant Hitler and team gambled on achieving a quick war (either a win or a loss).

It is a common misconception that the German army succeeded by having better equipment or being 'faster' than the Allies. Neither is true. They succeeded because they exploited their ability to make decisions faster than a mulitnational command force...and because they gambled on this advantage.

...lots went wrong in the first 2 years for the allies, didnt it? Good thing the Axis couldn't sustain a war for very long and had some really unstable people making many of the decisions. So why the French hate thing?

 

[TheExecuter]

...lots went wrong in the first 2 years for the allies, didnt it? Good thing the Axis couldn't sustain a war for very long and had some really unstable people making many of the decisions. So why the French hate thing?

IMO, the Germans needed everyone to believe that their army was invincible...when it wasn't.

The British needed to direct attention away from their poor performance in 1940 in order to keep Allies in the war and woo the United States...so they slagged off the French.

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

IMO, the Germans needed everyone to believe that their army was invincible...when it wasn't.

The British needed to direct attention away from their poor performance in 1940 in order to keep Allies in the war and woo the United States...so they slagged off the French.

Again? Why does everyone keep believing the British when they say something? They've been pulling that shit with france especially for at least 600 years. In fact, i think that might be their national superpower (not sailing): the ability to rewrite history.

It's a bit of a change from WWI though. Every nation was rearing to go then, fully believing their army was ready, they were going to win and win quickly. WW2? Not inlu was no one ready, no one thought they were ready and no one aside from the truly desperate nations really wanted to fight at all.

So bearing in mind everything just said about OTL, what would you see france planning to do this time around with what they have?

 

[TheExecuter]

I think France will be interested in trying to clandestinely bring down the German government...

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

I think France will be interested in trying to clandestinely bring down the German government...

...was going to respond that doing that would either start a civil war or cause a communist take over...but then realised they probably don't care or want one of those things to happen.

All this begs the question of what the UK is wanting to do as well. Aside from keep belgium alive and europe not-communist.

Actually...thats probably it but how are they going to go about that, i mean?

 

[El Pip]

I go away for a brief holiday and come back to a long debate on the Battle of France. Excellent work chaps and chapesses, keep it up. I'm going to break a habit and not respond to everything, my general understanding is that @Casko has the guts of the Anglo-French strategy correct but has under-estimated the blockade/economic warfare part.

Germany imported pretty much everything before the war and that only got worse once the war started, the aim of blockade wasn't starvation per se but crippling the German economy. Apart from the obvious oil and rubber, the aim was strategic materials like copper, tungsten, iron ore. Germany had a big programme for making oil and rubber from coal (at the cost of inducing a coal shortage elsewhere) but the rest were import only. The plan pretty much worked, even by the Spring of 1940 industrial plants across Germany were shutting down to lack of raw materials.

Of course the Germans knew this and as @TheExecuter points out gambled on a risky plan for a short war. But the high level Allied plan wasn't bad, even if the specific Dyle Plan was bloody awful. I would also point out that the reason every blames the French is that it was Gamelin and the GQG who came up with the plan and then convinced the British to take part, the BEF slotting into the French command structure (with right to appeal to London, but basically under French command). This made sense because there were 104 French Division fighting in the North and only 10 effective divisions in the BEF (Belgium had 22), so of course France took the lead on Land, just as Britain took the lead on Sea. If you have control then you have to accept you will get the blame.

Now a few selected responses.

So...
El Pip you glorius, de-lurking, on of a kind writer...
Seems like you got another one.

Though I'm still not finished with this beast of an AAR, I wanted to take a quick peak at the current site to give you some late congrats for your little Pippettes* and to thank you for entertaining me for quite some time now.
I first stumbled upon you when I discovered Inevitable Defeat back at the beginning of the year. Then I took a peak at your other works, mainly this one**.
Just came from work, sat down a minute and felt the urge to write you this.***

I already dread the moment where I discover the actuall end of this AAR. Then I will have to wait for an Update just like all the other old faces here. Luckily by then I will still have for king dingsbums and the Fjords to read, but after that... *shudder*
I was thinking about asking you if you could just speed up a bit, but that's a lost cause I think. Also would steal a lot of the magic done.

So yeah, thanks a lot for all the fun, interessting Techporn (Boat-Faction by the way****) and all the other stuff. Feels like if known you for years now even though I just appered here the first time.
Please keep it up!

Jaimie Wolf

*: Quite a nice name by the way, sounds a bit frensh... I like it!*****
**: Also took a look at furius vengeance, but most of the pictures have been deletet. Guess that took a lot of Fun from that one...
***: BTW my first post here, also created the account mainly for doing this. Hope you do like getting offered my first time!
****: If there is currently a vote going on count me in for whatever is the most boaty. If not please do so nevertheless.
*****: Even though the danger of a lot of furius replys, I'm mostly a Frenshman. I remember the time there was a discussion here about francophilia, I can relate to that!

A first time poster! The very best sort of commentator, welcome aboard @Jaimie Wolf clearly you are a reader of taste and discernment and the boat-porn faction can always need another member to stand up to the armoured caucus. I'm delighted you've enjoyed these works and look forward to perhaps coaxing some additional posts out of you once you have caught up.

I think France will be interested in trying to clandestinely bring down the German government...

That is pretty much standard French Government policy at all times.

...was going to respond that doing that would either start a civil war or cause a communist take over...but then realised they probably don't care or want one of those things to happen.

All this begs the question of what the UK is wanting to do as well. Aside from keep belgium alive and europe not-communist.

Actually...thats probably it but how are they going to go about that, i mean?

At present the establishment and most MPs, regardless of which side of the house they are on, are of the opinion that Europe can probably take care of itself for the foreseeable. The alt-Rhineland Crisis has 'proved' Germany is a paper tiger and Hitler just bluffs, the Abyssinian War has cut Italy down to size and, aside from the ongoing Spanish unpleasantness, everything else is relatively calm (using the fairly lax 20s/30s definition of calm). Even in Spain the view is that, at the absolute worst, the Republicans win, it gets a bit awkward for the British firms based there, but the French have things in hand and no-one is going Communist.

Obviously this view is completely wrong in places, but until that becomes apparent there is a strong majority for thinking that (Spanish interventions aside) UK shouldn't 'Do' much in Europe - "Don't just Do something, stand there." - leaving time and effort free for the Empire and the rest of the world. Basically the UK is going to carry on getting Foreign Policy with regards to the Continent badly wrong in places, as is required by long standing custom and tradition.

If I can count properly, next post is top of the page... *Begin the Incantation*