Intelligence in War: The Value--And Limitations--Of What the Military Can Learn About the Enemy by John Keegan Read Free Book Online Page A

overhearing of the enemy’s own signals which have revealed his intentions and capabilities to his opponent and so allowed countermeasures to be taken in time.
    The case studies that follow will support this argument. Not, however, in its entirety; one case study, that of the German airborne descent on Crete in May 1941, has deliberately been chosen to demonstrate that even the best intelligence will not avail if the defence is too weak to profit by it. Other studies—particularly those of the Battle of the Atlantic and the V-weapons—emphasise the parallel importance of non-intelligence factors, in the first case, and of photographic intelligence and humint, in the second, in defeating the threat. The book begins with studies of intelligence campaigns in the age before signal intelligence was available to a keen-eared listener. The examples of Nelson’s Mediterranean campaign of 1798 and Stonewall Jackson’s campaign in the Shenandoah Valley in 1862 may persuade those who expect too much—or too little—of modern intelligence-gatherers and -users to reconsider their opinions.
    It has become part of the conventional wisdom that intelligence is the necessary key to success in military operations. A wise opinion would be that intelligence, while generally necessary, is not a sufficient means to victory. Decision in war is always the result of a fight, and in combat willpower always counts for more than foreknowledge. Let those who disagree show otherwise.

CHAPTER TWO
     

     
    Chasing Napoleon
     
    A CCURATE INTELLIGENCE in the age of sail was a scarce commodity. Accurate intelligence is, of course, scarce at all times, but the sea, in the years before radar and radio, let alone satellite surveillance, was an arena of the unknown. The horizon was an impenetrable barrier, the man-of-war, breasting the waves at six knots or so, a ponderous means of extending a captain’s field of vision beyond it. An admiral with a fleet under command could enlarge his supervision by disposing his men-of-war and their attendant frigates at intervals of a dozen miles or so, the maximum distance at which intervisibility and so intercommunication, masthead to masthead, was possible. Even thus, the transmission of news of a sighting was a haphazard business. Admiral Lord Howe, seeking to establish the whereabouts of a French convoy of 139 merchantmen he knew to be nearby, had to quarter the sea for eight days before he brought its escort to action on the Glorious First of June 1794. The interception was rightly regarded as remarkable. The battle took place 400 miles from land at a time when most sea engagements were fought, as they always had been, within fifty miles of the coast.
    Admirals, moreover, did not like to disperse their capital ships for purposes of reconnaissance, needing to keep them concentrated for action lest the enemy were met unexpectedly. The need to gather information always had to be balanced against that of keeping firepower massed under the commander’s hand. The strength of a fleet lay not in that of its individual units but in the line of battle, formed bow to stern at intervals of a few hundred feet. Ships isolated were ships exposed to “defeat in detail,” or one by one, by superior numbers. Hence the importance of the capital ships’ scouts, the frigates, smaller and swifter sailers which could be sent to and beyond the horizon in search of the enemy.
    No admiral ever had enough frigates. The calls on their service were manifold: as despatch vessels, as commerce raiders, as convoy escorts. Such duties chronically depleted the number available as scouts and “repeater ships,” which lay close to but outside the line of battle, copying the signals of the flagship, which were often masked by its near neighbours, so that they were visible from van to rear. The scarcity of frigates was odd. As they were much smaller than battleships, a third or a quarter by displacement, carried far fewer men, perhaps only 150