Operation Crusader and the Desert War in British History and Memory: ‘What Is Failure? What Is Loyalty?’ by Alexander H. Joffe

Author:Alexander H. Joffe
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury

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Crusader and the Desert War in the Public Eye

Remembering what to forget

Churchill’s famous speech in November 1942 about the ‘end of the beginning’ came after Alamein. That beginning phase of the war was, however, remembered selectively; arguably, more was forgotten than remembered. After the fall of France, Britain may have been willing to fight alone, and then alongside Russia and the United States. But the circumstances of the war, at home and overseas, were increasingly unhappy, grim conditions that implicitly shaped later memories as well as histories. It was a period seemingly destined to be forgotten.

After the heroic stand against the Blitz from September 1940 through May 1941 the circumstances of war for the British people shifted for the worse. On the one hand, the German invasion of Russia in June launched a titanic struggle whose vast dimensions dwarfed those of Britain, in terms of geography, populations and sheer slaughter. This relieved the burden of Britain standing alone (Lend-Lease notwithstanding) but cast its heroism in a different light. But on the other hand, Russia’s sudden material needs began another drain on British wartime production that was just beginning to become organized after a chaotic beginning. Russian needs, as well as those of British forces, put ever-higher labour demands on British industry and were accompanied by growing exhortations for Britain to open a second front. What some referred to as Churchill’s private war in the Mediterranean did not qualify. The international and domestic political dimensions of coalition warfare exerted new strains on British society.

In response to growing production needs, the British economy was overhauled once again; there was a shift from voluntary sacrifices to compulsory ones, and to increasingly organized central planning. Railroads and ports, along with their owners and labour forces, had been in a chaotic state in 1940 and early 1941, but new initiatives brought these gradually under control, agreements short of nationalization but which advanced the cause of labour. Registration of men and women for assignment to wartime industries was also introduced, and the maximum ages were progressively increased. Countless workers, firms and industries all found themselves on various essential lists, subject to government controls. But along with the military and Civil Defense, the sheer numbers of bodies required to mobilize Britain to total war was staggering. The military needs in particular required manpower be withdrawn from industry: age limits for workers were continually raised again and by the end of 1941 the conscription of women into the military was necessary. Though in a sense popular with women, who now could do their part alongside men, it was a radical shift for society.

But despite the growing workforce and levels of production, shortages bit deeper and deeper, driving dramatic price inflation and, in early 1941, the introduction of rationing for food, clothing and other goods. At the same time the Battle of the Atlantic took an ever-greater toll on shipping, imports and lives, reaching horrific levels in the first half of 1942. While rising taxes were apparently not an overwhelming social concern, the loss of housing from the blitz and rising food prices were.

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