Peter HennessyRezensionen

A detailed look at the machinery of Government required to launch Britain's independent nuclear deterrent, and the way it developed from the end of the Second World War to the dawn of the Age of Terror. It is a thorough and detailed book, and so the reader must be prepared for a lot of detail of different Governmental committees, who sat on them, and what gems of wisdom they uttered or slipped into memos.

If that sounds dry, it is. Hennessy leavens the mix with personal recollections, odd humorous asides, and (later in the account) some stories from the men tasked with delivering nuclear weapons against their targets. The author makes the necessary wading through Cabinet Office procedural memos as painless as possible.

There are some set pieces in the text; an account of a visit to TURNSTILE, the alternative seat of Government in a disused quarry near Bath; anecdotes from V-bomber crews; and a detailed account of a simulated launch of a Trident missile. These last two in particular very effectively show the professionalism of the armed forces whilst continuing to harbour personal doubts and fears over what they have to be prepared to do to fulfil their oaths of duty. There is little room for discussion of disarmament here; Hennessey shares the absolute belief in the value of deterrence with those servicemen and goes into no little detail as to why that is.

The book was first published in 2002, and so there was little time to revise the book to take account of the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. This was done for the 2010 edition, which now makes for interesting reading in the light of the changes in the last ten years, in particular the invasion of Ukraine by Russia. The planning in place in the early 2000s does seem to have been done with some forethought, though pandemic illnesses and cyber attacks come further down the list of risks than we might be comfortable with in the 2020s. But the analysis contained in the last couple of chapters is very clear and prescient - though how much notice recent political players have taken of that analysis must be open to doubt.

Some of the comments go to the heart, not only of security questions, but to wider matters. For example, the former Cabinet Secretary, Richard Wilson, is quoted as observing that the British appear to have the habit of going into their big changes "as if under anaesthetic". Hennessey considers that he had in mind the UK's accession to the European Community in 1973 and devolution plus the adoption of human rights legislation in the 1990s. Only later, Wilson said, do people realise the significance of these huge constitutional changes and ask 'Is that what we really meant?'. (Had the book seen a further edition ten years later, he might well have added Brexit.)

And our former ambassador to the UN, Sir Anthony Parsons, once said: "I would love it if we could become like Norway, where you can pick and choose. You can ... do good around the world if you feel you've got the money and if you run out of money you don't need to do anything... Nobody expects anything of you. But it's going to be a very very long time before people stop expecting something extra of us. We are now paying the price in these terms for our history - for having ruled a quarter of the world's population right up to 1945. And it's a very short time ago and you cannot simply wish that away in a matter of half-a-century."

Michael Quinlan, former Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Defence, said: "In matters of military contingency, the expected, precisely because it is expected, is not to be expected... What we expect, we plan and provide for. What we plan and provide for, we thereby deter. What we deter does not happen. What does happen is what we did not deter, because we did not plan and provide for it, because we did not expect it." (Our reaction to the war in Ukraine provides a perfect example of this.)

Finally: Tony Wright MP, Labour member for Cannock in 2009 and Chair of the Commons' Public Accounts Committee, said "...to improve the emaciated quality of our civic life, politicians could play it straight. Journalists could play it fair. Parties could resist the rise of a political class. Ministers could make sure that Cabinet government works. MPs could decide that Parliament matters....Interest groups could say who should have less, if they are to have more. Civil Servants could tell truth to power. Governments could promise less and perform more. Intellectuals could abandon their 'mechanical snigger', as Orwell called it. Social scientists could start writing in good plain English. The blogosphere could exchange rant for reason. Electors could decide to become critical citizens. None of this requires a written constitution, a bill of rights, proportional representation, or an elected House of Lords, no matter how desirable these things might or might not be. But it does require a change of culture." (Sadly, we seem to have gone away from this ideal rather than towards it. If only there was a political party willing to sign up to such principles....)

So in the end, Hennessy's book goes some little way beyond its brief of looking at the hidden machinery of the State and how it aims to control the awful power of Armageddon. In its closing pages, Hennessey sets out, in effect, what it is of the nation that the secret state is trying to protect. He quotes Karl Popper, who in 1945 said that we should plan for freedom and not only for security. Without the freedoms that some seem nowadays to want roll back, the necessary security stops defending freedom and instead restricts it. Without freedom, security becomes oppression.

A thought-provoking piece on the past, current place and future of the civil service in government, explored in dialogue between Professor Peter Hennessy and Sir David Normington, former Permanent Secretary and now First Civil Service Commissioner. An essential read for public servants.

Peter, now Lord, Hennessy, is not merely a great historian: I suspect he is probably the historians’ historian. In addition to his academic career (- he is currently the Attlee Professor of Contemporary British History at Queen Mary University of London) he has worked as a journalist, having written for The Economist and as Whitehall correspondent for The Times. He has also been a regular broadcaster on BBC’s Radio 4, where his Reflections series of conversations with notable political figures has drawn considerable plaudits.

This volume continues his great sweeping history of Britain since the Second World War, and embarks upon the 1960s. As the previous decade drew to a close, Harold Macmillan was Prime Minister, leading a Conservative government that seemed to be losing its momentum. The 1950s had seen the Conservatives return to power, led by the towering figure of Winston Churchill, still holding the reigns of power as he approached his ninth decade. Eventually driven from office by ill health, he had been succeeded by Anthony Eden, his protégé, generally seen as the great wunderkind of British politics. Eden would also be driven to retire on the grounds of health (as indeed would his own successor, Harold Macmillan), ground down by the ill-fated Suez debacle, and the general mayhem unleashed around the world during 1956.

Britain in the late 1950s seems a dreary, downtrodden place, far removed from the popular perception of the Swinging Sixties that were to follow. The economy proved reluctant to respond to the various attempts at stimulus that successive Chancellors of the Exchequer had attempted to inject. As if to demonstrate the sagacity of George Santayana’s apophthegm, ‘Those who do not study the past are condemned to repeat it’, one of the questions that dominate domestic, foreign and economic policy was Harold Macmillan’s desire to take Britain into the European Economic Community, then newly-formed but already showing signs of delivering economic recovery to Western Europe. Attempts to gain access for Britain, and Charles de Gaulle’s dogged refusal, proved a focus for Macmillan throughout his premiership. Even then, joining the EEC did not draw unanimous support even within his own party, and some doubters already alleging a conspiracy designed to bring about a European Federation.

Macmillan emerges as a likeable premier, although one not without his Machiavellian streak. While he revelled in his self-parody as an ageing bumbler, he had his tough side too, as evinced in his brutal Cabinet reshuffle, which has come to be known as the ‘Night of the Long Knives’ in which he dispensed with a third of his Cabinet. Hennessy digs deep, scouring through Cabinet Office records and Macmillan’s own journals and notes, and provides detailed insight into Macmillan’s motives and objectives.

He also offers an extended chapter dealing with 1963, a momentous year in many ways (and one of special to significance to me as they year in which I was born). The Profumo affair reached its peak that year, which also saw the assassination of President Kennedy and Macmillan’s own retirement, brought about by prostate problems. He was succeeded by Lord Alec Douglas Home who, like Tony Benn shortly before him, chose to renounce his hereditary title in order to succeed Macmillan. I found Hennessy’s account of this transfer of power fascinating, particularly in the light of the succession on Boris Johnson to that post just three months ago. While Johnson secured the top job as a consequence of a leadership election under prescribed rules within the Conservation Party, in 1963 the transition was basically down to a personal recommendation from Macmillan as outgoing Prime Minister, who wrote a note to the Queen setting out his own advice, which she chose to follow. Of course, it was not quite as smooth as that, and it did cause lasting ructions within Home’s subsequent government, with some key players refusing to serve the new leader. What was it that Santayana said …

Hennessy is obviously immensely knowledgeable about the period (well, he was eighteen in 1964), and writes with enthusiasm and great clarity. He makes the study of modern history a great pleasure.

A very comprehensive and as close as I can imagine it's going to be, to being a definitive history of the submarine service. Highly readable, and clearly written by two fan boys, this is a big undertaking. Some parts can be dry, but it comes alive with human interest stories, experience, and also technical discussions that are not overwhelming. Very intriguing in places, and extremely informative, this is an excellent history. One word of warning though, it's quite an undertaking, make sure you have some time to get into it before you start.½

I enjoyed this book despite it being very technical in part. The story of the Royal Nay submarine service post WWII, covering the change from diesel to nuclear boats, the complicated interactions with the Americans, who necessarily supplied most of the technology the Royal Navy needed, the rise of Polaris and then Trident and the political twists and turns that are involved with designing and launching boats that will only be used for the unthinkable. The best part of the book is those that deal with the actual submarines themselves, their captains, crews and the missions they undertook, the endless game of cat & mouse with the Soviet submarines, hide & seek under the waves are thrilling, anyone who loved The Hunt For Red October will find this wonderful. I really loved the first real description I have ever seen of the lead-up to the sinking of the General Belgrano during the Falklands War by HMS Conqueror, the only British sub to have sunk a vessel in anger since 1945. An excellent book, good mix of serious technical stuff and real derring-do. Great read.½

Since the end of World War II the Royal Navy Submarine Service has become the linchpin of the British armed forces. Submarines carry the British nuclear deterrent and are called upon to carry out a number of key military roles across the globe. Despite this, very little is known about the Submarine Service. Hennessy has produced a detailed and comprehensive history showing how the submarine came to such prominence, how the service operates, how the technology developed and where it is all going. This is a work of high quality, slightly dry in an academic sort of way, but revealing of incident and action that shines a light on the men who operate these highly complex, expensive and deadly machines.

.A fascinating, and often terrifying, analysis of the machinery of government designed to orchestrate Britain's defence since the end of the Second World War and, in particular, on how the nuclear deterrent might be delivered in the event of a breakdown of peace.
Chapter 7, "The Human Button" (based upon Hennessy's Radio 4 programme of the same name) is especially chilling as it offers a step by step guide to how the decisions to use that deterrent might be arrived at, and how the bombs would eventually be launched. I had not previously realised, for example, that all of the Vulcan Bomber pilots were well aware that, in the event that they were ever scrambled to bomb the Soviet Union, they would not have enough fuel to return home.
While the weaponry may have been among the most technically advanced machinery to be found anywhere in the world, the administration required to launch it often stooped to farcical levels. For instance, during the early 19060s there was a standing requirement that the Prime Minister's official drivers should always ensure that they had four pennies with them in case the PM had to phone through instructions to launch the missiles. As the Cabinet Secretary of the time put it, "It would be ridiculous if the Prime Minister had to ask a bus conductor for change of a sixpence before he could phone the Chiefs of Staff!".
The depth of research behind this book is positively breathtaking, and it is all delivered in Hennessy's pellucid prose.½

A great thing about Hennessy's research is that he keeps an open mind while using his first class access to political figures and exhaustively reading cabinet minutes, diaries and essentially collating everything that could be of relevance. The result is a remarkable portrait of the decade.

The book full of surprises. He shows for example that the fast exit from empire had as much to do with removing financial burdens as accepting independence movements, or the way that successive Conservative governments carried the crushingly expensive "British New Deal" welfare state and Keynesian big government spending as a "modern" understanding of the economy (uncomfortable but we can't do anything about it). Almost nowhere do 1950's British government ministers examine the positive aspects or German and European economic success (Eden did slightly but didn't act) and the first stages of the European Community were treated with disdain as governments followed the chimera of a Commonwealth economic community.

To greatly generalize, he shows a group of British aristocrats, Churchill, Eden and Macmillan who were formed by, and reached power, within an unchanged imperially structured education and governmental system. Had the pre WW1 British empire still existed then maybe they could have completed the work they wished to do through a bureaucracy that was finely adapted to carry it out, but in the event the withdrawal of American financial and political support in the Suez crisis made the real position plain for the world to see.

Its fascinating to observe how 60 years later, Great Britain is still struggling with its imperial class system and the "Europe" question.

Great mixture of history and personal experieces bringing alive the wonder of the 1950s½

Never Again: Britain 1945-1951 by Peter Hennessy (2006)