General The Lord Dannatt: “Will we not learn the lessons of history?”

By Joseph Hornsby

Richard Dannatt has been many things. He matriculated into Hatfield College, Durham to read Economic History, with the rank Second Lieutenant in 1973 – already having won the Military Cross for dragging an injured solider from paramilitary gunfire on tour in Belfast, the previous year. He has been soldier, military advisor and House of Lords peer. Yet, Lord Dannatt has not always been quite so exceptional.

”I did three A-Levels: History, English, and French. After my two years at Sixth Form, I got a B in History and a D in English. I applied to read Law at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and managed to make a fool of myself at the interview”.

The Government didn’t like me, and the Secretary of State for Defence just didn’t want to know…

Arriving at Hatfield College in Freshers’ Week, 1973, Richard Dannatt was already a seasoned army officer. After excelling in the 2-year Army Officer Commissioning Course, Dannatt commissioned into the Green Howards, aged 20, as a Second Lieutenant in the July of 1971. Before matriculating, he had commanded a platoon in two tours of the streets of Belfast during the early years of The Troubles. As part of his In-Service Scholarship contract, Dannatt was required to return to active service each year during the long months of the Summer Vacation. The annual alternation between the visceral intensity commanding troops on the front line, and Durham’s academic terms, was not always easy:

“I arrived with the mindset that I would be a fresher just like everyone else. I think that my academic performance at Durham was fairly lacklustre. I spend nearly all of my second Summer Vacation in South Armagh, during which my company commander was killed. I arrested the guy responsible, which meant that I spent nearly all of my penultimate academic term in Belfast, in the courthouse. I tried to argue with the Head of Economic History that this had rather handicapped me, and that deservedly kinder marking of a summative essay would have taken me into a 2:1”. Dannatt graduated with a 2:2 in Economic History.

From our conversation, I sense that Durham remains a very important place for Richard Dannatt. He met his wife, Phillipa, as a student at St Mary’s College, and was President of the Durham Union Society in Michaelmas Term, 1974. He has, in recent years, returned to Durham University as the Chair of its Global Security Institute.

“Durham, I think we’d all agree, is a very special place. I love walking along past Palace Green, down by the Cathedral and up to 24 North Bailey, and every time I do that, I’m waiting for my friends to come around the corner […] It’s always somebody different now, and ever younger. It’s very difficult to dissociate places that you’ve loved with the people that you’ve gotten to know”.

Richard Dannatt navigated his early years as an officer with prodigious success. Immediately after graduating, Dannatt returned to Berlin as the Regimental Adjutant of the Green Howards, was posted to Armagh, then assumed control of HM Prison Frankland, County Durham, during a prison officers’ strike.

Will we not learn the lessons of history? Just because you have new methods of warfare doesn’t mean to say that the old ways of fighting have gone.

The Great Volta in Dannatt’s career came early on. In the summer of 1977, aged only 26, Richard Dannatt suffered a major stroke. It was during the subsequent months of recovery that Dannatt discovered in earnest his enduring Christian faith. He briefly considered a career change to train for ordination or enter national politics; to leave the Army for the Church of England or the House of Commons. He remains committed to living out his faith, having taken up the Presidency of the Armed Forces Christian Union in 1998.

“My wife, six months pregnant, came to see me, and asked the Consultant what my chances were. He said, ‘It’s how you say in England, fifty-fifty.’ As a spectator on life, I began to re-evaluate what really mattered. I decided that I would try and be as committed a Christian I could”.

Dannatt’s first experience of the political machine came in 1987 upon his appointment as Military Assistant to the Secretary of State for the Armed Forces, at that time, George Younger, Tom King, and Malcolm Rifkind.

“I worked with three successive Ministers. Some of the old-fashioned civil servants found my appointment [as a military advisor] unfathomable, and would walk right past my desk to the Private Secretary to discuss work which they knew full I was working on. You would get the Chief of the General Staff being summoned to see the Minister, and this very senior general would come in looking really quite worried”.

It was this first-hand political experience which stood Richard Dannatt in such good stead for his eventual appointment as Chief of the General Staff. Parliament’s most senior figures were no untouchable demi-gods for Dannatt.

“Ministers held no awe nor threw me off at all. They’re just normal people doing their rather abnormal jobs. Those experiences were fascinating, and confirmed to me that I probably didn’t want to be a politician.”

Richard Dannatt has not always toed the line. Commanding British Forces in Kosovo at the height of the 1998-1999 Kosovo War, Dannatt took the prerogative not to block Pristina Airport against Russian Forces by using British troops, as had been mooted by Wesley Clark, the American Supreme Allied Commander Europe. Dannatt was subsequently awarded the Queen’s Commendation for Valuable Service, and has been credited for preventing a Third World War.

“There was a certain date by which the Croats and Bosniaks had to leave, and a certain date before which the Serbs were not allowed to return. Doing that sort of thing is not in the rulebook at Sandhurst”.

I spent nearly all of my penultimate academic term in Belfast, in the courthouse. I tried to argue with the Head of Economic History [at Durham] that this had rather handicapped me.

Richard Dannatt was appointed Chief of the General Staff, the professional head of the British Army, under Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2006. He was not, however, the obvious appointment on paper. Dannatt had expressed his interest in contesting a constituency as a Conservative parliamentary candidate in the months after his 1977 stroke. During his tenure, Dannatt made known publicly his dismay towards Blair’s austere funding of and approach
to British activities the Middle East. Tension soon arose over the question of military intervention:

“We had gone into Iraq in 2003 in what became a pretty controversial and ultimately not very successful deployment. It was decided that in 2006, we would spearhead a new deployment to Southern Afghanistan. Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown didn’t see it the way I saw it […] I didn’t have very many friends; the Government didn’t like me, the Secretary of State for Defence just didn’t want to know, and the others were pretty keen to keep the Army in its box”.

As CGS, Dannatt’s tenure was defined by concerns for personnel welfare and force retention. Though not without controversy – in direct opposition to the government’s position, he declared in a 2006 Daily Mail interview that a withdrawal of British troops from Iraq was necessary for any success in Afghanistan, Dannatt established a lasting legacy of championing the Army’s people. He spearheaded the formation of Help for Heroes and SSAFA.

Perhaps Dannatt’s move into politics was only natural. He had always been a political figure, intentionally or unintentionally. Prime Minister Gordon Brown personally vetoed Dannatt’s appointment to head the British Armed Forces as Chief of the Defence Staff. After being raised to the peerage, David Cameron had planned to appoint Dannatt as a Minister in the Ministry of Defence, before a premature announcement rendered the appointment inviable. From the benches of the House of Lords, he has spoken on issues of defence strategy, funding, and personnel welfare.

Though supposedly retired, Richard Dannatt is as active as ever. He served for seven years as 159th Constable of the Tower of London, until 2016. He has penned an autobiography, and co-authored Victory to Defeat, a neat history of the British Army during the inter- war period of the 20th Century. Dannatt appears to be across every minutiae of live geopolitics. When I quizzed him on the war in Ukraine, Richard Dannatt was eager to ensure that the mistakes of the past, in underfunding the British military capability, are not repeated:

“Will we not learn the lessons of history? There is a belief that the new ways of warfare, cyberwar and arms-length combat, are how war is going to be fought in the future. Just because you have new methods of warfare doesn’t mean to say that the old ways of fighting have gone. The brutal land war in Ukraine, not to mention what is going on in Gaza at present, very much underlines that.”

Image: via Lord Dannatt