Talk:Ferdinand Foch

Plan XVII

Isn't saying that it completely failed an opinion? I could probably think of a few arguments on why it was at least partialy succesful.

And the other thing is that he didn't design said plan in the first place. Plan XVII was developed by Foch's pupil Grandmaison, who completely distorted Foch's position. So let's not libel the poor fellow any more than we need to, eh? -Turi

Actually, Joffre must take responsibility for Plan XVII, although the 'cult of the offensive' can be laid at Grandmaison's door and he did indeed distort Foch's position. Foch said 'Fire has become the decisive argument’ in 1903, so he clearly was not in the morale wins all camp. See Joseph Joffre, The Memoirs of Marshall Joffre, (translated by T Bentley Mott, London, 1932), Vol. 1, pp. 48-9 & Ferdinand Foch, The Principles of War, (trans. Hilaire Belloc, originally published 1903, London: Chapman, 1920), p. 337. In addition, Hew Strachan has recently suggested that Plan XVII was very successful in terms of mobilisation, Strachan, First World War, p. 206. It is also worth bearing in mind that the much vaunted WW1 German army suffered just as appalling casualties during 1914 as did the French. Only the BEF, with its well trained regular soldiers, was able to display the skill needed to engage in modern battle, although even the BEF suffered serious casualties. The standard account on the 'cult of the offensive' is in Douglas Porch, March to the Marne, pp. 213-231 but also see Stefan T. Possony & Etienne Mantoux, ‘Du Picq and Foch: The French School,’ in Edward Mead Earle, ed., Makers of Modern Strategy, (Princeton: PUP, 1943), pp. 206-233, Michael Howard, ‘Men against Fire: The Doctrine of the Offensive in 1914,’ in Peter Paret ed., Makers of Modern Strategy, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1986), pp. 510 – 526, & for a modern French view; Michel Goya, La Chair et l’Acier – L’invention de la guerre moderne (1914-1918), (Paris: Tallandier, 2004), pp. 69-112. For a rather different view, see Paddy Griffith, Forward into Battle – Fighting Tactics from Waterloo to Vietnam, (Chichester; Anthony Bird, 1981), Chapter 4 & Azar Gat, Military Thought, pp. 382-440.

WWI position?

Generalissimo is italian and has no link back to Foch. Maxime Weygand article calls him Supreme Allied Commander, again an article apparently that has nothing to do with WWI and Foch. Perhaps somebody who knows more about this era and Foch should fix that matter. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 10:54, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I read a book by John Keegan on WWI which specifically uses the word "Generalissimo." I will source it if I can remember later. - Borg Sphere (talk) 17:31, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Added the inline citation. Hope I helped. Borg Sphere (talk) 17:22, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Generalissimo is more correct, although in Anglophone books he's sometimes called "Supreme Allied Commander" which is strictly anachronistic - it was actually the title of WW2 theatre commanders (Eisenhower, Maitland Wilson/Alexander, MacArthur, Mountbatten, Nimitz)

Ethnicity?

What is Foch's ethnic backround? Foch doesn't exactly sound French.

the ethnicity of Foch is quite french. in 1914, he wa at the head of the XX army corps (and not the XXX)

He's French by birth and never claimed to be anything but. Ethnically, however, he was the son of a Basque father and an Alsatian (the German-speaking people of Alsace) mother. His last name is Basque, derived from "fioch," the Basque word for fire. France has many Basques and Alsatians, they're French citizens just like everyone else.

Work

This article needs major improvement. Foch was a very significant figure in the French Army during the First World War and the paragraph concerning that conflict only deals with his role in 1918. J Gez M 17:02, 1st March 2006

You are, of course, welcome to make additions to the article to make it better. john k 19:08, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Changes

Tried to improve things a bit as part of the collaboration of the week. I am happy to report that it is now much more substantial than the French Wiki article. Andreas 16:21, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Slow promotion?

I think that unless it can be sourced, the half-sentence about his brother being a Jesuit and that holding back Foch's career, should go. I could not find anything on that on Google, but a WW I buff would come in handy now. Andreas

That was from Carver's book, I can add the reference later if you like. The sentence relates to the separation of religious and political or military power in France, officers were strongly discouraged from having links to religious groups. I don't understand the issue well enough to explain it concisely, so as it stands that sentence is a bit isolated. I wouldn't object to its removal just now, but the issue would be important enough to be discussed in a more in-depth article. Leithp 07:54, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Hi there - in that case I would suggest to add the citation and maybe a footnote. Otherwise it comes a bit out of the blue. Andreas 07:46, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

This observation is actually pretty standard in biographies of Foch (see Johnston, Puaux, Cornwall, and of course, Liddell Hart) or generally in histories of the French Army under the Third Republic (de Gaulle, incidentally, faced similar discrimination owing to a right wing Catholic background). It relates to Republican fears of the counterrevolutionary forces entrenched in the army and clergy— leftovers of Boulangism that supposedly acted in concert to challenge the legitimacy of Republican governments and threatened to carry the country into civil war during the Dreyfus affair—or really, any reactionary "man on horseback" who might entertain funny ideas about the value or sustainability of parliamentary values and institutions. (look no further than Petain) In the case of Foch, moreover, Catholicism is often cited as a defining element of his character:

“ At times, his eyes seemed to say: 'Young men, you do not know what a father suffers when mourning has entered his home to bide there forever. My only son is taken, and one of my daughters is widowed. I shall find in my home, which I left in the joyousness of a midsummer Sunday, little orphans who have never even known their fathers. I approach the twilight of my life with the consciousness of a good servant who will rest in the peace of his Lord. Faith in eternal life, in a good and merciful God, has sustained me in the hardest hours. Prayer has illuminated my soul. Our France has been torn and murdered. There are thousands and thousands of old fathers who, like me, have lost all they loved best, all the hope of their race. I am one with them at heart. I know what they suffer. But we have no right, now, to think about ourselves. ... We, here, are humble sons of the soil of France, who defend our liberties. Each one does his best. I know that we shall have the victory. It will be complete, and our dead will be avenged. But it is necessary to work, to fight on, to meet, with all the resources of the French spirit, the shocks of the barbarian masses. Spirit will conquer matter. Without a high ideal, without a spiritual conception of life, it is not possible to rise above feebleness and discouragement. Great sacrifices will be demanded of you, young men, they will be demanded of you to the end. Accept them as I have accepted mine. ... Afterward we may weep in our silent homes over which float the standards of victory." It is thus I would help you to think of him: mighty in spirit, strong in faith, supreme in strategy, immensely broad in understanding–a very great man; but too great a man to be a "superman"; and, withal, a tender, heartbroken old father to whom the laying down of arms means not the leisure to wear laurels, but the right to sit again by his hearth, now desolate, and think back on happy days and forward to a reassembled group in the house not made with hands. ”

Albrecht 05:05, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

It is true Catholic officers were discriminated against during the time of Foch's career - and you have to remember the political context. France became a Republic largely by accident in the 1870s (monarchists had majority, but they couldn't decide which Bourbon claiminant to restore to throne). As noted above General Boulanger tried to overthrow the state in 1880s, then at turn of century you had the Dreyfus Affair, in which the Army/conservatives were seen to be out of synch with Republican/civil ideals. Similar issues in education, where there were big disputes between secular and Catholic control of schools.

So staunch Catholics were seen as politically unreliable (not quite as bad as Britain in the late seventeenth century, in which they were prevented from holding public office until 1829). Preferment was often given to people like Joffre and Sarrail who were arch-Republicans (indeed the growth of the Salonika Front owed a lot to the latter's political connections and need to find a big job for him).

But it's rubbish to claim that similar prejudice hampered de Gaulle (b. 1890) in the inter-war period. De Gaulle was a protege of Pétain, who ran the French Army of the 1920s. It's true he was a captain for 14 years (till the late 1920s) but Lacouture points out that this was "a perfectly usual period". He was also very arrogant - when being examined on an exercise in the mid-1920s, he rubbed up the examining officer the wrong way and was lucky not to fail the course outright - he had to call in a favour from Pétain to get a "good" grade (rather than "excellent" which he would have needed for a General Staff posting) and wound up with a posting to supply & logistics in Occupied Germany. In the mid-1930s he was already a bit of a right-wing political intriguer, and was passed over for promotion to full colonel, having to pull strings (Daladier, Minister of War) to get his name added to the promotion list the following year. He was still a brigadier and divisional commander, and being considered for jobs at the War Ministry, before he was fifty, which is pretty reasonable going. De Gaulle was Catholic but, for what it's worth, was a Republican and his family had been pro-Dreyfus. Any decent de Gaulle biography will cover all this, eg. Lacouture.

Rating

I am assuming that this article has been expanded since the Military History rating. There is good basic information here. ludahai 魯大海 23:38, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Possible Neutrality Issues

The article seems to give Foch large amounts of credit out of context. For example it credits Foch with the defense during the Spring Offensive when Petain deserves as much or more credit. The section about WWI seems to only focus on the good and magnifies that while ignoring the bad and the major downfalls of Foch as a commander. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tempestswordsman (talk • contribs) 01:40, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

It also fails to note that due to Foch's insistence that there will be no cease-fire and that hostilities will not cease during the commencement of the peace talks (even though the Germans offered one), there were even more casualties taken on both sides. Apparently full scale offensives were still being launched by the Allies, even as the negotiations were progressing, offensives which Foch, as Supreme Allied Commander, had authorised. There is a documentary on the History Channel, entitled "Last Day of World War I: 11th Month, 11th Day, 11th Hour: Armistice Day, 1918", which covers this. Coruvian (talk) 05:14, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

A Franco-US offensive was being planned towards Metz, along with further BEF pushes through Belgium, at the time of the Armistice. Pétain's role was (after the mutiny) the refitting and regrouping of the French Army (and some successful minor offensives) in late 1917. In Spring 1918 Pétain was felt - by the politicians and by the British generals - to lack fire in his belly, and to be too keen to retreat on Paris when the Germans defeated British Fifth Army - that was why Foch was appointed Generalissimo. To be fair to Pétain, the disaster on the Aisne (Blucher, May 1918) was because Humbert had ignored his instructions to defend in depth.