A footnote about yesterday’s note on J.L. Austin’s service in military intelligence during World War II. Austin, a philosopher in disguise as a young lieutenant, served under Kenneth Strong, then a lieutenant-colonel and later a major general at Gen. Eisenhower’s headquarters.
The warnings from intelligence that Germany — and specifically an armored corps under Erwin Rommel — was going to cause mischief in North Africa was ignored by the British high command. Those at the top were certain that Germany wasn’t interested in Africa and discounted, ridiculed and pooh-poohed intelligence that contradicted that belief.
That sad story also seems to me to be a useful metaphor for how much of the world works. When facts run against the beliefs of powerful leaders, the facts usually are discounted. People in power got into their positions by investing in the way things were, as opposed to the way things are.
Austin’s biographer, M.W. Rowe, said that Strong became such an expert on the German army before the war that he made predictions that were considered “absurdly alarmist” by top British generals.
Consequently, after Strong’s lectures on German military strengths, senior officers would frequently warn audiences not to be influenced by what they’d heard; and at the Imperial Defence College he was forbidden to suggest that the German warplanes might give close support to their ground forces.
One wonders what the high command thought the Stuka dive bomber was for.
Once the war started, however, Strong’s prestige was considerably enhanced when many of his predictions proved true, especially his conjecture that German armour would launch an attack on France through the Ardennes Forest.
Strong was largely viewed as an eccentric until German armored units invaded France through the Ardennes.
But maybe that’s the way people should look at philosophers and intelligence officers. There is something strange about both activities.
Intelligence officers exist to tell commanders what is going to happen — they are supposed to foresee the future, to predict what a secretive enemy will do before he does it.
No intelligence officer is perfect. But I think this is true:
The inquirer who investigates broadly, rather focuses narrowly, is more likely to get it right.
The inquirer who is studying the question now, rather than the one who studied years ago, also is the better bet.
And so it is with philosophers too.
• M.W. Rowe, J.L. Austin: Philosopher & D-Day Intelligence Officer; Oxford University Press, 2023, p. 173.
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