![Sample our Social Sciences journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/110822/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Social-Sciences.jpg"})
ABSTRACT
The decision-making process behind the appointment of General Alan Cunningham as High Commissioner of Palestine in November 1945 to replace Field Marshal Lord Gort has been difficult to explain. Cunningham’s record as a failed wartime general and backwater administrative commander were scant preparation for an important political position in Mandatory Palestine. Newly located files indicate Vice Chief of the Imperial Staff Archibald Nye listed Cunningham among a series of possible candidates for consideration by Prime Minister Clement Atlee. Terror attacks in Palestine, American pressure over Jewish refugees, the need to secure additional American loans, and the covert Anglo-French intelligence war in the Middle East, pressured Atlee to make a quick decision. After some confusion Cunningham was selected and Chief of the Imperial General Staff Alan Brooke approved. Haste and personal connections therefore brought about a critical appointment that shaped the end of the Mandate.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1. For example, Louis, “Sir Alan Cunningham”; and Golani, “Palestine, 1945–1948.”
2. The Half-Yearly Army List, January 1940, 66.
3. Joffe, Operation Crusader.
4. Colville, Man of Valour, 263–5.
5. Gort died of liver cancer in March 1946. Levenburg’s claim that Gort resigned due to opposition to British policy seems far-fetched given that his health had been in serious decline since at least the summer of 1945 (Levenburg, “Abdullah and Cunningham”). For material regarding Gort’s health see also Israel State Archives 536/12-מ, Indisposition of Viscount Gort.
6. The National Archives, CO 733/452/5, Note of interview with Mr. Ben Gurion, 2 May 1945.
7. Palestine Post, Monday, 12 November 1945. The article was reprinted on Tuesday, 11 December 1945.
8. CO 967/99, Archibald Nye to Alan Brooke, 29 October 1945.
9. CO 967/99, Alan Brooke to Archibald Nye, 1 November 1945.
10. CO 967/99, Archibald Nye to Alan Brooke, 6 November 1945.
11. CO 967/99, Alan Brooke to Archibald Nye, 6 November 1945.
12. CO 850/206/2, R.A. Whittle to A.P. Serpell, 13 January 1947.
13. Connell, Auchinleck, 285.
14. Danchev and Todman, War Diaries 1939–1945, 236, 238, 252.
15. Ibid., 331.
16. TNA, CAB 65/28/13. Conclusions of a Meeting of the War Cabinet, 20 October 1942.
17. Charters, The British Army and Jewish Insurgency, 85.
18. Supplement to the London Gazette 329 January 7446, 1946, 701; 329 October 7769, 1946, 5293.
19. Blake, Northern Ireland mentions Cunningham twice. A more recent historiographic analysis of Blake’s work by Nelis, ‘Northern Ireland,’ does not mention Cunningham at all. Nor does Ollerenshaw in Northern Ireland.
20. Charters The British Army, 54–5.
21. Cohen, Palestine and the Great Powers, 73.
22. Penkower, “The Earl Harrison Report”; and Ovendale, “The Palestine Policy.”
23. Callaway, “The Anglo-American Loan.”
24. See generally Nachmani, Great Power Discord in Palestine, 207–45. The committee also loomed especially large in Cunningham’s only retrospective on his experience as High Commissioner (Cunningham, “Palestine-The Last Days.”)
25. Zamir, The Secret Anglo-French War.
26. Ibid., 27.
27. Ibid., 18.
28. Swarc, “Illegal Immigration to Palestine,” 53.
29. For a discussion of Cunningham’s assessment of intelligence data see Wagner, “British Intelligence and the Jewish Resistance.”
30. TNA, CO 967/100, Bernard Montgomery to George H. Hall, 6 August 1946.
31. Hamilton, Monty, The Making of a General, 512. In 1945 the WO 106/5826 file was transmitted to the Cabinet Office Historical Section where it became CAB 106/655 and formed the core of the Official History of Operation Crusader. See Joffe, 143–4.
32. TNA, WO 216/194, Bernard Montgomery to Miles Dempsey, 5 August 1946.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Alexander Joffe
Alexander Joffe is a Senior Non-Resident Fellow, Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, Bar-Ilan University