On the Psychology of Military Incompetence takes us through the past few centuries of British military catastrophes, outlining the failures of leadership that led to several humiliating defeats and unimaginable amounts of human suffering. More so it deconstructs the personality traits of the generals and speculates on the psychological basis of these traits with reference to psychoanalytic theory.

Some of the ineptitude borders on the unbelievable; General Melchert in Blackadder Goes Forth (Stephen Fry’s character) seems to be far more competent than the typical commander in the book. Unlike the writers of Blackadder, however, Dixon is by no means trying to make a caricature of the generals. On the contrary, he makes every effort to give them the benefit of the doubt: highlighting, for instance, that the British Navy’s continued reluctance to adopt innovations (like changing the hulls from wood to iron) saved the taxpayer great expense, albeit at the probable cost of many lives. Yet even the most ardent supporters of the military couldn’t deny the magnitude of some of the failures involved.

For that reason, the book often made me sad. The needless loss of life due to pure incompetence – the contrast between the bravery and self-sacrifice of the soldiers and the generals who blunder’d (The Charge of the Light Brigade). Dixon outlines how pride, jealousy, irrationality, and a lack of accountability combined to create unimaginable amounts of suffering. For instance, a complete lack of logistics in the Siege of Kut led to disease and mass starvation among the British troops.

Fortunately, Dixon balances out the bleakness with several classic one-liners:

In Part 2, the book threads history with psychology, exploring both the individual complexes of the inept generals and the organisational psychology that leads to collective incompetence. He argues that military organisations select for the personality traits that create poor leaders (though the traits may be beneficial for common soldiers); specifically, the military selects for Authoritarian personality types. This leads to, among other things: an inability to accept contradicting information, an urge to be in a position of power, and overall poor decision-making.

The Fall of Singapore is one of the best case studies (though this is slightly biased by my upbringing); it is a clear example of the inadequacy of the “Bloody Fool Theory”, for General Percival was highly intelligent. Yet despite his IQ, he was comically inept, refusing to build North-facing defences because doing so would supposedly lower morale. Instead, he continued to fortify the sea-facing defences, leaving Singapore completely unprepared for a land invasion from – who could have guessed – the North.

The psychology angle of the book is fascinating, but it does remind me of the classic criticisms regarding the pseudoscientific nature of psychoanalysis. The author finds many examples that support his thesis and its contrapositive (i.e. incompetent authoritarians and competent non-authoritarians) but seems to allocate little effort to exploring exceptions. Nevertheless, I think the book is useful even if one does not accept all the psychoanalysis: the discussion of the common traits of bad generals is incisive, even if one places little weight on Dixon’s speculation regarding the psychoanalytic origins of such behaviours. For my part, I find the psychoanalytical arguments compelling, if not strong enough to be predictive.

Lastly, though lengthy, the book is a pleasure to read. It is beautifully English, dripping with dry wit and revelling in deliberate anglo-centrism. Nobody can criticise the British like the British!

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