Введение
Фраза, используемая для критики некомпетентных лидеров. Популярная фраза времен Первой мировой войны – "Львы, ведомые ослами" – используется для обозначения ситуации, когда способные люди находятся под некомпетентным руководством. Возникшая в античности, эта фраза получила широкое распространение после Первой мировой войны для описания высшего командного состава воюющих армий, особенно британских вооруженных сил. В историографии Великобритании XX века пехоту британской армии часто описывали как храбрых солдат (львов), которых некомпетентные и безразличные командиры (ослики) отправляли на верную смерть. Исследование, в котором британские генералы того периода были охарактеризованы как некомпетентные, вызвало резкую критику со стороны других историков, таких как Джон Террейн. Древняя арабская пословица гласит: "Армия овец, ведомая львом, победит армию львов, ведомую овцой". Во время Крымской войны, как сообщается, британский солдат отправил домой письмо, цитируя русского офицера, который назвал британских солдат "львами, ведомыми ослами". Это произошло сразу после осады Севастополя (1854–1855) и неудачной попытки штурма крепости, что, если это правда, отодвигает происхождение поговорки к 1854–1855 годам. Фраза встречается в книге Анны Стоддарт "Жизнь Изабеллы Бёрд" (1906) в сцене, где Изабелла, направляясь в Америку в 1854 году, проходит мимо транспорта с шотландскими серыми, направляющимися в Балаклаву. Эти и другие упоминания Крымской войны были включены в документальный сериал британского телеканала Channel 4 "Крымская война" (1997) и сопровождающую его книгу (Майкл Харгрив Маусон, эксперт-консультант). Карл Маркс и Фридрих Энгельс использовали эту фразу 27 сентября 1855 года в статье, опубликованной в Neue Oder Zeitung, № 457 (1 октября 1855), посвященной стратегическим ошибкам и неудачам британской армии при падении Севастополя, и в частности, военному руководству генерала Джеймса Симпсона во время штурма Большого Редана. The Times, как сообщается, использовала фразу "львы, ведомые ослами" по отношению к французским солдатам во время Франко-прусской войны. Существовало множество примеров ее использования во время Первой мировой войны, относящихся к британцам и немцам. В книге Ричарда Коннагтона "Восходящее солнце и рушащийся медведь: война России с Японией" (2003) более поздняя цитата приписывается полковнику Дж. М. Гриерсону (впоследствии сэру Джеймсу Гриерсону) в 1901 году, когда он докладывал о российском контингенте в Боксерском восстании, описывая их как "львов, ведомых осликами".
the popular First World War phrase
"Lions led by donkeys" is a phrase used to imply a capable group of individuals are incompetently led. Coined in classical antiquity, the phrase was commonly used after World War I to describe senior commanders of militaries which participated in the war, most prominently those of the British Armed Forces. The historiography of the United Kingdom during the 20th century frequently described the infantry of the British Army as brave soldiers (lions) being sent to their deaths by incompetent and indifferent commanders (donkeys). His study, which characterised British general officers of the period as incompetent has been the subject of intense criticism by other historians such as John Terraine. An ancient Arabian proverb says "An army of sheep led by a lion would defeat an army of lions led by a sheep". During the Crimean War, a letter was reportedly sent home by a British soldier quoting a Russian officer who had said that British soldiers were "lions commanded by donkeys". This was immediately after the Siege of Sevastopol (1854–55) and the failure to storm the fortress which, if true, would take the saying back to 1854–55. The phrase is quoted in Anna Stoddart's 1906 book The Life of Isabella Bird in the scene where Isabella, en route for America in 1854, passes a troopship taking the Scots Greys out to Balaclava. These and other Crimean War references were included in British Channel 4 television's The Crimean War series (1997) and the accompanying book (Michael Hargreave Mawson, expert reader). Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels used the phrase on 27 September 1855, in an article published in Neue Oder Zeitung, No. 457 (1 October 1855), on the British military's strategic mistakes and failings during the fall of Sevastopol, and particularly General James Simpson's military leadership of the assault on the Great Redan. The Times reportedly used the phrase as "lions led by donkeys" with reference to French soldiers during the Franco Prussian War:
There were numerous examples of its use during the First World War, referring to the British and the Germans. In Rising Sun and Tumbling Bear: Russia's War with Japan (2003), Richard Connaughton attributed a later quotation to Colonel J. M. Grierson (later Sir James Grierson) in 1901, when reporting on the Russian contingent to the Boxer Rebellion, describing them as 'lions led by asses'.
Более позднее использование
Во время Второй мировой войны немецкий генерал Эрвин Роммель так отозвался о британцах после захвата Тобрука. В начале 2019 года хэштег #LedByDonkeys был создан анти-Brexit движением, которое обращает внимание на кажущиеся лицемерными высказывания британских политиков.
Приписание
Эвелин, принцесса Блюхер, англичанка, жившая в Берлине во время Первой мировой войны, в своих мемуарах, опубликованных в 1921 году, вспоминает немецкого генерала Эриха Людендорфа в немецком генеральном штабе (Großes Hauptquartier), хвалившего британцев за их храбрость: «Я приведу это слово в слово, как услышал непосредственно из Grosse Hauptquartier: «Английским генералам не хватает стратегии. У нас не было бы шансов, если бы они обладали таким же мастерством, как их офицеры и солдаты – мужеством и отвагой. Они львы, ведомые ослами». Фраза «Львы, ведомые ослами» была использована в качестве названия книги, опубликованной в 1927 году капитаном П. А. Томпсоном. Подзаголовок этой книги гласил: «Показывая, как победа в Великой войне была достигнута теми, кто совершил меньше ошибок». Алан Кларк взял название своей книги «Ослы» (1961) из этой фразы. Перед публикацией, в письме Хью Тревору Роперу, он спросил: «Английские солдаты, львы, ведомые ослами и т. п. – вы помните, кто это сказал?» Б. Х. Лидделл Харт, хотя и не оспаривал достоверность цитаты, попросил Кларка указать ее источник. Каким бы ни был ответ Тревора Ропера, Кларк в итоге использовал эту фразу в качестве эпиграфа к книге «Ослы» и приписал ее разговору между Людендорфом и Максом Гофманом:
Ludendorff: The English soldiers fight like lions. Hoffmann: True. But don't we know that they are lions led by donkeys. The conversation was supposedly published in the memoirs of General Erich von Falkenhayn, the Chief of the German General Staff of the German Army between 1914 and 1916, but the exchange and the memoirs remain untraced. Clark was equivocal about the source for the dialogue for many years, although in 2007 a friend Euan Graham, recalled a conversation in the mid sixties, when Clark on being challenged as to the provenance of the dialogue, looked sheepish and said "well I invented it". At one time Clark said Hart had given him the quote (unlikely as Hart had asked him where it came from) and Clark's biographer believes he invented the Ludendorff and Hoffmann attribution. This invention provided critics of The Donkeys with an opportunity to condemn the work. Richard Holmes, wrote
Dan Snow wrote in The Guardian:My family's dark Somme secret "Delving into his own ancestors' past, Dan Snow was stunned to discover that his great grandfather Thomas Snow was a first world war general who sent thousands to die". Subsequently Snow wrote an article for the BBC in 2014 discussing 10 big myths about World War One debunked in which he posits the idea that "Much of what we think we know about the 1914–18 conflict is wrong" and that "This saying was supposed to have come from senior German commanders describing brave British soldiers led by incompetent old toffs from their chateaux. In fact the incident was made up by Alan Clark." While Clark is said to have admitted to his imagining "the incident" this has no impact on the appropriate (or otherwise) use of the phrase, since a book with this title had been published by Captain Peter Thompson in 1927 (through an independent publisher, T. W. Laurie). Thompson was a well travelled writer who had served in the Royal Army Service Corps – a forerunner of the Royal Logistics Corps. He was part of a small but growing group of soldiers turned writers who used their prodigious talents to raise profound questions about the nature and management of World War One. Producers of television documentaries about the war have had to grapple with the "lions led by donkeys" interpretive frame since the 1960s. The 1964 seminal and award winning BBC Television The Great War has been described as taking a moderate approach, with co scriptwriter John Terraine fighting against what he viewed as an oversimplification, while Hart resigned as an advising historian to the series, in an open letter to The Times, in part over a dispute with Terraine, claiming that he minimised the faults of the High Command on The Somme and other concerns regarding the treatment of Third Ypres. The Great War was viewed by about a fifth of the adult population in Britain and the production of documentaries on the war has continued ever since. While recent documentaries such as Channel 4's 2003 The First World War have confronted the popular image of lions led by donkeys, by reflecting current scholarship presenting more nuanced portrayals of British leaders and more balanced appraisals of the difficulties faced by the High Commands of all the combatants, they have been viewed by far fewer members of the public than either 1964's The Great War or comedies such as Blackadder. The name of British anti Brexit political campaign group Led By Donkeys was inspired by the saying. The activists thought it aptly described the relationship between the British people and their Brexit leaders.
Людендорф: Английские солдаты сражаются как львы.
Гофман: Правда. Но разве мы не знаем, что это львы, ведомые ослами?
Ludendorff: The English soldiers fight like lions. Hoffmann: True. But don't we know that they are lions led by donkeys. The conversation was supposedly published in the memoirs of General Erich von Falkenhayn, the Chief of the German General Staff of the German Army between 1914 and 1916, but the exchange and the memoirs remain untraced. Clark was equivocal about the source for the dialogue for many years, although in 2007 a friend Euan Graham, recalled a conversation in the mid sixties, when Clark on being challenged as to the provenance of the dialogue, looked sheepish and said "well I invented it". At one time Clark said Hart had given him the quote (unlikely as Hart had asked him where it came from) and Clark's biographer believes he invented the Ludendorff and Hoffmann attribution. This invention provided critics of The Donkeys with an opportunity to condemn the work. Richard Holmes, wrote
Dan Snow wrote in The Guardian:My family's dark Somme secret "Delving into his own ancestors' past, Dan Snow was stunned to discover that his great grandfather Thomas Snow was a first world war general who sent thousands to die". Subsequently Snow wrote an article for the BBC in 2014 discussing 10 big myths about World War One debunked in which he posits the idea that "Much of what we think we know about the 1914–18 conflict is wrong" and that "This saying was supposed to have come from senior German commanders describing brave British soldiers led by incompetent old toffs from their chateaux. In fact the incident was made up by Alan Clark." While Clark is said to have admitted to his imagining "the incident" this has no impact on the appropriate (or otherwise) use of the phrase, since a book with this title had been published by Captain Peter Thompson in 1927 (through an independent publisher, T. W. Laurie). Thompson was a well travelled writer who had served in the Royal Army Service Corps – a forerunner of the Royal Logistics Corps. He was part of a small but growing group of soldiers turned writers who used their prodigious talents to raise profound questions about the nature and management of World War One. Producers of television documentaries about the war have had to grapple with the "lions led by donkeys" interpretive frame since the 1960s. The 1964 seminal and award winning BBC Television The Great War has been described as taking a moderate approach, with co scriptwriter John Terraine fighting against what he viewed as an oversimplification, while Hart resigned as an advising historian to the series, in an open letter to The Times, in part over a dispute with Terraine, claiming that he minimised the faults of the High Command on The Somme and other concerns regarding the treatment of Third Ypres. The Great War was viewed by about a fifth of the adult population in Britain and the production of documentaries on the war has continued ever since. While recent documentaries such as Channel 4's 2003 The First World War have confronted the popular image of lions led by donkeys, by reflecting current scholarship presenting more nuanced portrayals of British leaders and more balanced appraisals of the difficulties faced by the High Commands of all the combatants, they have been viewed by far fewer members of the public than either 1964's The Great War or comedies such as Blackadder. The name of British anti Brexit political campaign group Led By Donkeys was inspired by the saying. The activists thought it aptly described the relationship between the British people and their Brexit leaders.
Предполагалось, что этот разговор был опубликован в мемуарах генерала Эриха фон Фалькенхайна, начальника немецкого Генерального штаба немецкой армии в период с 1914 по 1916 год, однако ни обмен репликами, ни сами мемуары не были найдены. Кларк на протяжении многих лет не был уверен в источнике диалога, но в 2007 году его друг Юан Грэм вспомнил разговор середины 1960-х годов, когда Кларк, будучи поставленным в тупик вопросом о происхождении диалога, смутился и сказал: «Ну, я это выдумал». В свое время Кларк утверждал, что Харт дал ему эту цитату (что маловероятно, поскольку Харт спрашивал его, откуда она взялась), а биограф Кларка полагает, что он сам придумал авторство Людендорфа и Гофмана. Это вымысел предоставил критикам книги «Ослы» возможность осудить ее. Ричард Холмс написал…
Ludendorff: The English soldiers fight like lions. Hoffmann: True. But don't we know that they are lions led by donkeys. The conversation was supposedly published in the memoirs of General Erich von Falkenhayn, the Chief of the German General Staff of the German Army between 1914 and 1916, but the exchange and the memoirs remain untraced. Clark was equivocal about the source for the dialogue for many years, although in 2007 a friend Euan Graham, recalled a conversation in the mid sixties, when Clark on being challenged as to the provenance of the dialogue, looked sheepish and said "well I invented it". At one time Clark said Hart had given him the quote (unlikely as Hart had asked him where it came from) and Clark's biographer believes he invented the Ludendorff and Hoffmann attribution. This invention provided critics of The Donkeys with an opportunity to condemn the work. Richard Holmes, wrote
Dan Snow wrote in The Guardian:My family's dark Somme secret "Delving into his own ancestors' past, Dan Snow was stunned to discover that his great grandfather Thomas Snow was a first world war general who sent thousands to die". Subsequently Snow wrote an article for the BBC in 2014 discussing 10 big myths about World War One debunked in which he posits the idea that "Much of what we think we know about the 1914–18 conflict is wrong" and that "This saying was supposed to have come from senior German commanders describing brave British soldiers led by incompetent old toffs from their chateaux. In fact the incident was made up by Alan Clark." While Clark is said to have admitted to his imagining "the incident" this has no impact on the appropriate (or otherwise) use of the phrase, since a book with this title had been published by Captain Peter Thompson in 1927 (through an independent publisher, T. W. Laurie). Thompson was a well travelled writer who had served in the Royal Army Service Corps – a forerunner of the Royal Logistics Corps. He was part of a small but growing group of soldiers turned writers who used their prodigious talents to raise profound questions about the nature and management of World War One. Producers of television documentaries about the war have had to grapple with the "lions led by donkeys" interpretive frame since the 1960s. The 1964 seminal and award winning BBC Television The Great War has been described as taking a moderate approach, with co scriptwriter John Terraine fighting against what he viewed as an oversimplification, while Hart resigned as an advising historian to the series, in an open letter to The Times, in part over a dispute with Terraine, claiming that he minimised the faults of the High Command on The Somme and other concerns regarding the treatment of Third Ypres. The Great War was viewed by about a fifth of the adult population in Britain and the production of documentaries on the war has continued ever since. While recent documentaries such as Channel 4's 2003 The First World War have confronted the popular image of lions led by donkeys, by reflecting current scholarship presenting more nuanced portrayals of British leaders and more balanced appraisals of the difficulties faced by the High Commands of all the combatants, they have been viewed by far fewer members of the public than either 1964's The Great War or comedies such as Blackadder. The name of British anti Brexit political campaign group Led By Donkeys was inspired by the saying. The activists thought it aptly described the relationship between the British people and their Brexit leaders.
Дэн Сноу в The Guardian написал: «Темная тайна моей семьи о Сомме». «Изучая прошлое своих предков, Дэн Сноу был потрясен, обнаружив, что его прадед Томас Сноу был генералом Первой мировой войны, отправившим тысячи людей на смерть». Впоследствии Сноу написал статью для BBC в 2014 году, в которой обсуждались 10 главных мифов о Первой мировой войне, развенчанных им, и в которой он предположил, что «большая часть того, что мы думаем, что знаем о конфликте 1914–1918 годов, неверна», и что «эта поговорка якобы исходила от старших немецких командиров, описывающих храбрых британских солдат, ведомых некомпетентными стариками из своих замков. На самом деле этот эпизод был выдуман Аланом Кларком». Хотя Кларк, как говорят, признался в том, что он вообразил «эпизод», это не влияет на уместность (или неуместность) использования этой фразы, поскольку книга с таким названием была опубликована капитаном Питером Томпсоном в 1927 году (через независимое издательство T. W. Laurie). Томпсон был опытным писателем, служившим в Королевском армейском корпусе снабжения – предшественнике Королевского логистического корпуса. Он входил в небольшую, но растущую группу солдат, ставших писателями, которые использовали свои выдающиеся таланты, чтобы поднимать глубокие вопросы о природе и управлении Первой мировой войной. Создатели телевизионных документальных фильмов о войне должны были учитывать интерпретационную рамку «львов, ведомых ослами» с 1960-х годов. Знаменитая и удостоенная наград телевизионная постановка BBC 1964 года «Великая война» была описана как придерживающаяся умеренного подхода, при этом соавтор сценария Джон Террейн боролся против того, что он считал чрезмерным упрощением, в то время как Харт ушел в отставку с поста консультанта-историка сериала, направив открытое письмо в The Times, отчасти из-за спора с Террейном, утверждая, что тот преуменьшал ошибки Верховного командования на Сомме и другие проблемы, касающиеся обращения с Третьей битвой при Ипре. «Великую войну» посмотрело около одной пятой взрослого населения Великобритании, и с тех пор производство документальных фильмов о войне продолжается. В то время как недавние документальные фильмы, такие как «Первая мировая война» на канале Channel 4 в 2003 году, столкнулись с популярным образом «львов, ведомых ослами», отражая современные исследования, представляющие более нюансированные портреты британских лидеров и более сбалансированные оценки трудностей, с которыми сталкивались Верховные командования всех воюющих сторон, их посмотрело гораздо меньше зрителей, чем либо «Великую войну» 1964 года, либо комедии, такие как «Черный Зубов». Название британской политической кампании против Brexit Led By Donkeys было вдохновлено этой поговоркой. Активисты посчитали, что она уместно описывает отношения между британским народом и лидерами Brexit.
Ludendorff: The English soldiers fight like lions. Hoffmann: True. But don't we know that they are lions led by donkeys. The conversation was supposedly published in the memoirs of General Erich von Falkenhayn, the Chief of the German General Staff of the German Army between 1914 and 1916, but the exchange and the memoirs remain untraced. Clark was equivocal about the source for the dialogue for many years, although in 2007 a friend Euan Graham, recalled a conversation in the mid sixties, when Clark on being challenged as to the provenance of the dialogue, looked sheepish and said "well I invented it". At one time Clark said Hart had given him the quote (unlikely as Hart had asked him where it came from) and Clark's biographer believes he invented the Ludendorff and Hoffmann attribution. This invention provided critics of The Donkeys with an opportunity to condemn the work. Richard Holmes, wrote
Dan Snow wrote in The Guardian:My family's dark Somme secret "Delving into his own ancestors' past, Dan Snow was stunned to discover that his great grandfather Thomas Snow was a first world war general who sent thousands to die". Subsequently Snow wrote an article for the BBC in 2014 discussing 10 big myths about World War One debunked in which he posits the idea that "Much of what we think we know about the 1914–18 conflict is wrong" and that "This saying was supposed to have come from senior German commanders describing brave British soldiers led by incompetent old toffs from their chateaux. In fact the incident was made up by Alan Clark." While Clark is said to have admitted to his imagining "the incident" this has no impact on the appropriate (or otherwise) use of the phrase, since a book with this title had been published by Captain Peter Thompson in 1927 (through an independent publisher, T. W. Laurie). Thompson was a well travelled writer who had served in the Royal Army Service Corps – a forerunner of the Royal Logistics Corps. He was part of a small but growing group of soldiers turned writers who used their prodigious talents to raise profound questions about the nature and management of World War One. Producers of television documentaries about the war have had to grapple with the "lions led by donkeys" interpretive frame since the 1960s. The 1964 seminal and award winning BBC Television The Great War has been described as taking a moderate approach, with co scriptwriter John Terraine fighting against what he viewed as an oversimplification, while Hart resigned as an advising historian to the series, in an open letter to The Times, in part over a dispute with Terraine, claiming that he minimised the faults of the High Command on The Somme and other concerns regarding the treatment of Third Ypres. The Great War was viewed by about a fifth of the adult population in Britain and the production of documentaries on the war has continued ever since. While recent documentaries such as Channel 4's 2003 The First World War have confronted the popular image of lions led by donkeys, by reflecting current scholarship presenting more nuanced portrayals of British leaders and more balanced appraisals of the difficulties faced by the High Commands of all the combatants, they have been viewed by far fewer members of the public than either 1964's The Great War or comedies such as Blackadder. The name of British anti Brexit political campaign group Led By Donkeys was inspired by the saying. The activists thought it aptly described the relationship between the British people and their Brexit leaders.
Критика
Брайан Бонд, редактируя сборник эссе 1991 года по истории Первой мировой войны, выразил общее стремление авторов выйти за рамки "распространенных стереотипов об 'ослах'", признавая при этом, что были допущены серьезные ошибки в руководстве и что авторы не будут стремиться к реабилитации репутации старших командиров на Сомме. Хью Страхан процитировал Мориса Женевуа со словами "[е]сли нежелательно и нехорошо, чтобы профессиональный историк превалировал над ветераном, то также нехорошо, чтобы ветеран превалировал над историком", а затем подверг критике Харта за "замалчивание решающих сражений войны", тем самым "позволив его изображению британских генералов предстать в виде легкой последовательности, от некомпетентности на Западном фронте до консерватизма в 1920-х годах". Гордон Корриган, например, даже не считал Кларка историком. Выражение "львы, ведомые ослами" создало ложную, или, по крайней мере, крайне неполную картину командования в Первой мировой войне, создавая впечатление о генералах как о "генералах, живущих в замках", наслаждающихся роскошью и безразличных к страданиям подчиненных, интересующихся лишь кавалерийскими атаками и расстрелами трусов. Один историк писал, что "утверждение об их безразличии к страданиям своих солдат постоянно опровергается фактами и сохраняется лишь потому, что некоторые комментаторы стремятся увековечить миф о том, что эти генералы, представляющие высшие классы, не заботились о судьбе низших слоев общества". Некоторые современные научные круги описывают эту школу мысли как "дискредитированную". Страхан цитирует Гэвина Стампа, который сожалеет о "новом поколении военных историков", которые кажутся такими же "бессердечными и шовинистическими", как Хейг, в то время как сам ссылается на "неинформированные тирады Вольфа и Кларка".