The Rules of the Game

The Rules of the Game is a 1996 work of military history by Gilbert Andrew Hugh Gordon, a British naval historian and former Royal Navy reservist. The book provides a detailed account of the Battle of Jutland, a naval battle between British and German fleets fought over two days in the North Sea in 1916. Although the British fleet had an overwhelming numerical advantage, the battle was indecisive, with both sides claiming victory. The British commanders, Admiral Sir John Jellicoe and Vice-Admiral Sir David Beatty, took disparate approaches both in their preparation for war and in the heat of battle, and both received intense criticism from contemporaries. Military historians have continued to argue about which commander made the better decisions. Gordon suggests that ultimately blame lies not with either man, but with the culture of the Royal Navy, weakened by nearly a century of peace, an over-reliance on new technology, and endemic favoritism shown to the sons of gentlemen and officers. Gordon interweaves the story of the Royal Navy’s decline from its Trafalgar heyday with the story of the climactic battle.

Gordon begins his account with the tensions between Jellicoe, overall commander of the British Grand Fleet, and Beatty, in charge of the Battle Cruiser Fleet, a sub-division of the Grand Fleet. These tensions are personal as well as professional. Jellicoe is a quiet, cautious man, “a manager rather than a heroic leader,” “the Uncle Arthur of Admirals.” Besides his natural caution, Jellicoe has good reason to be careful and scrupulous. His job is to keep the German fleet pinned at Williamshafen. If he fails, the war will likely be lost. Winston Churchill (then First Lord of the Admiralty) adds to the pressure when he remarks that Jellicoe is the “only man who could lose the war in a day.”

Beatty, on the other hand, is “a scion of hard-hunting, hard-playing Irish landowning gentry [with] charisma and panache.” Having made a controversial marriage to an American divorcée, Beatty has become Britain’s youngest rear admiral since national hero Lord Nelson. Unlike Jellicoe, Beatty thrives on press attention, and—again unlike Jellicoe— the press love him.



Jellicoe divides his fleet, sending the Battle Cruiser Fleet under Beatty to Rosyth in Scotland. Gordon notes that in Rosyth, Beatty has much more access to the press than Jellicoe (anchored further north at Scapa Flow), a fact which influenced contemporary interpretations of the two men’s actions in battle.

Beatty lobbies to add to his command the 5th Battle Squadron, containing the Navy’s most advanced battleships. Jellicoe is forced to concede, but having secured his objective, Beatty fails to establish a working relationship with the commander of the 5th Squadron, Evan-Thomas.

In their widely separated stations, the two fleets come to be shaped by the personalities of their commanding officers. On Jellicoe’s dreadnoughts, the careful, deliberate approach reigns supreme, while Beatty creates a more dashing, Nelsonian culture on his battle cruisers.



From signal intercepts, the British learn that a major naval operation is likely, so Jellicoe sails to rendezvous with Beatty. The Grand Fleet sets off to encounter the German fleet. Beatty’s battle cruisers form the vanguard, and Beatty accidentally steams ahead of the 5th Battle Squadron, with its advanced battleships. Unexpectedly, Beatty’s force comes upon the main body of the German fleet. Beatty’s force turns away, hoping to lure the German fleet towards the overwhelming firepower of Jellicoe’s force. Gordon zeroes in on a key moment: for several minutes, the 5th Battle Squadron fails to turn away from the enemy, leaving valuable ships exposed to concentrated fire. Gordon suggests that the cause of this delay was that the commander of the 5th Battle Squadron, Evan-Thomas, was waiting for a signal from Beatty before maneuvering.

The next section of the book dives into nineteenth-century naval history, looking for a reason why an admiral would leave his ships under heavy fire for several minutes in a crucial battle just because he had not received the appropriate signal to maneuver.

The key reason, Gordon concludes, is that the more predictable movements of steamships had given rise to the idea that admirals should be able to control their whole fleet, without needing to give license to subordinate commanders or individual ships’ captains to act as they see fit. This more centralized system of control placed greater emphasis on the role of signals’ officers. These positions became more prestigious and were increasingly reserved for royal favorites, which in turn further increased the importance of obedience to signals within the Navy’s culture.



The tension between this new culture and an older naval culture which emphasized initiative had become marked in the Grand Fleet due to the different temperaments of Jellicoe and Beatty. Evan-Thomas, who had been stationed with Jellicoe and had not developed a relationship with Beatty, did not realize that Beatty—unlike Jellicoe—expected him to take initiative. Similarly, Beatty failed to relay crucial information to Jellicoe, failing to realize that Jellicoe’s fleet would not take action without orders from Jellicoe himself.

The next section of the book traces how these tensions combined to cause a series of errors by the British during the Battle of Jutland. However, Gordon also finds cause to indict Jellicoe, for excessive caution. Gordon argues that Jellicoe’s lack of actual battle experience caused him to over-rely on military theory. When the Germans failed to behave as Jellicoe had predicted, he proceeded with his pre-arranged battle plan anyway, allowing the German fleet to escape his grip.

In the book’s final section, Gordon details the arguments that broke out after the battle between those in the Navy who subscribed to Jellicoe’s central-control model, and those who believed that Beatty’s looser structure was more practical in the heat of battle. Gordon concludes that the debate, and subsequent changes in doctrine and practice, proved crucial in the Second World War. His judgment of the naval officers of the First is damning: “They thought they were good, but in ways that mattered, they were not. They thought they were ready for war, but they were not.”