Marshall and Dill stand behind President Franklin D. Roosevelt (left) and Prime Minister Winston Churchill (right) on HMS Prince of Wales in Placentia Bay, Newfoundland, August 10, 1941. Dill became head of the British Joint Staff Mission in Washington D.C. in January 1942, where he sat as a permament British member of Combined Chiefs of Staff.

Sir John Dill and the Power of Allied Unity

In February 1944, Field Marshal Sir John Dill was awarded Yale University’s prestigious Howland Prize for his work as the British permanent representative on the Combined Chiefs of Staff in Washington D.C. Dill was no battlefield commander, but he played a quiet, indispensable role in coordinating the Anglo-American war effort at the highest level–often smoothing tensions before they could disrupt Allied planning.

He was also a close friend of General George C. Marshall, who was invited to offer a short tribute during the ceremony. While assisting with the digitization of Marshall’s personal papers last Fall, I came across the speech. It’s not long, but it captures something enduring: the importance of good-natured, guileless allies–people willing to subordinate personal or national ego for the sake of a common cause. Marshall’s words are as clear-eyed as they are relevant today:

Here’s what he said:

The harmful possibilities of such discord have been serious in the past and will continue to be so in the future because of the necessity in the European theater for combined operations, even involving on occasions the complete intermingling of troops, as is now the case with Fifth Army in Italy. Under such circumstances the possibility that misunderstandings may develop into festering sores should be evident to all, not to mention the fatal effect on the power of our blows that would result from any lack of harmony in the command and staff direction of our combined efforts.

That we have been able to master these very human difficulties—that in fact we have triumphed over them to the disaster of the enemy—is in my opinion the single greatest Allied achievement of the war.

So I am gratified, I am tremendously encouraged to see Yale University honor the man who, in my opinion, has made an outstanding, a unique personal contribution to the coordination of the Allied effort.”

With all the pessimistic talk today about America’s fraying alliances and uncertain standing abroad, it’s worth remembering that someone with real experience in winning global wars saw unity–not superiority, not dominance–as the Allies’ greatest wartime achievement.