Thread by @acatfromgreece

Prominent in any list of dangerous military incompetents must come the name of Vice Admiral Sir Doveton Sturdee.

He was conceited, overbearing and utterly contemptuous of everyone's views except his own.

This wouldn't have mattered so much if his views had been sensible. They were not.

Sturdee's flaws were starkly demonstrated in the tragic fate which befell HMS Cressy, HMS Hogue and HMS Aboukir on 22 September 1914.

These obsolete armoured cruisers had been ordered by Sturdee to patrol a part of the North Sea known as the Broad Fourteens.

Even if this had been a sensible disposition, which it wasn't, these old, slow ships were completely unfitted for it.

They were classic examples of what Fisher called vessels that were too weak to fight and too slow to run away.

On 17 September 1914 a conference was held at which Commodore Roger Keyes (no coward) told Sturdee that it was folly to keep the three cruisers on patrol in an area which was bound to be full of German submarines.

The pompous, dismissive arrogance of Sturdee's reply epitomises the man: 'My dear fellow, you don't know your history. We've always maintained a squadron in the Broad Fourteens.'

Sturdee subsequently ignored an instruction from the First Lord of the Admiralty (Winston Churchill) to terminate the patrol.

As a result, the cruisers were plodding uselessly along on 22 September when they were sighted by a German submarine.

All three were sunk, with the loss of 1,459 men.

So whenever you see something stupid or dangerous being done, and the explanation is 'we've always done it this way', remember Doveton Sturdee, the Broad Fourteens and 1,459 dead men.