Calais Conference (July 1915) participant Horatio Kitchener
Conference
On the morning of the conference the British Secretary of State for War Lord Kitchener met with the French commander-in-chief Joseph Joffre in the railway carriage that brought the French delegation to Calais.  Kitchener agreed to provide Joffre with a timetable for the deployment of fresh British divisions (the so-called Kitchener's Army) to the Western Front, which Joffre had been requesting for months.  The timetable would allow Joffre to plan new offensives, knowing that the line could be reinforced with British troops if losses occurred.  The conference opened later that morning.  Viviani permitted Asquith to open the event, which he did with a speech made in his halting French; the speech had been hastily translated from English by diplomat George Clerk .  Maurice Hankey, the British Secretary of the War Council, described the conference as "chaos" with the proceedings being "stone age" in nature as all discussion was permitted to take place only in French.  French general Ferdinand Foch, responsible for liaison between the British and French forces in the field, was not even invited to the conference as the French felt they were more properly represented by Joffre alone.During proceedings Asquith confirmed the British position was that the Western Front was to be the main focus but that he retained freedom to act elsewhere as the situation arose.  The British also attempted to persuade the French to delay the resumption of offensive operations on the Western Front.  In the course of proceedings Kitchener agreed to a French proposal that the British Expeditionary Force should reach 70 divisions in strength, a target which proved impossible to meet without the introduction of conscription (which followed in 1916).  Owing to poor organisation no secretaries were present to record the outcome of discussions.  This led to a misunderstanding in that the French believed the British had committed to a major offensive on the Western Front later that summer whilst the British thought they had persuaded the French that the main British effort that year should be in the Gallipoli campaign.
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