Robertson told Hankey on 1 June that Sir John French was "always wanting to do reckless and impossible things" and made similar remarks to Kitchener in July. When French visited London on 23 June to talk to Kitchener, Robertson remained behind as he could not be seen to argue with French in public. He advised on 25 June 1915 against retreat to the Channel Ports, an option contemplated by the Cabinet after the defensive losses at Second Ypres, arguing that it would leave the British "helpless spectators" in France's defeat, and on 26 June, in response to a Churchill memorandum, that attacks on entrenched positions at Gallipoli had been just as costly as on the Western Front, but without the chance of defeating the German army. In "Notes on the Machinery of the Government for the Conduct of the War" on 30 June 1915 he argued, in Clausewitzian terms, that the government should state its war aims, in this case, the liberation of Belgium and the destruction of German militarism, and then let the professionals achieve them.