Jean Baptiste Eugène Estienne

Jean-Baptiste Eugène Estienne (7 November 1860 - 2 April 1936), born at Condé-en-Barrois in the Meuse is considered by many in France to be the Père des Chars (Father of the Tanks). He was a general of artillery and a specialist in military engineering, one of the founders of modern French artillery and French military aviation; and the creator of the French tank weapon.

Early Career

Modern Artillery

He was admitted at the École Polytechnique at the age of nineteen, and graduated, the 131th of his year, in 1882, the same year he won the first price in the national mathematics competition. He would for the rest of his life be interested in mathematical and philosophical problems — but his real passion was Greek Antiquity. In 1883 he joined the professional army as a second lieutenant, from 1884 serving with the artillery. Studying ballistics, in 1890 he presented his first major work, Erreurs d'Observation, to the Académie des Sciences. This stimulated the introduction of modern indirect fire methods. Promoted to captain with the 1st Artillery Regiment in 1891, he began to develop telemetric instruments at the atelier of Bourges to put his theories in practice. In 1902 he was made squadron commander with the 19th Artillery Regiment, but his real work is done while heading the workshop building precision instruments for the technical artillery section in Paris and promoting the use of telephonic connections to enable the artillery to quickly change fire targets. This work didn't keep him from publishing a paper on Pascal's theorem in 1906. In 1907 he became head of the artillery school in Grenoble.

Military Aviation

At that time Estienne already had the reputation of being one of the most competent and progressive officers in France and to be among the founders of modern artillery. When General Brun created the French aviation service at Reims in 1909, the logical candidate to command this new unit was Estienne: since the main task of aircraft was seen as directing artillery fire, he seemed the best qualified man to solve the technological difficulties involved. So Estienne, now promoted to Lieutenant-Colonel, also became one of the founders of French military aviation. After establishing proper organisation, training and production of aircraft while developing communication methods, he commanded 5th Aviation Group at Lyon for a short time, but was recalled to the arsenal of Vincennes to continue his technical work — though he couldn't resist founding a new artillery aviation section there.

First World War

At the outbreak of the First World War Estienne was made commander of the 22nd Artillery Regiment serving with the division of Philippe Pétain. Fighting at the Battle of Charleroi he shocked his German opponents by the precision of his artillery fire, well directed in close cooperation with aircraft, but even France's foremost artillery specialist had to admit his competence couldn't save the French infantry from being decimated by machine gun fire. Always having advocated the use of indirect fire methods he now began to search for viable ways to provide close support fire by field guns. On 23 August he made his famous statement Messieurs, la victoire appartiendra dans cette guerre à celui des deux belligérants qui parviendra le premier à placer un canon de 75 sur une voiture capable de se mouvoir en tout terrain. As however such vehicles were lacking at the time, nothing more could be done. In the summer of 1915 he learns that Eugène Brillié of the Schneider company and Jean-Louis Bréton (then member of parliament) are developing a barbed wire-cutter on a tracked Holt chassis. On 1 December he sent some ideas about using such tracked vehicles to the supreme command; because of his outstanding reputation these are taken quite seriously and he is invited to explain them further during a personal visit on 12 December. On 9 December he and Pétain first attend a demonstration of the Schneider chassis; he perceives that unknown to him Schneider has been constructing an armoured tracked vehicle since May and immediately understands the very existence of such a prototype, even though only partly finished, might well be a decisive argument for the creation of an armoured force: on 20 December he is proven right when an official plan is conceived to produce the Schneider CA. The same day he contacts Louis Renault to convince him to build light tanks, but the industrialist refuses. During a personal visit to Joffre on 18 January 1916 he succeeds in convincing the supreme commander that the plan is sound.

At first however Estienne himself was not personally involved in the development of the new tanks. He suggested some ideas that were taken duely notice of, but had no effect on the construction and production preparations. While two of his personal enemies, Undersecretary Jean-Louis Bréton (who resents that Estienne took over his project) and Colonel Rimailho (the inventor of the 75 mm field gun) cooperate to build the ill-fated St Chamond, Estienne finds himself side-tracked in the summer of 1916 as head recruting, an important and responsible task with which he is nevertheless deeply unhappy, despite the promise in August to be promoted to brigadier. On 16 July during a chance meeting Renault informs him that his company is developing a light tank (the later Renault FT-17), but Estienne is not in a position to make any promises. In August he and Bréton together travel to London, trying to convince the British government to postpone the first use of tanks till the French tanks are ready. They fail but this has a beneficial side-effect: after the use of the British Mark I on 15 September, the resulting tankeuphoria accelerates developments and he is instated on 30 September as commander of the Artillerie Spéciale: the tank weapon. On 17 October he is promoted to brigadier.

At that time there was neither personnel nor materiel and Estienne now spent many months trying to put together the new force from scratch, first recruting, then constructing training grounds, waiting till 1 December for the first Schneider CA to be delivered to the troop and training could begin in earnest. During these months he cooperates with Renault to develop the light Renault tank and tries to sabotage efforts by General Mouret to massproduce superheavy tanks (the later Char 2C) that threaten to swallow all available production capacity.

On 16 April 1917 he was forced by the new supreme commander Robert Nivelle to commit his force prematurely near Berry-au-Bac, leading to complete failure. The officer commanding the attack, Commandant Louis Bossut, was killed; a large monument there commemorates all the French tankers who died in WWI. This nearly led to the abolishment of the tank force: Estienne was saved by the appointment of his friend Pétain as CinC. He now directed his mind to the conception of appropriate tactics. In his mind tanks were to be above all a new form of mobile artillery, capable of moving over the ravaged battlefield and breaking through enemy lines, without any traditional artillery support for the standard preliminary "softening up". Heavier tanks might be useful for this but a more efficient effort could be made by a "swarm" of lighter vehicles. Estienne paid little attention to exploitation.

In 1918 a large mass of Renault FT-17's was at last made available, allowing for the first time since 1914 to effectively counterattack the Germans. The FT-17 became the Char de la Victoire and the necessity for a strong tank force became firmly established.

Interbellum

Estienne remained head of the tank force, first still as Artillerie Spéciale, then as commander of the Chars when in 1920 all tanks were made part of the Infantry by law. He resigned as such in 1922 but then headed the technical section till 1933 and thus strongly influenced the development path of the French tanks, trying to turn it from light tanks to larger Chars de Bataille; he therefore is largely responsible for the production of the too expensive Char B1. As a reaction after 1933 the Infantry concentrated again on the too light R 35, leaving men of the middle ground like Colonel Charles de Gaulle without the materiel to equip strategically mobile armoured divisions.

Nevertheless today his reputation is unscathed and he is venerated as the Father of the Tanks. A street in Paris was named after him. In the past several military stations and posts also beared his name and the biggest tank museum in France and the world, the Musée des Blindés in Saumur, is called "Musée Général Estienne".