Eighty years ago this week the Foreign Office's scissors hover over the old school tie

 

A White Paper on reforming the Foreign Office was published and was well received. The ambition was to move the organization on from its status as an aloof domain of the upper classes. Predictably it was light on detail, beyond proposing a merger of diplomatic and commercial branches; including the consular service was deemed to be a step too far at that stage. The goal was set of opening the service to all men of ability (the question of female entry was held over). The White Paper was embodied into concrete reforms in 1947 and in 1966 Britain appointed an ambassador who had gone to a state school, had no university education and entered as a consular officer.

General Montgomery's Eight Army launched Operation Pugilist  a full-scale assalt on the Axis Mareth line in Tunisia. It had been built by France as North African counter-part to the Maginot line in the 1930s. The frontal assault was beaten back with heavy losses but the LRDG had identified a route to outflank the line through the Tebaga Gap in the South. 

General de Gaulle finally consented to leave Britain for North Africa, apparently opening the prospect of unifiying the non-Vichy French  elements in the fight against Germany. De Gaulle judged that the time was right to sideline General Giraud, the Americans' choice as Free French leader and by default in charge of French North Africa. In reality he had proved little improvement on his murdered predecessor Admiral Darlan and had failed to build any serious following.