ABSTRACT
At the beginning of 1945, Cunningham was appointed a Knight of the Thistle. The Admiralty had argued for a peacetime strength of 375,000 but a combination of the heightened requirements of the other services, labour shortages, the need to rebuild a shattered economy and infrastructure, and financial stringency, kept it down to 98,000 by the end of 1947. Strategically, Cunningham argued that 'the major military interest was in keeping any powerful potential enemy away from the shore of the Mediterranean' a reference to Russia's traditional policy of securing rights of passage through the Dardanelles. At first the Admiralty attitude was traditional imperial defence with the Commonwealth navies playing a subordinate role but Cunningham quickly admitted that Britain lacked the manpower and money 'to undertake the major share in Empire defence, which the people previously did'. John Cunningham had a somewhat undistinguished war and was remembered chiefly for the failures with which he had been associated.
