F. L. Lucas

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F. L. Lucas : biography

28 December 1894 – 1 June 1967
"that the object of these large movements of the German Army and Air Force is Russia. From rail movements towards Moldavia in the south to ship movements towards Varanger fjord in the far north there is everywhere the same eastward trend. Either the purpose is blackmail or it is war. No doubt Hitler would prefer a bloodless surrender. But the quiet move, for instance, of a prisoner-of-war cage to Tarnow looks more like business than bluff."The National Archives PRO HW 1/3; Smith, Michael, The Secrets of Station X (London, 2011), p. 126

He also wrote, with Peter Calvocoressi, the report in early 1945 on the failure of Allied intelligence to foresee the German counter-offensive through the Ardennes in December 1944. Lucas and Calvocoressi concluded that Bletchley Park had accurately reported German preparations. (E. J. N. Rose, head Air Adviser in Hut 3, read the paper at the time and described it in 1998 as "an extremely good report" that "showed the failure of intelligence at SHAEF and at the Air Ministry".Smith, Michael, The Secrets of Station X (London, 2011), p.272Millward, William, ‘Life in and out of Hut 3’ in Codebreakers: The Inside Story of Bletchley Park, eds. F. H. Hinsley & Alan Strip (Oxford 1993), p.24 The report is not known to have survived.) Lucas and Calvocoressi "expected heads to roll at Eisenhower’s HQ, but they did no more than wobble".Calvocoressi, Peter, Top Secret Ultra (London 1980)’Peter Calvocoressi: Political writer who served at Bletchley Park and assisted at the Nuremberg trials’, independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/peter-calvocoressi-political-writer-who-served-at-bletchley-park-and-assisted-at-the-nuremberg-trials-1905181.html The most "exciting" work he did at Bletchley Park, he recalled, was handling operational signals on Axis convoys to North Africa in 1942 and deducing convoys’ routes using decrypts, maps, pins and pieces of string.History of Hut 3, Public Records Office documents, ref. HW3/119 and /120; Smith, Michael, Station X: The Codebreakers of Bletchley Park (London, 1998); Smith, Michael, The Secrets of Station X (London, 2011), p.195 The high standards of accuracy and clarity that prevailed in Hut 3, his chief maintained, were "largely due to his being such a stickler" for them. In off-duty hours till 1943 Major Lucas was Officer Commanding the Bletchley Park Home Guard, a "rabble of egg-heads" that he turned, contrary to stereotype, into an efficient unit that outwitted the local regular forces in military exercises.Wilkinson, L. P., ‘F. L. Lucas’ in King’s College Report, November 1967, p.21; Hinsley, F. H. and Stripp, Alan, eds., Code-breakers : The Inside Story of Bletchley Park (Oxford 2001) From June 1945 to the end of the War he was head of the Hut 3 History Section.bletchleypark.org.uk/resources/file.rhtm/591878/l.pdf He was awarded the O.B.E in 1946 for his wartime work. His recollections of Hut 3, now in the National Archives, are quoted in the history books.

Demographics

In the post-war years, Lucas early took up the cause of population-control, "a problem not talked about nearly enough", discussing the dangers of world overpopulation in his book The Greatest Problem (1960). Having laid out the statistics to 1959 and future projections, he argued that the "reckless proliferation" of homo sapiens, as well as impoverishing the world by environmental damage and species-extinctions, would be damaging to the individual and to society:

"The finest human qualities are endangered, because the size of populations increases, and ought to be diminished; the size of states increases, and ought to be diminished; the size of cities increases, and ought to be diminished. Vast communities lead to small individuals; and the real worth of any community lies in the worth of its individuals… The individual comes to feel himself a mere drop in the ocean; and feeling impotent, he grows irresponsible… Vast democracies cannot keep the virtues of democracy."Lucas, F. L., The Greatest Problem, and Other Essays" (London 1960), p.321Lucas, F. L., The Art of Living (London 1959), p.176-7

If population-growth went unchecked, he felt, "the damage to national efficiency might drive governments to act more intelligently";Lucas, F. L., The Greatest Problem, and Other Essays" (London 1960), p.326 but better would be "a concentrated drive for population-planning, despite the formidable practical, scientific and psychological obstacles". "Common sense percolates," he had written in 1934, "despite the Roman Church; which with its half-cynical sense of reality will doubtless end by swallowing the inevitable, as with Copernicus and Darwin, and evolve some doctrine of Immaculate Contraception."Lucas, F. L., From Olympus to the Styx (London, 1934), p.254 He was not optimistic about post-war immigration: "Persons of liberal principles are shocked if one views this influx with misgiving. But the advantages are far from certain. Principles, however liberal, are no substitute for common sense."