War Staff Papers

IOR/L/WS

War Staff Papers

1921-1951

The surviving files fall into two sections: L/WS/1/1-1755 War Staff 'WS' Series Files, 1921-1950 and L/WS/2/1-85 Other War Staff Files 1940-1951.The files cover all aspects of military strategy, organisation, intelligence and supply.

For registers and indexes see Z/L/WS

Public Record(s)

English

1840 files

Unrestricted

The War Staff organisation was set up in 1939 within the India Office under the Military Secretary. On the outbreak of war in 1939 the Military Secretary automatically became responsible for co-ordinating India Office arrangements for passing from a peace to a war footing, as detailed in the India Office War Book, and for forming a War Staff within his department.Routine military matters continued to be handled by the normal Military Department staff, under the Civilian Joint Secretary, while all 'war' matters were referred to the new War Staff. This was divided into three sections ? General, Intelligence and Supply ? with a joint Registry, and a Personal Assistant in charge of a Reception Bureau for ex-officers seeking war employment was also appointed. As wartime administrative arrangements became increasingly complex, specialist officers such as the Air Liaison Officer were attached to the War Staff. See Files WS 2278, 2810 and 12029 for a detailed analysis of the organisation. The War Staff took over a number of pre-war Military Department files, and also continued to operate and produce its own records relating to virtually all aspects of military strategy, organisation, intelligence and supply. Because the majority of the files carried obsolete wartime 'Top Secret' or 'Secret' classifications, they were subjected to drastic weeding. A number of files were also consulted at this period for the Official History of the War, and are stamped 'Permanent Preservation, Quoted in Official History'. Both the India Office Military Department and the War Staff were merged in the new Defence Department of the Commonwealth Relations Office in 1949, which took over the War Staff files.