No Uncertain Sound: The Life and Times of Admiral Sir Jock Slater

192 pages

Andrew Livsey

The book will be published on 10 December 2025 and is available to pre-order at: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1849956138

Peter Hore’s No Uncertain Sound is a deeply researched, well crafted biography of Admiral Sir Jock Slater, whose career culminated as First Sea Lord from 1995 to 1998. Though enabled by long discussions with its subject it also draws upon other interviews and Hore’s own time within the Royal Navy of the period, often close to the Naval Staff. Yet Hore does not allow his mastery of the subject to bog the narrative down: the book moves along at a fair pace. There is also place for gentle humour, with a wry but never disrespectful awareness of human foibles.

No Uncertain Sound is also the first book to discuss the Royal Navy of the 1990s in any detail, Edward Hampshire’s The Royal Navy of the Cold War Years logically ending in 1990. This is therefore almost the first time an accomplished historian has put into context  the decision to enable women to go to sea, the overturning of the ban on homosexuals in the service, the naval view on the setting up of PJHQ and the initial decision to have the current carriers built. That the current First Sea Lord is a Royal Marine was made possible by the move in the 1990s to much closer alignment between the Royal Navy and Royal Marines, with Marines taking significant posts in the combined hierarchy. Many of the other refinements made to the personnel structures in the 1990s are also with us today, such as the end of a dedicated ‘schoolie’ branch and Commodore becoming a substantive rank. Even for the 1980s, which has received much fuller coverage, there are aspects little explored elsewhere such as the British approach to the reduction in nuclear weapons pursued by US President Ronald Reagan.

Part of the fascination comes from the insight one gets in to the assumptions of the Navy of the period. The decision making process within the highest ranks seemed to be based on both hierarchy and consensus building, with individuals holding strong positions but also being sensitive to the shifting moods of others. Admiral Slater was clearly a master at this and could also rapidly assimilate issues as varied as the intricacies of a ship’s propulsion systems and nuclear disarmament bargaining. He was a fine leader, firm and able to take charge yet prepared to take time with individuals. His amazing memory for names and faces required not only natural ability but genuine effort. Yet Slater also seemed to find it difficult to create space to think. Even when advised by his doctor to slow down he kept on adding to the workload of naturally busy posts by agreeing to further socialising or even stalking deer with the Royal Family.

Hore does not give an overall judgement on his subject, just as he did not in his biography of Admiral Henry Harwood of the Second World War. Yet I am reminded of the German General Hammerstein-Equord’s fourfold division of military officers. Equord distinguished between officers who were brilliant and hard-working, who make the best staff officers, the less brilliant and lazy, who make adequate junior officers, and the less brilliant but hard working who are a menace because they create work for others. It was, however, the final category, the brilliant but lazy who he thought were fitted for the highest ranks, for they gave themselves space to think. I am not sure that our German general would have put Admiral Slater into that last category.

It is understandable that Slater revelled in driving ships fast, and far preferred command at sea to time in Whitehall. Yet he seems to have largely restricted his learning to his own experience, rather than books or outside experts. Indeed, while one has some sympathy with Slater for the occasions in which he decried academics as verbosely repeating unclear concepts, the suspicion remains that if he’d listened more carefully he might have learnt something. Previous First Sea Lords had possessed and used wider learning, such as McGrigor quoting the German Prince Bulow’s statement in 1914 to make the point that wars are often longer than expected, and Admiral Fraser having read the Strategikon attributed to the Byzantine Emperor Maurice.

This lack of ability to use wider learning perhaps explains why there was little new thinking as the fleet shrank and the Royal Navy only removed the ban on homosexuals when pushed from outside. Slater himself wondered if he should have been more calculating in seeking the position of Chief of Defence Staff which in the event went to an Army officer. Yet it depends on what one expects from a First Sea Lord and I am perhaps being unfair. It was under Slater that critical moves were made towards getting the current carriers, and it seems likely that under less adept leadership the Navy might have suffered steeper cuts than occurred in the 1998 Strategic Defence Review. He also, to his credit, supported and provided direction for the first recent edition of BR 1806, British Maritime Doctrine. Read the book and judge for yourself.

It is also surprising the extent to which Slater seemed interested in the opinions of the Royal Family. The monarch of course has a constitutional position, yet Slater spent considerable time with the others for years after he finished his stint with the royal household as a relatively junior officer. He clearly considered their views seriously, even if he did not always act upon them. Inputs from many directions can be valuable, but there were surely more perceptive people to engage with.

Regardless of ones’ views on all of that, with Hore we have the ideal author: able to explain clearly but briefly while also possessing a good eye for the telling detail which puts the whole into perspective. He has fairly represented this individual while also giving an unprecedented insight into the Navy of the period. Rarely can I recommend a book so wholeheartedly.