command, instead securing permission to leave active service. His temporary promotion ended on 16 May 1916, when he returned to the rank of major. Back in the House of Commons, Churchill spoke out on war issues, calling for conscription to be extended to the Irish, greater recognition of soldiers' bravery, and for the introduction of steel helmets for troops. It was in November 1916 that he penned "The greater application of mechanical power to the prosecution of an offensive on land", but it fell on deaf ears. He was frustrated at being out of office as a backbencher, but he was repeatedly blamed for Gallipoli, mainly by the pro-Conservative press. Churchill argued his case before the Dardanelles Commission, whose published report placed no blame on him personally for the campaign's failure. Lloyd George government: 1916–1922 Minister of Munitions: 1917–1919 In October 1916, Asquith resigned as Prime Minister and was succeeded by Lloyd George who, in May 1917, sent Churchill to inspect the French war effort. In July, Churchill was appointed Minister of Munitions. He quickly negotiated an end to a strike in munitions factories along the Clyde and increased munitions production. It was in his October 1917 letter to the attention of his Cabinet colleagues that he penned the plan of attack for the next year that would bring final victory to the Allies. He ended a second strike, in June 1918, by threatening to conscript strikers into the army. In the House of Commons, Churchill voted in support of the Representation of the People Act 1918, which gave some British women the right to vote. In November 1918, four days after the Armistice, Churchill's fourth child, Marigold, was born. Secretary of State for War and Air: 1919–1921 With the war over, Lloyd George called a general election with voting on Saturday, 14 December 1918. During the election campaign, Churchill called for the nationalisation of the railways, a control on monopolies, tax reform, and the creation of a League of Nations to prevent future wars. He was returned as MP for Dundee and, although the Conservatives won a majority, Lloyd George was retained as Prime Minister. In January 1919, Lloyd George moved Churchill to the War Office as both Secretary of State for War and Secretary of State for Air. Churchill was responsible for demobilising the British Army, although he convinced Lloyd George to keep a million men conscripted for