Battle Studies; Ancient and Modern Battle Part 12

To-day the artillery is effective at great distances. There is much liberty of movement for the different arms. The apparent liaison between arms is lessened. This has its influence on morale. There is another advantage in reliable troops, in that they can be extended more widely, and will consequently suffer smaller losses and be in better morale for close conflict.

The further off one is, the more difficult it is to judge of the terrain. Consequently the greater is the necessity for scouting, for reconnoitering the terrain by skirmishers. This is something that the Duke of Gramont forgot at Nordlingen, and which is often forgotten; but it const.i.tutes another important reason for the use of skirmishers.

The formation in rank is a disciplinary measure against the weakness of man in the face of danger. This weakness is greater to-day in that the moral action of weapons is more powerful, and that the material rank has the inherent lack of cohesion of open order. However, open order is necessary to economize losses and permit the use of weapons.

Thus to-day there is greater necessity than ever for the rank, that is for discipline, not for the geometrical rank. It is at the same time more necessary and doubly difficult to attain.

In ancient battle unity existed, at least with the Greeks and the Romans. The soldier was known to his officer and comrades; they saw that he fought.

In modern armies where losses are as great for the victor as for the vanquished, the soldier must more often be replaced. In ancient battle the victor had no losses. To-day the soldier is often unknown to his comrades. He is lost in the smoke, the dispersion, the confusion of battle. He seems to fight alone. Unity is no longer insured by mutual surveillance. A man falls, and disappears. Who knows whether it was a bullet or the fear of advancing further that struck him! The ancient combatant was never struck by an invisible weapon and could not fall in this way. The more difficult surveillance, the more necessary becomes the individuality of companies, sections, squads. Not the least of their boasts should be their ability to stand a roll call at all times.

The ancients often avoided hand to hand conflict, so terrible were its consequences. In modern combat, there never is hand to hand conflict if one stands fast.

From day to day close combat tends to disappear. It is replaced by fire action; above all by the moral action of maneuvers. Dispersion brings us back to the necessity for the unity which was an absolute necessity in ancient battle.

Strategy is a game. The first strategist, long before Napoleon, was Horace with his three enemies.

The size of the battle field permits, less than ever, holding units together; the role of the general is much more difficult: many more chances are left to fate. Thus the greater the necessity for the best troops who know best their trade, who are most dependable and of greatest fort.i.tude. To diminish the effect of luck, it is necessary to hold longer, to wait for help from a distance. Battles resolve themselves into battles of soldiers. The final decision is more difficult to obtain. There is a strange similarity in battle at one league to battle at two paces. The value of the soldier is the essential element of success. Let us strengthen the soldier by unity.

Battle has more importance than ever. Communication facilities such as the telegraph, concentration facilities such as the railroad, render more difficult such strategic surprises as Ulm and Jena. The whole forces of a country can thus be united. So united, defeat becomes irreparable, disorganization greater and more rapid.

In modern combat the melee really exists more than in ancient battle.

This appears paradoxical. It is true nevertheless of the melee taken in the sense of a mixed up affair where it is infinitely difficult to see clearly.

Man, in the combat of our days, is a man who, hardly knowing how to swim, is suddenly thrown into the sea.

The good quality of troops will more than ever secure victory.

As to the comparative value of troops with cohesion and of new troops, look at the Zouaves of the Guard or the Grenadiers at Magenta, and the 55th at Solferino. [34]

Nothing should be neglected to make the battle order stronger, man stronger.

2. Moral Elements in Battle

When, in complete security, after dinner, in full physical and moral contentment, men consider war and battle they are animated by a n.o.ble ardor that has nothing in common with reality. How many of them, however, even at that moment, would be ready to risk their lives? But oblige them to march for days and weeks to arrive at the battle ground, and on the day of battle oblige them to wait minutes, hours, to deliver it. If they were honest they would testify how much the physical fatigue and the mental anguish that precede action have lowered their morale, how much less eager to fight they are than a month before, when they arose from the table in a generous mood.

Man's heart is as changeable as fortune. Man shrinks back, apprehends danger in any effort in which he does not foresee success. There are some isolated characters of an iron temper, who resist the tendency; but they are carried away by the great majority (Bismarck).

Examples show that if a withdrawal is forced, the army is discouraged and takes flight (Frederick). The brave heart does not change.

Real bravery, inspired by devotion to duty, does not know panic and is always the same. The bravery sprung from hot blood pleases the Frenchman more. He understands it, it appeals to his vanity; it is a characteristic of his nature. But it is pa.s.sing; it fails him at times, especially when there is nothing for him to gain in doing his duty.

The Turks are full of ardor in the advance. They carry their officers with them. But they retreat with the same facility, abandoning their officers.

Mediocre troops like to be led by their shepherds. Reliable troops like to be directed, with their directors alongside of them or behind.

With the former the general must be the leader on horseback; with the latter, the manager.

Warnery did not like officers to head a charge. He thought it useless to have them killed before the others. He did not place them in front and his cavalry was good.

General Leboeuf did not favor the proposed advance into battle with platoon leaders in front of the center of their platoons. The fear exists that the fall of the captain will demoralize the rest. What is the solution? Leboeuf must have known that if the officer is not in front of his command, it will advance less confidently, that, with us, all officers are almost always in advance. Practice is stronger than any theory. Therefore fit theories to it. In column, put the chiefs of platoon on the flank where they can see clearly.

Frightfulness! Witness the Turks in the Polish wars. What gave power to the Turks in their wars with Poland was not so much their real strength as their ferocity. They ma.s.sacred all who resisted; they ma.s.sacred without the excuse of resistance. Terror preceded them, breaking down the courage of their enemies. The necessity to win or to submit to extreme peril brought about cowardice and submission, for fear of being conquered.

Turenne said, "You tremble, body...." The instinct of self-preservation can then make the strongest tremble. But they are strong enough to overcome their emotion, the fear of advancing, without even losing their heads or their coolness. Fear with them never becomes terror; it is forgotten in the activities of command. He who does not feel strong enough to keep his heart from ever being gripped by terror, should never think of becoming an officer.

The soldiers themselves have emotion. The sense of duty, discipline, pride, the example of their officers and above all their coolness, sustain them and prevent their fear from becoming terror. Their emotion never allows them to sight, or to more than approximately adjust their fire. Often they fire into the air. Cromwell knew this very well, dependable as his troops were, when he said, "Put your trust in G.o.d and aim at their shoe laces."

What is too true is that bravery often does not at all exclude cowardice, horrible devices to secure personal safety, infamous conduct.

The Romans were not mighty men, but men of discipline and obstinacy.

We have no idea of the Roman military mind, so entirely different from ours. A Roman general who had as little coolness as we have would have been lost. We have incentives in decorations and medals that would have made a Roman soldier run the gauntlet.

How many men before a lion, have the courage to look him in the face, to think of and put into practice measures of self-defense? In war when terror has seized you, as experience has shown it often does, you are as before a lion. You fly trembling and let yourself be eaten up.

Are there so few really brave men among so many soldiers? Alas, yes!

Gideon was lucky to find three hundred in thirty thousand.

Napoleon said, "Two Mamelukes held three Frenchmen; but one hundred French cavalry did not fear the same number of Mamelukes; three hundred vanquished the same number; one thousand French beat fifteen hundred Mamelukes. Such was the influence of tactics, order and maneuver." In ordinary language, such was the great moral influence of unity, established by discipline and made possible and effective in battle by organization and mutual support. With unity and sensible formation men of an individual value one-third less beat those who were individually their betters. That is the essential, must be the essential, point in the organization of an army. On reflection, this simple statement of Napoleon's seems to contain the whole of battle morale. Make the enemy believe that support is lacking; isolate; cut off, flank, turn, in a thousand ways make his men believe themselves isolated. Isolate in like manner his squadrons, battalions, brigades and divisions; and victory is yours. If, on account of bad organization, he does not antic.i.p.ate mutual support, there is no need of such maneuver; the attack is enough.

Some men, such as Orientals, Chinese, Tartars, Mongols do not fear death. They are resigned to it at all times. Why is it that they can not stand before the armies of the western people? It is lack of organization. The instinct of self-preservation which at the last moment dominates them utterly, is not opposed by discipline. We have often seen fanatic eastern peoples, implicitly believing that death in battle means a happy and glorious resurrection, superior in numbers, give way before discipline. If attacked confidently, they are crushed by their own weight. In close combat the dagger is better than the bayonet, but instinct is too strong for such people.

What makes the soldier capable of obedience and direction in action, is the sense of discipline. This includes: respect for and confidence in his chiefs; confidence in his comrades and fear of their reproaches and retaliation if he abandons them in danger; his desire to go where others do without trembling more than they; in a word, the whole of esprit de corps. Organization only can produce these characteristics.

Four men equal a lion.

Note the army organizations and tactical formations on paper are always determined from the mechanical point of view, neglecting the essential coefficient, that of morale. They are almost always wrong.

Esprit de corps is secured in war. But war becomes shorter and shorter and more and more violent. Consequently, secure esprit de corps in advance.

Mental acquaintances.h.i.+p is not enough to make a good organization. A good general esprit is needed. All must work for battle and not merely live, quietly going through with drills without understanding their application. Once a man knows how to use his weapon and obey all commands there is needed only occasional drill to brush up those who have forgotten. Marches and battle maneuvers are what is needed.

The technical training of the soldier is not the most difficult. It is necessary for him to know how to use and take care of his weapon; to know how to move to the right and to the left, forward, to the rear, at command, to charge and to march with full pack. But this does not make the soldier. The Vendeans, who knew little of this, were tough soldiers.

It is absolutely necessary to change the instruction, to reduce it to the necessary minimum and to cut out all the superfluities with which peacetime laborers overload it each year. To know the essential well is better than having some knowledge of a lot of things, many of them useless. Teach this the first year, that the second, but the essential from the beginning! Also instruction should be simple to avoid the mental fatigue of long drills that disgust everybody.

Here is a significant sentence in Colonel Borbstaed's enumeration of the reasons for Prussian victory over the Austrians in 1866, "It was ... because each man, being trained, knew how to act promptly and confidently in all phases of battle." This is a fact.

To be held in a building, at every minute of the day to have every movement, every att.i.tude under a not too intelligent surveillance is indeed to be harried. This incessant surveillance weakens the morale of both the watched and the watcher. What is the reason for this incessant surveillance which has long since exceeded s.h.i.+pboard surveillance? Was not that strict enough?

3. Material and Moral Effect

The effect of an army, of one organization on another, is at the same time material and moral. The material effect of an organization is in its power to destroy, the moral effect in the fear that it inspires.

In battle, two moral forces, even more than two material forces, are in conflict. The stronger conquers. The victor has often lost by fire more than the vanquished. Moral effect does not come entirely from destructive power, real and effective as it may be. It comes, above all, from its presumed, threatening power, present in the form of reserves threatening to renew the battle, of troops that appear on the flank, even of a determined frontal attack.

Material effect is greater as instruments are better (weapons, mounts, etc.), as the men know better how to use them, and as the men are more numerous and stronger, so that in case of success they can carry on longer.

With equal or even inferior power of destruction he will win who has the resolution to advance, who by his formations and maneuvers can continually threaten his adversary with a new phase of material action, who, in a word has the moral ascendancy. Moral effect inspires fear. Fear must be changed to terror in order to vanquish.

When confidence is placed in superiority of material means, valuable as they are against an enemy at a distance, it may be betrayed by the actions of the enemy. If he closes with you in spite of your superiority in means of destruction, the morale of the enemy mounts with the loss of your confidence. His morale dominates yours. You flee. Entrenched troops give way in this manner.