Besides, the companies thrown into this interval are a surprise for the enemy. That is something to be considered, as is the fact that so long as there is fighting at a halt, intervals in the skirmish lines are fit places for enemy bullets. Furthermore, these companies remain in the hands of their leaders. With the present method of reenforcing skirmishers—I am speaking of the practical method of the battlefield, not of theory—a company, starting from behind the skirmishers engaged, without a place in which to deploy, does not find anything better to do than to mingle with the skirmishers. Here it doubles the number of men, but in doing so brings disorder, prevents the control of the commanders and breaks up the regularly constituted groups. While the closing up of intervals to make places for new arrivals is good on the drill ground, or good before or after the combat, it never works during battle.

No prescribed interval will be kept exactly. It will open, it will close, following the fluctuations of the combat. But the onset, during which it can be kept, is not the moment of brisk combat; it is the moment of the engagement, of contact, consequently, of feeling out. It is essential that there remain space in which to advance. Suppose you are on a plain, for in a maneuver one starts from the flat terrain. In extending the new company it will reenforce the wings of the others, the men naturally supporting the flanks of their comrades. The individual intervals will lessen in order to make room for the new company. The company will always have a well determined central group, a rallying point for the others. If the interval has disappeared there is always time to employ the emergency method of doubling the ranks in front; but one must not forget, whatever the course taken, to preserve good order.

We cannot resist closing intervals between battalions; as if we were still in the times of the pikemen when, indeed, it was possible to pass through an interval! To-day, the fighting is done ten times farther away, and the intervals between battalions are not weak joints. They are covered by the fire of the skirmishers, as well covered by fire as the rest of the front, and invisible to the enemy.

Skirmishers and masses are the formations for action of poorly instructed French troops. With instruction and unity there would be skirmishers supported and formation in battalion columns at most.

Troops in close order can have only a moral effect, for the attack, or for a demonstration. If you want to produce a real effect, use musketry. For this it is necessary to form a single line. Formations have purely moral effect. Whoever counts on their material, effective action against reliable, cool troops, is mistaken and is defeated. Skirmishers alone do damage. Picked shots would do more if properly employed.

In attacking a position, start the charge at the latest possible moment, when the leader thinks he can reach the objective not all out of breath. Until then, it has been possible to march in rank, that is under the officers, the rank not being the mathematical line, but the grouping in the hands of the leader, under his eye. With the run comes confusion. Many stop, the fewer as the run is shorter. They lie down on the way and will rejoin only if the attack succeeds, if they join at all. If by running too long the men are obliged to stop in order to breathe and rest, the dash is broken, shattered. At the advance, very few will start. There are ten chances to one of seeing the attack fail, of turning it into a joke, with cries of "Forward with fixed bayonet," but none advancing, except some brave men who will be killed uselessly. The attack vanishes finally before the least demonstration of the foe. An unfortunate shout, a mere nothing, can destroy it.

Absolute rules are foolish, the conduct of every charge being an affair requiring tact. But so regulate by general rules the conduct of an infantry charge that those who commence it too far away can properly be accused of panic. And there is a way. Regulate it as the cavalry charge is regulated, and have a rearguard in each battalion of non-commissioned officers, of most reliable officers, in order to gather together, to follow close upon the charge, at a walk, and to collect all those who have lain down so as not to march or because they were out of breath. This rearguard might consist of a small platoon of picked shots, such as we need in each battalion. The charge ought to be made at a given distance, else it vanishes, evaporates. The leader who commences it too soon either has no head, or does not want to gain his objective.

The infantry of the line, as opposed to elite commands, should not be kept in support. The least firm, the most impressionable, are thus sent into the road stained with the blood of the strongest. We place them, after a moral anxiety of waiting, face to face with the terrible destruction and mutilation of modern weapons. If antiquity had need of solid troops as supports, we have a greater need of them. Death in ancient combat was not as horrible as in the modern battle where the flesh is mangled, slashed by artillery fire. In ancient combat, except in defeat, the wounded were few in number. This is the reply to those who wish to begin an action by chasseurs, zouaves, etc.

He, general or mere captain, who employs every one in the storming of a position can be sure of seeing it retaken by an organized counter-attack of four men and a corporal.

In order that we may have real supervision and responsibility in units from companies to brigades, the supporting troops ought to be of the same company, the same battalion, the same brigade, as the case may be. Each brigade ought to have its two lines, each battalion its skirmishers, etc.

The system of holding out a reserve as long as possible for independent action when the enemy has used his own, ought to be applied downwards. Each battalion should have its own, each regiment its own, firmly maintained.

There is more need than ever to-day, for protecting the supporting forces, the reserves. The power of destruction increases, the morale remains the same. The tests of morale, being more violent than previously, ought to be shorter, because the power of morale has not increased. The masses, reserves, the second, the first lines, should be protected and sheltered even more than the skirmishers.

Squares sometimes are broken by cavalry which pursues the skirmishers into the square. Instead of lying down, they rush blindly to their refuge which they render untenable and destroy. No square can hold out against determined troops.... But!

The infantry square is not a thing of mechanics, of mathematical reasoning; it is a thing of morale. A platoon in four ranks, two facing the front, two the rear, its flanks guarded by the extreme files that face to the flank, and conducted, supported by the non-commissioned officers placed in a fifth rank, in the interior of the rectangle, powerful in its compactness and its fire, cannot be dislodged by cavalry. However, this platoon will prefer to form a part of a large square, it will consider itself stronger, because of numbers, and indeed it will be, since the feeling of force pervades this whole force. This feeling is power in war.

People who calculate only according to the fire delivered, according to the destructive power of infantry, would have it fight deployed against cavalry. They do not consider that although supported and maintained, although such a formation seem to prevent flight, the very impetus of the charge, if led resolutely, will break the deployment before the shock arrives. It is clear that if the charge is badly conducted, whether the infantry be solid or not, it will never reach its objective. Why? Moral reasons and no others make the soldier in a square feel himself stronger than when in line. He feels himself watched from behind and has nowhere to flee.

3. Firing

It is easy to misuse breech-loading weapons, such as the rifle. The fashion to-day is to use small intrenchments, covering battalions. As old as powder. Such shelter is an excellent device on the condition, however, that behind it, a useful fire can be delivered.

Look at these two ranks crouched under the cover of a small trench. Follow the direction of the shots. Even note the trajectory shown by the burst of flame. You will be convinced that, under such conditions, even simple horizontal firing is a fiction. In a second, there will be wild firing on account of the noise, the crowding, the interference of the two ranks. Next everybody tries to get under the best possible cover. Good-by firing.

It is essential to save ammunition, to get all possible efficiency from the arm. Yet the official adoption of fire by rank insures relapsing into useless firing at random. Good shots are wasted, placed where it is impossible for them to fire well.

Since we have a weapon that fires six times more rapidly than the ancient weapon, why not profit by it to cover a given space with six times fewer riflemen than formerly? Riflemen placed at greater intervals, will be less bewildered, will see more clearly, will be better watched (which may seem strange to you), and will consequently deliver a better fire than formerly. Besides, they will expend six times less ammunition. That is the vital point. You must always have ammunition available, that is to say, troops which have not been engaged. Reserves must be held out. This is hard to manage perhaps. It is not so hard to manage, however, as fire by command.

What is the use of fire by rank? By command? It is impracticable against the enemy, except in extraordinary cases. Any attempt at supervision of it is a joke! File firing? The first rank can shoot horizontally, the only thing required; the second rank can fire only into the air. It is useless to fire with our bulky knapsacks interfering so that our men raise the elbow higher than the shoulder. Learn what the field pack can be from the English, Prussians, Austrians, etc.... Could the pack not be thicker and less wide? Have the first rank open; let the second be checkerwise; and let firing against cavalry be the only firing to be executed in line.

One line will be better than two, because it will not be hindered by the one behind it. One kind of fire is practicable and efficient, that of one rank. This is the fire of skirmishers in close formation.

The king's order of June 1st, 1776, reads (p. 28): "Experience in war having proved that three ranks fire standing, and the intention of his majesty being to prescribe only what can be executed in front of the enemy, he orders that in firing, the first man is never to put his knee on the ground, and that the three ranks fire standing at the same time." This same order includes instructions on target practice, etc.

Marshal de Gouvion-Saint Cyr says that conservatively one-fourth of the men who are wounded in an affair are put out of commission by the third rank. This estimate is not high enough if it concerns a unit composed of recruits like those who fought at Lutzen and Bautzen. The marshal mentions the astonishment of Napoleon when he saw the great number of men wounded in the hand and forearm. This astonishment of Napoleon's is singular. What ignorance in his marshals not to have explained such wounds! Chief Surgeon Larrey, by observation of the wounds, alone exonerated our soldiers of the accusation of self-inflicted wounds. The observation would have been made sooner, had the wounds heretofore been numerous. That they had not been can be explained only by the fact that while the young soldiers of 1813 kept instinctively close in ranks, up to that time the men must have spaced themselves instinctively, in order to be able to shoot. Or perhaps in 1813, these young men might have been allowed to fire a longer time in order to distract them and keep them in ranks, and not often allowed to act as skirmishers for fear of losing them. Whilst formerly, the fire by rank must have been much rarer and fire action must have given way almost entirely to the use of skirmishers.

Fire by command presupposes an impossible coolness. Had any troops ever possessed it they would have mowed down battalions as one mows down corn stalks. Yet it has been known for a long time, since Frederick, since before Frederick, since the first rifle. Let troops get the range calmly, let them take aim together so that no one disturbs or hinders the other. Have each one see clearly, then, at a signal, let them all fire at once. Who is going to stand against such people? But did they aim in those days? Not so accurately, possibly, but they knew how to shoot waist-high, to shoot at the feet. They knew how to do it. I do not say they did it. If they had done so, there would not have been any need of reminding them of it so often. Note Cromwell's favorite saying, "Aim at their shoe-laces;" that of the officers of the empire, "Aim at the height of the waist." Study of battles, of the expenditure of bullets, show us no such immediate terrible results. If such a means of destruction was so easy to obtain, why did not our illustrious forbears use it and recommend it to us? (Words of de Gouvion-Saint-Cyr.)

Security alone creates calmness under fire.

In minor operations of war, how many captains are capable of tranquilly commanding their fire and maneuvering with calmness?

Here is a singular thing. You hear fire by rank against cavalry seriously recommended in military lectures. Yet not a colonel, not a battalion commander, not a captain, requires this fire to be executed in maneuvers. It is always the soldier who forces the firing. He is ordered to shoot almost before he aims for fear he will shoot without command. Yet he ought to feel that when he is aiming, his finger on the trigger, his shot does not belong to him, but rather to the officer who ought to be able to let him aim for five minutes, if advisable, examining, correcting the positions, etc. He ought, when aiming, always be ready to fire upon the object designated, without ever knowing when it will please his commander to order him to fire.

Fire at command is not practicable in the face of the enemy. If it were, the perfection of its execution would depend on the coolness of the commander and the obedience of the soldier. The soldier is the more easily trained.

The Austrians had fire by command in Italy against cavalry. Did they use it? They fired before the command, an irregular fire, a fire by file, with defective results.

Fire by command is impossible. But why is firing by rank at will impossible, illusory, under the fire of the enemy? Because of the reasons already given and, for this reason: that closed ranks are incompatible with fire-arms, on account of the wounding caused by the latter in ranks. In closed ranks, the two lines touching elbows, a man who falls throws ten men into complete confusion. There is no room for those who drop and, however few fall, the resulting disorder immediately makes of the two ranks a series of small milling groups. If the troops are young, they become a disordered flock before any demonstration. (Caldiero, Duhesme.) If the troops have some steadiness, they of themselves will make space: they will try to make way for the bullets: they will scatter as skirmishers with small intervals. (Note the Grenadier Guards at Magenta.)[42]

With very open ranks, men a pace apart, whoever falls has room, he is noticed by a lesser number, he drags down no one in his fall. The moral impression on his comrades is less. Their courage is less impaired. Besides, with rapid fire everywhere, spaced ranks with no man in front of another, at least permit horizontal fire. Closed ranks permit it hardly in the first rank, whose ears are troubled by the shots from the men behind. When a man has to fire four or five shots a minute, one line is certainly more solid than two, because, while the firing is less by half, it is more than twice as likely to be horizontal fire as in the two-rank formation. Well-sustained fire, even with blank cartridges, would be sufficient to prevent a successful charge. With slow fire, two ranks alone were able to keep up a sufficiently continuous fusillade. With rapid fire, a single line delivers more shots than two with ancient weapons. Such fire, therefore, suffices as a fusillade.

Close ranks, while suitable for marching, do not lend themselves to firing at the halt. Marching, a man likes a comrade at his side. Firing, as if he felt the flesh attracting the lead, he prefers being relatively isolated, with space around him. Breech-loading rifles breed queer ideas. Generals are found who say that rapid firing will bring back fire at command, as if there ever were such a thing. They say it will bring back salvo firing, thus permitting clear vision. As if such a thing were possible! These men have not an atom of common sense.

It is singular to see a man like Guibert, with practical ideas on most things, give a long dissertation to demonstrate that the officers of his time were wrong in aiming at the middle of the body, that is, in firing low. He claims this is ridiculous to one who understands the trajectory of the rifle. These officers were right. They revived the recommendations of Cromwell, because they knew that in combat the soldier naturally fires too high because he does not aim, and because the shape of the rifle, when it is brought to the shoulder, tends to keep the muzzle higher than the breech. Whether that is the reason or something else, the fact is indisputable. It is said that in Prussian drills all the bullets hit the ground at fifty paces. With the arms of that time and the manner of fighting, results would have been magnificent in battle if the bullets had struck fifty paces before the enemy instead of passing over his head.

Yet at Mollwitz, where the Austrians had five thousand men disabled, the Prussians had over four thousand.

Firing with a horizontal sector, if the muzzle be heavy, is more deadly than firing with a vertical sector.

4. Marches. Camps. Night Attacks.

From the fact that infantry ought always to fight in thin formation, scattered, it does not follow that it ought to be kept in that order. Only in column is it possible to maintain the battle order. It is necessary to keep one's men in hand as long as possible, because once engaged, they no longer belong to you.

The disposition in closed mass is not a suitable marching formation, even in a battalion for a short distance. On account of heat, the closed column is intolerable, like an unventilated room. Formation with half-distances is better. (Why? Air, view, etc.)

Such a formation prevents ready entry of the column into battle in case of necessity or surprise. The half-divisions not in the first line are brought up, the arms at the order, and they can furnish either skirmishers or a reserve for the first line which has been deployed as skirmishers.

At Leuctra, Epaminondas diminished, by one-half, the depth of his men; he formed square phalanxes of fifty men to a side. He could have very well dispensed with it, for the Lacedaemonian right was at once thrown into disorder by its own cavalry which was placed in front of that wing. The superior cavalry of Epaminondas overran not only the cavalry but the infantry that was behind it. The infantry of Epaminondas, coming in the wake of his cavalry finished the work. Turning to the right, the left of Epaminondas then took in the flank the Lacedaemonian line. Menaced also in front by the approaching echelons of Epaminondas, this line became demoralized and took to flight. Perhaps this fifty by fifty formation was adopted in order to give, without maneuver, a front of fifty capable of acting in any direction. At Leuctra, it simply acted to the right and took the enemy in the flank and in reverse.

Thick woods are generally passed through in close column. There is never any opening up, with subsequent closing on the far side. The resulting formation is as confused as a flock of sheep.

In a march through mountains, difficult country, a bugler should be on the left, at the orders of an intelligent officer who indicates when the halt seems necessary for discipline in the line. The right responds and if the place has been judged correctly an orderly formation is maintained. Keep in ranks. If one man steps out, others follow. Do not permit men to leave ranks without requiring them to rejoin.

In the rear-guard it is always necessary to have pack mules in an emergency; without this precaution, considerable time may be lost. In certain difficult places time is thus lost every day.

In camp, organize your fatigue parties in advance; send them out in formation and escorted.

Definite and detailed orders ought to be given to the convoy, and the chief baggage-master ought to supervise it, which is rarely the case.

It is a mistake to furnish mules to officers and replace them in case of loss or sickness. The officer overloads the mule and the Government loses more thereby than is generally understood. Convoys are endless owing to overloaded mules and stragglers. If furnished money to buy a mule the officer uses it economically because it is his. If mules are individually furnished to officers instead of money, the officer will care for his beast for the same reason. But it is better to give money only, and the officer, if he is not well cared for on the march has no claim against the Government.

Always, always, take Draconian measures to prevent pillage from commencing. If it begins, it is difficult ever to stop it. A body of infantry is never left alone. There is no reason for calling officers of that arm inapt, when battalions although established in position are not absolutely on the same line, with absolutely equal intervals. Ten moves are made to achieve the exact alignment which the instructions on camp movements prescribe. Yet designating a guiding battalion might answer well enough and still be according to the regulations.

Why are not night attacks more employed to-day, at least on a grand scale? The great front which armies occupy renders their employment more difficult, and exacts of the troops an extreme aptitude in this kind of surprise tactics (found in the Arabs, Turcos, Spahis), or absolute reliability. There are some men whose knowledge of terrain is wonderful, with an unerring eye for distance, who can find their way through places at night which they have visited only in the day time. Utilizing such material for a system of guides it would be possible to move with certainty. These are simple means, rarely employed, for conducting a body of troops into position on the darkest night. There is, even, a means of assuring at night the fire of a gun upon a given point with as much precision as in plain day.



CHAPTER III

CAVALRY

1. Cavalry and Modern Appliances

They say that cavalry is obsolete; that it can be of no use in battles waged with the weapons of today. Is not infantry affected in the same way?

Examples drawn from the last two wars are not conclusive. In a siege, in a country which is cut off, one does not dare to commit the cavalry, and therefore takes from it its boldness, which is almost its only weapon.

The utility of cavalry has always been doubted. That is because its cost is high. It is little used, just because it does cost. The question of economy is vital in peace times. When we set a high value upon certain men, they are not slow to follow suit, and to guard themselves against being broken. Look at staff officers who are almost never broken (reduced), even when their general himself is.

With new weapons the role of cavalry has certainly changed less than any other, although it is the one which is most worried about. However, cavalry always has the same doctrine: Charge! To start with, cavalry action against cavalry is always the same. Also against infantry. Cavalry knows well enough today, as it has always known, that it can act only against infantry which has been broken. We must leave aside epic legends that are always false, whether they relate to cavalry or infantry. Infantry cannot say as much of its own action against infantry. In this respect there is a complete anarchy of ideas. There is no infantry doctrine.

With the power of modern weapons, which forces you to slow down if it does not stop you, the advance under fire becomes almost impossible. The advantage is with the defensive. This is so evident that only a madman could dispute it. What then is to be done? Halt, to shoot at random and cannonade at long range until ammunition is exhausted? Perhaps. But what is sure, is that such a state of affairs makes maneuver necessary. There is more need than ever for maneuver at a long distance in an attempt to force the enemy to shift, to quit his position. What maneuver is swifter than that of cavalry? Therein is its role.

The extreme perfection of weapons permits only individual action in combat, that is action by scattered forces. At the same time it permits the effective employment of mass action out of range, of maneuvers on the flank or in the rear of the enemy in force imposing enough to frighten him.

Can the cavalry maneuver on the battle field? Why not? It can maneuver rapidly, and above all beyond the range of infantry fire, if not of artillery fire. Maneuver being a threat, of great moral effect, the cavalry general who knows how to use it, can contribute largely to success. He arrests the enemy in movement, doubtful as to what the cavalry is going to attempt. He makes the enemy take some formation that keeps him under artillery fire for a while, above all that of light artillery if the general knows how to use it. He increases the enemy's demoralization and thus is able to rejoin his command.

Rifled cannon and accurate rifles do not change cavalry tactics at all. These weapons of precision, as the word precision indicates, are effective only when all battle conditions, all conditions of aiming, are ideal. If the necessary condition of suitable range is lacking, effect is lacking. Accuracy of fire at a distance is impossible against a troop in movement, and movement is the essence of cavalry action. Rifled weapons fire on them of course, but they fire on everybody.

In short, cavalry is in the same situation as anybody else.

What response is there to this argument? Since weapons have been improved, does not the infantryman have to march under fire to attack a position? Is the cavalryman not of the same flesh? Has he less heart than the infantryman? If one can march under fire, cannot the other gallop under it?

When the cavalryman cannot gallop under fire, the infantryman cannot march under it. Battles will consist of exchanges of rifle shots by concealed men, at long range. The battle will end only when the ammunition is exhausted.

The cavalryman gallops through danger, the infantryman walks. That is why, if he learns, as it is probable he will, to keep at the proper distance, the cavalryman will never see his battle role diminished by the perfection of long range fire. An infantryman will never succeed by himself. The cavalryman will threaten, create diversions, worry, scatter the enemy's fire, often even get to close quarters if he is properly supported. The infantryman will act as usual. But more than ever will he need the aid of cavalry in the attack. He who knows how to use his cavalry with audacity will inevitably be the victor. Even though the cavalryman offers a larger target, long range weapons will paralyze him no more than another.

The most probable effect of artillery of today, will be to increase the scattering in the infantry, and even in the cavalry. The latter can start in skirmisher formation at a distance and close in while advancing, near its objective. It will be more difficult to lead; but this is to the advantage of the Frenchman.

The result of improving the ballistics of the weapon, for the cavalry as for the infantry (there is no reason why it should be otherwise for the cavalry), will be that a man will flee at a greater distance from it, and nothing more.

Since the Empire, the opinion of European armies is that the cavalry has not given the results expected of it.

It has not given great results, for the reason that we and others lacked real cavalry generals. He is, it seems, a phenomenon that is produced only every thousand years, more rarely than a real general of infantry. To be a good general, whether of infantry or cavalry, is an infinitely rare thing, like the good in everything. The profession of a good infantry general is as difficult as, perhaps more difficult than, that of a good cavalry general. Both require calmness. It comes more easily to the cavalryman than to the foot soldier who is much more engaged. Both require a like precision, a judgment of the moral and physical forces of the soldier; and the morale of the infantryman, his constitution, is more tried than is the case with the horseman.

The cavalry general, of necessity, sees less clearly; his vision has its limits. Great cavalry generals are rare. Doubtless Seidlitz could not, in the face of the development of cannon and rifle, repeat his wonders. But there is always room for improvement. I believe there is much room for improvement.

We did not have under the Empire a great cavalry general who knew how to handle masses. The cavalry was used like a blind hammer that strikes heavily and not always accurately. It had immense losses. Like the Gauls, we have a little too much confidence in the "forward, forward, not so many methods." Methods do not hinder the forward movement. They prepare the effect and render it surer and at the same time less costly to the assailant. We have all the Gallic brutality. (Note Marignano, where the force of artillery and the possibility of a turning movement around a village was neglected). What rare things infantry and cavalry generals are!

A leader must combine resolute bravery and impetuosity with prudence and calmness; a difficult matter!

The broken terrain of European fields no longer permits, we are told, the operation of long lines, of great masses of cavalry. I do not regret it. I am struck more with the picturesque effect of these hurricanes of cavalry in the accounts of the Empire than with the results obtained. It does not seem to me that these results were in proportion to the apparent force of the effort and to the real grandeur of the sacrifices. And indeed, these enormous hammers (a usual figure), are hard to handle. They have not the sure direction of a weapon well in hand. If the blow is not true, recovery is impossible, etc. However, the terrain does not to-day permit the assembling of cavalry in great masses. This compelling reason for new methods renders any other reason superfluous.

Nevertheless, the other reasons given in the ministerial observations of 1868, on the cavalry service, seems to me excellent. The improvement of appliances, the extension of battle fields, the confidence to the infantry and the audacity to the artillery that the immediate support of the cavalry gives, demand that this arm be in every division in sufficient force for efficient action.

I, therefore, think it desirable for a cavalry regiment to be at the disposal of a general commanding a division. Whatever the experiences of instruction centers, they can not change in the least my conviction of the merit of this measure in the field.

2. Cavalry Against Cavalry

Cavalry action, more than that of infantry, is an affair of morale.

Let us study first the morale of the cavalry engagement in single combat. Two riders rush at each other. Are they going to direct their horses front against front? Their horses would collide, both would be forced to their feet, while running the chance of being crushed in the clash or in the fall of their mounts. Each one in the combat counts on his strength, on his skill, on the suppleness of his mount, on his personal courage; he does not want a blind encounter, and he is right. They halt face to face, abreast, to fight man to man; or each passes the other, thrusting with the sabre or lance; or each tries to wound the knee of the adversary and dismount him in this way. But as each is trying to strike the other, he thinks of keeping out of the way himself, he does not want a blind encounter that does away with the combat. The ancient battles, the cavalry engagements, the rare cavalry combats of our days, show us nothing else.

Discipline, while keeping the cavalrymen in the ranks, has not been able to change the instinct of the rider. No more than the isolated man is the rider in the line willing to meet the shock of a clash with the enemy. There is a terrible moral effect in a mass moving forward. If there is no way to escape to the right or to the left, men and horses will avoid the clash by stopping face to face. But only preeminently brave troops, equally seasoned in morale, alike well led and swept along, animated alike, will meet face to face. All these conditions are never found united on either side, so the thing is never seen. Forty-nine times out of fifty, one of the cavalry forces will hesitate, bolt, get into disorder, flee before the fixed purpose of the other. Three quarters of the time this will happen at a distance, before they can see each other's eyes. Often they will get closer. But always, always, the stop, the backward movement, the swerving of horses, the confusion, bring about fear or hesitation. They lessen the shock and turn it into instant flight. The resolute assailant does not have to slacken. He has not been able to overcome or turn the obstacles of horses not yet in flight, in this uproar of an impossible about face executed by routed troops, without being in disorder himself. But this disorder is that of victory, of the advance, and a good cavalry does not trouble itself about it. It rallies in advancing, while the vanquished one has fear at its heels.

On the whole, there are few losses. The engagement, if there is one, is an affair of a second. The proof is that in this action of cavalry against cavalry, the conquered alone loses men, and he loses generally few. The battle against infantry is alone the really deadly struggle. Like numbers of little chasseurs have routed heavy cuirassiers. How could they have done so if the others had not given way before their determination? The essential factor was, and always is, determination.

The cavalry's casualties are always much less than those of the infantry both from fire and from disease. Is it because the cavalry is the aristocratic arm? This explains why in long wars it improves much more than the infantry.

As there are few losses between cavalry and cavalry, so there is little fighting.

Hannibal's Numidians, like the Russian Cossacks, inspired a veritable terror by the incessant alarms they caused. They tired out without fighting and killed by surprise.

Why is the cavalry handled so badly?—It is true that infantry is not used better.—Because its role is one of movement, of morale, of morale and movement so united, that movement alone, often without a charge or shock action of any sort can drive the enemy into retreat, and, if followed closely, into rout. That is a result of the quickness of cavalry. One who knows how to make use of this quickness alone can obtain such results.

All writers on cavalry will tell you that the charge pushed home of two cavalry bodies and the shock at top speed do not exist. Always before the encounter, the weaker runs away, if there is not a face to face check. What becomes then of the MV squared? If this famous MV squared is an empty word, why then crush your horses under giants, forgetting that in the formula besides M there is V squared. In a charge, there is M, there is V squared, there is this and that. There is resolution, and I believe, nothing else that counts!

Cohesion and unity give force to the charge. Alignment is impossible at a fast gait where the most rapid pass the others. Only when the moral effect has been produced should the gait be increased to take advantage of it by falling upon an enemy already in disorder, in the act of fleeing. The cuirassiers charge at a trot. This calm steadiness frightens the enemy into an about face. Then they charge at his back, at a gallop.

They say that at Eckmuhl, for every French cuirassier down, fourteen Austrians were struck in the back. Was it because they had no back-plate? It is evident that it was because they offered their backs to the blows.

Jomini speaks of charges at a trot against cavalry at a gallop. He cites Lasalle who used the trot and who, seeing cavalry approach at a gallop, would say: "There are lost men." Jomini insists on the effect of shock. The trot permits that compactness which the gallop breaks up. That may be true. But the effect is moral above all. A troop at the gallop sees a massed squadron coming towards it at a trot. It is surprised at first at such coolness. The material impulse of the gallop is superior; but there are no intervals, no gaps through which to penetrate the line in order to avoid the shock, the shock that overcomes men and horses. These men must be very resolute, as their close ranks do not permit them to escape by about facing. If they move at such a steady gait, it is because their resolution is also firm and they do not feel the need of running away, of diverting themselves by the unchecked speed of the unrestrained gallop, etc. [43]

Galloping men do not reason these things out, but they know them instinctively. They understand that they have before them a moral impulse superior to theirs. They become uneasy, hesitate. Their hands instinctively turn their horses aside. There is no longer freedom in the attack at a gallop. Some go on to the end, but three-fourths have already tried to avoid the shock. There is complete disorder, demoralization, flight. Then begins the pursuit at a gallop by the men who attacked at the trot.

The charge at a trot exacts of leaders and men complete confidence and steadfastness. It is the experience of battle only that can give this temper to all. But this charge, depending on a moral effect, will not always succeed. It is a question of surprise. Xenophon [44] recommended, in his work on cavalry operations, the use of surprise, the use of the gallop when the trot is customary, and vice-versa. "Because," he says, "agreeable or terrible, the less a thing is foreseen, the more pleasure or fright does it cause. This is nowhere seen better than in war, where every surprise strikes terror even to the strongest."

As a general rule, the gallop is and should be necessary in the charge; it is the winning, intoxicating gait, for men and horses. It is taken up at such a distance as may be necessary to insure its success, whatever it may cost in men and horses. The regulations are correct in prescribing that the charge be started close up. If the troopers waited until the charge was ordered, they would always succeed. I say that strong men, moved by pride or fear, by taking up too soon the charge against a firm enemy, have caused more charges to fail than to succeed. Keeping men in hand until the command "charge," seizing the precise instant for this command, are both difficult. They exact of the energetic leader domination over his men and a keen eye, at a moment when three out of four men no longer see anything, so that good cavalry leaders, squadron leaders in general are very rare. Real charges are just as rare.

Actual shock no longer exists. The moral impulse of one of the adversaries nearly always upsets the other, perhaps far off, perhaps a little nearer. Were this "a little nearer," face to face, one of the two troops would be already defeated before the first saber cut and would disentangle itself for flight. With actual shock, all would be thrown into confusion. A real charge on the one part or the other would cause mutual extermination. In practice the victor scarcely loses any one.

Observation demonstrates that cavalry does not close with cavalry; its deadly combats are those against infantry alone.

Even if a cavalryman waits without flinching, his horse will wish to escape, to shrink before the collision. If man anticipates, so does the horse. Why did Frederick like to see his center closed in for the assault? As the best guarantee against the instincts of man and horse.

The cavalry of Frederick had ordinarily only insignificant losses: a result of determination.

The men want to be distracted from the advancing danger by movement. The cavalrymen who go at the enemy, if left to themselves, would start at a gallop, for fear of not arriving, or of arriving exhausted and material for carnage. The same is true of the Arabs. Note what happened in 1864 to the cavalry of General Martineau. The rapid move relieves anxiety. It is natural to wish to lessen it. But the leaders are there, whom experience, whom regulations order to go slowly, then to accelerate progressively, so as to arrive with the maximum of speed. The procedure should be the walk, then the trot, after that the gallop, then the charge. But it takes a trained eye to estimate distance and the character of the terrain, and, if the enemy approaches, to pick the point where one should meet him. The nearer one approaches, the greater among the troops is the question of morale. The necessity of arriving at the greatest speed is not alone a mechanical question, since indeed one never clashes, it is a moral necessity. It is necessary to seize the moment at which the uneasiness of one's men requires the intoxication of the headlong charging gallop. An instant too late, and a too great anxiety has taken the upper hand and caused the hands of the riders to act on the horses; the start is not free; a number hide by remaining behind. An instant too soon: before arrival the speed has slowed down; the animation, the intoxication of the run, fleeting things, are exhausted. Anxiety takes the upper hand again, the hands act instinctively, and even if the start were unhampered, the arrival is not.

Frederick and Seidlitz were content when they saw the center of the charging squadron three and four ranks deep. It was as if they understood that with this compact center, as the first lines could not escape to the right or left, they were forced to continue straight ahead.

In order to rush like battering-rams, even against infantry, men and horses ought to be watered and fresh (Ponsomby's cavalry at Waterloo). If there is ever contact between cavalry, the shock is so weakened by the hands of the men, the rearing of the horses, the swinging of heads, that both sides come to a halt.

Only the necessity for carrying along the man and the horse at the supreme moment, for distracting them, necessitates the full gallop before attacking the enemy, before having put him to flight.

Charges at the gallop of three or four kilometers, suppose horses of bronze.

Because morale is not studied and because historical accounts are taken too literally, each epoch complains that cavalry forces are no longer seen charging and fighting with the sword, that too much prudence dictates running away instead of clashing with the enemy.

These plaints have been made ever since the Empire, both by the allies, and by us. But this has always been true. Man was never invulnerable. The charging gait has almost always been the trot. Man does not change. Even the combats of cavalry against cavalry today are deadlier than they were in the lamented days of chivalry.

The retreat of the infantry is always more difficult than that of the cavalry; the latter is simple. A cavalry repulsed and coming back in disorder is a foreseen, an ordinary happening; it is going to rally at a distance. It often reappears with advantage. One can almost say, in view of experience, that such is its role. An infantry that is repelled, especially if the action has been a hot one and the cavalry rushes in, is often disorganized for the rest of the day.

Even authors who tell you that two squadrons never collide, tell you continually: "The force of cavalry is in the shock." In the terror of the shock, Yes. In the shock, No! It lies only in determination. It is a mental and not a mechanical condition.

Never give officers and men of the cavalry mathematical demonstrations of the charge. They are good only to shake confidence. Mathematical reasoning shows a mutual collapse that never takes place. Show them the truth. Lasalle with his always victorious charge at a trot guarded against similar reasonings, which might have demonstrated to him mathematically that a charge of cuirassiers at a trot ought to be routed by a charge of hussars at a gallop. He simply told them: "Go resolutely and be sure that you will never find a daredevil determined enough to come to grips with you." It is necessary to be a daredevil in order to go to the end. The Frenchman is one above all. Because he is a good trooper in battle, when his commanders themselves are daredevils he is the best in Europe. (Note the days of the Empire, the remarks of Wellington, a good judge). If moreover, his leaders use a little head work, that never harms anything. The formula of the cavalry is R (Resolution) and R, and always R, and R is greater than all the MV squared in the world.

There is this important element in the pursuit of cavalry by cavalry. The pursued cannot halt without delivering himself up to the pursuer. The pursuer can always see the pursued. If the latter halts and starts to face about the pursuer can fall upon him before he is faced, and take him by surprise. But the pursued does not know how many are pursuing him. If he alone halts two pursuers may rush on him, for they see ahead of them and they naturally attack whoever tries to face about. For with the about face danger again confronts them. The pursuit is often instigated by the fear that the enemy will turn. The material fact that once in flight all together cannot turn again without risking being surprised and overthrown, makes the flight continuous. Even the bravest flee, until sufficient distance between them and the enemy, or some other circumstances such as cover or supporting troops, permits of a rally and a return to the offensive. In this case the pursuit may turn into flight in its turn.

Cavalry is insistent on attacking on an equal front. Because, if with a broader front, the enemy gives way before it, his wings may attack it and make it the pursued instead of the pursuer. The moral effect of resolution is so great that cavalry, breaking and pursuing a more numerous cavalry, is never pursued by the enemy wings. However the idea that one may be taken in rear by forces whom one has left on the flanks in a position to do so, has such an effect that the resolution necessary for an attack under these circumstances is rare.

Why is it that Colonel A—— does not want a depth formation for cavalry, he who believes in pressure of the rear ranks on the first? It is because at heart he is convinced that only the first rank can act in a cavalry charge, and that this rank can receive no impression, no speeding up, from those behind it.

There is debate as to the advantage of one or two ranks for the cavalry. This again is a matter of morale. Leave liberty of choice, and under varying conditions of confidence and morale one or the other will be adopted. There are enough officers for either formation.

It is characteristic of cavalry to advance further than infantry and consequently it exposes its flanks more. It then needs more reserves to cover its flanks and rear than does infantry. It needs reserves to protect and to support the pursuers who are almost always pursued when they return. With cavalry even more than infantry victory belongs to the last reserves held intact. The one with the reserves is always the one who can take the offensive. Tie to that, and no one can stand before you.

With room to maneuver cavalry rallies quickly. In deep columns it cannot.

The engagement of cavalry lasts only a moment. It must be reformed immediately. With a roll call at each reforming, it gets out of hand less than the infantry, which, once engaged, has little respite. There should be a roll call for cavalry, and for infantry after an advance, at each lull. There should be roll calls at drill and in field maneuvers, not that they are necessary but in order to become habituated to them. Then the roll call will not be forgotten on the day of action, when very few think of what ought to be done.

In the confusion and speed of cavalry action, man escapes more easily from surveillance. In our battles his action is increasingly individual and rapid. The cavalryman should not be left too free; that would be dangerous. Frequently in action troops should be reformed and the roll called. It would be an error not to do so. There might be ten to twenty roll calls in a day. The officers, the soldiers, would then have a chance to demand an accounting from each man, and might demand it the next day.

Once in action, and that action lasts, the infantryman of today escapes from the control of his officers. This is due to the disorder inherent in battle, to deployment, to the absence of roll calls, which cannot be held in action. Control, then, can only be in the hands of his comrades. Of modern arms infantry is the one in which there is the greatest need for cohesion.

Cavalry always fights very poorly and very little. This has been true from antiquity, when the cavalryman was of a superior caste to the infantryman, and ought to have been braver.

Anybody advancing, cavalry or infantry, ought to scout and reconnoiter as soon as possible the terrain on which it acts. Conde forgot this at Neerwinden. The 55th forgot it at Solferino. [45] Everybody forgets it. And from the failure to use skirmishers and scouts, come mistakes and disasters.

The cavalry has a rifle for exceptional use. Look out that this exception does not become the rule. Such a tendency has been seen. At the battle of Sicka, the first clash was marred by the lack of dash on the part of a regiment of Chasseurs d'Afrique, which after being sent off at the gallop, halted to shoot. At the second clash General Bugeaud charged at their head to show them how to charge.

A young Colonel of light cavalry, asked carbines for his cavalry. "Why? So that if I want to reconnoiter a village I can sound it from a distance of seven or eight hundred meters without losing anybody." What can you say to a man advancing such ideas? Certainly the carbine makes everybody lose common sense.

The work of light cavalry makes it inevitable that they be captured sometimes. It is impossible to get news of the enemy without approaching him. If one man escapes in a patrol, that is enough. If no one comes back, even that fact is instructive. The cavalry is a priceless object that no leader wants to break. However it is only by breaking it that results can be obtained.

Some authors think of using cavalry as skirmishers, mounted or dismounted. I suppose they advance holding the horse by the bridle? This appears to be to be an absurdity. If the cavalryman fires he will not charge. The African incident cited proves that. It would be better to give the cavalryman two pistols than a carbine.

The Americans in their vast country where there is unlimited room, used cavalry wisely in sending it off on distant forays to cut communications, make levies, etc. What their cavalry did as an arm in battle is unknown. The cavalry raids in the American war were part of a war directed against wealth, against public works, against resources. It was war of destruction of riches, not of men. The raiding cavalry had few losses, and inflicted few losses. The cavalry is always the aristocratic arm which loses very lightly, even if it risks all. At least it has the air of risking all, which is something at any rate. It has to have daring and daring is not so common. But the merest infantry engagements in equal numbers costs more than the most brilliant cavalry raid.

3. Cavalry Against Infantry

Cavalry knows how to fight cavalry. But how it fights infantry not one cavalry officer in a thousand knows. Perhaps not one of them knows. Go to it then gaily, with general uncertainty!

A military man, a participant in our great wars, recommends as infallible against infantry in line the charge from the flank, horse following horse. He would have cavalry coming up on the enemy's left, pass along his front and change direction so as to use its arms to the right. This cavalryman is right. Such charges should give excellent results, the only deadly results. The cavalryman can only strike to his right, and in this way each one strikes. Against ancient infantry such charges would have been as valuable as against modern infantry. This officer saw with his own eyes excellent examples of this attack in the wars of the Empire. I do not doubt either the facts he cites or the deductions he makes. But for such charges there must be officers who inspire absolute confidence in their men and dependable and experienced soldiers. There is necessary, in short, an excellent cavalry, seasoned by long wars, and officers and men of very firm resolution. So it is not astonishing that examples of this mode of action are rare. They always will be. They always require a head for the charge, an isolated head, and when he is actually about to strike, he will fall back into the formation. It seems to him that lost in the mass he risks less than when alone. Everybody is willing to charge, but only if all charge together. It is a case of belling the cat.

The attack in column on infantry has a greater moral action than the charge in line. If the first and second squadrons are repulsed, but the infantry sees a third charging through the dust, it will say "When is this going to stop?" And it will be shaken.

An extract from Folard: "Only a capable officer is needed to get the best results from a cavalry which has confidence in its movement, which is known to be good and vigorous, and also is equipped with excellent weapons. Such cavalry will break the strongest battalions, if its leader has sense enough to know its power and courage enough to use this power."

Breaking is not enough, and is a feat that costs more than it is worth if the whole battalion is not killed or taken prisoner, or at least if the cavalry is not immediately followed by other troops, charged with this task.

At Waterloo our cavalry was exhausted fruitlessly, because it acted without artillery or infantry support.

At Krasno, August 14, 1812, Murat, at the head of his cavalry could not break an isolated body of ten thousand Russian infantry which continually held him off by its fire, and retired tranquilly across the plain.

The 72nd was upset by cavalry at Solferino.

From ancient days the lone infantryman has always had the advantage over the lone cavalryman. There is no shadow of a doubt about this in ancient narrations. The cavalryman only fought the cavalryman. He threatened, harassed, troubled the infantryman in the rear, but he did not fight him. He slaughtered him when put to flight by other infantry, or at least he scattered him and the light infantry slaughtered him.

Cavalry is a terrible weapon in the hands of one who knows how to use it. Who can say that Epaminondas could have defeated the Spartans twice without his Thessalonian cavalry.

Eventually rifle and artillery fire deafen the soldier; fatigue overpowers him; he becomes inert; he hears commands no longer. If cavalry unexpectedly appears, he is lost. Cavalry conquers merely by its appearance. (Bismarck or Decker).

Modern cavalry, like ancient cavalry, has a real effect only on troops already broken, on infantry engaged with infantry, on cavalry disorganized by artillery fire or by a frontal demonstration. But against such troops its action is decisive. In such cases its action is certain and gives enormous results. You might fight all day and lose ten thousand men, the enemy might lose as many, but if your cavalry pursues him, it will take thirty thousand prisoners. Its role is less knightly than its reputation and appearance, less so than the role of infantry. It always loses much less than infantry. Its greatest effect is the effect of surprise, and it is thereby that it gets such astonishing results.

What formation should infantry, armed with modern weapons, take to guard against flank attacks by cavalry? If one fires four times as fast, if the fire is better sustained, one needs only a quarter as many men to guard a point against cavalry. Protection might be secured by using small groups, placed the range of a rifle shot apart and flanking each other, left on the flank of the advance. But they must be dependable troops, who will not be worried by what goes on behind them.

4. Armor and Armament

An armored cavalry is clearly required for moral reasons.

Note this with reference to the influence of cuirassiers (armored cavalrymen) on morale. At the battle of Renty, in 1554, Tavannes, a marshal, had with him his company armored in steel. It was the first time that such armor had been seen. Supported by some hundreds of fugitives who had rallied, he threw himself at the head of his company, on a column of two thousand German cavalry who had just thrown both infantry and cavalry into disorder. He chose his time so well that he broke and carried away these two thousand Germans, who fell back and broke the twelve hundred light horsemen who were supporting them. There followed a general flight, and the battle was won.

General Renard says "The decadence of cavalry caused the disappearance of their square formations in battle, which were characteristic in the seventeenth century." It was not the decadence of the cavalry but the abandonment of the cuirass and the perfecting of the infantry weapon to give more rapid fire. When cuirassiers break through they serve as examples, and emulation extends to others, who another time try to break through as they did.

Why cuirassiers? Because they alone, in all history, have charged and do charge to the end.

To charge to the end the cuirassiers need only half the courage of the dragoons, as their armor raises their morale one half. But since the cuirassiers have as much natural courage as the dragoons, for they are all the same men, it is proper to count the more on their action. Shall we have only one kind of cavalry? Which? If all our cavalry could wear the cuirass and at the same time do the fatiguing work of light cavalry, if all our horses could in addition carry the cuirass through such work, I say that there should be only cuirassiers. But I do not understand why the morale given by the cuirass should be lightly done away with, merely to have one cavalry without the cuirass.

A cavalryman armored completely and his horse partially, can charge only at a trot.

On the appearance of fire arms, cavalry, according to General Ambert, an author of the past, covered itself with masses of armor resembling anvils rather than with cuirasses. It was at that time the essential arm. Later as infantry progressed the tactics changed, it needed more mobility. Permanent armies began to be organized by the State. The State thought less of the skin of the individual than of economy and mobility and almost did away with cuirassiers. The cuirass has always given, and today more than ever it will give, confidence to the cavalryman. Courage, dash, and speed have a value beyond that of mere mass. I leave aside mathematical discussions which seem to me to have nothing in common with battle conditions. I would pick to wear the cuirass the best men in the army, big chested, red-blooded, strong limbed, the foot chasseurs. I would organize a regiment of light cuirassiers for each of our divisions. Men and horses, such a cavalry would be much more robust and active than our present cuirassiers. If our armored cavalry is worth more than any other arm by its dash in battle, this cavalry would be worth twice as much. But how would these men of small stature get into the saddle? To this serious objection I answer, "They will arrange it." And this objection, which I do not admit, is the only one that can be made against the organization of a light armored cavalry, an organization that is made imperative by the improvement in weapons. The remainder of those chasseur battalions which furnish cuirassiers, should return to the infantry, which has long demanded them, and hussars and dragoons, dismounted in the necessary number will also be welcomed by the infantry.

As for the thrust, the thrust is deadlier than the cut. You do not have to worry about lifting your arm; you thrust. But it is necessary that the cavalryman be convinced that to parry a vertical cut is folly. This can be done by his officers, by those who have had experience, if there are any such in peace times. This is not easy. But in this respect, as in all others, the advantage lies with the brave. A cavalry charge is a matter of morale above all. It is identical in its methods, its effects, with the infantry charge. All the conditions to be fulfilled in the charge (walk, trot, gallop, charge, etc.) have a reason bearing on morale. These reasons have already been touched on.

Roman discipline and character demand tenacity. The hardening of the men to fatigue, and a good organization, giving mutual support, produced that tenacity, against which the bravest could not stand. The exhausting method of powerful strokes used by the Gauls could not last long against the skillful, terrible and less fatiguing method of fighting by the thrust.

The Sikh cavalrymen of M. Nolan armed with dragoon sabers sharpened by themselves, liked the cut. They knew nothing about methods of swordsmanship; they did not practice. They said "A good saber and a willingness to use it are enough." True, True!

There is always discussion as to the lance or the saber. The lance requires skillful vigorous cavalrymen, good horsemen, very well drilled, very adroit, for the use of the lance is more difficult than that of the straight sword, especially if the sword is not too heavy. Is not this an answer to the question? No matter what is done, no matter what methods are adopted, it must always be remembered that our recruits in war time are sent into squadrons as into battalions, with a hasty and incomplete training. If you give them lances, most of them will just have sticks in their hands, while a straight sword at the end of a strong arm is at the same time simple and terrible. A short trident spear, with three short points just long enough to kill but not only enough to go through the body, would remain in the body of the man and carry him along. It would recoil on the cavalryman who delivered the blow, he would be upset by the blow himself. But the dragoon must be supported by the saddle, and as he had kept hold of the shaft he would be able to disengage the fork which had pierced the body some six inches. No cavalry of equal morale could stand against a cavalry armed with such forked spears.

As between forks and lances, the fork would replace the lance. That is, of course, for beginners in mounted fencing. But the fork! It would be ridiculous, not military!

With the lance one always figures without the horse, whose slightest movement diverts the lance so much. The lance is a weapon frightful even to the mounted man who uses it properly. If he sticks an enemy at the gallop, he is dismounted, torn off by the arm attached to the lance which remains in the body of his enemy.

Cavalry officers and others who seek examples in "Victories and Conquests," in official reports, in "Bazancourt" are too naive. It is hard to get at the truth. In war, in all things, we take the last example which we have witnessed. And now we want lances, which we do not know how to use, which frighten the cavalryman himself and pluck him from the saddle if he sticks anybody. We want no more cuirasses; we want this and that. We forget that the last example gives only a restricted number of instances relating to the matter in question.

It appears, according to Xenophon, that it was not easy to throw the dart from horseback. He constantly recommends obtaining as many men as possible who know how to throw the dart. He recommends leaning well back to avoid falling from the horse in the charge. In reading Xenophon it is evident that there was much falling from the horse.

It appears that in battle there is as great difficulty in handling the saber as in handling the bayonet. Another difficulty for the cavalryman lies in the handling of the musket. This is seen in the handling of the regulation weapon of the Spahis. There is only one important thing for the cavalryman, to be well seated. Men should be on horseback for hours at a time, every day, from their arrival in the organization. If the selection of those who know something about horses was not neglected in the draft, and if such men were, made cavalrymen, the practical training of the greater number would be much more rapidly concluded. I do not speak of the routine of the stable. Between mounted drills, foot drills might be gone through with in a snappy, free fashion, without rigidity, with daily increasing speed. Such drills would instruct cavalrymen more rapidly than the restricted method employed.

A dragoon horse carries in campaign with one day's food three hundred and eight pounds, without food or forage two hundred and seventy seven pounds. How can such horses carry this and have speed?

Seek the end always, not the means! Make a quarter of your cavalrymen into muleteers, a quarter of your horses into pack animals. You will thus secure, for the remaining three quarters unquestioned vigor. But how will you make up these pack trains? You will have plenty of wounded horses after a week of campaign.



CHAPTER IV

ARTILLERY

If artillery did not have a greater range than the rifle, we could not risk separating it far from its support, as it would have to wait until the enemy was but four or five hundred paces away to fire on him. But the more its range is increased, the further away it can be placed from its support.

The greater the range of artillery, the greater freedom of action from the different arms, which no longer have to be side by side to give mutual support.

The greater the range of artillery, the easier it is to concentrate its fire. Two batteries fifteen hundred meters apart can concentrate on a point twelve hundred meters in front of and between them. Before the range was so long they had to be close together, and the terrain did not always lend itself to this.

Furthermore, do not support a piece by placing infantry just behind or alongside of it, as is done three-quarters of the time at maneuvers. On the contrary hide the infantry to the right or left and far behind, cover it without worrying too much about distance and let the artillery call for help if they think that the piece is in danger of being lost. Why should infantry be placed too close, and consequently have its advance demoralized? This will throw away the greatest advantage that we Frenchmen have in defense, that of defending ourselves by advancing, with morale unimpaired, because we have not suffered heavy losses at a halt. There is always time to run to the defense of artillery. To increase the moral effect advance your supports in formation. Skirmishers can also be swiftly scattered among the batteries. These skirmishers, in the midst of the guns will not have to fear cavalry. Even if they are assailed by infantry it will not be such a terrible thing. The engagement will merely be one between skirmishers, and they will be able to take cover behind the pieces, firing against the enemy who is coming up in the open.

Guibert, I believe, held that artillery should not worry whether it was supported or not; that it should fire up to the last minute, and finally abandon the pieces, which supporting troops might or might not recapture. These supporting troops should not be too close. It is easier to defend pieces, to take them back even, by advancing on an enemy dispersed among them, than to defend them by standing fast after having participated in the losses suffered by the artillery under fire. (Note the English in Spain. The system of having artillery followed by infantry platoons is absurd.)

Artillery in battle has its men grouped around the pieces, stationary assembly points, broadly distributed, each one having its commander and its cannoneers, who are always the same. Thus there is in effect a roll call each time artillery is put into battery. Artillery carries its men with it; they cannot be lost nor can they hide. If the officer is brave, his men rarely desert him. Certainly, in all armies, it is in the artillery that the soldier can best perform his duty.

As General Leboeuf tells us, four batteries of artillery can be maneuvered, not more. That is all right. Here is the thing in a nut-shell. Four battalions is a big enough command for a colonel. A general has eight battalions. He gets orders, "General, do so and so." He orders, "Colonel, do so and so." So that without any maneuvers being laid down for more than four battalions, as many battalions as you like can be maneuvered and drilled.



CHAPTER V

COMMAND, GENERAL STAFF, AND ADMINISTRATION

There are plenty of carefree generals, who are never worried nor harassed. They do not bother about anything. They say, "I advance. Follow me." The result is an incredible disorder in the advance of columns. If ten raiders should fall on the column with a shout, this disorder would become a rout, a disaster. But these gentlemen never bother with such an eventuality. They are the great men of the day, until the moment that some disaster overwhelms them.

Cavalry is no more difficult to work with than infantry. According to some military authors, a cavalry general ought to have the wisdom of the phoenix. The perfect one should have. So should the perfect infantry general. Man on horseback and man afoot is always the same man. Only, the infantry general rarely has to account for the losses in his command, which may have been due to faulty or improper handling. The cavalry general does have to do this. (We shall lay aside the reasons why.) The infantry general has six chances for real battle to one for the cavalry general. These are the two reasons why, from the beginning of a war, more initiative is found in infantry than in cavalry generals. General Bugeaud might have made a better cavalry general than an infantry general. Why? Because he had immediate decision and firm resolution. There is more need for resolution in the infantryman than in the cavalryman. Why? There are many reasons, which are matters of opinion.

In short, the infantryman is always more tired than the cavalryman. His morale is therefore harder to keep up. I believe therefore that a good infantry general is rarer than one of cavalry. Also, the resolution of an infantry general does not have to last for a moment only; it has to endure for a long, long time.

Good artillery generals are common. They are less concerned with morale than with other things, such as material results. They have less need to bother about the morale of their troops, as combat discipline is always better with them than with the other arms. This is shown elsewhere.

Brigadier generals ought to be in their prescribed places. Very well, but the most of them are not and never have been. They were required to be in place at the battle of Moscow, but, as they were so ordered there, it is evident that they were not habitually in place. They are men; and their rank, it seems to them, ought to diminish rather than increase the risks they have to run. And, then, in actual engagement, where is their prescribed place?

When one occupies a high command there are many things which he does not see. The general-in-chief, even a division commander, can only escape this failing by great activity, moved by strict conscientiousness and aided by clairvoyance. This failing extends to those about him, to his heads of services. These men live well, sleep well; the same must be true of all! They have picked, well-conditioned horses; the roads are excellent! They are never sick; the doctors must be exaggerating sickness! They have attendants and doctors; everybody must be well looked after! Something happens which shows abominable negligence, common enough in war. With a good heart and a full belly they say, "But this is infamous, unheard of! It could not have happened! It is impossible! etc."

To-day there is a tendency, whose cause should be sought, on the part of superiors to infringe on the authority of inferiors. This is general. It goes very high and is furthered by the mania for command, inherent in the French character. It results in lessening the authority of subordinate officers in the minds of their soldiers. This is a grave matter, as only the firm authority and prestige of subordinate officers can maintain discipline. The tendency is to oppress subordinates; to want to impose on them, in all things, the views of the superior; not to admit of honest mistakes, and to reprove them as faults; to make everybody, even down to the private, feel that there is only one infallible authority. A colonel, for instance, sets himself up as the sole authority with judgment and intelligence. He thus takes all initiative from subordinate officers, and reduces them to a state of inertia, coming from their lack of confidence in themselves and from fear of being severely reproved. How many generals, before a regiment, think only of showing how much they know! They lessen the authority of the colonel. That is nothing to them. They have asserted their superiority, true or false; that is the essential. With cheeks puffed out, they leave, proud of having attacked discipline.

This firm hand which directs so many things is absent for a moment. All subordinate officers up to this moment have been held with too strong a hand, which has kept them in a position not natural to them. Immediately they are like a horse, always kept on a tight rein, whose rein is loosened or missing. They cannot in an instant recover that confidence in themselves, that has been painstakingly taken away from them without their wishing it. Thus, in such a moment conditions become unsatisfactory, the soldier very quickly feels that the hand that holds him vacillates.

"Ask much, in order to obtain a little," is a false saying, a source of errors, an attack on discipline. One ought to obtain what one asks. It is only necessary to be moderately reasonable and practical.

In following out this matter, one is astonished at the lack of foresight found in three out of four officers. Why? Is there anything so difficult about looking forward a little? Are three-quarters of the officers so stupid? No! It is because their egoism, generally frankly acknowledged, allow them to think only of who is looking at them. They think of their troops by chance perhaps, or because they have to. Their troops are never their preoccupation, consequently they do not think about them at all. A major in command of an organization in Mexico, on his first march in a hot country, started without full canteens, perhaps without canteens at all, without any provision for water, as he might march in France. No officer in his battalion called his attention to the omission, nor was more foresighted than he. In this first march, by an entire lack of foresight in everything, he lost, in dead, half of his command. Was he reduced? No! He was made a lieutenant-colonel.

Officers of the general staff learn to order, not to command. "Sir, I order," a popular phrase, applies to them.

The misfortune is not that there is a general staff, but that it has achieved command. For it always has commanded, in the name of its commanders it is true, and never obeyed, which is its duty. It commands in fact. So be it! But just the same it is not supposed to.

Is it the good quality of staffs or that of combatants that makes the strength of armies? If you want good fighting men, do everything to excite their ambition, to spare them, so that people of intelligence and with a future will not despise the line but will elect to serve in it. It is the line that gives you your high command, the line only, and very rarely the staff. The staff, however, dies infrequently, which is something. Do they say that military science can only be learned in the general staff schools? If you really want to learn to do your work, go to the line.

To-day, nobody knows anything unless he knows how to argue and chatter. A peasant knows nothing, he is a being unskilled even in cultivating the soil. But the agriculturist of the office is a farmer emeritus, etc. Is it then believed that there is ability only in the general staff? There is the assurance of the scholar there, of the pedagogue who has never practiced what he preaches. There is book learning, false learning when it treats of military matters. But knowledge of the real trade of a soldier, knowledge of what is possible, knowledge of blows given and received, all these are conspicuously absent.

Slowness of promotion in the general staff as compared to its rapidity in the line might make many men of intelligence, of head and heart, pass the general staff by and enter the line to make their own way. To be in the line would not then be a brevet of imbecility. But to-day when general staff officers rank the best of the line, the latter are discouraged and rather than submit to this situation, all who feel themselves fitted for advancement want to be on the general staff. So much the better? So much the worse. Selection is only warranted by battle.

How administrative deceits, in politics or elsewhere, falsify the conclusions drawn from a fact!

In the Crimea one hundred per cent. of the French operated upon succumbed, while only twenty-seven per cent. of the English operated upon died. That was attributed to the difference in temperament! The great cause of this discrepancy was the difference in care. Our newspapers followed the self-satisfied and rosy statements given out by our own supply department. They pictured our sick in the Crimea lying in beds and cared for by sisters of charity. The fact is that our soldiers never had sheets, nor mattresses, nor the necessary changes of clothes in the hospitals; that half, three-quarters, lay on mouldy straw, on the ground, under canvass. The fact is, that such were the conditions under which typhus claimed twenty-five to thirty thousand of our sick after the siege; that thousands of pieces of hospital equipment were offered by the English to our Quartermaster General, and that he refused them! Everybody ought to have known that he would! To accept such equipment was to acknowledge that he did not have it. And he ought to have had it. Indeed he did according to the newspapers and the Quartermaster reports. There were twenty-five beds per hospital so that it could be said, "We have beds!" Each hospital had at this time five hundred or more sick.

These people are annoyed if they are called hypocrites. While our soldiers were in hospitals, without anything, so to speak, the English had big, well-ventilated tents, cots, sheets, even night stands with urinals. And our men had not even a cup to drink from! Sick men were cared for in the English hospitals. They might have been in ours, before they died, which they almost always did.

It is true that we had the typhus and the English had not. That was because our men in tents had the same care as in our hospitals, and the English the same care as in their hospitals.

Read the war reports of supply departments and then go unexpectedly to verify them in the hospitals and storehouses. Have them verified by calling up and questioning the heads of departments, but question them conscientiously, without dictating the answers. In the Crimea, in May of the first year, we were no better off than the English who complained so much, Who has dared to say, however, that from the time they entered the hospital to the time that they left it, dead, evacuated, or cured, through fifteen or twenty days of cholera or typhus, our men lay on the same plank, in the same shoes, drawers, shirts and clothing that they brought in with them? They were in a state of living putrefaction that would by itself have killed well men! The newspapers chanted the praises of the admirable French administration. The second winter the English had no sick, a smaller percentage than in London. But to the eternal shame of the French command and administration we lost in peace time, twenty-five to thirty thousand of typhus and more than one thousand frozen to death. Nevertheless, it appeared that we had the most perfect administration in the world, and that our generals, no less than our administration, were full of devoted solicitude to provide all the needs of the soldier. That is an infamous lie, and is known as such, let us hope.

The Americans have given us a good example. The good citizens have gone themselves to see how their soldiers were treated and have provided for them themselves. When, in France, will good citizens lose faith in this best of administrations which is theirs? When will they, confident in themselves, do spontaneously, freely, what their administration cannot and never will be able to do?

The first thing disorganized in an army is the administration. The simplest foresight, the least signs even of order disappear in a retreat. (Note Russia-Vilna).

In the Crimea, and everywhere more or less, the doctor's visit was without benefit to the patient. It was made to keep up his spirits, but could not be followed by care, due to lack of personnel and material. After two or three hours of work, the doctor was exhausted.

In a sane country the field and permanent hospitals ought to be able to handle one-fifth of the strength at least. The hospital personnel of to-day should be doubled. It is quickly cut down, and it ought to have time, not only to visit the sick, but to care for them, feed them, dose and dress them, etc.



CHAPTER VI

SOCIAL AND MILITARY INSTITUTIONS. NATIONAL CHARACTERISTICS.

Man's admiration for the great spectacles of nature is the admiration for force. In the mountains it is mass, a force, that impresses him, strikes him, makes him admire. In the calm sea it is the mysterious and terrible force that he divines, that he feels in that enormous liquid mass; in the angry sea, force again. In the wind, in the storm, in the vast depth of the sky, it is still force that he admires.

All these things astounded man when he was young. He has become old, and he knows them. Astonishment has turned to admiration, but always it is the feeling of a formidable force which compels his admiration. This explains his admiration for the warrior.

The warrior is the ideal of the primitive man, of the savage, of the barbarian. The more people rise in moral civilization, the lower this ideal falls. But with the masses everywhere the warrior still is and for a long time will be the height of their ideals. This is because man loves to admire the force and bravery that are his own attributes. When that force and bravery find other means to assert themselves, or at least when the crowd is shown that war does not furnish the best examples of them, that there are truer and more exalted examples, this ideal will give way to a higher one.

Nations have an equal sovereignty based on their existence as states. They recognize no superior jurisdiction and call on force to decide their differences. Force decides. Whether or not might was right, the weaker bows to necessity until a more successful effort can be made. (Prud'homme). It is easy to understand Gregory VII's ideas on the subject.

In peace, armies are playthings in the hands of princes. If the princes do not know anything about them, which is usually the case, they disorganize them. If they understand them, like the Prince of Prussia, they make their armies strong for war.

The King of Prussia and the Prussian nobility, threatened by democracy, have had to change the passion for equality in their people into a passion for domination over foreign nations. This is easily done, when domination is crowned with success, for man, who is merely the friend of equality is the lover of domination. So that he is easily made to take the shadow for the substance. They have succeeded. They are forced to continue with their system. Otherwise their status as useful members of society would be questioned and they would perish as leaders in war. Peace spells death to a nobility. Consequently nobles do not desire it, and stir up rivalries among peoples, rivalries which alone can justify their existence as leaders in war, and consequently as leaders in peace. This is why the military spirit is dead in France. The past does not live again. In the spiritual as in the physical world, what is dead is dead. Death comes only with the exhaustion of the elements, the conditions which are necessary for life. For these reasons revolutionary wars continued into the war with Prussia. For these reasons if we had been victorious we would have found against us the countries dominated by nobilities, Austria, Russia, England. But with us vanquished, democracy takes up her work in all European countries, protected in the security which victory always gives to victors. This work is slower but surer than the rapid work of war, which, exalting rivalries, halts for a moment the work of democracy within the nations themselves. Democracy then takes up her work with less chance of being deterred by rivalry against us. Thus we are closer to the triumph of democracy than if we had been victors. French democracy rightfully desires to live, and she does not desire to do so at the expense of a sacrifice of national pride. Then, since she will still be surrounded for a long time by societies dominated by the military element, by the nobility, she must have a dependable army. And, as the military spirit is on the wane in France, it must be replaced by having noncommissioned officers and officers well paid. Good pay establishes position in a democracy, and to-day none turn to the army, because it is too poorly paid. Let us have well paid mercenaries. By giving good pay, good material can be secured, thanks to the old warrior strain in the race. This is the price that must be paid for security.

The soldier of our day is a merchant. So much of my flesh, of my blood, is worth so much. So much of my time, of my affections, etc. It is a noble trade, however, perhaps because man's blood is noble merchandise, the finest that can be dealt in.

M. Guizot says "Get rich!" That may seem cynical to prudes, but it is truly said. Those who deny the sentiment, and talk to-day so loftily, what do they advise? If not by words, then by example they counsel the same thing; and example is more contagious. Is not private wealth, wealth in general, the avowed ambition sought by all, democrats and others? Let us be rich, that is to say, let us be slaves of the needs that wealth creates.

The Invalides in France, the institutions for pensioners, are superb exhibits of pomp and ostentation. I wish that their founding had been based on ideas of justice and Christianity and not purely on military-political considerations. But the results are disastrous to morality. This collection of weaklings is a school of depravity, where the invalided soldier loses in vice his right to respect.

Some officers want to transform regiments into permanent schools for officers of all ranks, with a two-hour course each day in law, military art, etc. There is little taste for military life in France; such a procedure would lessen it. The leisure of army life attracts three out of four officers, laziness, if you like. But such is the fact. If you make an officer a school-boy all his life he will send his profession to the devil, if he can. And those who are able to do so, will in general be those who have received the best education. An army is an extraordinary thing, but since it is necessary, there should be no astonishment that extraordinary means must be taken to keep it up; such as offering in peace time little work and a great deal of leisure. An officer is a sort of aristocrat, and in France we have no finer ideal of aristocratic life than one of leisure. This is not a proof of the highest ideals, nor of firmness of character. But what is to be done about it?

From the fact that military spirit is lacking in our nation (and officers are with greater difficulty than ever recruited in France) it does not follow that we shall not have to engage in war. Perhaps the contrary is true.

It is not patriotic to say that the military spirit is dead in France? The truth is always patriotic. The military spirit died with the French nobility, perished because it had to perish, because it was exhausted, at the end of its life. That only dies which has no longer the sap of life, and can no longer live. If a thing is merely sick it can return to health. But who can say that of the French nobility? An aristocracy, a nobility that dies, dies always by its own fault; because it no longer performs its duties; because it fails in its task; because its functions are of no more value to the state; because there is no longer any reason for its existence in a society, whose final tendency is to suppress its functions.

After 1789 had threatened our patriotism, the natural desire for self-protection revived the military spirit in the nation and in the army. The Empire developed this movement, changed the defensive military spirit to the offensive, and used it with increasing effect up to 1814 or 1815. The military spirit of the July Restoration was a reminiscence, a relic of the Empire, a form of opposition to government by liberalism instead of democracy. It was really the spirit of opposition and not the military spirit, which is essentially conservative.

There is no military spirit in a democratic society, where there is no aristocracy, no military nobility. A democratic society is antagonistic to the military spirit.

The military spirit was unknown to the Romans. They made no distinction between military and civil duties. I think that the military air dates from the time that the profession of arms became a private profession, from the time of the bravos, the Italian condottieri, who were more terrifying to civilians than to the enemy. When the Romans said "cedant arma togae," they did not refer to civil officials and soldiers; the civil officials were then soldiers in their turn; professional soldiers did not exist. They meant "might gives way to right."

Machiavelli quotes a proverb, "War makes thieves and peace has them hanged" The Spaniards in Mexico, which has been in rebellion for forty years, are more or less thieves. They want to continue to ply the trade. Civil authority exists no longer with them, and they would look on obedience to such an authority as shameful. It is easy to understand the difficulty of organizing a peaceful government in such a country. Half the population would have to hang the other half. The other half does not want to be hanged.

We are a democratic society; we become less and less military. The Prussian, Russian, Austrian aristocracies which alone make the military spirit of those states, feel in our democratic society an example which threatens their existence, as nobility, as aristocracy. They are our enemies and will be until they are wiped, out, until the Russian, Austrian and Prussian states become democratic societies, like ours. It is a matter of time.

The Prussian aristocracy is young. It has not been degenerated by wealth, luxury and servility of the court. The Prussian court is not a court in the luxurious sense of the word. There is the danger.

Meanwhile Machiavellian doctrines not being forbidden to aristocracies, these people appeal to German Jingoism, to German patriotism, to all the passions which move one people who are jealous of another. All this is meant to hide under a patriotic exterior their concern for their own existence as an aristocracy, as a nobility.

The real menace of the day is czarism, stronger than the czars themselves, which calls for a crusade to drive back Russia and the uncultured Slav race.

It is time that we understood the lack of power in mob armies; that we recall to mind the first armies of the revolution that were saved from instant destruction only by the lack of vigor and decision in European cabinets and armies. Look at the examples of revolutionaries of all times, who have all to gain and cannot hope for mercy. Since Spartacus, have they not always been defeated? An army is not really strong unless it is developed from a social institution. Spartacus and his men were certainly terrible individual fighters. They were gladiators used to struggle and death. They were prisoners, barbarian slaves enraged by their loss of liberty, or escaped serfs, all men who could not hope for mercy. What more terrible fighters could be imagined? But discipline, leadership, all was improvised and could not have the firm discipline coming down from the centuries and drawn from the social institutions of the Romans. They were conquered. Time, a long time, is needed to give to leaders the habit of command and confidence in their authority—to the soldiers confidence in their leaders and in their fellows. It is not enough to order discipline. The officers must have the will to enforce it, and its vigorous enforcement must instill subordination in the soldiers. It must make them fear it more than they fear the enemy's blows.

How did Montluc fight, in an aristocratic society? Montluc shows us, tells us. He advanced in the van of the assault, but in bad places he pushed in front of him a soldier whose skin was not worth as much as was his. He had not the slightest doubt or shame about doing this. The soldier did not protest, the propriety of the act was so well established. But you, officers, try that in a democratic army, such as we have commenced to have, such as we shall later have!

In danger the officer is no better than the soldier. The soldier is willing enough to advance, but behind his officer. Also, his comrades' skin is no more precious than is his, they must advance too. This very real concern about equality in danger, which seeks equality only, brings on hesitation and not resolution. Some fools may break their heads in closing in, but the remainder will fire from a distance. Not that this will cause fewer losses, far from it.

Italy will never have a really firm army. The Italians are too civilized, too fine, too democratic in a certain sense of the word. The Spaniards are the same. This may cause laughter, but it is true. The French are indeed worthy sons of their fathers, the Gauls. War, the most solemn act in the life of a nation, the gravest of acts, is a light thing to them. The good Frenchman lets himself be carried away, inflamed by the most ridiculous feats of arms into the wildest enthusiasm. Moreover he interprets the word "honor" in a fashion all his own. An expedition is commenced without sufficient reason, and good Frenchmen, who do not know why the thing is done, disapprove. But presently blood is spilled. Good sense and justice dictate that this spilled blood should taint those responsible for an unjust enterprise. But jingoism says "French blood has been spilled: Honor is at stake!" And millions of gold, which is the unit of labor, millions of men, are sacrificed to a ridiculous high-sounding phrase.