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the troops can gain a victory, as was the case during a great part of the period of the modern Art of War,
THEN THE BREAKING UP OF THIS FORMATION is the decision. A beaten wing which is put out of
joint decides the fate of all that was connected with it. If as was the case at another time the essence of the
defence consists in an intimate alliance of the Army with the ground on which it fights and its obstacles, so
that Army and position are only one, then the CONQUEST of AN ESSENTIAL POINT in this position is the
decision. It is said the key of the position is lost, it cannot therefore be defended any further; the battle cannot
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be continued. In both cases the beaten Armies are very much like the broken strings of an instrument which
cannot do their work.
That geometrical as well as this geographical principle which had a tendency to place an Army in a state of
crystallising tension which did not allow of the available powers being made use of up to the last man, have
at least so far lost their influence that they no longer predominate. Armies are still led into battle in a certain
order, but that order is no longer of decisive importance; obstacles of ground are also still turned to account to
strengthen a position, but they are no longer the only support.
We attempted in the second chapter of this book to take a general view of the nature of the modern battle.
According to our conception of it, the order of battle is only a disposition of the forces suitable to the
convenient use of them, and the course of the battle a mutual slow wearing away of these forces upon one
another, to see which will have soonest exhausted his adversary.
The resolution therefore to give up the fight arises, in a battle more than in any other combat, from the
relation of the fresh reserves remaining available; for only these still retain all their moral vigour, and the
cinders of the battered, knocked-about battalions, already burnt out in the destroying element, must not be
placed on a level with them; also lost ground as we have elsewhere said, is a standard of lost moral force; it
therefore comes also into account, but more as a sign of loss suffered than for the loss itself, and the number
of fresh reserves is always the chief point to be looked at by both Commanders.
In general, an action inclines in one direction from the very commencement, but in a manner little observable.
This direction is also frequently given in a very decided manner by the arrangements which have been made
previously, and then it shows a want of discernment in that General who commences battle under these
unfavourable circumstances without being aware of them. Even when this does not occur it lies in the nature
of things that the course of a battle resembles rather a slow disturbance of equilibrium which commences
soon, but as we have said almost imperceptibly at first, and then with each moment of time becomes stronger
and more visible, than an oscillating to and fro, as those who are misled by mendacious descriptions usually
suppose.
But whether it happens that the balance is for a long time little disturbed, or that even after it has been lost on
one side it rights itself again, and is then lost on the other side, it is certain at all events that in most instances
the defeated General foresees his fate long before he retreats, and that cases in which some critical event acts
with unexpected force upon the course of the whole have their existence mostly in the colouring with which
every one depicts his lost battle.
We can only here appeal to the decision of unprejudiced men of experience, who will, we are sure, assent to
what we have said, and answer for us to such of our readers as do not know War from their own experience.
To develop the necessity of this course from the nature of the thing would lead us too far into the province of
tactics, to which this branch of the subject belongs; we are here only concerned with its results.
If we say that the defeated General foresees the unfavourable result usually some time before he makes up his
mind to give up the battle, we admit that there are also instances to the contrary, because otherwise we should
maintain a proposition contradictory in itself. If at the moment of each decisive tendency of a battle it should
be considered as lost, then also no further forces should be used to give it a turn, and consequently this
decisive tendency could not precede the retreat by any length of time. Certainly there are instances of battles
which after having taken a decided turn to one side have still ended in favour of the other; but they are rare,
not usual; these exceptional cases, however, are reckoned upon by every General against whom fortune
declares itself, and he must reckon upon them as long as there remains a possibility of a turn of fortune. He
hopes by stronger efforts, by raising the remaining moral forces, by surpassing himself, or also by some
fortunate chance that the next moment will bring a change, and pursues this as far as his courage and his
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judgment can agree. We shall have something more to say on this subject, but before that we must show what
are the signs of the scales turning.
The result of the whole combat consists in the sum total of the results of all partial combats; but these results
of separate combats are settled by different considerations.
First by the pure moral power in the mind of the leading officers. If a General of Division has seen his
battalions forced to succumb, it will have an influence on his demeanour and his reports, and these again will
have an influence on the measures of the Commander-in-Chief; therefore even those unsuccessful partial
combats which to all appearance are retrieved, are not lost in their results, and the impressions from them
sum themselves up in the mind of the Commander without much trouble, and even against his will.
Secondly, by the quicker melting away of our troops, which can be easily estimated in the slow and
relatively[*] little tumultuary course of our battles.
[*] Relatively, that is say to the shock of former days.
Thirdly, by lost ground.
All these things serve for the eye of the General as a compass to tell the course of the battle in which he is
embarked. If whole batteries have been lost and none of the enemy's taken; if battalions have been
overthrown by the enemy's cavalry, whilst those of the enemy everywhere present impenetrable masses; if the
line of fire from his order of battle wavers involuntarily from one point to another; if fruitless efforts have
been made to gain certain points, and the assaulting battalions each, time been scattered by well-directed
volleys of grape and case;--if our artillery begins to reply feebly to that of the enemy--if the battalions
under fire diminish unusually, fast, because with the wounded crowds of unwounded men go to the rear;--if
single Divisions have been cut off and made prisoners through the disruption of the plan of the battle;--if the
line of retreat begins to be endangered: the Commander may tell very well in which direction he is going with
his battle. The longer this direction continues, the more decided it becomes, so much the more difficult will
be the turning, so much the nearer the moment when he must give up the battle. We shall now make some
observations on this moment.
We have already said more than once that the final decision is ruled mostly by the relative number of the
fresh reserves remaining at the last; that Commander who sees his adversary is decidedly superior to him in
this respect makes up his mind to retreat. It is the characteristic of modern battles that all mischances and [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]