Tactics

The amazing thing was that Napoleon never seems to have grasped how easily they could be defeated. Frederick had been equally ignorant of the solution at the opening of the Seven Years' War, but once the Austrians began to use ground as cover against fire, he at once increased the number of his howitzers, and literally blew them out of their positions. Had Napoleon realized the power of the howitzer, and had the third of his artillery been howitzers, there is little doubt that at Waterloo he would have been able to demoralize the main force of Wellington's army who were sheltered from his cannon balls and grape shot, and so have paved the way for the advance of his squadrons and infantry columns. It is one of those enigmas of tactics that with all his genius he could not see this very simple solution as old as the battle of Hastings (q.v.) and beyond.

The Influence of the Rifle.

The 5o years which followed the battle of Waterloo are tactically most instructive. Over 20 years of devastating war, of battles, sieges and naval actions, of attacks and retreats, and manoeuvres taught the armies of Europe noth ing, and from the military point of view Napoleon might as well have never been born. No sooner had the emperor been incarcer ated in St. Helena than the rigid school of war, the men of the hoplite mind, took over control. Nevertheless in spite of their ponderous ideas the industrial revolution swept on. Invention followed invention, and amongst these were two of supreme tacti cal importance, namely, the percussion cap invented in 1814, and the cylindro-conoidal bullet invented in The rifle had been long known, but hitherto all rifles and mus kets had been fired by a flint and steel, and in rainy weather frequently misfired. The percussion cap signed the death warrant of the cavalry charge, and the conoidal bullet revolutionized artillery tactics. In 1839 a percussion musket was issued to the British infantry, and in 1851 they were equipped with the Minie rifle, a weapon with an effective range of 1,000 yards. In 1815 cavalry, artillery and infantry were in close contact, and operated by the general in chief as easily as a platoon is to-day. The guns were frequently placed in front of the infantry, 'and the cavalry close behind them. All this was changed by the rifle. The cavalry can no longer attack infantry, unless completely broken. The guns have to retire well in rear of the infantry, and as the range of the rifle is increased so is the distance between them and the infantry they are supporting. Thus the old battle order, which in idea had changed but slightly since the days of Gustavus Adol phus, was completely thrown out of joint. To operate an army as Wellington did at Waterloo was impossible ; to render its sepa rated parts co-operative demanded intelligence and not merely a powerful voice. The Prussians seeing the difficulty attempted to overcome it by replacing the general by an army fashioned like a clock, which once wound up was expected to tick out victory.

The English maintained their fox-hunting generals, and the French, contemptuous of others, since they had produced one of the greatest geniuses in history, shrouded their ignorance in the glamour of his fame.

Tactics from 1849 to 1870.

The middle of the century ushered in a series of wars which lasted for 20 years. During this long period tactics underwent a profound change; the gun again and again asserted its superiority, yet the leaders of armies still maintained the supremacy of infantry. They could not see that as each campaign ended infantry had become more and more a supplement to artillery action. The battle of Temesvar,

in 1849, was but a repetition of Ocafia in 1809, for artillery not only accomplished the act of demoralization,' but brought both of these battles to a decisive issue. The war in the Crimea was largely an artillery war, mainly so on account of Sevastopol. True, the French massed their artillery as Napoleon had done, but between the British and the Russians the old and somewhat stale contest of line versus column was once again f ought out, because the Russians still believed in shock by weight of num bers, which never takes place, and the British in deployment in order to develop fire power which seems obvious, but which apparently is not so to a semi-oriental, since the Russians repeated their tactics in 1878.

In 1859 rifled guns were issued to the French army, and this same year Napoleon III., emulating his uncle, decided on a war against Austria in Italy. The Austrian infantry were the better armed, as the Lorenz muzzle-loader was superior to the French Minie rifle. To compensate for their inferior rifle the French made extensive use of skirmishers, the Austrians normally remain ing stationary. The broken nature of the ground favoured these tactics, as happened at Solferino (q.v.) in 1859. When Marshal Niel's firing line began to waver he brought up his reserves, and "the bayonet," as he writes in his report, apparently to please the emperor, "recovered everything that had been lost by the fire-fighting." His enemy, the Austrians, however, showed no in itiative. They believed in the methodical battle as recommended by the Germans, that is, a gradual nourishing of the fighting-line until the enemy's strength is used up; only then would they at tack him with their last reserves. What actually happened was that the nourishing of their firing line starved their reserves to death, so that when the decision was signalled the reserves had volatilized. The French learnt little from this war, and never troubled to reflect on the causes of their successes. The Austrians, however, learnt "that the employment of artillery en masse, when it is to take general part in the action, must be made from the very beginning, and the infantry attack must really be the one to bring about the decision." In 1859 the Austrian tactics were of a defensive nature, in 1866 they were diametrically opposite, that is they were offensive, and with these tactics they decisively defeated the Italians under La Marmora, at Custozza (q.v.) in 1866, though it should be re membered that their enemy had lost all power of taking the initiative. In Bohemia it was otherwise, for the solid masses of Austrians who, almost unprotected by skirmishers, attempted to rush the Prussians armed with the needle gun, were decimated. In the Prussian army, however, the employment of the arms in co-operation had been neglected. Their general staff had studied the French infantry tactics of 1859, but their artillery tactics had be no question that the cavalry of Zieten and Seydlitz were the most efficient since the days of Alexander. Though completely successful in his Silesian Wars (1740-42 and it is not until the Seven Years War (q.v.) (1756-63) that his genius was fully manifested. In the early battles of this war, the Austrians dispersed their guns along their entire front, and made all efforts on the part of the Prussians of no avail. At Lowositz (1756) Frederick's cavalry were repulsed by gun fire, and so also were his infantry at Prague (q.v.) in 1757 and Kolin (q.v.) in 1757.