Tactics

Frederick now saw that artillery was the superior arm, and proved it at Rossbach (q.v.) and at Leu then (q.v.) in 1757. In these two battles the demoralization of the enemy was handed over from the infantry to the gunner. Not only did Frederick realize that artillery should prepare the in fantry attack, but that it should search out the enemy where the terrain concealed him, conse quently he increased his howitz ers to one-third of his total guns, and massing them brought them against the defender's flank. Leuthen is probably the finest example of the Frederician tac tics. The Austrians, less well drilled, deployed, but he marched straight forward deploying his advanced guard only. Then wheel ing the main body to the right he placed it at right angles to the enemy's left and deployed it in echelon in oblique order. The Austrians were fixed, since they were unable to manoeuvre. On their left flank, now in confusion through attempting to form a new front, Frederick converged the fire of all his guns. Under this fire his infantry advanced to the assault, and his cavalry manoeuvred on the rear of the enemy. At Torgau (q.v.) in 176o, one of his most daring battles, he separated his army, and whilst Zieten and his cavalry held the enemy's front, the bulk of his army took the Austrians completely in reverse.

Such were his battles, classical actions drawn from the study of classical history, for Leuthen was modelled on Leuctra (q.v.). In brief, his system is expressed in his favourite maxim—"To bring one's own strength against the enemy's weakness." Like Alexander he refused one wing and assaulted with the other, the refused wing acting as a reserve to that part of the line not used for the shock. The assaulting wing consisted of an advanced guard, an artillery mass, an infantry mass and a cavalry mass. When the enemy stood in the open his guns smote them, and when he sought shelter by ground his howitzers pounded him to pieces.

Rise of Light Infantry.

As a gunner Frederick stands supreme, and further, he knew well the value of the cavalry charge and the infantry assault, but he never seems to have grasped the value of a well-trained light infantry for protective duties, and for preparing the act of distraction, for only towards the end of his reign did he raise a few battalions of fusiliers. In spite of this neglect, the times demanded a change towards infan try flexibility. Folard had advocated it, Saxe had proved it at Lauffeld (1747), Henry Lloyd wrote about it in his "History of the Seven Years War," and so had Guibert, the most far-sighted tactician of his day in his "General Essay on Tactics" (1751). In 1702 the French had raised several "Compagnies Franches" under the duc de Bellisle, and in 1725 the English raised the Black Watch, a form of irregular police "for the protection of the country against robbers." It was, however, during the Seven Years War that the new infantry order took form. In Europe Moratz, Trenk, Nadasty and Frankini raised bands of Croats, Pandours and other ruffians who fought as independent riflemen, and in America, Bouquet, Rogers, Howe and Montgomery demonstrated their extreme value when well led and trained against the red Indians. After this war, all these lessons were lost sight of. The

glamour of Frederick's great battles blinded the military eye; soldiers sought his secret in his drill and not in his ideas, and pre pared for themselves a rude awakening in the wars of the Ameri can Rebellion and the French Revolution.

Whilst backwoodsmen and redskins were picking off the British red-coats, and whilst Simcoe, Tarleton and Ferguson were striv ing their utmost to counter them by raising light infantry, the marechal de Broglie, in 1778, at the camp of Vaussieux carried out experiments in line and column, showing that the evolutions of the first were heavy and difficult, and of the second flexible and speedy. Mesnil Durand advocated massive columns, Guibert battalion columns. Then came the French Revolution, all tactical shibboleths were cast to the winds; cohesion disappeared, and man took to natural fighting, that is skirmishing, and though the Revolutionary armies, utterly lacking in discipline were frequently beaten, in 1794 an A.D.C. of the duke of York was compelled to acknowledge that "No mobbed fox was ever more put to it to make his escape than we were." Though in their first campaigns the French looked upon columns solely as reservoirs for skir mishers, it soon became apparent that skirmishers should be used for the act of distraction, and that columns should be used for the act of decision, artillery being employed to co-operate with the skirmishers. Thus was re-established the tactics of the successive employment of arms.

Napoleon.

Whilst in Austria and Prussia the art of drill was mistaken for the art of war, the greatest military genius of modern time, but certainly not the greatest tactician, emerged out of the chaos of the Revolution to astonish the world. As a grand tactician and a strategist Napoleon stands supreme, and it may be due to this that as a minor tactician he left much to be desired. Sometimes he broke his enemy's centre, as was the case at Rivoli (1797), Marengo (i800), Friedland (1807) and at Ligny (1815), but normally he preferred a flank, or, if possible, a rear attack, for he understood clearly that the rear was the decisive point. His grand tactics consisted in engaging as few troops as possible, using them up completely without reinforcing them, and meanwhile holding in hand his main body for the decisive blow, which when once delivered was normally followed by an annihilating cavalry pursuit. "It is by turning the enemy, by attacking his flank, that battles are won." So said Napoleon, and he always when possible attempted it, as at Castiglione (q.v.) in 1796, Ulm and Austerlitz (q.v.) in 1805, Jena (q.v.) in 1806, Eylau (q.v.) in 1807 and Wagram (q.v.) in 1809. If he did not succeed in a full attack on the flank, he contented himself with an outflanking movement. These are battles of intellect rather than of muscle in spite of their slaughter and destruction, yet had he paid more attention to minor tactics his battles would have been even more intellectual.