The art of war is usually defined to consist of two elements, strategy and tactics. Of these, the former is essentially immutable, its prin ciples, few and simple, having remained un changed throughout the whole course of history. The only recent development in strategy is one, therefore, affecting not its principles, but the means of applying those principles. The em ployment of the railway, of the telegraph and of other means of communication has greatly increased the rapidity with which strategic com binations may now be carried out, and has added to the number possible within a given time and area. In general, then, strategy is not a measure of the changes occurring between any two given epochs, while tactics, on the contrary, responding sooner or later, if not instantane ously, to any new influence, does furnish such a measure. We shall here briefly consider the tactics of infantry from this point of view, because this arm is still the °queen of battles,") and the others have to conform to its possibil ities.
To clear the way, let us recollect that the tactics of infantry had remained substantially unchanged from the days of Gustavus Adolphus to those of Frederick the Great ; that the latter, by the use of lines in place of columns as a habitual formation, had increased the mobility, and, by the substitution of an iron for a wooden ramrod, the rate of fire, of his troops. As, however, the range of the musket was extremely limited, fire was opened at very short distance, and, independently of any system of tactics, the bayonet was, therefore, a weapon of great im portance. Indeed, it might happen on a rainy day that the bayonet was the only weapon avail able. As was but natural, Frederick's system, known as the °linear)) system of tactics, was copied by all other armies.
With the French Revolution came a change. Unquestionably inspired by our own Revolu tion, in which, for the first time, skirmishers ap peared on the field of battle, the French aban doning the precise linear system, substituted therefor small columns for manoeuvre and as sault, and deployed lines for firing. In man oeuvring, skirmishers covered the front, un masking it as each company arrived on the firing-line. We note at once that this employ ment of skirmishers is not the modern use, but, nevertheless, it marks the breaking of tradition. The French system, known as the perpendicular, was followed in all Napoleon's earlier cam paigns. In 1805 he prescribed that the normal formation of the division should be by °linked brigades," a disposition carrying with it the advantage of giving each brigade a separate objective. This principle is to-day fundamental in combat-tactics, even the company having its designated objective.
Frederick's system, decisively beaten at Austerlitz, was finally overthrown at Jena Auerstadt, and, in 1813, the tactics of the French, including the use of skirmishers, be came universal. But before this the English
had adopted a two-rank formation, and had successfully opposed thin lines to the heavy columns which the French, for reasons into which we need not here enter, had apparently found themselves compelled to readopt in the Peninsula. In fact, the type-formation was not as yet firmly fixed, the English using heavy columns at New Orleans, and the French, in spite of their experience in Champagne, re suming them with disastrous results at Water loo.
All the changes here touched upon, it will be noticed, are independent of any change or improvement in weapons, and are simply efforts in the direction of increased mobility and flexi bility. Passing by the Crimean War in which, apparently, the experience of the past had been totally forgotten by both sides, we reach our own Civil War, "rern:rkable as a turning-point of tactics, there being scarcely a feature of the tactics of the present day that did not have its germ, its prototype, or its development in that great contest." Both armies were now armed with the rifle, the extreme range being 1,000 yards ; in the Union army the breech-loader made its appearance before the end of the war. Markmanship was of a high order on both sides, and infantry fire consequently so deadly as to effect marked changes in tactical formations. These are, briefly, attacks by rushes, attacks in successive deployed lines, the use of heavy lines of skirmishers in place of the line of battle, and the use of hasty entrench ments. They were brought about by the com mon sense of the American soldier, who. un hampered by tradition, knew how boldly to adopt his tactics to the confronting situation.
Europe, however, was slow in learning the lessons of our war. In 1866 the Prussians, using the breech-loader against the Austrian muzzle-loader, generally attacked in company columns, preceded by skirmishers, who were ordered to feel and develop the enemy. But the Prussian privates instinctively left their columns to join the skirmishers, with the re sult familiar to all. Strange as it may seem, the Prussian authorities failed to appreciate the new conditions of warfare, for, deprecating "the disorder and tumult of the impromptu at tack-formation, which had sprung into being under the Austrian fire, . . . they waited for the appalling losses of a greater war to em phasize the necessity of a change in their pre scribed tactical methods.° This experience came in 1870. Both combatants were now armed with the breech-loading rifle, the Chassepot be ing effective at 1,300 yards. Before the end of the war, under the superior rifle fire of the French, the Germans found themselves com pelled to deploy their columns, the direct attack being made, and the hostile position invariably carried, by the rushes of swarms of skirmishers.