Considering the great advances in aero nautics, radio-telegraphy and gunnery it is ap parent that the true way to security is stra tegic surprise, that Is to say, it is possible for the enemy to attack when we are least prepared to cope with him and by the skilful use of inner lines. The British in the Northwest were while the word tactics was neglected. Strategy, then, soon came to be the term applied to every operation of war, large and small. A recon noitering patrol which had carried out its du ties smartly was said to have displayed fine strat egy, the clever concealment of a machine gun was cunning strategy, etc., etc. Mont Kemmel, a small hill in French Flanders, became a strategical key point, and it has been stated on the highest authority that Vimy Ridge, which was captured in 1917, has proved to be a feature of the highest strategic importance. Formerly tactical would have been the adjective used in these descriptions, now it is strategical.
In the course of the European War, 1914-18, there developed many strategic mysteries — the Russian success in East Prussia, followed by the defeat at Tannenberg; the sudden arrest and defeat of the Germans on the Marne; Mackensen's overwhelming blow against the Russians when the latter were threatening to overrun Hungary in the early part of 1915; and many others. The easiest of these stra tegic mysteries to explain is the final and rapid very efficiently assisted by the French to keep up their priceless communications with their sea bases and held back for months hundreds of thousands of the invaders and at last the converging Entente armies, in November, 1918, brought about the completest collapse of Ger many since the days of Julius Casar. (Fig.
4). Profiting by a study of the blunders of 1870. we may add to Napoleon's maxims about readiness these two principles: (a) In strat egy, as in everything else, the jump into the unknown is the reverse of desirable, or rea sonably one has no right to substitute for the hard facts of reality, which should always be sought for, the creations of imagination and hypothesis. On these known facts alone a reasonable operation can be based. (b) In any case, not merely in strategy, but in fact, one ought not to undertake a manoeuvre which causes dispersion without being guaranteed the possibility of being able in time and place to change it into a concentrated plan.
. Another lesson enforced on all students of war alike by Napoleon, Moltke and Foch is that knowledge, a disciplined understanding, a cultivated memory and all the resources of science, art, invention, as well as readiness, judgment and initiative are more important to the general than to surgeons, engineers, etc. The strategist of to-day declares that ignorance and carelessness are intolerable in military men and that military skill is priceless. The mind is the army. The general is the soul, the nerve centre, the brains of the army. (See TAcncs). Consult Altham, 'The Principles of War> (Lon don 1914) ; Aston, 'Sea, Land and Air Strategy' (ib. 1914) ; Clausewitz, 'Germany's War Mania> (ib. 1914) ; Derrecagaix, 'Modern War> (Washington 1890); Dufour, 'Strategy and Tactics> (New York 1864) ; Dickman, 'Notes on the German Army' (United States Infantry and Cavalry School, Fort Leavenworth 1897); Mahan, 'Mahan on Naval Warfare> (Boston 1918) ; Wagner, 'Organization and Tactics> (London 1895).