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126 Chapters
Subsistence This subject has acquired much greater importance in modern warfare from two causes in particular. First, because the armies in general are now much greater than those of the middle ages,…
Base of Operations If an army sets out on any expedition, whether it be to attack the enemy and his theatre of war, or to take post on its own frontier, it continues in a state of necessary dependenc…
Lines of Communication The roads which lead from the position of an army to those points in its rear where its depôts of supply and means of recruiting and refitting its forces are principally united…
On Country and Ground Quite irrespective of their influence as regards the means of subsistence of an army, country and ground bear another most intimate and never-failing relation to the business of…
Command of Ground The word “command” has a charm in the art of war peculiar to itself, and in fact to this element belongs a great part, perhaps half the influence which ground exercises on the use o…
Offence and Defence 1.—Conception of Defence. What is defence in conception? The warding off a blow. What is then its characteristic sign? The state of expectancy (or of waiting for this blow). This…
The Relations of the Offensive and Defensive to Each Other in Tactics First of all we must inquire into the circumstances which give the victory in a battle. Of superiority of numbers, and bravery, …
The Relations of the Offensive and Defensive to Each Other in Strategy Let us ask again, first of all, what are the circumstances which insure a successful result in strategy? In strategy there is n…
Convergence of Attack and Divergence of Defence These two conceptions, these forms in the use of offensive and defensive, appear so frequently in theory and reality, that the imagination is involunta…
Character of the Strategic Defensive We have already explained what the defensive is generally, namely, nothing more than a stronger form of carrying on war, by means of which we endeavour to wrest a…
