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The Art of War written by Baron Henri de Jomini

B >> Baron Henri de Jomini >> The Art of War




The intrenched camp of the Austrians before Mayence in 1795 would,
indeed, have prevented the siege of the place, if the French had
possessed the means of carrying on a siege, as long as the Rhine had not
been crossed; but as soon as Jourdan appeared on the Lahn, and Moreau in
the Black Forest, it became necessary to abandon the camp and leave the
place to its own means of defense. It would only be in the event of a
fortress occupying a point such that it would be impossible for an army
to pass it without taking it, that an intrenched camp, with the object
of preventing an attack upon it, would be established; and what place in
Europe is upon such a site?

So far from agreeing with these German authors, on the contrary, it
seems to me that a very important question in the establishment of these
camps near fortified places on a river, is whether they should be on the
same bank as the place, or upon the other. When it is necessary to make
a choice, by reason of the fact that the place cannot be located to
cover both banks, I should decidedly prefer the latter.

To serve as a refuge or to favor a debouch, the camp should be on the
bank of the river toward the enemy; and in this, case the principal
danger to be feared is that the enemy might take the camp in reverse by
passing the river at some other point; and if the fortress were upon the
same bank us the camp, it would be of little service; while if upon the
other bank, opposite to the camp, it would be almost impossible to take
the latter in reverse. For instance, the Russians, who could not hold
for twenty-four hours their camp of Drissa, would have defied the enemy
for a long time if there had been a fortification on the right bank of
the Dwina, covering the rear of the camp. So Moreau for three months, at
Kehl, withstood all the efforts of the Archduke Charles; while if
Strasbourg had not been there upon the opposite bank his camp would
easily have been turned by a passage of the Rhine.

Indeed, it would be desirable to have the protection of the fortified
place upon the other bank too; and a place holding both banks would
fulfill this condition. The fortification of Coblentz, recently
constructed, seems to introduce a new epoch. This system of the
Prussians, combining the advantages of intrenched camps and permanent
works, deserves attentive consideration; but, whatever may be its
defects, it is nevertheless certain that it would afford immense
advantages to an army intended to operate on the Rhine. Indeed, the
inconvenience of intrenched camps on large rivers is that they are only
very useful when beyond the river; and in this case they are exposed to
the dangers arising from destruction of bridges (as happened to Napoleon
at Essling,)--to say nothing of the danger of losing their provisions
and munitions, or even of a front attack against which the works might
not avail. The system of detached permanent works of Coblentz has the
advantage of avoiding these dangers, by protecting the depots on the
same bank as the army, and in guaranteeing to the army freedom from
attack at least until the bridges be re-established. If the city were
upon the right bank of the Rhine, and there were only an intrenched camp
of field-works on the left bank, there would be no certainty of security
either for the depots or the army. So, if Coblentz were a good ordinary
fortress without detached forts, a large army could not so readily make
it a place of refuge, nor would there be such facilities for debouching
from it in the presence of an enemy. The fortress of Ehrenbreitstein,
which is intended to protect Coblentz on the right bank, is so difficult
of access that it would be quite easy to blockade it, and the egress of
a force of any magnitude might be vigorously disputed.

Much has been recently said of a new system used by the Archduke
Maximilian to fortify the intrenched camp of Linz,--by masonry towers.
As I only know of it by hearsay and the description by Captain Allard in
the _Spectateur Militaire_, I cannot discuss it thoroughly. I only know
that the system of towers used at Genoa by the skillful Colonel Andreis
appeared to me to be useful, but still susceptible of
improvements,--which the archduke seems to have added. We are told that
the towers of Linz, situated in ditches and covered by the glacis, have
the advantage of giving a concentrated horizontal fire and of being
sheltered from the direct shot of the enemy. Such towers, if well
flanked and connected by a parapet, may make a very advantageous
camp,--always, however, with some of the inconveniences of closed lines.
If the towers are isolated, and the intervals carefully covered by
field-works, (to be thrown up when required,) they will make a camp
preferable to one covered by ordinary redoubts, but not so advantageous
as afforded by the large detached forts of Coblentz. These towers number
thirty-two, eight of which are on the left bank, with a square fort
commanding the Perlingsberg. Of these twenty-four on the right bank,
some seven or eight are only half-towers. The circumference of this line
is about twelve miles. The towers are between five hundred and six
hundred yards apart, and will be connected, in case of war, by a
palisaded covered way. They are of masonry, of three tiers of guns, with
a barbette battery which is the principal defense, mounting eleven
twenty-four pounders. Two howitzers are placed in the upper tier. Those
towers are placed in a wide and deep ditch, the _deblais_ of which forms
a high glacis which protects the tower from direct shot; but I should
think it would be difficult to protect the artillery from direct fire.

Some say that this has cost about three-fourths of what a complete
bastioned enceinte, necessary to make Linz a fortress of the first rank,
would have cost; others maintain that it has not cost more than a
quarter as much as a bastioned work, and that it subserves, besides, an
entirely different object. If these works are to resist a regular siege,
they are certainly very defective; but, regarded as an intrenched camp
to give refuge and an outlet upon both banks of the Danube for a large
army, they are appropriate, and would be of great importance in a war
like that of 1809, and, if existing then, would probably have saved the
capital.

To complete a grand system, it would perhaps have been better to
encircle Linz with a regular bastioned line, and then to have built
seven or eight towers between the eastern salient and the mouth of the
Traun, within a direct distance of about two and a half miles, so as to
have included for the camp only the curved space between Linz, the
Traun, and the Danube. Then the double advantage of a fortress of the
first rank and a camp under its guns would have been united, and, even
if not quite so large, would have answered for a large army,
particularly if the eight towers on the left bank and the fort of
Perlingsberg had been preserved.

TETES DE PONTS.

_Tetes de ponts_ are the most important of all field-works. The
difficulties of crossing a river, particularly a large one, in the face
of the enemy, demonstrate abundantly the immense utility of such works,
which can be less easily dispensed with than intrenched camps, since if
the bridges are safe an army is insured from the disastrous events which
may attend a rapid retreat across a large river.

_Tetes de ponts_ are doubly advantageous when they are as it were
_keeps_ for a large intrenched camp, and will be triply so if they also
cover the bank opposite to the location of the camp, since then they
will mutually support each other. It is needless to state that these
works are particularly important in an enemy's country and upon all
fronts where there are no permanent works. It may be observed that the
principal difference between the system of intrenched camps and that of
_tetes de ponts_ is that the best intrenched camps are composed of
detached and closed works, while _tetes de ponts_ usually consist of
contiguous works not closed. An intrenched line to admit of defense must
be occupied in force throughout its whole extent, which would generally
require a large army; if, on the contrary, the intrenchments are
detached closed works, a comparatively small force can defend them.

The attack and defense of these works will be discussed in a subsequent
part of this volume.




ARTICLE XXVIII.

Strategic Operations in Mountains.


A mountainous country presents itself, in the combinations of war, under
four different aspects. It may be the whole theater of the war, or it
may be but a zone; it may be mountainous throughout its whole extent, or
there may be a line of mountains, upon emerging from which the army may
debouch into large and rich plains.

If Switzerland, the Tyrol, the Noric provinces, some parts of Turkey and
Hungary, Catalonia and Portugal, be excepted, in the European countries
the mountains are in single ranges. In these cases there is but a
difficult defile to cross,--a temporary obstacle, which, once overcome,
is an advantage rather than an objection. In fact, the range once
crossed and the war carried into the plains, the chain of mountains may
be regarded as an eventual base, upon which the army may fall back and
find a temporary refuge. The only essential precaution to be observed
is, not to allow the enemy to anticipate the army on this line of
retreat. The part of the Alps between France and Italy, and the
Pyrenees, (which are not so high, though equally broad,) are of this
nature. The mountains of Bohemia and of the Black Forest, and the
Vosges, belong to this class. In Catalonia the mountains cover the whole
country as far as the Ebro: if the war were limited to this province,
the combinations would not be the same as if there were but a line of
mountains. Hungary in this respect differs little from Lombardy and
Castile; for if the Crapacks in the eastern and northern part are as
marked a feature as the Pyrenees, they are still but a temporary
obstacle, and an army overcoming it, whether debouching in the basin of
the Waag, of the Neytra, or of the Theiss, or in the fields of
Mongatsch, would have the vast plains between the Danube and the Theiss
for a field of operations. The only difference would be in the roads,
which in the Alps, though few in number, are excellent, while in Hungary
there are none of much value. In its northern part, this chain, though
not so high, becomes broader, and would seem to belong to that class of
fields of operations which are wholly mountainous; but, as its
evacuation may be compelled by decisive operations in the valleys of the
Waag or the Theiss, it must be regarded as a temporary barrier. The
attack and defense of this country, however, would be a strategic study
of the most interesting character.

When an extremely mountainous country, such as the Tyrol or Switzerland,
is but a zone of operations, the importance of these mountains is
secondary, and they must be observed like a fortress, the armies
deciding the great contests in the valleys. It will, of course, be
otherwise if this be the whole field.

It has long been a question whether possession of the mountains gave
control of the valleys, or whether possession of the valleys gave
control of the mountains. The Archduke Charles, a very intelligent and
competent judge, has declared for the latter, and has demonstrated that
the valley of the Danube is the key of Southern Germany. However, in
this kind of questions much depends upon the relative forces and their
arrangement in the country. If sixty thousand French were advancing on
Bavaria in presence of an equal force of Austrians, and the latter
should throw thirty thousand men into the Tyrol, intending to replace
them by reinforcements on its arrival on the Inn, it would be difficult
for the French to push on as far as this line, leaving so large a force
on its flanks masters of the outlets of Scharnitz, Fussen, Kufstein, and
Lofers. But if the French force were one hundred and twenty thousand
men, and had gained such successes as to establish its superiority over
the army in its front, then it might leave a sufficient detachment to
mask the passes of the Tyrol and extend its progress as far as Linz,--as
Moreau did in 1800.

Thus far we have considered these mountainous districts as only
accessory zones. If we regard them as the principal fields of
operations, the strategic problem seems to be more complicated. The
campaigns of 1799 and 1800 are equally rich in instruction on this
branch of the art. In my account of them I have endeavored to bring out
their teachings by a historical exposition of the events; and I cannot
do better than refer my readers to it.

When we consider the results of the imprudent invasion of Switzerland by
the French Directory, and its fatal influence in doubling the extent of
the theater of operations and making it reach from the Texel to Naples,
we cannot too much applaud the wisdom of France and Austria in the
transactions which had for three centuries guaranteed the neutrality of
Switzerland. Every one will be convinced of this by carefully studying
the interesting campaigns of the Archduke Charles, Suwaroff, and
Massena in 1799, and those of Napoleon and Moreau in 1800. The first is
a model for operations upon an entirely mountainous field; the second is
a model for wars in which the fate of mountainous countries is decided
on the plains.

I will here state some of the deductions which seem to follow from this
study.

When a country whose whole extent is mountainous is the principal
theater of operations, the strategic combinations cannot be entirely
based upon maxims applicable in an open country.

Transversal maneuvers to gain the extremity of the front of operations
of the enemy here become always very difficult, and often impossible. In
such a country a considerable army can be maneuvered only in a small
number of valleys, where the enemy will take care to post advanced
guards of sufficient strength to delay the army long enough to provide
means for defeating the enterprise; and, as the ridges which separate
these valleys will be generally crossed only by paths impracticable for
the passage of an army, transversal marches can only be made by small
bodies of light troops.

The important natural strategic points will be at the junction of the
larger valleys or of the streams in those valleys, and will be few in
number; and, if the defensive army occupy them with the mass of its
forces, the invader will generally be compelled to resort to direct
attacks to dislodge it.

However, if great strategic maneuvers in these cases be more rare and
difficult, it by no means follows that they are less important. On the
contrary, if the assailant succeed in gaining possession of one of these
centers of communication between the large valleys upon the line of
retreat of the enemy, it will be more serious for the latter than it
would be in an open country; since the occupation of one or two
difficult defiles will often be sufficient to cause the ruin of the
whole army.

If the attacking party have difficulties to overcome, it must be
admitted that the defense has quite as many, on account of the necessity
of covering all the outlets by which an attack in force may be made
upon the decisive points, and of the difficulties of the transversal
marches which it would be compelled to make to cover the menaced points.
In order to complete what I have said upon this kind of marches and the
difficulties of directing them, I will refer to what Napoleon did in
1805 to cut off Mack from Ulm. If this operation was facilitated by the
hundred roads which cross Swabia in all directions, and if it would have
been impracticable in a mountainous country, for want of transversal
routes, to make the long circuit from Donauwerth by Augsburg to
Memmingen, it is also true that Mack could by these same hundred roads
have effected his retreat with much greater facility than if he had been
entrapped in one of the valleys of Switzerland or of the Tyrol, from
which there was but a single outlet.

On the other hand, the general on the defensive may in a level country
concentrate a large part of his forces; for, if the enemy scatter to
occupy all the roads by which the defensive army may retire, it will be
easy for the latter to crush these isolated bodies; but in a very
mountainous country, where there are ordinarily but one or two principal
routes into which other valleys open, even from the direction of the
enemy, the concentration of forces becomes more difficult, since serious
inconveniences may result if even one of these important valleys be not
observed.

Nothing can better demonstrate the difficulty of strategic defense in
mountainous regions than the perplexity in which we are involved when we
attempt simply to give advice in such cases,--to say nothing of laying
down maxims for them. If it were but a question of the defense of a
single definite front of small extent, consisting of four or five
converging valleys, the common junction of which is at a distance of two
or three short marches from the summits of the ranges, it would be
easier of solution. It would then be sufficient to recommend the
construction of a good fort at the narrowest and least-easily turned
point of each of these valleys. Protected by these forts, a few brigades
of infantry should be stationed to dispute the passage, while half the
army should be held in reserve at the junction, where it would be in
position either to sustain the advanced guards most seriously
threatened, or to fall upon the assailant with the whole force when he
debouches. If to this be added good instructions to the commanders of
the advanced guards, whether in assigning them the best point for
rendezvous when their line of forts is pierced, or in directing them to
continue to act in the mountains upon the flank of the enemy, the
general on the defensive may regard himself as invincible, thanks to the
many difficulties which the country offers to the assailant. But, if
there be other fronts like this upon the right and left, all of which
are to be defended, the problem is changed: the difficulties of the
defense increase with the extent of the fronts, and this system of a
cordon of forts becomes dangerous,--while it is not easy to adopt a
better one.

We cannot be better convinced of these truths than by the consideration
of the position of Massena in Switzerland in 1799. After Jourdan's
defeat at Stockach, he occupied the line from Basel by Schaffhausen and
Rheineck to Saint-Gothard, and thence by La Furca to Mont-Blanc. He had
enemies in front of Basel, at Waldshut, at Schaffhausen, at Feldkirch,
and at Chur; Bellegarde threatened the Saint-Gothard, and the Italian
army menaced the Simplon and the Saint-Bernard. How was he to defend
such a circumference? and how could he leave open one of these great
valleys, thus risking every thing? From Rheinfelden to the Jura, toward
Soleure, it was but two short marches, and there was the mouth of the
trap in which the French army was placed. This was, then, the pivot of
the defense. But how could he leave Schaffhausen unprotected? how
abandon Rheineck and the Saint-Gothard? how open the Valais and the
approach by Berne, without surrendering the whole of Switzerland to the
Coalition? And if he covered each point even by a brigade, where would
be his army when he would need it to give battle to an approaching
force? It is a natural system on a level theater to concentrate the
masses of an army; but in the mountains such a course would surrender
the keys of the country, and, besides, it is not easy to say where an
inferior army could be concentrated without compromising it.

After the forced evacuation of the line of the Rhine and Zurich, it
seemed that the only strategic point for Massena to defend was the line
of the Jura. He was rash enough to stand upon the Albis,--a line shorter
than that of the Rhine, it is true, but exposed for an immense distance
to the attacks of the Austrians. If Bellegarde, instead of going into
Lombardy by the Valtellina, had marched to Berne or made a junction with
the archduke, Massena would have been ruined. These events seem to prove
that if a country covered with high mountains be favorable for defense
in a tactical point of view, it is different in a strategic sense,
because it necessitates a division of the troops. This can only be
remedied by giving them greater mobility and by passing often to the
offensive.

General Clausewitz, whose logic is frequently defective, maintains, on
the contrary, that, movements being the most difficult part in this kind
of war, the defensive party should avoid them, since by such a course he
might lose the advantages of the local defenses. He, however, ends by
demonstrating that a passive defense must yield under an active
attack,--which goes to show that the initiative is no less favorable in
mountains than in plains. If there could be any doubt on this point, it
ought to be dispelled by Massena's campaign in Switzerland, where he
sustained himself only by attacking the enemy at every opportunity, even
when he was obliged to seek him on the Grimsel and the Saint-Gothard.
Napoleon's course was similar in 1796 in the Tyrol, when he was opposed
to Wurmser and Alvinzi.

As for detailed strategic maneuvers, they may be comprehended by reading
the events of Suwaroff's expedition by the Saint-Gothard upon the
Muttenthal. While we must approve his maneuvers in endeavoring to
capture Lecourbe in the valley of the Reuss, we must also admire the
presence of mind, activity, and unyielding firmness which saved that
general and his division. Afterward, in the Schachenthal and the
Muttenthal, Suwaroff was placed in the same position as Lecourbe had
been, and extricated himself with equal ability. Not less extraordinary
was the ten days' campaign of General Molitor, who with four thousand
men was surrounded in the canton of Glaris by more than thirty thousand
allies, and yet succeeded in maintaining himself behind the Linth after
four admirable fights. These events teach us the vanity of all theory
_in details_, and also that in such a country a strong and heroic will
is worth more than all the precepts in the world. After such lessons,
need I say that one of the principal rules of this kind of war is, not
to risk one's self in the valleys without securing the heights? Shall I
say also that in this kind of war, more than in any other, operations
should be directed upon the communications of the enemy? And, finally,
that good temporary bases or lines of defense at the confluence of the
great valleys, covered by strategic reserves, combined with great
mobility and frequent offensive movements, will be the best means of
defending the country?

I cannot terminate this article without remarking that mountainous
countries are particularly favorable for defense when the war is a
national one, in which the whole people rise up to defend their homes
with the obstinacy which enthusiasm for a holy cause imparts: every
advance is then dearly bought. But to be successful it is always
necessary that the people be sustained by a disciplined force, more or
less numerous: without this they must finally yield, like the heroes of
Stanz and of the Tyrol.

The offensive against a mountainous country also presents a double case:
it may either be directed upon a belt of mountains beyond which are
extensive plains, or the whole theater may be mountainous.

In the first case there is little more to be done than this,--viz.: make
demonstrations upon the whole line of the frontier, in order to lead the
enemy to extend his defense, and then force a passage at the point which
promises the greatest results. The problem in such a case is to break
through a cordon which is strong less on account of the numbers of the
defenders than from their position, and if broken at one point the whole
line is forced. The history of Bard in 1800, and the capture of
Leutasch and Scharnitz in 1805 by Ney, (who threw fourteen thousand men
on Innspruck in the midst of thirty thousand Austrians, and by seizing
this central point compelled them to retreat in all directions,) show
that with brave infantry and bold commanders these famous
mountain-ranges can generally be forced.

The history of the passage of the Alps, where Francis I. turned the army
which was awaiting him at Suza by passing the steep mountains between
Mont-Cenis and the valley of Queyras, is an example of those
_insurmountable_ obstacles which can always be surmounted. To oppose him
it would have been necessary to adopt a system of cordon; and we have
already seen what is to be expected of it. The position of the Swiss and
Italians at Suza was even less wise than the cordon-system, because it
inclosed them in a contracted valley without protecting the lateral
issues. Their strategic plan ought to have been to throw troops into
these valleys to defend the defiles, and to post the bulk of the army
toward Turin or Carignano.