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The Art of War written by Baron Henri de Jomini

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




A war of invasion without good reason--like that of Genghis Khan--is a
crime against humanity; but it may be excused, if not approved, when
induced by great interests or when conducted with good motives.

The invasions of Spain of 1808 and of 1823 differed equally in object
and in results: the first was a cunning and wanton attack, which
threatened the existence of the Spanish nation, and was fatal to its
author; the second, while combating dangerous principles, fostered the
general interests of the country, and was the more readily brought to a
successful termination because its object met with the approval of the
majority of the people whose territory was invaded.

These illustrations show that invasions are not necessarily all of the
same character. The first contributed largely to the fall of Napoleon;
the second restored the relation between France and Spain, which ought
never to have been changed.

Let us hope that invasions may be rare. Still, it is better to attack
than to be invaded; and let us remember that the surest way to check the
spirit of conquest and usurpation is to oppose it by intervention at the
proper time.

An invasion, to be successful, must, be proportioned in magnitude to the
end to be attained and to the obstacles to be overcome.

An invasion against an exasperated people, ready for all sacrifices and
likely to be aided by a powerful neighbor, is a dangerous enterprise, as
was well proved by the war in Spain, (1808,) and by the wars of the
Revolution in 1792, 1793, and 1794. In these latter wars, if France was
better prepared than Spain, she had no powerful ally, and she was
attacked by all Europe upon both land and sea.

Although the circumstances were different, the Russian invasion of
Turkey developed, in some respects, the same symptoms of national
resistance. The religious hatred of the Ottoman powerfully incited him
to arms; but the same motive was powerless among the Greeks, who were
twice as numerous as the Turks. Had the interests of the Greeks and
Turks been harmonized, as were those of Alsace with France, the united
people would have been stronger, but they would have lacked the element
of religious fanaticism. The war of 1828 proved that Turkey was
formidable only upon the frontiers, where her bravest troops were found,
while in the interior all was weakness.

When an invasion of a neighboring territory has nothing to fear from the
inhabitants, the principles of strategy shape its course. The popular
feeling rendered the invasions of Italy, Austria, and Prussia so prompt.
(These military points are treated of in Article XXIX.) But when the
invasion is distant and extensive territories intervene, its success
will depend more upon diplomacy than upon strategy. The first step to
insure success will be to secure the sincere and devoted alliance of a
state adjoining the enemy, which will afford reinforcements of troops,
and, what is still more important, give a secure base of operations,
depots of supplies, and a safe refuge in case of disaster. The ally must
have the same interest in success as the invaders, to render all this
possible.

Diplomacy, while almost decisive in distant expeditions, is not
powerless in adjacent invasions; for here a hostile intervention may
arrest the most brilliant successes. The invasions of Austria in 1805
and 1809 might have ended differently if Prussia had interfered. The
invasion of the North of Germany in 1807 was, so to speak, permitted by
Austria. That of Rumelia in 1829 might have ended in disaster, had not a
wise statesmanship by negotiation obviated all chance of intervention.





ARTICLE VII.

Wars of Opinion.


Although wars of opinion, national wars, and civil wars are sometimes
confounded, they differ enough to require separate notice.

Wars of opinion may be intestine, both intestine and foreign, and,
lastly, (which, however, is rare,) they may be foreign or exterior
without being intestine or civil.

Wars of opinion between two states belong also to the class of wars of
intervention; for they result either from doctrines which one party
desires to propagate among its neighbors, or from dogmas which it
desires to crush,--in both cases leading to intervention. Although
originating in religious or political dogmas, these wars are most
deplorable; for, like national wars, they enlist the worst passions, and
become vindictive, cruel, and terrible.

The wars of Islamism, the Crusades, the Thirty Years' War, the wars of
the League, present nearly the same characteristics. Often religion is
the pretext to obtain political power, and the war is not really one of
dogmas. The successors of Mohammed cared more to extend their empire
than to preach the Koran, and Philip II., bigot as he was, did not
sustain the League in France for the purpose of advancing the Roman
Church. We agree with M. Ancelot that Louis IX., when he went on a
crusade in Egypt, thought more of the commerce of the Indies than of
gaining possession of the Holy Sepulcher.

The dogma sometimes is not only a pretext, but is a powerful ally; for
it excites the ardor of the people, and also creates a party. For
instance, the Swedes in the Thirty Years' War, and Philip II. in France,
had allies in the country more powerful than their armies. It may,
however, happen, as in the Crusades and the wars of Islamism, that the
dogma for which the war is waged, instead of friends, finds only bitter
enemies in the country invaded; and then the contest becomes fearful.

The chances of support and resistance in wars of political opinions are
about equal. It may be recollected how in 1792 associations of fanatics
thought it possible to propagate throughout Europe the famous
declaration of the rights of man, and how governments became justly
alarmed, and rushed to arms probably with the intention of only forcing
the lava of this volcano back into its crater and there extinguishing
it. The means were not fortunate; for war and aggression are
inappropriate measures for arresting an evil which lies wholly in the
human passions, excited in a temporary paroxysm, of less duration as it
is the more violent. Time is the true remedy for all bad passions and
for all anarchical doctrines. A civilized nation may bear the yoke of a
factious and unrestrained multitude for a short interval; but these
storms soon pass away, and reason resumes her sway. To attempt to
restrain such a mob by a foreign force is to attempt to restrain the
explosion of a mine when the powder has already been ignited: it is far
better to await the explosion and afterward fill up the crater than to
try to prevent it and to perish in the attempt.

After a profound study of the Revolution, I am convinced that, if the
Girondists and National Assembly had not been threatened by foreign
armaments, they would never have dared to lay their sacrilegious hands
upon the feeble but venerable head of Louis XVI. The Girondists would
never have been crushed by the Mountain but for the reverses of
Dumouriez and the threats of invasion. And if they had been permitted to
clash and quarrel with each other to their hearts' content, it is
probable that, instead of giving place to the terrible Convention, the
Assembly would slowly have returned to the restoration of good,
temperate, monarchical doctrines, in accordance with the necessities and
the immemorial traditions of the French.

In a military view these wars are fearful, since the invading force not
only is met by the armies of the enemy, but is exposed to the attacks of
an exasperated people. It may be said that the violence of one party
will necessarily create support for the invaders by the formation of
another and opposite one; but, if the exasperated party possesses all
the public resources, the armies, the forts, the arsenals, and if it is
supported by a large majority of the people, of what avail will be the
support of the faction which possesses no such means? What service did
one hundred thousand Vendeans and one hundred thousand Federalists do
for the Coalition in 1793?

History contains but a single example of a struggle like that of the
Revolution; and it appears to clearly demonstrate the danger of
attacking an intensely-excited nation. However the bad management of the
military operations was one cause of the unexpected result, and before
deducing any certain maxims from this war, we should ascertain what
would have been the result if after the flight of Dumouriez, instead of
destroying and capturing fortresses, the allies had informed the
commanders of those fortresses that they contemplated no wrong to
France, to her forts or her brave armies, and had marched on Paris with
two hundred thousand men. They might have restored the monarchy; and,
again, they might never have returned, at least without the protection
of an equal force on their retreat to the Rhine. It is difficult to
decide this, since the experiment was never made, and as all would have
depended upon the course of the French nation and the army. The problem
thus presents two equally grave solutions. The campaign of 1793 gave
one; whether the other might have been obtained, it is difficult to say.
Experiment alone could have determined it.

The military precepts for such wars are nearly the same as for national
wars, differing, however, in a vital point. In national wars the country
should be occupied and subjugated, the fortified places besieged and
reduced, and the armies destroyed; whereas in wars of opinion it is of
less importance to subjugate the country; here great efforts should be
made to gain the end speedily, without delaying for details, care being
constantly taken to avoid any acts which might alarm the nation for its
independence or the integrity of its territory.

The war in Spain in 1823 is an example which may be cited in favor of
this course in opposition to that of the Revolution. It is true that the
conditions were slightly different; for the French army of 1792 was
made up of more solid elements than that of the Radicals of the Isla de
Leon. The war of the Revolution was at once a war of opinion, a national
war, and a civil war,--while, if the first war in Spain in 1808 was
thoroughly a national war, that of 1823 was a partial struggle of
opinions without the element of nationality; and hence the enormous
difference in the results.

Moreover, the expedition of the Duke of Angouleme was well carried out.
Instead of attacking fortresses, he acted in conformity to the
above-mentioned precepts. Pushing on rapidly to the Ebro, he there
divided his forces, to seize, at their sources, all the elements of
strength of their enemies,--which they could safely do, since they were
sustained by a majority of the inhabitants. If he had followed the
instructions of the Ministry, to proceed methodically to the conquest of
the country and the reduction of the fortresses between the Pyrenees and
the Ebro, in order to provide a base of operations, he would perhaps
have failed in his mission, or at least made the war a long and bloody
one, by exciting the national spirit by an occupation of the country
similar to that of 1807.

Emboldened by the hearty welcome of the people, he comprehended that it
was a political operation rather than a military one, and that it
behooved him to consummate it rapidly. His conduct, so different from
that of the allies in 1793, deserves careful attention from all charged
with similar missions. In three months the army was under the walls of
Cadiz.

If the events now transpiring in the Peninsula prove that statesmanship
was not able to profit by success in order to found a suitable and solid
order of things, the fault was neither in the army nor in its
commanders, but in the Spanish government, which, yielding to the
counsel of violent reactionaries, was unable to rise to the height of
its mission. The arbiter between two great hostile interests, Ferdinand
blindly threw himself into the arms of the party which professed a deep
veneration for the throne, but which intended to use the royal authority
for the furtherance of its own ends, regardless of consequences. The
nation remained divided in two hostile camps, which it would not have
been impossible to calm and reconcile in time. These camps came anew
into collision, as I predicted in Verona in 1823,--a striking lesson, by
which no one is disposed to profit in that beautiful and unhappy land,
although history is not wanting in examples to prove that violent
reactions, any more than revolutions, are not elements with which to
construct and consolidate. May God grant that from this frightful
conflict may emerge a strong and respected monarchy, equally separated
from all factions, and based upon a disciplined army as well as upon the
general interests of the country,--a monarchy capable of rallying to its
support this incomprehensible Spanish nation, which, with merits not
less extraordinary than its faults, was always a problem for those who
were in the best position to know it.




ARTICLE VIII.

National Wars.


National wars, to which we have referred in speaking of those of
invasion, are the most formidable of all. This name can only be applied
to such as are waged against a united people, or a great majority of
them, filled with a noble ardor and determined to sustain their
independence: then every step is disputed, the army holds only its
camp-ground, its supplies can only be obtained at the point of the
sword, and its convoys are everywhere threatened or captured.

The spectacle of a spontaneous uprising of a nation is rarely seen; and,
though there be in it something grand and noble which commands our
admiration, the consequences are so terrible that, for the sake of
humanity, we ought to hope never to see it. This uprising must not be
confounded with a national defense in accordance with the institutions
of the state and directed by the government.

This uprising may be produced by the most opposite causes. The serfs may
rise in a body at the call of the government, and their masters,
affected by a noble love of their sovereign and country, may set them
the example and take the command of them; and, similarly, a fanatical
people may arm under the appeal of its priests; or a people enthusiastic
in its political opinions, or animated by a sacred love of its
institutions, may rush to meet the enemy in defense of all it holds most
dear.

The control of the sea is of much importance in the results of a
national invasion. If the people possess a long stretch of coast, and
are masters of the sea or in alliance with a power which controls it,
their power of resistance is quintupled, not only on account of the
facility of feeding the insurrection and of alarming the enemy on all
the points he may occupy, but still more by the difficulties which will
be thrown in the way of his procuring supplies by the sea.

The nature of the country may be such as to contribute to the facility
of a national defense. In mountainous countries the people are always
most formidable; next to these are countries covered with extensive
forests.

The resistance of the Swiss to Austria and to the Duke of Burgundy, that
of the Catalans in 1712 and in 1809, the difficulties encountered by the
Russians in the subjugation of the tribes of the Caucasus, and, finally,
the reiterated efforts of the Tyrolese, clearly demonstrate that the
inhabitants of mountainous regions have always resisted for a longer
time than those of the plains,--which is due as much to the difference
in character and customs as to the difference in the natural features of
the countries.

Defiles and large forests, as well as rocky regions, favor this kind of
defense; and the Bocage of La Vendee, so justly celebrated, proves that
any country, even if it be only traversed by large hedges and ditches or
canals, admits of a formidable defense.

The difficulties in the path of an army in wars of opinions, as well as
in national wars, are very great, and render the mission of the general
conducting them very difficult. The events just mentioned, the contest
of the Netherlands with Philip II. and that of the Americans with the
English, furnish evident proofs of this; but the much more extraordinary
struggle of La Vendee with the victorious Republic, those of Spain,
Portugal, and the Tyrol against Napoleon, and, finally, those of the
Morea against the Turks, and of Navarre against the armies of Queen
Christina, are still more striking illustrations.

The difficulties are particularly great when the people are supported by
a considerable nucleus of disciplined troops. The invader has only an
army: his adversaries have an army, and a people wholly or almost wholly
in arms, and making means of resistance out of every thing, each
individual of whom conspires against the common enemy; even the
non-combatants have an interest in his ruin and accelerate it by every
means in their power. He holds scarcely any ground but that upon which
he encamps; outside the limits of his camp every thing is hostile and
multiplies a thousandfold the difficulties he meets at every step.

These obstacles become almost insurmountable when the country is
difficult. Each armed inhabitant knows the smallest paths and their
connections; he finds everywhere a relative or friend who aids him; the
commanders also know the country, and, learning immediately the
slightest movement on the part of the invader, can adopt the best
measures to defeat his projects; while the latter, without information
of their movements, and not in a condition to send out detachments to
gain it, having no resource but in his bayonets, and certain safety only
in the concentration of his columns, is like a blind man: his
combinations are failures; and when, after the most carefully-concerted
movements and the most rapid and fatiguing marches, he thinks he is
about to accomplish his aim and deal a terrible blow, he finds no signs
of the enemy but his camp-fires: so that while, like Don Quixote, he is
attacking windmills, his adversary is on his line of communications,
destroys the detachments left to guard it, surprises his convoys, his
depots, and carries on a war so disastrous for the invader that he must
inevitably yield after a time.

In Spain I was a witness of two terrible examples of this kind. When
Ney's corps replaced Soult's at Corunna, I had camped the companies of
the artillery-train between Betanzos and Corunna, in the midst of four
brigades distant from the camp from two to three leagues, and no Spanish
forces had been seen within fifty miles; Soult still occupied Santiago
de Compostela, the division Maurice-Mathieu was at Ferrol and Lugo,
Marchand's at Corunna and Betanzos: nevertheless, one fine night the
companies of the train--men and horses--disappeared, and we were never
able to discover what became of them: a solitary wounded corporal
escaped to report that the peasants, led by their monks and priests, had
thus made away with them. Four months afterward, Ney with a single
division marched to conquer the Asturias, descending the valley of the
Navia, while Kellermann debouched from Leon by the Oviedo road. A part
of the corps of La Romana which was guarding the Asturias marched behind
the very heights which inclose the valley of the Navia, at most but a
league from our columns, without the marshal knowing a word of it: when
he was entering Gijon, the army of La Romana attacked the center of the
regiments of the division Marchand, which, being scattered to guard
Galicia, barely escaped, and that only by the prompt return of the
marshal to Lugo. This war presented a thousand incidents as striking as
this. All the gold of Mexico could not have procured reliable
information for the French; what was given was but a lure to make them
fall more readily into snares.

No army, however disciplined, can contend successfully against such a
system applied to a great nation, unless it be strong enough to hold all
the essential points of the country, cover its communications, and at
the same time furnish an active force sufficient to beat the enemy
wherever he may present himself. If this enemy has a regular army of
respectable size to be a nucleus around which to rally the people, what
force will be sufficient to be superior everywhere, and to assure the
safety of the long lines of communication against numerous bodies?

The Peninsular War should be carefully studied, to learn all the
obstacles which a general and his brave troops may encounter in the
occupation or conquest of a country whose people are all in arms. What
efforts of patience, courage, and resignation did it not cost the troops
of Napoleon, Massena, Soult, Ney, and Suchet to sustain themselves for
six years against three or four hundred thousand armed Spaniards and
Portuguese supported by the regular armies of Wellington, Beresford,
Blake, La Romana, Cuesta, Castanos, Reding, and Ballasteros!

If success be possible in such a war, the following general course will
be most likely to insure it,--viz.: make a display of a mass of troops
proportioned to the obstacles and resistance likely to be encountered,
calm the popular passions in every possible way, exhaust them by time
and patience, display courtesy, gentleness, and severity united, and,
particularly, deal justly. The examples of Henry IV. in the wars of the
League, of Marshal Berwick in Catalonia, of Suchet in Aragon and
Valencia, of Hoche in La Vendee, are models of their kind, which may be
employed according to circumstances with equal success. The admirable
order and discipline of the armies of Diebitsch and Paskevitch in the
late war were also models, and were not a little conducive to the
success of their enterprises.

The immense obstacles encountered by an invading force in these wars
have led some speculative persons to hope that there should never be any
other kind, since then wars would become more rare, and, conquest being
also more difficult, would be less a temptation to ambitious leaders.
This reasoning is rather plausible than solid; for, to admit all its
consequences, it would be necessary always to be able to induce the
people to take up arms, and it would also be necessary for us to be
convinced that there would be in the future no wars but those of
conquest, and that all legitimate though secondary wars, which are only
to maintain the political equilibrium or defend the public interests,
should never occur again: otherwise, how could it be known when and how
to excite the people to a national war? For example, if one hundred
thousand Germans crossed the Rhine and entered France, originally with
the intention of preventing the conquest of Belgium by France, and
without any other ambitious project, would it be a case where the whole
population--men, women, and children--of Alsace, Lorraine, Champagne,
and Burgundy, should rush to arms? to make a Saragossa of every walled
town, to bring about, by way of reprisals, murder, pillage, and
incendiarism throughout the country? If all this be not done, and the
Germans, in consequence of some success, should occupy these provinces,
who can say that they might not afterward seek to appropriate a part of
them, even though at first they had never contemplated it? The
difficulty of answering these two questions would seem to argue in favor
of national wars. But is there no means of repelling such an invasion
without bringing about an uprising of the whole population and a war of
extermination? Is there no mean between these contests between the
people and the old regular method of war between permanent armies? Will
it not be sufficient, for the efficient defense of the country, to
organize a militia, or landwehr, which, uniformed and called by their
governments into service, would regulate the part the people should take
in the war, and place just limits to its barbarities?

I answer in the affirmative; and, applying this mixed system to the
cases stated above, I will guarantee that fifty thousand regular French
troops, supported by the National Guards of the East, would get the
better of this German army which had crossed the Vosges; for, reduced to
fifty thousand men by many detachments, upon nearing the Meuse or
arriving in Argonne it would have one hundred thousand men on its hands.
To attain this mean, we have laid it down as a necessity that good
national reserves be prepared for the army; which will be less expensive
in peace and will insure the defense of the country in war. This system
was used by France in 1792, imitated by Austria in 1809, and by the
whole of Germany in 1813.

I sum up this discussion by asserting that, without being a utopian
philanthropist, or a condottieri, a person may desire that wars of
extermination may be banished from the code of nations, and that the
defenses of nations by disciplined militia, with the aid of good
political alliances, may be sufficient to insure their independence.

As a soldier, preferring loyal and chivalrous warfare to organized
assassination, if it be necessary to make a choice, I acknowledge that
my prejudices are in favor of the good old times when the French and
English Guards courteously invited each other to fire first,--as at
Fontenoy,--preferring them to the frightful epoch when priests, women,
and children throughout Spain plotted the murder of isolated soldiers.