Merely to use the term ‘the military art’ is to enter directly into the debate as to whether warfare is indeed an art, thus the province of unquantifiable qualities such as given ability and inspiration (not to mention the luck about which
Strategy is the application of sound human sense to the conduct of war; its teachings go little beyond the first requirement of common sense. Its value lies entirely in concrete application. The main point is correctly to estimate the situation and then to do the simplest and most natural things with firmness and caution. Thus war becomes an art—an art, of course, which is served by many sciences. In war, as in art, we find no universal forms; in neither can a rule take the place of talent.This is an area where there has been little agreement amongst military thinkers over the centuries. Some, like Jomini, have tended towards the prescriptive, arguing that war has rules whose application brings success and whose breach courts failure. Others, like Clausewitz, have been more descriptive, emphasizing that war is the realm of chance and uncertainty, and the pure light of reason glows darkly through its fog. Azar Gat argues that ‘New ideas emerge during periods of revolutionary change or at times of crisis’, and that these ideas remain dominant until they themselves are rendered inadequate by new paradigmatic changes. Jomini and Clausewitz wrote under the cultural stimulus of the Enlightenment and the Romantic movement. Gat asserts that ‘The two fundamental positions which grew out of this intellectual process underlie the modern outlook and still vie for supremacy today in the humanities and social sciences.’
Even the most descriptive have recognized that even if war has no rules, it certainly possesses broad principles, and a proper grasp of its purpose, function, and scale is crucial to understanding it. The former tsarist officer Aleksandr Svechin (1878-1938), subsequently murdered on Stalin's orders, neatly linked the levels of conflict as follows: ‘Tactics make the steps from which operational leaps are assembled: strategy points out the path’ (Strategy, 1926). An understanding of these levels and what is required to be achieved by each lies at the heart of the military art. For example, any successful defensive strategy will need to embrace counter-offensive operations; often an offensive strategy will need to include defensive operations in order to guard flanks, rear areas, and borders with countries not involved in any given conflict. Various fighting techniques, or tactics, are required for each type of operation. Achieving the right balance of effort between offensive and defensive operations; determining where to seek a decision in battle and how much of the force to retain uncommitted in the form of reserves are some of the most important considerations a commander must face in developing his tactical or higher level campaign plan. In answering such questions a commander must rest on his knowledge of the military art tempered by his operational experience and the advice offered by his staff. The capability to make keenly judged and timely decisions, combined with the ability to motivate the troops under his command and the resolution to overcome the frictions and inevitable setbacks of war, constitute that rare and elusive quality of generalship.
Yet the management and conduct of war requires more than the adoption of tactical or operational schemes of manoeuvre in order to meet some strategic design. While the amount of resources allocated to conflict remains critical, much is also determined by the society, culture, and history of the armed groups or states concerned. Further, the structure, arms and equipment, doctrine, level of training, and not least efficiency and morale of the forces involved, all contribute to military effectiveness. Non-military influences as well as organizational and technological matters help shape the military art. While an analysis of the practice by an army of the military art will not necessarily reveal its detailed equipment list, it should indicate that force's view of conflict and suggest what military strategies, operational methods and tactics it might employ. The fate of all civilizations has been linked to their military means. The ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Persians, Carthaginians, and Romans developed well-organized standing armies and fleets to wage war against their foes in pursuit of policy ends. The Roman way of war, for example, capitalized on tough, highly disciplined, and well-trained units of manpower that could be committed flexibly over a wide geographical area and for long duration. Few nations could resist Rome's power in the long term as long as she possessed the necessary economic and social means to maintain her military forces and to sustain the will to fight. Yet ultimately, less well organized but more numerous, brutal, and committed peoples overwhelmed the Roman empire. In view of the economic effort (treasure), social commitment (blood), and political stakes (survival) involved, writers began to record the lessons from past conflict and to investigate the enduring dynamics of war. Early military historians such as Herodotus (see Greek historians) and Xenophon give us detailed insights into how man fought in ancient times, giving us rich descriptions of battles, tactics, and weapons. Thucydides (see Greek historians) not only tells us why Athens and Sparta waged the Peloponnesian wars, but also explains why he wrote his famous history: ‘My work is not a piece of writing designed to meet that taste of an immediate public, but was done to last for ever.’
Military literature expanded in the Roman period, reflecting a fascination in the art of war and its impact on political and social development. Polybius (see Greek historians) composed his Histories in order to inform his Greek compatriots about the way in which Rome had sought and achieved power. In their treatment of the Punic wars, there is little doubt that Polybius wrote as much to explain as to narrate the rise of Rome's military prowess while Livy (see Roman military historians) stood to glorify it. Caesar and Tacitus (see Roman military historians) give us full, if not entirely accurate, accounts of Roman military endeavours. But of all the Greek or Roman works on war, perhaps Vegetius' De Re Militari (On Military Institutions) was the most influential in the longer term. Although largely neglected at the time of writing—a misfortune of many military philosophers down the ages—Vegetius was well read during the Renaissance. While Machiavelli in his Arte della Guerra (The Art of War) based much of his work on Vegetius, he provided more than a mere historical study. Although based on classical thought, Machiavelli's ‘general rules’ for commanders were of considerable contemporary significance. Yet well before Machiavelli had begun to study classical military history, Europe in the 13th century had been surprised by the sudden rise of Asian military might. Genghis Khan had spread fear and terror through the western world. Pope Gregory IX (1227-41) prayed, ‘From the fury of the Tartars, O Lord, deliver us.’ Mongol military power rested on thorough preparation, organization, training, and harsh discipline. Its advantage in battle largely depended on the shock action delivered by its body of fierce and highly skilled horsemen. More subtle methods were employed in achieving operational and strategic success. Genghis Khan used a combination of surprise, deception, and psychological operations to put his opponents off balance, both mentally and physically. These techniques remain very much relevant today. Above all, the Mongols—a nomadic race of some three to four millions only—developed various methods to convince their enemies that they were more numerous than was the case. Frugal methods of supply (what we might now term ‘lean logistics’) improved the Mongols' strategic mobility as did their ruthless rape of subjugated peoples and their territory. By the mid-13th century the Mongols had attacked successfully Russia, Poland, and Hungary and dominated most of Asia. Perhaps one of the most formidable armies in history, the Mongols presented a unified force who exploited their opponents' military weaknesses and political differences. The Mongol art of war that successfully synchronized time, space, and forces was essentially one of manoeuvre, and not without lasting influence on imperial Russian and Soviet military thought. The significance of Genghis Khan's achievements was not lost on modern military thinkers. In Great Captains Unveiled (1927), Liddell Hart declared that ‘the tank and the airplane were natural heirs and successors to the Mongol horsemen’. Meanwhile, the earliest known treatise on the conduct of war—The Art of War, written by Sun-tzu in 400-320 bc—was not accessible in Europe until a translation into French appeared in the late 18th century. By this time a series of European writers already had begun to codify the nature and principles of war in an attempt to provide the keys to military success. Among the most prominent military commanders and writers of the period were Saxe and Frederick ‘the Great’. Other contributors to the military art included the French Duc de Rohan and Marquis de Feuquières and the Welsh officer Henry Lloyd. In about 1644, Henri de Rohan produced a list of seven simple ‘Guides for the general who wishes to engage in war’ in Le Parfait Capitaine (The Perfect Captain), an adaptation of Caesar's account of the Gallic wars. At the beginning of the 18th century, the Marquis de Feuquières listed maxims or rules that generals need to know in Mémoires sur la guerre (Memoirs on War). This work drew heavily on practical lessons he learned on campaign in the service of France. Likewise, the famous Maurice de Saxe whose work Mes rêveries (My musings) was published posthumously in 1757, attracted wide interest. Henry Lloyd's contribution was arguably greater and more enduring. In 1766 he wrote, ‘This art, like all others, is founded on certain and fixed principles, which are by their nature invariable.’ In 1781 he set out ‘Rules concerning firepower’ and ‘Axioms on the Line of Operations’ that would provide the stimulus and basis of much of what Baron Antoine Henri Jomini wrote twenty years later.
The birth of the modern military art is usually attributed to the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars. The period's pre-eminent writers, Clausewitz and Jomini, remain the subject of detailed study and scrutiny today. If early 19th-century tactics have become overtaken by modern technology, strategy, logistics, and command remain highly relevant elements of the military art. In this respect the enigmatic Clausewitz has more to tell us of contemporary significance in Vom Kriege (On War) (published posthumously in 1832) than the prolific Jomini whose General Principles (1816) and Principal Maxims (1830) now seem outdated. That said, his influence in Europe and notably in America and Russia was far greater than that of Clausewitz during the 19th century.
The work of Helmuth von Moltke ‘the Elder’, chief of the Prussian, and later the German, general staff from 1858 to 1888, adds greatly to our general understanding of the military art. Moltke rejected the study of abstract Jominian principles, preferring the ‘practical application’ of method on a case by case basis.
If Great Britain produced no great Clausewitz, Jomini, or Helmuth von Moltke, a school of influential military writers emerged in the latter half of the 19th century. Its leading stars were Patrick Leonard MacDougall (The Theory of War, 1856), Edward Bruce Hamley (Operations of War, 1866), J. F. Maurice (Military History of the Campaign of 1882 in Egypt, 1887), Charles E. Callwell (Small Wars, 1896), and G. F. R. Henderson (Stonewall Jackson, 1899). Significantly, all were associated, whether as commandants, staff, or students, with the British army Staff College at Camberley; both J. F. Maurice and Henderson were professors of ‘the military art and history’. In the USA, the military art as practised in the civil war was influenced by the works of Jomini and MacDougall, often under the guise of popular summaries. For example, the Confederate Gen Beauregard published in 1863 a brief guide titled Principles and Maxims of the Art of War that borrowed much from Napoleon, Jomini, and MacDougall, including from the latter the statement: ‘The whole science of war may be briefly defined as the art of placing in the right position, at the right time, a mass of troops greater than your enemy can there oppose you.’ But faith in such simple truisms was not universal; nor could they always be applied readily. There are few short-cuts in the military art as a series of long and bloody conflicts since ancient times indicates. For example, success in the American civil war had as much to do with the North's superior strategic position with her richer industrial and manpower resources as with any dominant weaponry or battlefield tactics. After the war, studies into the military art in the US Military Academy, West Point, included military science and history. Instructional notes of the 1870s advised:
The general principles of war are deduced from the rules and methods used by those generals who are known as great and eminent in the practice of the profession. In the ‘art of war’, as in all the experimental sciences, observations made upon the actual occurrences precede the theories. It is therefore evident that an intimate connection exists between the history of military operations and the ‘art of war’, and that a course of military history is indispensable as an introduction to the teaching of the ‘science of war’.
The strong connection between the military art and science has not been lost on doctrine writers. Based on the Moltkean tradition, the Reichswehr operations manual Truppenführung began with the succinct statement ‘The conduct of war is an art, a free creative activity based on a scientific (disciplined) foundation.’ Fuller would have agreed: in his preface to The Foundation of the Science of War (1925) he observed: ‘I hope that military students will examine [the book], not only for its own worth, but in order to think of war scientifically, for until we do so we shall never become true artists of war.’
Traditionally, Russian and Soviet theorists have taken a broader view of military science and art, and the term ‘military doctrine’ has a meaning and emphasis unparalleled in the West. While at first sight it might appear to resemble Anglo-American concepts of ‘policy’ and ‘grand strategy’, in practice it was far more embracing. For the Soviets, military doctrine represented a politico-military framework and instrument for formulating the state's ‘views on war, its preparations, conduct and prevention’. Ideologically influenced military science formed the theoretical basis for military doctrine, which was politically endorsed. In turn, the most important component of military science was the study and practice of the military art which encompassed strategy, operational art, and tactics. All this study was underpinned by research and development into weapons technology and the establishment of mathematical norms for the employment of forces to achieve decisive results. The Soviets were particularly impressed by the results of technology after the ‘Great Patriotic War’ of 1941-5 and spent much effort investigating the nature of military-technical revolutions.
Meanwhile, while science and technology have continued to drive weaponry and tactics at an accelerating rate, particularly over the last two centuries, the military art has developed on more enduring lines. If tactics belong in drill books or doctrine manuals, strategy better lends itself to study through historical example. In illustration, if descriptions of ancient or medieval weapons are irrelevant in the conduct of war today, the works of Sun-tzu, Clausewitz, and Jomini on strategy are certainly not. Likewise, it is highly likely that 20th-century writings on the military art—whether by Svechin, Fuller, or Liddell Hart—will remain topical for many more decades and the subject of detailed investigation. For example, Liddell Hart's strategy of the ‘indirect approach’, which defines a particular way of warfare (not solely driven by technology), underwrites the ‘manoeuvrist approach’ found in contemporary British manoeuvre warfare.
Success in war demands hard training and continual practice. For centuries commanders have recognized that military proficiency requires prior study and exercise. In The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Edward Gibbon remarks:
In the midst of peace, the Roman troops familiarised themselves with the practice of war; and it is prettily remarked by an ancient historian who had fought against them, that the effusion of blood was the only circumstance which distinguished a field of battle from a field of exercise. It was the policy of the ablest generals, and even of the emperors themselves, to encourage these military studies by their presence and example.
If the art of generalship has developed since Roman times from direct leadership to more indirect methods of command, then the responsibility of those in command to train their subordinates in the military art remains. In sum, while it is relatively easy to gain a superficial picture of the art of war, perhaps through the media of popular fiction and film, such are the complexities of its dynamics and subtleties of its texture that war demands serious study. Like a language, the military art has its own lexicon, grammar, and syntax. Any picture of war must be viewed in relation to its constituent parts: strategy, operations, tactics, logistics, personnel, and command. As with religion, the conduct of war requires a doctrine to ensure coherence and consistency of teaching. In most cases training, judgement, confidence, and an element of intuition are fundamental prerequisites of success in the application of force. It requires balancing theory with practice, and a flexibility of mind to learn from past experience. But for those military commanders who ignore war's unforgiving realities and who are overconfident, unwarranted risk-taking may lead to deadly gambles. For, unlike any other human activity, the costs of failure in war can be catastrophic for individuals, teams, tribes, societies, and whole nations alike. Therefore it is often wise to take a wide perspective—and here military history must play its part—in order to learn about war, to view it from a number of angles, and, above all, to stand sufficiently well back in order to place any given conflict or particular operation into proper focus. For the future, a study of the military art may point out the path ahead. If neglected, a strategic overview, a balanced analysis of a plan of campaign together with its likely consequences, may be lost in a mass of tactical and technical detail.
Bibliography
- Alger, John I., The Quest for Victory (Westport, 1982).
- Frank, Willard C., and Gillette, Philip S. (eds.), Soviet Military Doctrine from Lenin to Gorbachev, 1915-1991 (Westport, 1992).
- Gat, Azar, The Development of Military Thought: The Nineteenth Century (Oxford, 1992).
- Handel, Michael I., Masters of War: Classical Military Thought (London, 1996).
- Jones, Archer, The Art of War in the Western World (New York, 1997).
- Keegan, John, A History of Warfare (London, 1993).
- Liddell Hart, B. H., Strategy: The Indirect Approach (London, 1967).
- Moltke, Helmuth Graf von, Moltke on the Art of War: Selected Writings, ed. Daniel J. Hughes and Harry Bell (Novato, Calif., 1993).
- Paret, Peter (ed.), Makers of Modern Strategy (London, 1986)
— Mungo Melvin
