kilometres or 812 square miles, or 1200 per square mile. General Bonnal in his Sadowa gives 36 square miles as sufficient for the maintenance of an army corps (30,000–35,000) or about 1100 men to the square mile during the assembly period, but only on condition of helping out local resources by special supplies from the base. The British Field Service Regulations state that ordinary agricultural districts of Western Europe, not previously traversed by troops, will support a force of twice the strength of the population for a week at a maximum. This would mean exacting fourteen rations from each inhabitant, but the incidence of the burden is spread over several days. A practical rule therefore would seem to be, in a district of 200 inhabitants to the square mile, to allot 1400 men per square mile for a flying passage of one day and 400 for a stay of one week, the resources of the country being more thoroughly and systematically exploited in the latter case. A British division (combatant column only) closing up to half its marching depth at the end of the day would require 12 square miles, and as its depth would be about 512 miles, its front or width would perhaps extend for only a mile on either side of the route. It is quite possible to move two divisions for several consecutive days on the same road, living on the country exclusively, subject to the condition that the second should halt on the areas which the first has passed through without stopping. In continental armies the rule is, in fact, “one army corps (＝2 British divisions) on one road.”
During the period of concentration, however, even if in movement, a modern army will necessarily be supplied in somewhat the same way as Napoleon’s. The billets will be allotted “without subsistence,” and the regimental reserve supplies will be called upon to ration their men, while all around the occupied towns and villages the supply officers and their mounted escorts will requisition food and vehicles to bring the food into the concentration area. In view of this, “supply officers will be sent on with cavalry or mounted brigades to investigate the resources of the country ahead of the main body, and if possible to collect supplies at suitable points.” Only commissioned officers and, as a rule, only those officers to whom the power is expressly delegated are entitled to carry out requisitions, though in an emergency a commander of any rank may obtain from the inhabitants articles or services by requisition and on his own responsibility, which responsibility may mean answering to a charge of “plundering” before a court-martial. On purely requisitioning work direct contact between the troops and the inhabitants is to be avoided.
Generally, then, a British regiment operating in Europe would be fed, during an advance, (a) by the inhabitants who provide the billets, without the necessity of a supply officer’s intervention, (b) by the regimental reserves, which would be filled up as they were emptied from the field dépôts, of food-stuffs requisitioned by the supply officers, or (c) on emergency by direct requisitioning. During a concentration it would be fed (a) in the first instance by “billets with subsistence,” as in an advance, (b) in so far as this was insufficient, by regimental, brigade and divisional reserves, which would refill partly from the lines of communication and partly from the field dépôts created by the requisitioning supply officers. Thus, as regards food and forage, the British Regulations—though it was not until 1909 that they appeared—are based on the fundamental principles of Napoleon that strategy must be the master, not the servant of supply, and that this mastery is most complete when—by means of “billets with subsistence” or by means of field dépôts of requisitioned food-stuffs—an army makes itself practically independent, as regards food, of its lines of communication.
The general organization of the supply service in Great Britain, calculated for a campaign under European conditions, is as follows: There are dépôts of various kinds and “mobile supplies.” The former are classified as (a) base dépôt, which is the great reserve magazine that collects all resources that come from outside the theatre of war; (b) intermediate dépôts (filled from the base or by local requisitioning) at intervals along the line of communication, which serve principally to feed the troops posted on the line of communication and those passing along it to the front, but can also be used as an “overflow” magazine if the base dépôt is full, and as a means of bringing reserves nearer to the front: (c) advanced dépôts at the head of the line of communication, which serve as the expense-magazine, issuing to the “mobile supplies” what these need to enable them to supplement local resources; (d) field dépôts, frequently alluded to above, which are small temporary dépôts (filled by requisitioning) in the immediate neighbourhood of the front, and from which, in preference to their own mobile reserves, the troops draw supplies if the inhabitants do not furnish them directly in the billets; field dépôts may also be utilized for storing local supplies surplus to the immediate wants of the army. The “mobile supplies” are classified as follows: (a) Regimental, which are carried partly by man and horse in the ranks and partly in “regimental transport” vehicles, and consist of the current day’s ration and the “emergency ration” of compressed food (which is never to be used except in an extremity) on man or horse, and a complete ration for every man and horse on the ration strength of the unit, with an extra “grocery ration” and some compressed forage in the vehicles, (b) Column, which are carried in the Army Service Corps “supply columns” of the division and carry one day’s complete ration[1] and one emergency ration per head of men and animals—these are in a sense mobile field dépôts and depend either on requisitioning or on the advanced dépôt of the line of communication, (c) Park, which are carried in “divisional parks" that move a day’s march (often more) in rear of the divisions and comprise a last mobile reserve of three days' rations of food and forage for the troops.
In warfare in savage or undeveloped countries the conditions are far less favourable, and each case has to be dealt with on its merits. But, in general, such warfare always necessitates an almost complete dependence on magazine supply. There are few or no “billets with subsistence” or “field dépôts” which are the backbone of the supply system in European warfare, and the regimental and column supply vehicles have generally such difficulty in keeping touch with the advanced dépôt of the line of communication that the striking radius of the army is strictly limited to the position and output of the line of communications. Moreover, the difficulty—even the principal difficulty—is the transport of the supplies obtained from the line of communication. The alternative, which has often to be adopted by “punitive”expeditions, is to carry all supplies for the calculated duration of the movements with the troops, but the penalty for this freedom to move is either slowness of movement—the fighting troops regulating their pace by that of the supply vehicles or pack animals—or a disproportionate number of “useless mouths” or non-combatants who must be fed. Altogether, the supply difficulty in expeditions in the Sudan, or West Africa, or on the Indian frontier infinitely outweighs all difficulties of country or enemy. Moreover, paradoxical as it may be, the triumphant surmounting of these difficulties has its disadvantages as regards European warfare. Generals and supply officers who have always dealt with the maximum of difficulty find it almost impossible to bring themselves to deal with easier conditions. In 1805 Mack vainly sought to teach the Austrian soldier how to live on the country in the Napoleonic fashion. In 1806 the Prussians starved in the midst of riches, in 1870 the French moved as slowly and kept themselves as closely concentrated as desert columns in Algeria, and so deprived themselves of the resources of their own country.
- ↑ One day’s supply of meat is usually taken with the column “on the hoof.”
