to sound reasons, he expressed, nevertheless, a perfectly independent opinion on every proposal placed before him, and on very many occasions made most useful suggestions. And at the same time, while systematically refraining from all interference after military operations had once begun, he never permitted military considerations to override the demands of policy. In 1866, when it was manifestly of the first importance, from a military point of view, that the Prussian army should be concentrated in a position which would enable it to cross the border immediately war was declared, the political situation was so strained that it was even more important to prevent the enemy from setting foot at any single point on Prussian territory. The army, in consequence, was dispersed instead of being concentrated, and the ultimate offensive became a difficult and hazardous operation. It is true that the king was an able and experienced soldier. Nevertheless, the wise restraint he displayed in the course of two great campaigns, as well as the skill with which he adjusted conflicting factors, are an admirable example of judicious statesmanship.
The duration of a campaign is largely affected by the deadly properties of modern firearms. It is true that the losses in Moral effect of fire. battle are relatively less than in the days of Brown Bess and the smooth-bore cannon, and almost insignificant when compared with the fearful carnage wrought by sword and spear. The reason is simple. A battlefield in the old days, except at close quarters, was a comparatively safe locality, and the greater part of the troops engaged were seldom exposed for a long time together to a hot and continuous fire. To-day death has a far wider range, and the strain on the nerves is consequently far more severe. Demoralization, therefore, sets in at an earlier period, and it is more complete. When troops once realize their inferiority, they can no longer be depended on. It is not the losses they have actually suffered, but those that they expect to suffer, that affect them. Unless discipline and national spirit are of superior quality, unless the soldier is animated by something higher than the mere habit of mechanical obedience, panic, shirking and wholesale surrender will be the ordinary features of a campaign. These phenomena made themselves apparent, though in a less degree, as long ago as the American Civil War, when the weapon of the infantry was the muzzle-loading rifle, firing at most two rounds a minute, and when the projectiles of the artillery were hardly more destructive than the stone shot of Mons Meg. With the magazine rifle, machine guns, shrapnel and high explosives they have become more pronounced than even at Vionville or Plevna. “The retreat of the 38th (Prussian) Brigade,” writes Captain Hoenig, an eye-witness of the former battle, “forms the most awful drama of the great war. It had lost 53% of its strength, and the proportion of killed to wounded was as 3 to 4. Strong men collapsed inanimate. … I saw men cry like children, others fell prone without a sound; in most the need of water thrust forth all other instincts; the body demanded its rights. ‘Water, water,’ was the only intelligible cry that broke from those moving phantoms. The enemy's lead poured like hail upon the wretched remnant of the brigade; yet they moved only slowly to the rear, their heads bent in utter weariness; their features distorted under the thick dust that had gathered on faces dripping with sweat. The strain was beyond endurance. The soldier was no longer a receptive being; he was oblivious of everything, great or small. His comrades or his superiors he no longer recognized; and yet he was the same man who but a short time before had marched across the battlefield shouting his marching chorus. A few active squadrons, and not a man would have escaped ! Only he who had seen men in such circumstances, and observed their bearing, knows the dreadful imprint that their features leave upon the memory. Madness is there, the madness that arises from bodily exhaustion combined with the most abject terror. … I do not shrink,” he adds, “from confessing that the fire of Mars-la-Tour affected my nerves for months.”
If such are the results of ill-success, a whole army might be reduced to the condition of the 38th Brigade in the first month of the campaign, and it is thus perfectly clear that some small mistake in conduct, some trifling deficiency in preparation, an ill-conceived order or a few hours' delay in bringing up a reinforcement may have the most terrible consequences.
The importance, nay the necessity, that the people, as a governing body, should keep as watchful an eye on its armed forces and the national defences as on diplomacy or legislation is fully realized naturally enough, only by those nations whose instincts of self-preservation, by reason of the configuration of their frontiers or their political situation, are strongly developed. Yet even to maritime empires, to Great Britain or indeed to the Naval and military force. United States, an efficient army is of the first necessity. Their land frontiers are vulnerable. They may have to deal with rebellion, and a navy is not all-powerful, even for the defence of coasts and commerce. It can protect, but it cannot destroy. Without the help of an army, it can neither complete the ruin of the enemy's fleet nor prevent its resuscitation. Without the help of an army it can hardly force a hostile power to ask for terms. Exhaustion is the object of its warfare; but exhaustion, unless accelerated by crushing blows, is an exceedingly slow process. In the spring of 1861 the blockade was established in American waters along the coasts of the Southern Confederacy, and maintained with increasing stringency from month to month. Yet it was not till the spring of 1865 that the colours of the Union floated from the capitol of Richmond, and it was the army which placed them there. A state, then, which should rely on naval strength alone, could look forward to no other than a protracted war, and a protracted war between two great powers is antagonistic to the interests of the civilized world. With the nations armed to the teeth, and dominated to a greater or smaller extent by a militant spirit; with commerce and finance dependent for health and security on universal peace, foreign intervention is a mere question of time. Nor would public opinion, either in Great Britain or America, be content with a purely defensive policy, even if such policy were practicable. Putting aside the tedium and the dangers of an interminable campaign, the national pride would never be brought to confess that it was incapable of the same resolute effort as much smaller communities. “An army, and a strong army,” would be the general cry. Nor would such an army be difficult to create. Enormous numbers would not be needed. An army supported by an invincible navy possesses a strength which is out of all proportion to its size. Even to those who rely on the big battalions and huge fortresses, the amphibious power of a great maritime state, if intelligently directed, may be a most formidable menace; while to the state itself it is an extraordinary security. The history of Great Britain is one long illustration. Captain Mahan points out that there are always dominant positions, outside the frontiers of a maritime state, which, in the interests of commerce, as well as of supremacy at sea, should never be allowed to pass into the possession of a powerful neighbour. Great Britain, always dependent for her prosperity on narrow seas, has long been familiar with the importance of the positions that command these waterways. In one respect at least her policy has been consistent. She has spared no effort to secure such positions for herself, or, if that has been impracticable, at least to draw their teeth. Gibraltar, Malta, St Lucia, Aden, Egypt, Cyprus are conspicuous instances; but above all stands Antwerp. In perhaps the most original passage of Alison's monumental work the constant influence of Antwerp on the destinies of the United Kingdom is vividly portrayed. “Nature has framed the Scheldt to be the rival of the Thames. Flowing through a country excelling even the midland counties of England in wealth and resources, adjoining cities equal to any in Europe in arts and commerce; the artery at once of Flanders and Holland, of Brabant and Luxemburg, it is fitted to be the great organ of communication between the fertile fields and rich manufacturing towns of the Low Countries and other maritime states of the world.” Antwerp, moreover, the key of the great estuary, is eminently adapted for the establishment of a vast naval arsenal, such as it became under Philip II. of
