Military buildup

“ If it be rare that a fortified place of itself absolutely prevents the progress of an army, it is, nevertheless, an embarrassment, and compels the army to detach a part of its force or to make détours in its march; while, on the other hand, it imparts corresponding advantages to the army which holds it, covers his depots, flanks, and movements, and, finally, is a place of refuge in case of need.
Fortresses thus exercise a manifest influence over military operations; and we now propose to examine their relations to strategy. ”

“ But the war called for money, provisions, and supplies on a vast scale, and even more it demanded endurance, energy, and military experience on the part of the troops. In the almost entire absence of all these, you personally provided and organised everything, drilled those who had reached the age for military service, got together a force of cavalry to match the enemy's, and issued orders for the infantry to persevere in their training. ”

“ There is perhaps no operation of war more difficult than that which this country has to undertake in the embarkation of its army for a continental campaign. It is not merely as regards its personnel; but large reserves of ammunition and stores, and the armaments and equipments of the artillery, engineers, [Pg 11] medical, commissariat, clothing, and other departments have to be embarked, and all so arranged as to be prepared for rapid landing after a long voyage, and possibly in the face of an enemy. ”

“ But the essential elements of defensive strength, fleets and armies, were mobile and equally available for offensive operations, and no efficient preparation for defence was possible that would not also serve for attack. Without a clear and true conception of the character of war as a conflict of national purposes, proper conduct of military operations and of defensive preparations was impossible, and to its absence was due the unorganized condition of the defence of the Empire. ”

“ That which has driven the masses of Europe into the trenches and to the battlefields is not their inner longing for war; it must be traced to the cut-throat competition for military equipment, for more efficient armies, for larger warships, for more powerful cannon. ”

“ It may, perhaps, be said that the army estimates are increasing; and my reply is that as the Empire is expanding, it requires not only more men, but more numerous and costly armaments for defence, than in the past. ”

“ In this conflict we are engaged with great nations whose military preparation has extended over nearly half a century, and whose aim, as far as we can comprehend it, has been world-wide supremacy by force of arms. ”

“ With full allowance for changes in army and battle formation, tactical action and armament, as well as greater facilities for the transportation of troops and army supplies, it remains true that the relative effect of all these changes upon success in war upon a grand scale, has not been the modification of those principles of military science which have shaped battle action and the general conduct of war, from the earliest period of authentic military history. ”

“ Mail, military, aerial and railway services are assigned. The commissary lines are laid and transportation provided for. With marvelous efficiency the full fighting strength, in front and rear, is made ready and co-ordinated.
The psychological effect of mobilization is tremendous. In every household home-ties are broken. The fields are stripped of men. Industry stops. Artillery rolls through the streets, bands play. An atmosphere of apprehension settles down on the country. ”

“ All the business of preparing for the military registration of 10,000,000 men, of providing quarters and instructors for nearly 50,000 prospective officers, for finding arms and equipment for millions of troops yet to be organized, of expanding the regular army to full war strength, of preparing and recruiting the National Guard for war was at hand. ”

“ The idea seems to be spreading that this war must lead to a thorough overhauling and recasting of the British military organisation. But if you are to make a bigger army, an army better suited to the times and to the needs of the Nation, you must begin by getting a competent army-creating instrument. ”

“ If the present war has proved anything it has proved that the one thing above all others which insures the national defense is trained and seasoned men,—and enough of them to overwhelm any invading enemy by the sheer force and weight of innumerable battalions. In all the future years the fundamental military strength of every nation is going to be measured by the number of such men that she has immediately [Pg 392] available for instant service, with adequate arms and equipment. ”

“ Large numbers of untrained men, without organization to embody them in, add little to actual military strength.
Armies of First Line
The Army which will take the field at the outbreak of war is the Regular Army, which is organized, kept up, and trained, year by year, in peace. The War Army will be this Peace Army mobilized, or brought up to war strength and completed in every essential, by calling up reserve officers and men to fill its ranks. ”

“ These, connected with a small military establishment to keep up our forts and garrisons, constitute the kind of preparation for war, which, it appears to me, this country ought to make. No man, who has paid the least attention to the operations of modern war, can have failed to remark, how essential good roads and canals are to the success of those operations. How often have battles been won by celerity and rapidity of movement! It is one of the most essential circumstances in war. ”

“ In these various ways different degrees of military efficiency are obtained, but, generally, experience shows that the more thorough and intelligent this training in arms, the greater the development of the requisite military qualities in the units; and the more these qualities become a second nature, the more complete will be their warlike efficiency. ”

“ Good civil government, in causing contentment to the people and in developing the resources of the country, gives vast additional strength to our military power. In addition to the British troops, we maintain highly efficient armies recruited from the many martial races under our rule, and are able to increase them [Pg 309] almost at will. At the same time, the improved means of communication by railways, roads, and rivers enable us to concentrate our forces, supplies, and munitions with comparative ease. ”

“ Starting from a minimum of organized strength, within this short period of sixteen months the entire resources of the country in men, money, and munitions have been placed under central control, and at the end of this period the Nation was in its full stride and had accomplished, from a military standpoint, what our enemy regarded as the impossible. ”

“ My policy is to preserve the present force, naval and military; to provide for the augmentation of the navy; and, if the danger of war should increase, to increase the army also. Arm the militia, and give it the most effective character of which it is susceptible. Provide in the most ample manner, and place in proper depots, all the munitions and instruments of war. Fortify and strengthen the weak and vulnerable points indicated by experience. Construct military roads and canals, particularly from the Miami of the Ohio to the Miami of Erie ”

“ Nor does preparation mean a policy of militarizing. Our people and industries are solicitous for the cause of 0111, country, and have great respect for the Army and Navy and foil the uniform worn by the men who stand ready at all times for our protection to encounter the dangers and perils necessary to military service, but all of these activities are to be taken not in behalf of aggression but in behalf of peace. They are the instruments by which we undertake to do our part to promote good will and support stability among all peoples. ”

“ To place any dependance upon Militia, is, assuredly, resting upon a broken staff. Men just dragged from the tender Scenes of domestick life; unaccustomed to the din of Arms; totally unacquainted with every kind of Military skill, which being followed by a want of confidence in themselves, when opposed to Troops regulary train'd, disciplined, and appointed, superior in knowledge, and superior in Arms, makes them timid, and ready to fly from their own shadows. ”

“ I am making this statement as an act of wilful defiance of military authority because I believe that the war is being deliberately prolonged by those who have the power to end it. I am a soldier, convinced that I am acting on behalf of soldiers. I believe that the war upon which I entered as a war of defence and liberation has now become a war of agression and conquest. ”

“ My countrymen, the surpassing war of all times has involved us, and found us utterly unprepared in either a mental or military sense. The Republic must awaken. The people must understand. Our safety lies in full realization the fate of the nation and the safety of the world will be decided on the western battlefront of Europe. ”

“ By method and discipline are to be understood the marshaling of the army in its proper subdivisions, the graduations of rank among the officers, the maintenance of roads by which supplies may reach the army, and the control of military expenditure. ”

“ The preparation for a complicated operation against the formidable defenses in front of us included the assembling of divisions and of corps and army artillery, transport, aircraft, tanks, ambulances, the location of hospitals, and the molding together of all of the elements of a great modern army with its own railroads, supplied directly by our own Service of Supply, The concentration for this operation, which was to be a surprise, involved the movement, mostly at night, of approximately 600,000 troops, and required for its success the most careful attention to every detail. ”

“ The war affords the Insurgents an opportunity of knowing Foreign Powers, with whom they form connexions, and from whom they receive aid: the war, in fine, destroys, in detail, our little army, either by the fruitless fatigues of a campaign under the present system, or by exposing it to the influence of seduction, to which the apparent remoteness of our success gives but too much room, and the effects of which are felt even amongst the European soldiers, without its being possible for the Government either to replace them or the arms which they generally carry off. ”

“ All around us, we see changes transforming our economy. Global competition, new technologies, and the reductions in military spending after we won the cold war. We can't stop the world from changing, but there is one decision we can and must make. Will we leave our people and our Nation unprepared for changes that are remaking our world, or will we invest in our people's jobs, our education, our training, our technology to build a high-skilled, high-wage future for ourselves and for our children? ”

“ To march an army of preponderous strength through level and fertile country, flanked by friendly war-ships and backed by unassailable credit; to meet and overcome a much smaller and far less rich army, intrenched behind earthworks of doubtful formidableness, and finally to besiege and capture an isolated city of more historic than strategic advantages, seemed on the face of it as easy as rolling a barrel downhill or eating when hungry. ”

“ Of course we are all aware that new tasks of stupendous proportions are being undertaken by the country as measures for national defense, and that while a large army is being recruited and trained, a still larger army is being drawn into industrial production to equip and support the army and navy directly on the lines of defense. ”

“ Our land and naval forces should be moderate, but adequate to the necessary purposes—the former to garrison and preserve our fortifications and to meet the first invasions of a foreign foe, and, while constituting the elements of a greater force, to preserve the science as well as all the necessary implements of war in a state to be brought into activity in the event of war ”

“ The first duty of the sovereign, that of protecting the society from the violence and invasion of other independent societies, can be performed only by means of a military force. ”

“ Our military strength is a prerequisite to peace, but let it be clear we maintain this strength in the hope it will never be used, for the ultimate determinant in the struggle that's now going on in the world will not be bombs and rockets, but a test of wills and ideas, a trial of spiritual resolve, the values we hold, the beliefs we cherish, the ideals to which we are dedicated. ”

“ In the weakness of one kind of authority, and in the fluctuation of all, the officers of an army will remain for some time mutinous and full of faction, until some popular general, who understands the art of conciliating the soldiery, and who possesses the true spirit of command, shall draw the eyes of all men upon himself. Armies will obey him on his personal account. There is no other way of securing military obedience in this state of things. ”

“ When the army crosses large streams, it will [Pg 68] construct têtes de pont; and, if the bridges are within walled cities, earth-works will be thrown up to increase the means of defense and to secure the safety of the eventual base or the strategic reserve which may occupy these posts.
Should the battle be lost, the army will retreat toward its base, in order to be reinforced therefrom by detachments of troops, or, what is equivalent, to strengthen itself by the occupation of fortified posts and camps, thus compelling the enemy to halt or to divide his forces. ”

“ Instead of wasting our energy in operations in mud and snow, we should spend the winter months in applying the lessons which we had learned in our first great battle as an army. Officers who had been proved unfit would be eliminated, and officers who had been proved fit would be promoted. All the freshly arrived divisions from home camps and all the personnel for handling the artillery, tanks, and other material of war which our home factories would then be producing in quantity, would be incorporated in a homogeneous organization. ”