Offensive warfare

“ By elevating the small guns the curtain fell farther and farther into the enemy's territory, thus making it possible for the Allies to go on farther and farther across No Man's Land.
The infantry rushed forward, fighting and dying nobly in a noble cause. Position after position was consolidated as the Germans fell back before the rain of shot and shell. It is always this way in an offensive, small or large. The first rush of the attacking side, be it German, French, British, or American, carries everything before it. It is the counter attack that tells. ”

“ In the future war every body of troops holding itself on the defensive or found taking the offensive, when it is not the question of sudden assault, will have to fortify itself in a chosen position and the war will be confined principally to the form of a series of combats in which the possession of fortified positions will be disputed, and in which the assailant will have to meet the accessory defensives in the neighbourhood of the fortifications such as barricades, barbed wire, etc., the destruction of these objects costing many victims.... ”

“ The invading force which enters an enemy's country is, to my mind, entirely at the mercy of and eventually forced to adopt, any system of warfare which may be thrust upon it by the owners of the country ”

“ Our case requires not merely firmness in holding our position by our veterans, but affirmative, aggressive action, resulting in accessions from the hostile or neutral, captures from the enemy. If the higher morale—the better weapons, the stronger ammunition—are not with us, but against us, how are we to be capable of the kind of warfare necessary to the situation? ”

“ But send these men away on foreign service, let them encounter a campaign or two, and be brought face to face with harassing marches, with the toil of actual warfare, with the fury of the elements, heat and cold, frost and sun, and the muster roll shows a rapid diminution, even before a shot has been fired or bayonet crossed bayonet. ”

“ This siege warfare is a war of force against force, the force of machinery dealing ponderous, mighty blows against a wall of steel, smashing, smashing, smashing, always in the same place, until the line is bent, then broken, then the force of man coming into play in a wild onrush of storming infantry, with their primitive passions aflame, surging forward amid clouds of green and yellow and red smoke, bombing and slashing their way through the breach their machines have made. ”

“ In regard to the other point of the proclamation to which you refer, I desire to say that I do not think the Enemy can either misconstrue or urge anything against it, or undertake to make unusual retaliation. The shooting of men who shall rise in arms against an Army in the Military occupation of a Country, is merely a necessary measure of defense, and entirely according to the usages of civilized warfare. ”

“ Finally, our army takes up its stand far in the rear, forming a new battle-front, which has been previously fortified.
The enemy advances, repeats the previous tactics, forming a long battle-front on commanding positions just beyond the range of our guns, and again proceeds to dislodge us, and drive us back by their long-range gun-fire.
Our loss in men and guns has been enormous. The enemy, on the contrary, has lost no guns, and but few men. ”

“ War once determined upon, the first point to be decided is, whether it shall be offensive or defensive; and we will first explain what is meant by these terms. There are several phases of the offensive: if against a great state, the whole or a large portion of whose territory is attacked, it is an invasion; if a province only, or a line of defense of moderate extent, be assailed, it is the ordinary offensive; finally, if the offensive is but an attack upon the enemy's position, and is confined to a single operation, it is called the taking the initiative. ”

“ We do not see the guns that bombard us; the attacking lines of the enemy infantry are men like ourselves; but these tanks are machines, their caterpillars run on as endless as the war, they are annihilation, they roll without feeling into the craters, and climb up again without stopping, a fleet of roaring, smoke-belching armour-clads, invulnerable steel beasts squashing the dead and the wounded—we shrivel up in our thin skin before them, against their colossal weight our arms are sticks of straw, and our hand-grenades matches. ”

“ Then began the race between the contending armies to produce guns and shells of such size and in such quantities as would blast a whole area with death, bury the machine-guns and the garrisons, destroy the superiority of the infantry in defence, and give the game once more into the hands of the offensive. ”

“ If they go forward equipped with the necessary arms, ammunition, and enginery of war, and are well trained and well officered, then they will be able not only to hold their own against the invaders, with comparatively little loss of life, but also to repel and drive out the enemy and save our land from spoliation and our homes from despoliation. ”

“ It will be evident that such warfare as this inevitable precision of gun and rifle forces upon humanity, will become less and less dramatic as a whole, more and more as a whole a monstrous thrust and pressure of people against people. ”

“ Huge day and night bombers will assemble at the declaration of war to penetrate into the enemy's country for the attack of his centres of population, his mobilization zones, his arsenals, harbours, strategic railways, shipping and rolling stock. ”

“ Day after day the American troops moved slowly forward, over rugged, difficult ground, broken by ravines and steep hills, through dense underbrush, in the face of deadly fire from artillery and nests of machine guns hidden in every vantage point, through incessant rain and mud and fog and penetrating cold, pushing the enemy steadily back, until they reached Sedan, cut the German Army’s most important line of communication, and so brought the end of the war in sight. ”

“ The purpose of war, namely, the overpowering of the enemy, is served in land warfare through two aims [230] —firstly, defeat of the enemy armed forces on land, and, secondly, occupation and administration of the enemy territory. The chief means by which belligerents try to realise those aims, and which are always conclusively decisive, are the different sorts of force applied against enemy persons. But besides such violence against enemy persons there are other means which are not at all unimportant, although they play a secondary part only. ”

“ The defensive army, on the contrary, should endeavor, by all means, to neutralize the first forward movement of its adversary, protracting operations as long as possible while not compromising the fate of the war, and deferring a decisive battle until the time when a portion of the enemy's forces are either exhausted by labors, or scattered for the purpose of occupying invaded provinces, masking fortified places, covering sieges, protecting the line of operations, depots, &c. ”

“ In effect, however, the right of the enemy presented less physical difficulties to the establishment of a hostile force on the flank, and it was there that the greatest number of artificial obstacles in the shape of guns, cavalry, and men, was accumulated. ”

“ The main object in defensive war is, to protect the menaced territory, to retard the enemy's progress, to multiply obstacles in his way, to guard the vital points of the country, and—at the favorable moment, when the enemy becomes enfeebled by detachments, losses, privations, and fatigue—to assume the offensive, and drive him from the country. This combination of the defensive and offensive has many advantages. The enemy, being forced to take the defensive in his turn, loses much of the moral superiority due to successful offensive operations. ”

“ Whereas formerly hostile forces surged up against stout towers and strong walls, the enemy of to-day lets loud-voiced cannon speak from afar, hurling destruction at what look like mounds, green hills, from a distance, but when approached bristle with ordnance and small-arms. ”

“ Parapets, trenches, men and Maxims were all destroyed if near the point of contact. "Some bomb!" as the boys said.
In this sort of warfare it is always the progressive and alert man who wins. It is useless sitting down and grousing. ”

“ They could cut their way through all opposition that we could offer. We have neither the infantry, nor the ar [108] tillery, nor the cavalry, to oppose them, and the artillery we have is of so much shorter range that at no time could we get near enough to the enemy to reach him with our guns.
If war comes between us and any of the Great Powers, the splendid young men of the country—husbands, fathers, sons, brothers, lovers—will have to go to the front and meet the invaders. ”

“ Any officer who has been present at great operations of this nature will understand what it is for an army to land in narrow and widely separated creeks all its munitions of war—its shells, its cannon-shot, its heavy guns, mortars, its powder, its gun-carriages, its platforms, its fascines, gabions, sandbags, its trenching tools, and all the various matériel requisite for the siege of extensive and formidable lines of fortifications and batteries. ”

“ Most times, it is thus impossible to aim at the total surrender of the enemy armies or state. One can aim for concrete operational purposes only at specific enemy troubles or effects. For the field, troop surrenders; for the home front, interference with the enemy war effort—these are about as general as goals can be made. ”

“ In warfare in civilised and highly developed countries, when the enemy's object is rather to defeat the fighting force than to harry the convoy, and when troops can march on broad frontages, the protection given by bodies of cavalry with horse artillery, flung far to front and flanks, and supported, if necessary, by infantry, is usually adequate. ”

“ The big guns may level the forts and reduce them to powder, driving off the opposing forces, but the infantry must advance and the small arms and rapid-fire guns must keep the opposing forces from resuming the position which they had abandoned. ”

“ Whether we shall drive the enemy from their posts with a strong body of regular troops, or whether we shall permit them to extend their devastations, while, with our battalions and fluctuating corps of militia, we protract a weak defensive war, till our allies are discouraged, and some unfavorable change takes place in the system of Europe. ”

“ In a military point of view, the offensive has its good and its bad side. Strategically, an invasion leads to deep lines of operations, which are always dangerous in a hostile country. All the obstacles in the enemy's country, the mountains, rivers, defiles, and forts, are favorable for defense, while the inhabitants and authorities of the country, so far from being the instruments of the invading army, are generally hostile. However, if success be obtained, the enemy is struck in a vital point: he is deprived of his resources and compelled to seek a speedy termination of the contest. ”

“ Trains of Artillery, cannon, ammunition—all that belong to our army fell into the hands of the enemy, for the dispersion was horrid. Our loss in dead, wounded and dispersed, is reckoned at six thousand men. The loss of the enemy is said to be greater, but you know that this way of expression among us is the fashion. ”

“ But nowadays, on a battlefield swept by artillery and machine-guns, these close formations would give the other side as good a target as they could wish for. If an attack were led in this way against an enemy who is under cover or is himself determined not to give ground, there would soon be nothing left of it but a heap of dead bodies. ”

“ What the public already knows of armies, guns, trenches, etc., has little to do with the suffering that the people of an invaded country endures, when the white-hot flame of the enemy invasion sweeps over the land scorching every flower and leaving in its wake only desolation and pain and despair. ”

“ Hence they are limited to indirect action against the enemy’s vitals—either by blockade, [36] by enabling troops to be landed, or nowadays by serving as a mobile base for aircraft which can strike at “nerve centres” within some 250 miles of the coast.
Armies have hitherto been the means of “direct action,” whether against the resources of the enemy nation, the intimidation of the people, or by the capture or overthrow of individuals who were the mainspring of the opposing policy. ”

“ Bombs and hand grenades and mortars are also old forms of warfare, and close-quarter fighting with the bayonet, as was evident to all practical observers before the war, will endure as long as the only way to occupy a position is by the presence of men on the spot and as long as the defenders fight to hold it in an arena free of interference by guns which must hold their fire in fear of injury to your own soldiers as well as to the enemy. ”

“ In the face of counter-attacks, supported by a rain of shells and bullets of artillery and machine-gun barrages, they held their ground in the midst of fountains of earth and flying débris and frightful casualties, with that resolution in which every man, no matter how many of his comrades are killed, determines that he will not yield alive. ”

“ Hostile aircraft are prevented from carrying out similar observational journeys, the resistance of defending squadrons is overcome, and whenever a favourable target is presented, casualties are caused by bullets and bombs. ”

“ Do the officers around you consider it honorable warfare to dig and mine under a man and blow him up while he is asleep—before he has time to get his musket? I always thought an open field and a fair fight, with the enemy in front at equal chances, 293 was the American idea of honest, manly warfare. To my mind this is the most awful thing that could be imagined. There is a strong feeling among the people I meet that the hour has come when we should consider the lives of the few men left to us. Why let the enemy wipe us off the face of the earth? ”