The Changing Face of War: Lessons of Combat, from the Marne to Iraq - Hardcover

Martin L. Van Creveld

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0891419012 ISBN 13: 9780891419013

Verlag: Presidio Press, 2007

Inhaltsangabe

A provocative look at how war has changed over the course of the past century reveals how twentieth-century warfare evolved from its historical predecessors, as well as what terrorism and other modern-day phenomena mean in terms of the future of war. 35,000 first printing.

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Martin van Creveld, professor of history at Hebrew University, Jerusalem, is one of the best-known experts on military history and strategy. He has written seventeen books, which have been translated into fourteen languages; most notable among them are Supplying War: Logistics from Wallenstein to Patton, Command in War, and The Transformation of War. Professor van Creveld has consulted to the defense departments of numerous governments, including those of the United States. He was the second civilian expert ever to be invited to address the Israeli General Staff, and has lectured or taught at practically every institute of strategic military study. He has appeared on CNN, BBC, and other international networks and has been featured in many magazines and newspapers, including Newsweek and the International Herald Tribune.

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1

Prelude, 1900-14

1.1. States, Armies, and Navies



Around 1900, the idea that the only possible threat to a "Great Power" could come from another "Great Power" was taken very much for granted. Indeed, nowhere in the voluminous strategic literature of the period is any other possibility so much as hinted at. Depending on whether or not one included Italy, the number of Great Powers was either seven or eight. Of them, no fewer than six (or seven) were populated almost entirely by Christian people of Caucasian stock--an extraordinary fact, considering that such people formed a small percentage of the world's population. Even more extraordinary, of the seven (or eight) Great Powers in question, four (or five) were located in just one, rather small, continent by the name of Europe. Another, Russia, had its main basis firmly rooted in that continent even though it also stretched all the way across Asia to the Pacific. Only two of the powers, the United States and Japan, were geographically separated from the "old" continent. However, even those two owed their strength either to the fact that their population was of Caucasian stock or to their successful adaptation of European ideas, methods, and techniques.

The product of a series of exceptionally fortunate circumstances,1 built up over the course of centuries, this tremendous concentration of military might enabled its owners to share almost the entire world among themselves. From about ad 1500 on, it was Europe that established colonies abroad, not the other way around. European ships were fully rigged and carried row upon row of cannon. Captained by the likes of Christopher Columbus, Vasco da Gama, and their followers, they reached the four corners of the earth. Wherever they met opposition they shot it to pieces; meanwhile, non-Europeans were able to reach Europe, if at all, only as licensed curiosities.2

In addition to Latin America, the only non-European countries that succeeded in staying independent were China, Thailand, Ethiopia, Liberia, the Ottoman Empire, Iran, and Afghanistan. The main reason why they did so was not their own strength but because the powers, while unable to agree on how to carve them up, did not want to go to war over them. Some were formally designated as buffer zones. Thus, Iran in 1907 was cut into three "zones of influence": a Russian one in the north, a British one in the south, and a common one in the center. In other cases, the independence in question was more apparent than real.

As so often happens, political power rested on an equally impressive accumulation of economic muscle. The Industrial Revolution had started in Britain during the second half of the eighteenth century. From there, it spread to the Continent; as of the beginning of the twentieth century, however, with the exception of the United States and Japan it had scarcely yet touched the other parts of the globe. Until 1750, according to the best available calculations, about three-quarters of all the world's manufacturing output had been concentrated in what, today, we would call the third world (Africa and Asia minus Russia and Japan). From this point, the share underwent a steady decline until, in 1900, it stood at a mere 12 percent. Conversely, by that time, Europe, the United States, and Japan together accounted for no less than 88 percent of world manufacturing output. In terms of per capita industrialization, the gap between the self-styled "civilized" and "primitive" countries was much greater still.

In 1914, on the eve of the Great War, the largest economic power was already the United States, with a population of 98 million and a national income of $37 billion. It was followed by Germany (65 million and $12 billion, respectively), Great Britain (45 and $11), Russia (171 and $7), France (39 and $6), Austria-Hungary (52 and $3), Italy (37 and $4), and Japan (55 and $2). Thus the US economy was slightly larger than those of the next four powers combined, amounting to no less than 45 percent of the total. At $377, American per capita income was also the highest by far--one result of this being that visitors to America who had been comfortable at home felt like paupers. It was followed, at a considerable distance, by Britain ($244), Germany ($184), and France ($153). On that basis, the poorest powers of all were Italy, Austria-Hungary, Russia, and Japan, in that order.3

At that time, five out of the world's seven most powerful armed forces, namely those of Germany, France, Italy, Austria-Hungary, and Russia, relied on some form of general conscription to fill their manpower needs. So did Japan, although in practice the country's financial penury meant that the fraction of the relevant age groups which actually saw service was much smaller. The important exceptions were Britain, whose main defense consisted of its navy, and the United States, which, feeling secure behind its oceans, hardly had an army at all.

Conscription, organized by the magistrates with the aid of pre-prepared lists of citizens, had been the normal method for obtaining military manpower both in classical Greece and during the Roman Republic. However, in the days of the empire it was abandoned, and before it was reinstituted, more than a millennium and a half had to pass. Assisted by advances in public administration, the first modern country to resort to conscription, or the levee en masse as it was called, was France in 1792. Other countries reluctantly followed, though not without many ups and downs that, often reflecting political battles among reactionaries, democrats, and socialists, lasted during most of the nineteenth century.4

Following the German triumph over France in 1870-71, most countries adopted the system of military organization developed by the victor. This system divided the armed forces into three parts. The first consisted of a core of professionals (officers and NCOs) who served on longtime contracts--in many cases, until retirement. The second was made up of a larger group of conscripts who, depending on the country in question and also on the service they joined, were usually made to serve two or three years. The two elements together might make up perhaps 1 percent of a country's population in peacetime, though in the case of France it was rather more and in those of Italy and Japan, rather less.

The third and largest part consisted of reservists who had completed their training and, having been discharged into civilian life and perhaps undergone refresher training from time to time, remained available for immediate recall in case war broke out.

By 1914, most countries expected reserves to increase their armed forces by a factor of four or five, but that did not prove the upper limit. The best-organized countries with the shortest lines of communications were Germany and France. Ultimately, they put almost 10 percent of their entire populations in uniform and kept them for years on end; what this meant for them, and their families, we can hardly imagine.

While every Great Power, as well as most of the lesser nations, possessed both an army and a navy, most land and naval forces had developed separately over a period of centuries. As a result, few people thought of providing them with common training at any level, let alone of putting them under joint command. Instead, each service had its own ministry responsible for providing it with weapons, cannon fodder, fuel, and administrative support in everything from financial affairs to veterans' pensions. Each ministry was headed by a minister or secretary who represented it either in the cabinet or, in Britain and France, in a smaller committee consisting of key ministers.

In Germany, the only link between the OHL (Oberste Heeresleitung) and the SKL (Seekriegsleitung) was the kaiser himself, as...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Presidio Press
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2007
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0891419012
• ISBN 13: 9780891419013
• Einband: Gebundene Ausgabe
• Anzahl der Seiten: 304
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar