French Influ on American Military

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FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY

COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

FRENCH THOUGHT AND THE AMERICAN MILITARY MIND:

A HISTORY OF FRENCH INFLUENCE ON THE

AMERICAN WAY OF WARFARE FROM 1814 THROUGH 1941

BY

MICHAEL ANDREW BONURA

A Dissertation submitted to theDepartment of History

in partial fulfillment of therequirements for the degree of

Doctor of Philosophy

Degree Awarded:Fall Semester 2008

Copyright 2008Michael Andrew Bonura

All Rights Reserved


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The members of the Committee approve the Dissertation of Michael Andrew Bonura defended on

August 6, 2008.

____________________________

Frederick R. Davis

Professor Directing Dissertation

____________________________

J. Anthony Stallins

Outside Committee Member

____________________________

James P. Jones

Committee Member

____________________________

Jonathan Grant

Committee Member

____________________________

Darrin M. McMahon

Committee Member

The Office of Graduate Studies has verified and approved the above named committee members.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

As everyone knows, a project of this size is the product of more than a single person, and

many have helped me along the way. First and foremost I would like to thank Dr. Frederick R.

Davis, my major professor, who agreed to take me on as a student after the retirement of Dr.

Donald Horward. Dr. Davis took an early interest in my development as a Historian and

continued to encourage my work and study in the Historians craft, even by letting me audit his

Historical Methods course. He challenged me intellectually and academically and his continued

long distance mentorship made this dissertation possible. I am eternally grateful and consider

him not only a mentor, but also a friend.

I would also like to thank the other members of my committee, Dr. Jim Jones, Dr.

Jonathan Grant, Dr. Darrin McMahon, and Dr. Tony Stallins. From my first semester in graduate

school, Dr. Jones was always available to challenge my assertions and broaden my horizons. I

can truly say that I am a better scholar and citizen for having been exposed to his certain brand of

education. Dr. Grant was as committed to my education as he is to all of the graduate students in

the FSU Department of History. He always had advice and guidance when no one else did and

contributed greatly to my development as a Historian. Dr. McMahon did the most to guide my

intellectual development, often challenging me to read and think deeply about a variety of

subjects. His mentorship, as both a Historian of the French Revolution and more generally as an

Intellectual Historian, prepared me to interact intelligently with both my civilian and military

peers at West Point. For this I am eternally grateful. I would also like to thank Dr. Stallins, who

graciously agreed to join this committee at short notice and to spend his valuable time and

energy helping me to defend my dissertation.

A special thanks goes out to Dr. Donald Horward, who accepted me into the Department

of History and the Institute on Napoleon and the French Revolution with an undistinguished

undergraduate transcript. His mentorship and example has set a high standard of both scholarship

and integrity that I will strive to live up to for the rest of my life. I truly would not be here today

without his trust and confidence, and I hope my achievements reflect greatly upon him.

I could not have successfully completed all of the requirements for this degree without

the support and friendship of Chris Pignatiello. Chris was the only friendly face I knew my entire

first summer at FSU and continued to be a bright part of my daily interaction in the department.

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Since I left, she has kept me straight with deadlines, course numbers, and friendly advice. I

promise to keep in touch.

I would never have been able to complete this project on the current timeline if it had not

been for the United States Military Academy Special Collections and Archives under the

direction of Suzanne Christoff. The Special Collections provided the majority of my sources due

to the depth and breadth of its holdings in both the warfare in the French Revolution, but also its

holdings in obscure American military writings. I especially could not have completed my work

but for the help of Valerie Dutdut, who cheerfully retrieved armload after armload of obscure

Nineteenth Century regulations, and found several important works hiding in the collection.

The support of the USMA Department of History has been incredible, and I want to

especially thank COL Lance Betros, COL Matthew Moten, and COL Ty Seidule for their

continued faith in my abilities as both an Officer and as a Historian. I continue to be indebted to

one of my most important mentors and friends COL Kevin Farrell, who has continued in the last

two years the job of mentoring me that he began when I was only Cadet Bonura. He provides

sage advice when I bring the problems, frustrations, and heresies of the moment to his office. He

continues to keep me on the path of righteousness and for that my debt is eternal.

One of the best parts of being a part of the USMA Department of History is the

interactions with my peers as both Officers and Historians. Many of the ideas and arguments I

made throughout this dissertation were strengthened in the crucible of discussion with many of

my peers, MAJs J. P. Clark, John Due, and Brian Schoelhorn being only a few of the most

difficult to convince. My biggest debt in the intellectual growth of my project is to Dr. Jonathan

Gumz who has listened to my ideas and has offered some of the most useful and interesting

advice during this project. His advice and his friendship made this dissertation possible.

I would also like to thank my family for continuing to support me in this endeavor. My

mother Terri Bonura, who could not be more proud of her second son to earn a Ph.D., is always

there for me and keeps me on track. Thank you so much for all of your love and support. To my

brother Carlo Bonura, the first son with a Ph.D., he challenges me intellectually in ways few do

and keeps me on my toes. To my mother-in-law Sandra Bethany, who has done everything she

could to support my work, to include proofreading my chapters for me, Thank you for being a

part of my life and my family.

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Last but certainly not least is my undying love, devotion, and gratitude to the love of my

life, my wife Kimberlee. I cannot imagine completing this dissertation without her unwavering

love and support, and especially understanding of the demands of this kind of endeavor. She was

a great sounding board, a great example for excellence in dissertations, and she was a source of

inspiration and wisdom. I could not live without her and I certainly could not have finished this

project without her.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT................................................................................................................................ viiiINTRODUCTION......................................................................................................................... 1CHAPTER 1: THE FRENCH COMBAT METHOD ............................................................. 10

SECTION 1: Military Art and Science before the French Revolution .............................. 11

The Military Revolution 1789-1804................................................................................... 11The Linear Warfare of the Ancien Regime ...................................................................... 13The French Debates from 1760-1788 ................................................................................ 15

SECTION 2: The New Warfare of the French Revolution................................................. 17The Creation of the Citizen Soldier................................................................................... 17The New Discipline of an Army of Citizen Soldiers......................................................... 18The Regulations of 1791: A New System of Tactics......................................................... 21The Regulations of 1792: A New Framework of Battle................................................... 23

SECTION 3: The French Combat Method in Action- Fleurus 1794 ................................. 31Conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 34

CHAPTER 2: BRINGING THE FCM TO AMERICA .......................................................... 38

SECTION 1: Choosing the French Combat Method .......................................................... 38From Steuben to a Multiplicity of Frameworks 1783-1808 ............................................ 38The First Attempt to Bring the FCM to America 1808-1814.......................................... 41No Standard Regulation and the British Alternative ...................................................... 43Winfield Scott and the Grey Line on the Niagara 1814 .................................................. 45America Adopts the FCM: The Regulations Board of 1814 ........................................... 49

SECTION 2: Institutionalizing The FCM ............................................................................ 51The General Army Regulations of 1821 and 1825 ........................................................... 51Scotts Infantry Tactics of 1825 ......................................................................................... 54The FCM and the Regulations from 1835 - 1847 ............................................................. 56

SECTION 3: The United States Military Academy and the FCM..................................... 60

Winfield Scott, Sylvanus Thayer, and USMA .................................................................. 60The Gay de Vernon Text 1817-1838 .................................................................................. 64The Americanization of the FCM: D. H. Mahon 1832-1846 ........................................... 67U. S. Officers in Mexico 1846-1848.................................................................................... 69

Conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 70CHAPTER 3: THE FCM AND THE CIVIL WAR................................................................. 74

SECTION 1: The U. S. Army Regulations 1848-1865 ......................................................... 74From Scott to Hardee: the FCM and the Rifled Musket ................................................ 74Silas Casey and the 1862 Regulation ................................................................................. 78The General Army Regulations 1857-1865....................................................................... 82

SECTION 2: USMA and the FCM 1848-1865 ..................................................................... 85

Jomini and Cadet Education.............................................................................................. 85American Military Theory: The Influence of D.H. Mahon ............................................ 87The Military Literature of the Union 1861-1865 ............................................................. 93The Military Literature of the Confederacy 1861-1865 .................................................. 96

SECTION 3: The FCM in Action in the Civil War ............................................................. 98The FCM on the Battlefield 1861-1863 ............................................................................. 98The FCM and the Modern Battlefield 1863-1865 .......................................................... 101

Conclusion ............................................................................................................................. 104

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CHAPTER 4: THE FCM AND THE U.S. ARMY THROUGH WWI ................................ 107SECTION 1: U.S. Army Tactical Regulations 1865-1918................................................. 107

Upton and the New Tactics of the FCM 1865-1891 ....................................................... 107A Change of Focus: The Regulations from 1891-1911 .................................................. 111A Return to Simplicity: The Regulations from 1911-1918............................................ 115

SECTION 2: The General Army Regulations 1865-1918 ................................................. 118Stagnation: The General Army Regulations 1865-1889................................................ 118The FCM and the Field Service Regulations 1905......................................................... 120The FSR, German Influence, and the FCM: The 1910 FSR......................................... 121

SECTION 3: USMA, 50 Years of Theory and the FCM ................................................... 124The End of Pre-Civil War Texts: Mahon and Dufour .................................................. 124American Theorists at West Point: Wheeler and Mercur ............................................ 126The Modernization of Cadet Education: Fiebeger 1896-1918 ...................................... 130

SECTION 4: Army Post Graduate Education and the FCM ........................................... 134The Fort Leavenworth Schools and Theoretical Education ......................................... 134Morrison and a New Direction in Officer Education .................................................... 136

Conclusion ............................................................................................................................. 139CHAPTER 5: THE END OF THE FCM IN AMERICAN WARFARE 1918-1941........... 143SECTION 1: The U.S. Army Tactical Regulations 1918-1941 ......................................... 143

The AEFs Provisional Infantry Drill Regulation 1919................................................. 143Prewar Continuity and Little Change: 1921-1939 ......................................................... 146Infantry Field Manual 7-8: A New System of Tactics ................................................... 148

SECTION 2: The Field Service Regulations 1918-1941.................................................... 150Learning from WWI: The 1923 FSR .............................................................................. 150THE MANUAL FOR COMMANDERS OF LARGE UNITS...................................... 152An FCM Driven Synthesis: The Tentative 1939 FSR.................................................... 153The End of the FCM: The 1941 FSR .............................................................................. 155

SECTION 3: The Undergraduate Education of the U.S. Army ....................................... 157West Point Curriculum 1918-1928 .................................................................................. 1571928-1941: The Rise of History and the Fall of the FCM ............................................. 159The Reserve Officers Training Corps 1920-1941........................................................... 161

SECTION 4: CGSS and the Chief of Infantry ................................................................... 163The Command and General Service Schools ................................................................. 163The Review of Military Literature, CGSS, and the Army............................................ 165The Infantry School and the Mailing List ...................................................................... 169The Chief of Infantry and the End of the FCM ............................................................. 170

Conclusion ............................................................................................................................. 171CONCLUSION ......................................................................................................................... 174BIBLIOGRAPHY ..................................................................................................................... 181BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH ................................................................................................... 197

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ABSTRACT

The French Revolution had a tremendous impact on the social, political, and cultural

development of the western world. Similarly, it had a revolutionary impact on warfare in both

Europe and the United States. Although the U.S. had a distinctly British military tradition

through the War of 1812, in the span of a single year, the U.S. Army adopted the French system

of warfare or French Combat Method as the intellectual framework for the American way of

warfare. This French Combat Method informed and guided the way in which American officers

conceptualized the battlefield, how they organized their formations and their regulations, how

they equipped them, and how they learned lessons from their experiences on the battlefield. This

French influence dominated the American way of warfare from 1814 through the Civil War and

World War I, and into the 1930s. It was not until the catastrophic fall of France in 1940 that

caused the U.S. Army to fundamentally change their intellectual framework.


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INTRODUCTION

The way an army fights is more than just the sum of its equipment, social composition,

weaponry, and leadership. When armies conduct combat operations on the battlefield, they do so

as the tip of an immense pyramid built of ideas about the fundamental nature of war. These

ideas, when taken together, create a conceptualization or intellectual framework that pervades

every aspect of an armys decision making, from the adoption of a new technology to the

creation of a new divisional organization. This conceptualization, sometimes called a way of

warfare, shapes the way an army fights, prepares to fight, and thinks about fighting. It is at the

same time vitally important to understand, both as practitioner and scholar, and yet difficult to

differentiate the core ideas of that intellectual framework from its impact on the myriad of

aspects of war and warfighting.

Since the publication of Russell F. WeigleysAmerican Way of Warfare in 1973,

historians and military professionals alike have argued about the traditions and cultural

predilections that surround this concept. The end of the Cold War led to a boom in articles and

monographs calling for a new American way of warfare to deal with the realities of yet another

iteration of modern war.1 The popularity of the concept almost requires another historical

examination of the American way of warfare to match the detailed works on the German,

Prussian, Russian, British, and French ways of war. Any new examination of the subject would

have to come to much more detailed conclusions than Weigleys original thesis that the

American way of war consisted of a focus on the total destruction of the enemy in offensive

1 Russell Weigley first defined the concept of the way of war by stating that the strategy of Annihilation was theAmerican way of war. Russell F. Weigley, The American Way of War: A History of United States Military Strategyand Policy, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1973), xxii. Antulio Echevarria called it instead of a way ofwar an American way of battle, which complements Weigleys thesis. Antulio J. Echevarria, Toward an AmericanWay of War, (Carlisle: Strategic Studies Institute, 2004), vi. If Weigley is right in his assertion that the strategy of

annihilation is the American way of warfare, then Max Boot argues that America actually has two ways of warfare,the other way characterized by small military interventions by regular forces, fought for a variety of reasons thathave nothing to do with national interests or battles of annihilation. Max Boot, Savage Wars of Peace: Small Warsand the Rise of American Power, (New York: Basic Books, 2002), xiv. And finally, a different approach entirelycomes from theMilitary History Quarterly that describes the American way of warfare Winfield Scotts CerroGordo envelopment and in a way reminiscent of Liddell Hart describes American warfare as a way of envelopment.Thomas Fleming, "Birth of the American Way of War,"Military History Quarterly 15, (2003). While some arguethat it is the winning spirit, marketplace ideology, and the American fighting soldier that make up the American wayof warfare. Larry Schwikart,America's Victories: Why the U.S. Wins Wars and Will Win the War on Terror, (NewYork: Sentinel Press, 2006), xiv-xxv.

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warfare. However, in order to understand the ideas that make up the American way of warfare

requires a different understanding of the concept of a way of war.

As stated above, it is extremely difficult to determine the important ideas that animate a

way of warfare, as opposed to merely creating a panacea of all the things that a military does in

the name of war. A way of warfare then becomes a mixture of strategy, foreign policy, military

policy, military thought, military theory, doctrine and regulations. Like many concepts, a way of

warfare which encompasses everything, in actuality encompasses nothing and supports an

endless study of military minutia. However, the concept of an American way of warfare is a

useful analytical tool to understand the development of the United States Army in the past, and

how those developments shaped the future. For this purpose, a way of warfare is different than

American strategy, policy, or doctrine, in that it informs their creation, development, and

implementation. This vision of war, or theory of war, or preconceptions of war, provides a

coherent intellectual framework for thinking and conceptualizing war. By establishing the

intellectual framework of American warfare in the past, it is possible to understand why and how

it was created, as well as why and how it changed in reaction to changes in the political, strategic

and technological elements of modern warfare. This kind of study has the potential to reveal how

and why it was replaced by a different framework, thus creating a new American way of warfare.

While this concept provides a new perspective on the intellectual history of the United

States Army, questions of origination, change and the evolution-revolution dichotomy have a

long and varied historiography. While the study of conceptual frameworks does not have its own

historiography, the study of how armies understand war and deal with change attracts a great

deal of historical interest. These studies divide themselves basically into three groupings

according to what the author describes as the driving force of change in the military: those that

prioritize technology, battlefield experience, or ideas, as the most important element in change.

This history is additionally divided into works that define warfare as either an evolutionary or

revolutionary endeavor. Many of these works discuss more than one of the aforementioned

forces, however one force always dominates the others. A theme that does run through all of

these histories and studies of war is the conceptualization of war as a science. This scientific

framework provides an understanding of how science learns, changes, and adapts to technology,

which provides a different perspective to the study of the military.

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warfare that identifies fundamental changes in modern warfare.6 These newer works overshadow

the larger group that either implicitly or explicitly understands warfare and the way armies adapt

to it as an evolutionary process.7 These evolutionary studies usually have a technological focus,

as the study of technology lends itself to an evolutionary process and organization. This

connection between technology and evolutionary development is one of the reasons that this

group dominates the traditional history of the military art and science.

The focus on technology is perhaps the most prolific part of the historiography of

warfare and change. In the past, this led to a series of works focused on the development of

specific technologies, weapons or vehicles.8

Technology also provides the organization of a

series of general military histories.9 In the recent technology historiography, technological

innovation is the principle force guiding corresponding changes in organization, doctrine and

tactics.10 While most of these works include wider changes than just technology, they all focus

on technology as either the implicit or explicit force of change. These arguments are extremely

persuasive, as they are grounded in the technologies that changed the modern battlefield, but they

dont explain why some countries modernized and adapted better than others. Technology may

be one of the most important changing factors of modern war, but it is not the most powerful tool

of analysis for understanding the way militaries adapt to those changes.

6 MacGregor Knox and Williamson Murray, eds, The Dynamics of Military Revolution, 1300-2050, (New York:Cambridge University Press, 2001); David Jablonsky, The Owl of Minerva Flies at Twilight: Doctrinal Change and

Continuity and the Revolution in Military Affairs, (Carlisle Barracks: Strategic Studies Institute, 1994); Antulio J.Echevarria,After Clausewitz: German Military Thinkers Before the Great War, (Lawrence: University of KansasPress, 2000); Leslie C. Eliason and Emily O. Goldman, eds, The Diffusion of Military Technology and Ideas,(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003).7 Military Service Publishing, The Evolution of Warfare, (Harrisburg, Military Service Publishing, 1947); TimothyT. Lupfer, The Dynamics of Doctrine: The Changes in German Tactical Doctrine During the 1st World War, (FortLeavenworth, Strategic Studies Institute, 1981); Christopher Bellamy, The Evolution of Modern Land WarfareTheory and Practise, (New York: Routledge, 1990); Bernard and Fawn M. Brodie, From Crossbow to H-Bomb(Bloomington, University of Indiana Press, 1973); Charles Townshend, ed., The Oxford History of Modern War,(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000); Stephen Biddle,Military Power: Explaining Victory and Defeat in

Modern Battle, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004).8 There are numerous histories of different weapons, one of the most academic studies of the history of militarytechnology is Bernard and Fawn Brodies From Crossbow to H-Bomb. Brodie, From Crossbow to H-Bomb; Trevor

Nevitt Dupuy, The Evolution of Weapons and Warfare, (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1980).9 All of these general histories of warfare divide their parts and chapters by the changes in technology and howcultures deal with those changes. Charles Townshend, ed., The Oxford History of Modern War; Geoffrey Parker, ed.,The Cambridge History of Modern Warfare, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005); and Archer Jones,The Art of War, (Urbana, University of Illinois Press, 1987).10 The recent focus on technological innovation comes out of the Revolutions in Military Affairs debate that hasaffected military planning and development since the end of the Cold War. Williamson R. Murray and Allan R.Millett, eds,Military Innovation in the Interwar Period, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996); Leslie C.Eliason and Emily O. Goldman, eds, The Diffusion of Military Technology and Ideas, Jablonsky, The Owl of

Minerva Flies at Twilight: Doctrinal Change and Continuity and the Revolution in Military Affairs .

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Almost as persuasive as an argument of technological determinism is one that makes

battlefield experience the driving force of change in the way armies conduct war. Some of these

authors firmly believe that armies either learn or fail to learn from the bottom-up and that all real

innovation occurs at the individual soldier level.11 Some studies suggest that theory and doctrine

are inconsequential on the battlefield, since few read it or understand it, and the intelligent avoid

it like the plague.12 Lastly, there are those who understand doctrine to be a conversation between

the intellectual power of the army and its practitioners which produces, in its most pure form, the

best possible doctrine vetted throughout the army and reflecting the most up to date lessons

learned at the tactical level.13

While there are many examples of battlefield adaptation

throughout military history, there are simply too many counter examples to make it the driving

force behind military adaptation. For every example of battlefield adaptation, there are many

more of armies which refuse to change their tactics and therefore suffer incredible casualties

catastrophic defeat. Like technology, battlefield experience is affected by more than just

marketplace competition or p

or

ragmatism.

Ideas provide a much more comprehensive explanation of military change, one that

integrates both technology and battlefield experience. Some historians refer to as a vision of war,

which is the conceptual framework of an army that drives the way in which it approaches

change, technology, doctrine, tactics, and experience.14 In addition to general studies of the

interaction between theory and thought on warfare, there are more specific studies which focus

on how armies construct and implement these conceptual frameworks and ideas. Other works

11 Robert Goldthwaite Carter, The Art and Science of War Versus the Art of Fighting, (Washington D.C.: NationalPublishing Company, 1922); Isabel V. Hull,Absolute Destruction: Military Culture and the Practices of War in

Imperial Germany , (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005); Mark Ethan Grotelueschen, The AEF Way of War: TheAmerican Army and Combat in World War I, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007).12 Both Paddy Griffith and Jay Luvaas came to similar conclusions concerning doctrine, its limited readership anddetachment from the reality of the battlefield. Paddy Griffith,Military Thought in the French Army, 1815 - 1851 ,

(New York: Manchester University Press, 1989); Jay Luvaas, The Military Legacy of the Civil War: The EuropeanInheritance, (Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 1988).13 Lupfer, The Dynamics of Doctrine: The Changes in German Tactical Doctrine During the 1st World War.14 J. F. C. Fuller, The Conduct of War 1789-1961: A Study of the Impact of the French and Russian Revolutions onWar and its Conduct, (New Brunswick: Da Capo Press, 1961); Echevarria,After Clausewitz: German MilitaryThinkers Before the Great War; Basil Henry Liddell Hart, The Ghost of Napoleon, (London: Faber and FaberLimited, 1933); John I. Alger, The Quest For Victory: The History of the Principles of War, (Westport: GreenwoodPress, 1982); Sehuda L. Wallach, The Dogma of the Battle of Annihilation: The Theories of Clausewitz andSchlieffen and their Impact on the German Conduct of the Two World Wars, (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1986);Dale Oliver Smith, U. S. Military Doctrine: A Study and Appraisal, (New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1955).

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focus on the impact of military history on military professionals and their way of war.15 These

works produce a wide variance of opinion concerning the utility of military history and most are

more proscriptive than demonstrative in their belief in the efficacy of the study of military

history for military professionals. Additionally, concede the fact that armies often deliberately

cultivate military history that tends to focus only on history as a validation of ideas to which they

already subscribe.16 Much more useful to understanding how ideas impact the way armies

conduct war is the growing on the military as a profession in much the same way as the sciences.

The most provocative works on the way armies think in the past two decades have a

focus on the military profession and the professionalization of the army. These works delve into

the details of army bureaucracy and parochialism, dissecting professional politics and their

impact on the ideas that form a conceptualization of warfare.17

Brian Linns recent workEcho of

Battle goes the farthest of any of these studies at attempting to pin down the way an army creates

a way of war. Linn argues that the creation of a way of warfare is fundamentally an intellectual

endeavor and that only a few officers create and disseminate their services vision of warfare,

the vast majority simply accepts it without question.18 He then focuses on the major trends that

dominated the thinking of the different major factions within the army, and that the U.S. Armys

way of war was a constant compromise between these different factions. Linns work represents

both the most ambitious intellectual history of the U.S. Army to date, and yet at the same time

15 It should not be surprising that military historians are prolific in their belief that military history is the best sourceof ideas or visions of war. Arden Bucholz,Hans Delbruck and the German Military Establishment, (Iowa City:University of Iowa Press, 1985); Dennis Hart Mahan,An Elementary Treatise on Advanced-Guard, Out-Post, and

Detachment Service of Troops: and the manner of posting and handling them in presence of an enemy. With a

historical sketch of the rise and progress of tactics,. intended as a supplement to the system of tactics adopted for the

military service of the United States, and especially for the use of officers and volunteers, (New York: Wiley andPuttnam, 1847); Williamson Murray and Richard Hart Sinnreich, eds., The Past as Prologue: The Importance of

History, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006); Carol Reardon, Soldiers and Scholars: The U.S. Army andthe Uses of Military History, 1865-1920, (Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 1990); Hew Strachan,European

Armies and The Conduct of War, (Boston: Routledge, 1983); Alfred Thayer Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power onHistory 1660 - 1783, (New York: Hill and Wang, 1957); Trevor Nevitt Dupuy, Understanding War: History and aTheory of Combat, (New York: Paragon House Publishing, 1987); Jean-Lambert-Alphonse Colin, The

Transformations of War, trans. L.H.R. Pope-Hennessy, (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1977); Marc Milner David A.Charters, and J. Brent Wilson, eds.,Military History and the Military Profession, (Westport: Greenwood Press,1992).16 Luvaas, The Military Legacy of the Civil War, xix.17 Stephen Peter Rosen, Winning the Next War: Innovation and the Modern Military, (Ithica: Cornell UniversityPress, 1991); Reardon, Soldiers and Scholars; Harold R. Winton, To Change an Army: General Sir John Burnett-Stuart and British Armored Doctrine, 1927-1938, (Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 1988); David E. Johnson,Fast Tanks and Heavy Bombers: Innovation in the U. S. Army 1917-1945, (Ithica: Cornell University Press, 1978).18 Brian McAllister Linn, The Echo of Battle: The Army's Way of War, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,2007), 4.

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demonstrates the theoretical limitations of focusing on professional differences amongst the

Army itself. Such studies almost immediately focus on internal politics, popular opinions, and

the writings of officers in any of a dozen professional journals, all of which, provide ample

evidence of every conceivable opinion operating at once in the army. Focusing on the

professional differences of the armys individuals, prevents one from seeing the homogeneity of

their conceptual way of warfare.

What the historiography lacks is a study of American warfare focused on its intellectual

framework and the underlying ideas that made up that framework. This methodology takes the

focus away from policy, strategy, doctrine, and technology and produces a very different history

of the United States Army and its institutional decisions concerning its way of warfare. It also

demonstrates clearly the influence of ideas on the United States Army which have previously

been misunderstood by historian and professionals focused on technological and experiential

influences. By comparing the way that the United States Army changes, evolves, and participates

in revolutions in warfare with the way that science changes, evolves, and precipitates revolutions

also expands our understanding of the military as a profession and provides an important element

in the creation of a way of warfare for the future.

Any intellectual history of the United States Army requires an examination of the

influence of foreign thought. Any of a number of European influences had an important

influence on the American military tradition, but one of the most persistent is that of French

thought. Beginning with French aid during the American Revolution, through the use of French

tactics in the War of 1812, and the influence of Jomini and French tactical regulations in the

Civil War, the French assistance in both equipment and training have linked the American and

French Armies in a unique way. Studying the American way of warfare through the lens of

French military thought and theory provides an excellent way to access both the interesting way

that French thought has impacted the United States Army, and also the uniquely American

developments in military thought and theory.

As a time period to study the French influence on the Untied States Army, the period

during which France and the French Army dominated Europe provides an opportunity to analyze

its influence in America. Militaries tend to emulate victorious nations in thought and in practice.

Therefore it is likely that French thought had its widest impact on the United States Army during

the period when it dominated Europe. Additionally, when Germany eclipsed France as the

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dominant military in Europe, the United States Army likely looked elsewhere for inspiration.

Thus the period of this study begins in the War of 1812 when the United States Army became

inculcated with the French military thought of the French Revolution and Napoleonic period, and

ends with the catastrophic French defeat at the hands of the German Army in May of 1940. This

French influence played an important part in the formation of the first American way of warfare.

A study of the influence of French thought in America requires condensing the wide

variance of French thought and battlefield activity throughout the era of the French Revolution

and Napoleon into a system. The great military theorists Henri Antoine Jomini and Carl von

Clausewitz made their careers trying to do this, and since almost every single theorist or military

thinker since 1792 includes a study of Napoleon in his theory, this presents a problem of almost

insurmountable dimensions. However, instead of attempting to create an arbitrary list of the

attributes of Napoleonic warfare, the French influence should be analyzed using the French

regulations and writings about the conduct of combat that existed and were available at the turn

of the Nineteenth Century.

Encapsulated by the FrenchRglement Concernant Lexercise et Manoeuvres de

Linfanterie du 1erAot 1791 and theReglement Provisoire sur Le Service de LInfanterie En

Campagne de 1792, the Armies of the French Revolution indoctrinated their officers and men in

a new intellectual framework, which proved successful against the enemies of the Revolution.

These two documents created a very specific intellectual framework of war that for the purpose

of this study will be called the French Combat Method (FCM). The French Combat Method

consisted of a simplified tactical system that provided commanders with a variety of tactical

formations and movements including lines, attack columns, and skirmishers, and non-dogmatic

formula for battle. The FCM organized its order of battle into lines, consisting of units deployed

according to the initiative of the individual commanders, the aggressive use of a reserve, and a

belief in the offensive action, culminating in a bayonet charge through the enemys formation.

This method required a standard, universally trained infantry capable of accomplishing all

infantry tasks, light and heavy. It was this heritage of the French Revolution, more so than any of

Napoleons organizational changes or battlefield maneuvers, that the United States Army

adopted beginning in the War of 1812.

Just as the French Combat Method originated as the intellectual framework of the Armies

of the French Revolution through the official regulations of the French Army, the majority of the

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sources for this intellectual history are contained within institutional documents, regulations and

textbooks, used by the United States Army to disseminate its intellectual framework across the

ranks of the army and from one generation of officers and soldiers to another throughout the

period. This is not a comprehensive study of American thought from 1814 through 1941 of every

service, congressional debate, Secretary of War, General, officer, and soldier. Quite frankly, such

a study would be exhaustive and would produce no perceivable pattern at all. The focus on

institutional documents, while limited in scope, is profoundly more important regarding the

intellectual framework of the American way of warfare. These documents are the primary

methods of educating both the serving and future army about combat, battle and warfare. As

such, they compose the official and sanctioned body of thought that guided the training,

armament, organization, and employment of the U.S. Army. They also demonstrate how the U.S.

Army integrated a wide variety of different battlefield conditions, military thought both foreign

and domestic, technologies, and enemies into their doctrine, regulations, and military theory.

More than the writings of any single individual, this body of publications constituted the

intellectual framework of the American way of war.

Studying the American intellectual framework from 1814 through 1941 facilitates the

study of a complete example of the way in which armies adapt their ideas and conceptions to the

modern battlefield. Chapter One focuses on the intellectual framework created by the French

themselves in their regulations and documents in 1791 and 1792. Chapter Two traces its

adoption by the United States Army during the War of 1812, and its institutionalization in both

regulations and the officer corps as demonstrated by the Mexican-American War. Chapter Three

examines the way in which the United States Army incorporated changes in technology into its

way of warfare, both before and during the Civil War. Chapter Four focuses on the learning that

occurred from both the Civil War and the first three years of the Great War in Western Europe,

and how the American Expeditionary Force incorporated those lessons into its way of war.

Finally, Chapter Five traces the intellectual developments during the inter-war period and

culminates with the change from the French Combat Method of 1791 and 1792 through the

transition to a different way of war by 1941. The study of the American way of war from the

adoption of a French intellectual framework through its replacement by 1941 presents a case

study of the way in which military art and science functions like the natural sciences, and shows

which definition of science best represents the phenomena of war.

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10

CHAPTER 1: THE FRENCH COMBAT METHOD

And so the day was over; the French could not be shifted, Kellermann had chosen

the more favorable position; our men had been pulled out of the firing line and

everything was back to where it was before. The greatest consternation spread

through the army. Only that morning all they had had in mind was skewering the

French and eating them for breakfast. Indeed, it was this unconditional

confidence in this army and its commander which had seduced me into joining

this perilous expedition. But now everyone kept his own counsel, did not meet the

eyes of his comrades, and if he did give tongue, it was only to curse or complain.

Just as darkness was failing, I and my companions had formed a circle, at the

center of which we couldnt even start a fire, as was usual. Most stayed silent, a

few spoke but no one could come up with an opinion or verdict on the days

events. Eventually, they turned to me and asked me what I thought about it, for in

the past I had usually cheered them up and stimulated them with pithy epigrams;

but on this occasion I just said: From here and today there begins a new epoch in

the history of the world, and you can say that you were there.1

It is only right that Goethe, one of the most brilliant minds of the century, declared the

French Revolution a watershed moment in European History, on the battlefield that saved the

new Republic from international intervention and provided it with the time required to ensure its

survival. The French Revolution altered the relationship between the French people and their

government, creating citizens of what would become the First Republic. The creation of a nation

of citizens, combined with the removal of internal obstruction of military reform in the officer

corps had a tremendous impact on Eighteenth Century warfare. Within the French Armies, there

emerged a curious mix of the old and the new, of the techniques of theAncien Regime

invigorated with the motivations and resources of the Revolution.

1Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Campaign in France in the Year 1792, trans. Robert Farie, (London: Chapman andHill, 1849), 80-81.


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This new system disregarded the limitations of Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century

warfare and produced a string of victories over the armies of the monarchies of Europe. This

French system of warfare, with its corresponding framework of ideas and theories, influenced

military affairs far beyond the borders of France, making and impact around the world.

Translated French documents transported this framework of war across the ocean to the United

States of America and the U. S. Army at the turn of the Eighteenth Century. Therefore, an

understanding of the American way of war is incomplete without an understanding, through the

ideas, documents, and actions of the wars of the French Revolution, of this new intellectual

framework of war and the battlefield.

SECTION 1: Military Art and Science before the French Revolution

The Military Revolution 1789-1804

There is a small cottage industry in the military history of both the Eighteenth and

Nineteenth centuries that provides a multitude of interpretations of the elements that made the

French way of warfare so overwhelmingly powerful as to defeat the armies of every single major

power in continental Europe.2 Some of these interpretations consider the French Revolution a

truly watershed moment in history and focus on the fundamentally different nature of warfare

that sprang from the revolutionary movement. They describe the different tactics of the French,

the use of manpower, and the manner in which the Revolution used the innovations in military

doctrine and technology since the Seven Years War. Others see the warfare of the French

Revolution as the logical perfection of a system of warfare that had been evolving since the wars

2 Steven Ross uses a fairly standard interpretation of the French system focusing on its tactical flexibility (the abilityto use both lines and columns) and places it in the context of an evolution of warfare. Steven T. Ross, FromFlintlock to Rifle: Infantry Tactics, 1740-1866, (Rutherford:Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1978); Severalhistorians share this opinion and consider the French tactical system a compromise between the line and the column.Robert S. Quimby, The Background of Napoleonic Warfare, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1957), 306-7;Ramsay Weston Phipps, The Armies of the First French Republic and the Rise of the Marshals of Napoleon I, ed.Charles Foskett Phipps and Elizabeth Sandars, (London: Oxford University Press, 1926), 39; Delbruck characterizedit as a blending of the old and the new utilizing the line, column, and skirmishers. Hans Delbruck, The Dawn of

Modern Warfare, trans. Walter J. Renfroe, (Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 1990), 400; Archibald Frank Becke,

An Introduction to the History of Tactics, 1740-1905, (London: Hugh Rees, 1909), 18; Gunther Erich Rothenberg,The Art of Warfare In The Age of Napoleon, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1978), 115; SpencerWilkenson refers to it as a system of flexibility. Spenser Wilkinson, The French Army Before Napoleon; Lectures

Delivered Before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas Term, 1914, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1915), 63.John Lynn has three main ingredients for French success, one of which was what he called the full range oftechniques available to French arms. John A. Lynn, The Bayonets of the Republic: Motivation and Tactics in the

Army of Revolutionary France, 1791-94 , (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1984), 215. While Jean-Paul Bertaudcharacterized the French system as comprised of a flanking movement and a strong general attack. Jean PaulBertaud, The Army of the French Revolution: From Citizen Soldiers to Instrument of Power, (Princeton: PrincetonUniversity Press, 1988), 239.

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of Louis XIV. This approach shows the similarities with Prussian doctrine, the extensive use of

linear tactics, and credit all of the important theorists as heavily influenced by works and

experiences from Frederick the Great and the Seven Years War.

A third interpretation focuses on the expediency of the French system that rose from the

battlefield to astound the armies modeled on the older Frederican model. This argument to

experience and common sense was made from almost the beginning of the Wars of the French

Revolution.3 Gerhard von Scharnhorst, who spent years fighting this new French system,

expressed this opinion in an essay describing the French in combat:

The French armies, compelled by the situation in which they found themselves and

aided by their national genius, had developed a practical system of tactics that permitted

them to fight over open or broken ground, in open or close order, but this without their

being aware of their system.4

This statement of the primacy of the battlefield and expediency, made by one of the most

influential reformers in the Prussian Army, demonstrates the persuasive nature of this argument.

In addition to these approaches, almost all of the analyses of French warfare see it as an

imperfect form of the system perfected by Napoleon. These previous analyses have two

shortcomings: their scope and their characterization of the French system as a system of

expedients formed on the field of battle. Defining of the powerful system of warfare created by

the French Revolution requires an analysis of the intellectual framework that enabled its

flexibility and effectiveness in combat.

Hans Delbruck created perhaps the most useful conceptualization of this new system of

warfare in his influential workThe Dawn of Modern Warfare. In it, he referred to this

fundamental revolution in warfare as the French Combat Method. Delbruck characterized this

method as a combination of the linear tactics of the old regime, a renewed emphasis on light

infantry and skirmisher tactics, and column attacks from the theoretical debates of the last half of

3 This thesis of common sense pervades much of the historiography on the evolution of tactics and doctrine. PaddyGriffith points to the dominance of circumstance, common sense and experience that provided the major catalyst tothe creation of the French way of warfare, Paddy Griffith, The Art of War of Revolutionary France, 1789-1802,(Pennsylvania: Stackpole Books, 1998), 232; Trevor Nevitt Dupuy claims that tactics are devised to suit theweapons systems and their capabilities, Trevor Nevitt Dupuy, The Evolution of Weapons and Warfare, 1.4 Peter Paret, Yorck and the Era of Prussian Reform, 1807-1815, (Princeton, 1966), 258.

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the 18th Century.5 He identified the three major components of this new system, the increase in

manpower, its extensive use of skirmishers, and its logistical system.6 While this analysis does

offer an explanation of French victory and has the potential of capturing the spirit of the French

way of warfare, these elements are only a part of this new system of warfare. Thus, examining

the ideas of the military philosophes of the Eighteenth Century and their embodiment in the

regulations of the Revolution issued in 1791 and 1792 provides the intellectual framework of this

FCM, and creates an analytical tool with which to understand American warfare in the

Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries.

The Linear Warfare of the Ancien Regime

As the citizen-soldier enabled the realization of some of the strategic ideas and theories of

the Eighteenth Century, it also allowed armies to follow a much more simple and powerful

organization. Since the gunpowder revolution, military theorists and professionals sought to

create infantry units uniformly equipped and trained with the musket. It was not until the

invention of the socket bayonet that allowed the armies of Europe began to develop the larger

infantry based armies armed entirely with smoothbore muskets, replacing both the Spanish

Tercios and Swedish Brigades with their mixtures of muskets and pikes.7 These armies had

specialized units of heavy line infantry and light infantry skirmishers. Theorists like Guibert

cried out for the elimination of different types of infantry units and the creation of an infantry

army capable of executing all infantry tasks.8

However, the needs and requirements of European

armies in the Eighteenth Century made such an army impossible.

The recruited professional armies of the Eighteenth Century were a product of their

political and military environments. With the devastation of the Thirty Years War not forgotten,

rulers desired an army supplied from magazines and placed under a strict discipline to make

those armies reliable both in war and peace. As the century progressed, and the corresponding

increases in the power of the centralized state allowed for ever increasing military

establishments, the quality of recruits and officers became at the same time both more mercenary

5 Delbruck, The Dawn of Modern Warfare, 400.6 Ibid., 414.7 Strachan,European Armies and The Conduct of War, 27.8 Jacques-Antoine-Hippolyte Guibert,A General Essay on Tactics. With an Introductory Discourse, Upon thePresent state of Politics, and the Military Science in Europe trans. LT Douglas, (London: J. Millan, 1781), 117.

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and less reliable.9 At the same time, uniformly equipped infantrymen required more and more

precision drill not only to maneuver on the battlefield, but also to produce the firepower

necessary to maximize the effectiveness of the inaccurate musket.10 The realities of Eighteenth

Century Europe led to the professional armies of the ancien regime.

The linear warfare of the Eighteenth Century was a result of these technological,

political, economic, and organizational constraints. With the increase in muskets and firepower

in the infantry, the battlefield became a contest between armies to generate the higher volume of

fire to break the enemy line or formation. This penetration was not generated by the shock of

cavalry, or the maneuver of formations, but was a result of the ability to destroy enough of the

enemy formation so that the remainder would break and run. In order to generate this kind of

firepower, the reserves of old were deployed into the main battle formation to ensure that all

possible firepower affected the enemy formations. The commanding general dictated the entire

order of battle prior to the combat, deployed his whole force into a single formation, and

launched his infantry against the infantry of the enemy. When the two formations collided, the

better-trained and drilled units produced a higher volume of fire by continuing to operate their

muskets amidst the carnage created by the short range volley fire of smoothbore muskets.11 The

discipline required to create effective infantry on the linear battlefield became the major factor in

victory, and the limiting factor on Eighteenth Century warfare.

The armies of Europe became organizations of specialists driven by a harsh and in some

circumstances extreme discipline. The unreliable nature of recruited troops made the creation of

special organizations an intelligent solution, which provided a picked corps of men who the

general could be sure would carry out orders. While the exploits of grenadiers and other specially

recruited formations are prevalent throughout the Eighteenth Century, they had a negative effect

9 Christopher Duffy, The Military Experience in the Age of Reason, (New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1987),18.10

Rothenberg, The Art of Warfare In The Age of Napoleon, 13.11 There is an extensive historiography on linear warfare, and the warfare of Frederick the Great. For more detaileddescriptions the following works are all excellent sources on the battlefield conditions and tactics of the EighteenthCentury. Dennis Showalter, The Wars of Frederick the Great, (London: Longman Group, 1995); T. C. W. Blanning,The French Revolutionary Wars, 1787-1802, (New York: Arnold, 1996); John Childs,Armies and Warfare in

Europe, 1648-1789, (New York Holmes and Meier, 1982); Delbruck, The Dawn of Modern Warfare; TheodoreAyrault Dodge,Napoleon: A History of the Art of War From the Beginning of the French Revolution to the End ofthe Eighteenth Century, (New York: Houghton, Mifflin Company, 1904); Duffy, The Military Experience in the Ageof Reason, David Fraser, Frederick The Great, (New York: Fromm Intl, 2001); Strachan,European Armies and TheConduct of War.

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on the regular line regiments.12 For the regular line infantry regiments, discipline became the

vehicle that inculcated the drill required to perform on the battlefield, and prevented what all

military professional feared from his recruited troops: desertion.

As the status of the private soldier declined, desertion became rampant and the harsh

discipline of the Eighteenth Century was designed to prevent this threat to the army. The French

Minister of War Saint-German stated in 1779 as things stand now, armies must inevitably be

composed of the filth of the nation, and everything which is useless and harmful to society. We

must turn to military discipline as the means of purifying this corrupt mass, of shaping it, and of

making in useful.13

These battalions could only be trained to perform specific battlefield tasks,

thus line infantry trained only to fight as line infantry, and light infantry only as light infantry.

Commanders considered it dangerous to the maintenance of discipline and effectiveness to have

line infantry train or fight as skirmishers.14 Not only did most of the generals of the time believe

that the battle was really won and lost with the line infantry, and thus saw light infantry as

having little part to play on the battlefield, it also provided soldiers an opportunity to desert.

Europe in the Eighteenth Century required specialization and discipline in its armies in order to

provide generals with a reliable army with which to wage war.

The French Debates from 1760-1788

No element of the military art of Eighteenth Century Europe underwent more

consideration, development, discussion and reform than battlefield tactics, and because of its

disastrous performance during the Seven Years War, there was no country more interested in its

evolution than France. French military professionals carried on a continual debate concerning the

best form of tactics for the modern battlefield from the 1760s to the 1790s. Out of these debates

there arose two distinct schools of thought, one supporting the ordre profoundor the attack in

column while the other continued to emphasize importance of the ordre mince, or linear warfare.

The ordre profoundhad many proponents in the debates, but none as influential as Jacques-

Antoine-Hippolyte, Comte de Guibert and his famousEssai General de Tactic.

12 Duffy cites several examples where such picked bodies of grenadiers performed too much and almost becamesurrounded (as at the Battle of Prague in 1757), or where they were unable to effect the decision due to theirconcentration on a quiet and unimportant part of the battlefield (as at the Battle of Krefeld in 1758). He concludesthat often these troops were called on to do too much and resulted in high casualties without commensurate benefitson the battlefield. Duffy, The Military Experience in the Age of Reason, 133-34.13 Saint-Germain as cited in Ibid., 89-90.14 Delbruck quotes from a memorandum produced probably in 1800 by Gneisenau expressing this resistance tousing line infantry to skirmish. Delbruck, The Dawn of Modern Warfare, 403-06.

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Although Guibert continued to support the primacy of the line over the column, he

proposed a simplified system of evolutions that enabled an army to move from line to column to

take advantage of the firepower of the line and the mobility, and offensive capability of the

column.15 His main improvement on the tactics of the day was the simplification of the

evolutions of the line for the French soldiers, making the movements on the parade field, and

subsequently on the battlefield, easier to execute. His rival in these theoretical debates was

Franois Mesnil-Durand who put forth the strength of the ordre profoundor the deep attack

column. He made intelligent arguments for the power and successful nature of attacks in column

and even caught the eye and approval of Marshal Victor-Franois de Broglie, the foremost

soldier in France before the Revolution. The exercises at the camp of Vaussieux in 1778 were a

series of large maneuvers that became essentially field trials between these two schools of

thought, where both Guibert and Mesnil-Durand served on the Marshals staff.16 Although there

was no clear statement from Marshal de Broglie, it seemed clear to the participants that Guiberts

evolutions were indeed easier for troops to execute and that Mesnil-Durands attack columns

failed to convince the majority of those present. These debates had reached a very detailed and

fevered pitch before the outbreak of the Revolution institutionalized them into a regulation for

the new armies.

This debate between French military philisophes like Guibert, and Mesnil-Durand, led

Marshal Victor-Franois de Broglie to command a series of exercises in 1778 at a camp in

Vaussieux in Normandy. Although no official system was adopted following these exercises, the

renewed discussion in pamphlets and books informed the continued reform movement in the

French Army.17 This reform movement produced a Provisional Ordinance of 1788 that was

significantly different from the regulations used throughout the 1770s, and it synthesized all of

the progress made since the 1750s.18 However, the French Revolution derailed army reform until

a committee formed under Colonel Vicomte de Noailles of the Chasseurs dAlsace created

another synthesis entirely. This synthesis becameRglement Concernant Lexercise et

Manoeuvres de Linfanterie du 1erAot 1791 or the Regulations of 1791. However, this synthesis

15 Guibert, 120-23.16 John A. Lynn, Tools of War: Instruments, Ideas, and Institutions of Warfare, 1445-1871, (Urbana: University ofIllinois Press, 1990), 161.17 Strachan,European Armies and The Conduct of War, 27.18 Quimby, The Background of Napoleonic Warfare, 302-04.

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required the force of the French Revolution in order to make the dreams of the military

committee into a reality.

SECTION 2: The New Warfare of the French Revolution

The Creation of the Citizen Soldier

Any understanding of the French Combat Method has to begin with an analysis of the

social impacts of the French Revolution. The idea that the changes in the French Army, and

corresponding changes in the way that they fought, were a reflection of the changing social and

political culture in France is not new to the historiography. Delbruck himself declared that

following the Allied invasion of 1792, gradually formed in France the new military system

based on the new political idea and conditions.19 This is a common interpretation in

historiography of the military aspects of the Revolution and states that the real change in warfare

was linked to the other, more sweeping changes wrought on France and Europe by the

Revolution.20 The problem with Delbrucks analysis, and correspondingly the majority of the

historiography, is that they fail to pinpoint this change, or series of changes, which transformed

warfare. The critical element of the French Combat Method, which describes this relationship

between the political and the military changes of the Revolution, is the nation in arms. However,

the nation in arms usually leads to an analysis of the Revolutions ability to mobilize its

population for war, but this is not the most important aspect with regard to the new system of

warfare. At its heart lies the political changes of 1789, and was the product of the transformation

of France from a nation of privilege to a nation of citizens.

All of the fundamental changes that make up the Nation in Arms stem from this

important transformation. Although far from realized, the creation of the Declaration of the

Rights of Man, the August Decrees, and the abolition of Feudalism transformed France into a

new kind of polity. As Clausewitz described it in his On War, in 1793 a force appeared that

beggared the imagination. Suddenly war again became the business of the people a people of

30 millions, all of whom considered themselves to be citizens the people became a participant

in war.21 This new relationship between the people and war set the stage for the transformation

19 Delbruck, The Dawn of Modern Warfare, 395.20 MacGregor Knox and Williamson Murray, eds, The Dynamics of Military Revolution, 1300-2050, 58.21 Carl von Clausewitz, On War, ed. Peter Paret Michael Howard, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984),591-2.

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from the limited, linear warfare of the Eighteenth Century, and the new age of warfare ushered in

by the Revolution.

By creating a nation of citizens, it was possible for the Committee of Public Safety to

mobilize the country for war in by making it the duty of all citizens to defend theLa Patrie by

issuing theLevee en Masse. Throughout hisEssai General de Tactic, Guibert praised the virtue

and capabilities of a citizen army as the way of the future, even though he downplayed their role

in hisDefense.22 He described this new military as springing from a free state, a people that

could carry on war with little cost, because all citizens would arm themselves for the common

defense, without crying out for pay.23TheLevee en Masse was the realization of this stronger,

simpler, and more virile image of both the state and the military that Guibert identifies as the

cornerstone for a new way of warfare. But the cornerstone was the citizen and not the 300,000

men credited to theLevee en Masse.

The New Discipline of an Army of Citizen Soldiers

If the creation of a nation of citizens produced an army to fight the wars of peoples, it

was the simultaneous creation of the citizen-soldier that transformed this conscript army into a

powerfully flexible military machine that by the end of the Wars of the French Revolution

defeated the armies of every single member of the 1st Coalition. In the armies that fought for the

Bourbon Monarchy, the infantry soldiers predominantly came from urban areas and represented

segments of the population that were forced into the army in order to survive.24

In comparison,

Levee en Masse produced citizen-soldiers that more adequately represented the makeup of

France, which changed the army from a predominantly urban to a predominantly rural force.25

The wider pool of military manpower added to the connection between the army and the nation.

In addition to the increased representative nature of the army, the quality of the men that filled

the ranks also improved.26 These new citizen-soldiers provided a better foundation upon which

22

Guibert was not alone in calling for a citizen army. In fact, a large number of philosophes wrote about citizensoldiers to include Rousseau, Mably, and Montesquieu, and there even appeared articles concerning them inDiderotsEncyclopedie. Gordon A. Craig Peter Paret, Felix Gilbert, eds.,Makers of Modern Strategy from

Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), 107; Jacques-Antoine-HippolyteGuibert,Defense du Systeme de Guerre Moderne (Neuchatel: Pollard, 1779).23 Guibert,A General Essay on Tactics, vol. 2, 128.24 Lynn, The Bayonets of the Republic, 43.25 Bertaud, The Army of the French Revolution, 132.26 J. F. C. Fuller, The Conduct of War, 1789-1961; A study of the Impact of the French, Industrial and Russian

Revolutions on War and Its Conduct, (London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1961), 36.

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to build an army, but their biggest advantage lay in a series of new and important motivations t

fight for France.

o

The creation of citizen-soldiers provided the armies of the Republic with a variety of new

motivations that directly increased their effectiveness on the battlefield. The most fundamental

change in these motivations is the change in foci in the interests of the individual soldier. The

way in which a soldier defines his interest has an impact on his level of commitment to his

military organization.27 The citizen-soldiers of the revolution represented a fundamental change

from this system, as the primary interest of the soldiers were linked to the survival and interests

of the state. Therefore, the citizen-soldier of the French Revolution was fighting for his self-

interest in defense of his rights as a citizen of the French Republic. 28 This different way in which

citizen soldiers identified interest requires a fundamentally different kind of discipline.

In all armies, both conscripted and professional, discipline is one of the most important

components of combat effectiveness. In the old regime, discipline was harsh and

uncompromising because the interests of the soldiers of the old regime were more mercenary and

an extremely small percentage were motivated by feelings of patriotism.29 Officers believed that

only through harsh discipline would soldiers remain in the ranks continuing to fire, despite the

high casualty rates that the battlefields of linear warfare produced.30 However, the citizen-soldier

who identified his self-interest with that of the state required a different kind of discipline.

Because of this difference in interest, the soldier willingly put himself under military discipline,

not through coercion or material rewards, but because the survival of the state depended on his

service.31

Citizens also deserved better treatment simply because they were citizens, equally

vested in the defense of the state with individual rights under law. It should not be surprising that

the regulations determining military discipline issued in 1792 would be very different from those

of the old regime.

In 1792, the Convention drafted a new regulation governing the disciplining of troops of

the new Republic. Gone were the humiliating corporal punishments of old. It was no longer legal

27 In his groundbreaking workBayonets of the Republic , John Lynn used an interdisciplinary model of combateffectiveness to identify the concept of interest as central to troop motivation and by extension to combateffectiveness. Lynn, The Bayonets of the Republic, 23.28 Ibid., 21.29 Duffy, The Military Experience in the Age of Reason, 8-10.30 Childs,Armies and Warfare in Europe, , 42. Duffy, The Military Experience in the Age of Reason, 99. Delbruck,The Dawn of Modern Warfare, 252-54. Strachan,European Armies and The Conduct of War, 15.31 Lynn, The Bayonets of the Republic, 21.

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to use floggings and other corporal punishments on the citizens of the new republic. The new

regulations published in 1792 forbid officers to injure, or distress those under their command by

harsh, abusive, and unbecoming language or by a conduct tyrannical, overbearing or unjust.32

Military justice began to reflect the belief that justice was not designated by class or prerogative,

but was the right of every citizen of France. These new regulations also clearly delineated the

privileges of officers by rank to not only formalize the kinds of courtesies and privileges that

officers could expect, but also to clear away the last vestiges of a society run by influence and

prestige.33 Discipline in this new republic was expected to be self-imposed by the soldier, not the

result of coercion by sergeants and officers. By refashioning the citizen solider as the defender of

the republic, the Revolution reinforced the impact of the new discipline codes, which effectively

motivated large numbers of men to stay in the army, and encouraged a new resistance to

desertion.

While the desertion rates for the majority of the Eighteenth Century were a serious

impediment to the conduct of war, the citizen armies of France had remarkably low desertion

rates. TheLevee en Masse was not a universal conscription, as the system allowed citizens to

purchase their way out of serving, and quotas in some regions of France went unfilled for long

periods of time. However, of the men that eventually became part of the French war machine,

there was a surprisingly small amount of desertion. In 1793, desertion represented 8% of the total

manpower, or between 40,000-50,000 men.34

In 1794, following the intensive program of

coercive measures and indoctrination of the Terror, desertion fell from 8% to 4%. 35 This figure

should be compared to the rates of desertion throughout the Eighteenth Century, which averaged

25% across the armies of Europe.36

32France, Rules and regulations for the field exercise, and manoeuvres of the French Infantry, issued August 1,1791. And the manoeuvres added, which have been since adopted by the Emperor Napoleon. Also, the manoeuvres

of the field artillery with Infantry. Translated by Irene Amelot de Lacroix. Edited by John Macdonald. 2 vols.

Boston: T.B. Wait and Co., 1810, vol. 1, 191.33 Ibid., 192-99.34 Bertaud, The Army of the French Revolution, 259.35 Ibid., 260.36 The desertion rates for the entirety of the Eighteenth Century would be almost impossible to reconstruct, but 25%is probably not too far off of the mark. The French suffered 25% desertion throughout the War of SpanishSuccession, while in the Saxon infantry from 1717 through 1728 the desertion rate was approximately 40%. Duringthe Seven Years War, the Prussians lost 80,000 men, the French 70,000, and the Austrians 62,000 men fromdesertion. 25% seems to be a general average of these figures. Strachan,European Armies and the Conduct of War,9.

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Even more surprising was that it was not uncommon for soldiers to leave the ranks to

attend to personal affairs, the harvest, and family survival, and then reappear at the front ready to

continue to serve the Republic. When brought to justice after voluntarily returning to his unit,

Julien Simon stated that he did not think I did anything wrong. 37 This was diametrically

opposed to the beliefs of many of the generals of the old regime as even Frederick the Great

designed many of his principles of warfare around the belief that only the harsh discipline of

Non-Commissioned Officers kept soldiers in the ranks. He began his famousInstructions by

reminding his generals to avoid desertion by recommending against night movements, night

attacks, and even billeting troops near wooded areas for fear of massive desertions.38

This

difference between the discipline of the Fredrickan soldiers and the citizen-soldiers of France

had wide ranging effects on the capabilities of the Infantry.

The French soldiers were not necessarily better than their ancien regime enemies, but

their new discipline carried with it a series of advantages to the battlefield. In the old regime, it

was only through harsh discipline that soldiers remained in the ranks both on the battlefield and

moving to the battlefield.39 The high desertion rates associated with this kind of discipline

restricted the ability of commanders to move rapidly, to use different routes and thus increase

mobility, to move and attack at night, and to promote initiative in junior officers. However, the

citizen-soldier who identifies his self-interest with that of the state required a different kind of

discipline and through this new discipline generated a new range of capabilities. These

capabilities made possible the army that Guibert envisioned in 1771, one that could move and

maneuver in ways undreamed of by the officers of Frederick the Great. This army allowed the

French to re-write warfare with the Regulations of 1791 and 1792.

The Regulations of 1791: A New System of Tactics

The Regulations of 1791 provided French arms with a new flexible system of tactics.

This new system created a variety of formations for commanders to use in order to take

advantage of the terrain and the dispositions and weaknesses of the enemy. However, for all of

its innovation, it still focused primarily on the line. The line fulfilled the same function for the

French armies in 1793 as it did in 1763, as the formation that maximized the firepower of the

37 Bertaud, The Army of the French Revolution, 261.38 Thomas R. Phillips, ed.,Roots of Strategy: The 5 Greatest Military Classics of All Time,(Harrisburg: StackpoleBooks, 1985),311-12.39 Rothenberg, The Art of Warfare In The Age of Napoleon, 13.

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There was no other more revolutionary single tactical innovation in the Regulations of

1791 than the small attack column. Although the line was used for a variety of purposes, in the

attack the revolutionary armies used the attack column. In the same study of the operations of the

Army of the North, the column was utilized in 47 engagements out of 108 total, or 43.5% of the

operations of the army as a whole.44 Thirty-five percent of these engagements saw the use of the

small attack column on the battlefield, such as General Lacroixs attack during the battle of

Tourcoing.45 Additional columns used on the battlefield by theArmee du Nordincluded

movement columns, columns as preliminary formations, and columns by platoons.46 From the

fall of 1792, the column became an integral part of the tactical options of the French armies, and

a mainstay of French offensive operations.

The Regulations of 1792: A New Framework of Battle

With the exodus of royal officers, the new officer corps had to rapidly assimilate these

new tactics in order to exercise effective command of their troops. Far from learning this

doctrine from battlefield experience, the same committee that produced the tactical regulation

produced a regulation entitled theRglement Provisoire Sur le Service de Linfanterie au

Campaign or Regulations of 1792. This regulation contained detailed descriptions on how to

move, equip, encamp, picket, and secure battalions and divisions of the newly trained soldiers.

However, more important than the Regulations pertaining to the command of troops was the

short twenty-four page section entitledInstruction for the Day of Combat. This section provided

a concise statement of how the new tactics functioned together on the battlefield. This regulation

was extremely important in the education of the officers that led the armies of the Republic, and

later the Empire to victory.

Before significant numbers of French citizens went into battle to either defend or export

the revolution, they spent a considerable amount of time in camps of instruction. The French

army had a history of using camps of instruction for the purpose of tactical training, and during

the 1770s for the evaluation of competing tactical doctrines. The most famous of these camps

was the camp at Vassieux in 1778.47 It was at this camp that Marshal Broglie evaluated the

systems of Guiberts smaller attack columns by division against the deep attack columns and

44 Lynn, The Bayonets of the Republic, 287-300.45 Ibid., 291.46 Ibid., 291.47 For a detailed examination of these trials and the debates which led to them there remains no study morecomprehensive than Quimby, The Background of Napoleonic Warfare.

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revised drill of Folard. In addition to the testing of doctrine, French units conducted tactical

training and indoctrinated recruits at this camp.

The armies of the Revolution were no different in their use of camps of instruction. These

camps appeared throughout the armies of the Revolution, making an important contribution to

combat effectiveness. TheArmee du Nordestablished three of them for the purpose of training

volunteer battalions from the Volunteers of 1791 and 1792.48 It was in this way that the

volunteers of 1791 received between four and eight months of training before they ever marched

out to meet the enemies of the Republic. Such training turned raw recruits into the battalions that

stood firm before the Prussian advance at Valmy. General Adam Philippe Custine then created

camps of instruction for the officers and NCOs of his army, so that they could go forth into their

units and train them in a more rapid and decentralized way.49

These drillmasters were critical in

the leavening of the army and the rapid increases in their combat effectiveness. Even theArmee

du Pyrenees established camps of instruction while watching the Spanish armies. These camps

provided both fortifications and the training necessary to take the offensive in 1793. 50 The

armies which defended the Republic were not as untrained or undisciplined as the Republican

myth purports. Indeed, with several months of training with the Regulations of 1791, it was no

surprise that the French troops performed s

o well.

Even though the new regulations represented a significant improvement on the drill

system in use at the time of the French Revolution, they were new to both the professional

soldiers and the new volunteers. This represented a problem for the wide dissemination of the

new regulations across the armies of the Republic.51

However, the new regulations themselves

provided the answers. At the tactical level, one of the important changes made in the 1791

regulations was the simplicity of movement. The regulations committee made every effort to

simplify the overly ceremonial and extraneous movements out of the drill when they adopted it.

This was mainly the work of Guibert, and was his major contribution to the project. Additionally,

the simplicity of drill lent itself to a simplicity of organization and instruction, which assisted in

the wide dissemination through the camps of instruction used throughout the armies of France.

48 Phipps, The Armies of the First French Republic, vol. 1, 84-96.49 Ibid., vol. 1, 186.50 Ibid., vol. 3, 145.51 The old military truism being that it is extremely perilous to change systems of tactics in an army in the midst ofa war, and highly inconvenient even at the beginning of one. Winfield Scott,Memoirs of Lieutenant-General Scott,2 vols, (New York: Sheldon & Company, 1864), vol. 2, 259.

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The regulation was designed for ease of instruction and organized around schools. For the new

officers created by the French Revolution, the Regulations of 1792 provided a similar education

in the basics of officership and a broad

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