Battle Studies | Page 6

du Picq, haunted by the need of a doctrine which would correct
existing evils and disorders, was continually returning to the
fountain-head. Anxious to instruct promising officers, to temper them
by irrefutable lessons, to mature them more rapidly, to inspire them
with his zeal for historical incidents, he resolved to carry on and add to
his personal studies while aiding them. Daring to take a courageous

offensive against the general inertia of the period, he translated the
problem of his whole life into a series of basic questions. He presented
in their most diverse aspects, the basic questions which perplex all
military men, those of which knowledge in a varying degree of
perfection distinguish and classify military men. The nervous grasp of
an incomparable style models each of them, carves them with a certain
harshness, communicates to them a fascinating yet unknown authority
which crystallizes them in the mind, at the same time giving to them a
positive form that remains true for all armies, for all past, present and
future centuries. Herewith is the text of the concise and pressing
questions which have not ceased to be as important to-day (1902) as
they were in 1870:
"General,
"In the last century, after the improvements of the rifle and field
artillery by Frederick, and the Prussian successes in war--to-day, after
the improvement of the new rifle and cannon to which in part the recent
victories are due--we find all thinking men in the army asking
themselves the question: 'How shall we fight to-morrow?' We have no
creed on the subject of combat. And the most opposing methods
confuse the intelligence of military men.
"Why? A common error at the starting point. One might say that no one
is willing to acknowledge that it is necessary to understand yesterday in
order to know to-morrow, for the things of yesterday are nowhere
plainly written. The lessons of yesterday exist solely in the memory of
those who know how to remember because they have known how to
see, and those individuals have never spoken. I make an appeal to one
of those.
"The smallest detail, taken from an actual incident in war, is more
instructive for me, a soldier, than all the Thiers and Jominis in the
world. They speak, no doubt, for the heads of states and armies but they
never show me what I wish to know--a battalion, a company, a squad,
in action.
"Concerning a regiment, a battalion, a company, a squad, it is

interesting to know: The disposition taken to meet the enemy or the
order for the march toward them. What becomes of this disposition or
this march order under the isolated or combined influences of accidents
of the terrain and the approach of danger?
"Is this order changed or is it continued in force when approaching the
enemy?
"What becomes of it upon arriving within the range of the guns, within
the range of bullets?
"At what distance is a voluntary or an ordered disposition taken before
starting operations for commencing fire, for charging, or both?
"How did the fight start? How about the firing? How did the men adapt
themselves? (This may be learned from the results: So many bullets
fired, so many men shot down--when such data are available.) How
was the charge made? At what distance did the enemy flee before it? At
what distance did the charge fall back before the fire or the good order
and good dispositions of the enemy, or before such and such a
movement of the enemy? What did it cost? What can be said about all
these with reference to the enemy?
"The behavior, i.e., the order, the disorder, the shouts, the silence, the
confusion, the calmness of the officers and men whether with us or
with the enemy, before, during, and after the combat?
"How has the soldier been controlled and directed during the action? At
what instant has he had a tendency to quit the line in order to remain
behind or to rush ahead?
"At what moment, if the control were escaping from the leader's hands,
has it no longer been possible to exercise it?
"At what instant has this control escaped from the battalion commander?
When from the captain, the section leader, the squad leader? At what
time, in short, if such a thing did take place, was there but a disordered
impulse, whether to the front or to the rear carrying along pell-mell

with it both the leaders and men?
"Where and when did the halt take place?
"Where and when were the leaders able to resume control of the men?
"At what moments before, during, or after the day, was the battalion
roll-call, the company roll-call made? The results of these roll-calls?
"How many dead, how many wounded on the one side and on