Modernising War, Making of the Modern World Rob Johnson

Historiography

Military History New Military History

New Debates ‘Modern’ War? Paradigmatic Concepts Western-centric focus Modalities of War Ferguson and the ‘hundred years’ war’ of the twentieth century.

Changing Fronts Technology Finance Tactics Ethics

Technology

Finance The Military Revolution Geoffrey Parker Jeremy Black

Tactics Maximum army size c. 50,000 & frontage of a few miles Command & control: mounted courier, drums and bugles, shouting Linear tactics (massed volleys within 100 yards; muskets must be reloaded standing up) Smoke obscuration: bright uniforms and regimental ‘colours’ Cavalry delivered shock and mobility in close order formations …European conventions… challenged in America… Battle of Leuthen, 1757 Prussian Grenadiers: close order drill and battlefield manoeuvre

The Storming of St Privat, August 1870 (Franco-Prussian War, )

Persistence of Established Techniques Sudanese assault, c.1885

Tactics Principles of war unchanged Trenches & dispersal for protection Continuing faith in the ‘offensive’

Changing Scale of Battle: Western Front, 1914

Firepower: Range & Accuracy Napoleonic cannon required direct line of sight; max range half a mile Whitworth’s rifling in 1850s instead of smooth bore Spin increased range & accuracy - up to half a mile for infantry rifles; - by 1914 naval guns could fire 15 miles, railway guns 40 miles Rifled cannon barrel from American Civil War era

Firepower: Increasing Rate of Fire Breech-loading rifles & artillery (1860s+) Dependent on precision-engineering Increased rate of fire (3-9 rounds per min) Allowed infantry to fire & reload lying down: …fieldcraft Krupp’s cast-iron, breech-loader, 1860s Prussian ‘needle gun’ + percussion cap, 1835

Firepower: Machine-guns Introduced in 1860s By late 19 th century machine-guns capable of 500 rounds per minute Used effectively in colonial wars, the Russo-Japanese War ( ) & the First World War Created ‘beaten zones’; eventually used in the ‘indirect’ role Gatling gun, 1865, required hand- cranking Maxim gun, 1885, used recoil to load next cartridge, effectively becoming self- firing

Firepower and Changing Tactics Loose, skirmish formations imperative Defensive tactics favour depth: firepower demanded ‘dispersal’ By 1914 wars of manoeuvre, in the open, were costly Fieldcraft, camouflage, entrenchment vital Breakthrough only possible with armoured warfare in 1917 Confederate trenches, Virginia, 1864 Trenches, western front,

US Marines on the Marianas during the Island Hopping Campaign,

Communications Road network (vastly improved in 18thC) Cartography Railways (1830s) Screw propeller (1850s) Telegraph Telephones Radio (1901)… … Radar … Satellites (1957) Railway marshalling yards at Atlanta, Georgia, American Civil War

Heliograph, Mesopotamia Telephonist, South African War

Conscription ‘From this moment until that in which the enemy shall have been driven from the soil of the Republic all Frenchmen are in permanent requisition for the service of the armies. The young men shall go to battle; the married men shall forge arms and transport provisions; the women shall make tents and clothing and shall serve in the hospitals; the children shall turn old linen into lint; the aged shall betake themselves to the public places in order to arouse the courage of the warriors and preach the hatred of kings and the unity of the Republic.’ Carnot, French Minister of War, 23 Aug. 1793

18thC multinational, professional armies European 19thC population increased … Increased taxation to pay for bigger armies … Growth in bureaucracy to register adult males 1793 levée en masse: by ,000 Frenchmen under arms Return to professional armies augmented by Reservists 1850s Mobilisation: armies numbered millions; 1916 Britain abandoned volunteering for conscription

Samori Touré Zulu

Ottoman Troops Chinese Imperial Army

The North West Frontier of India

Nationalism & War 18 th -century multi-national armies; reliance on discipline rather than patriotism Rousseau: ‘citizen soldier’ with duty to defend republic French Revolution: ‘the ‘‘Patrie’’ in danger’ Army as ‘school of the nation’ (Germany); ‘turning peasants into Frenchmen’ (Weber) German poster, 1915 British poster, 1915

The Indian Army in the Second World War

Limited War to Total War? 18 th -century: war as diplomatic leverage; armies less frequently committed to battle (?) Napoleonic maxim: decisive battle &impose a political settlement Clausewitz (1830s): distinction between ‘true’ (total) and ‘real’ (limited) war

Ethics 19 th -century attempts to ‘humanise’ war (Red Cross; Geneva Convention; Hague Conventions) Attempts to ban certain weapons, & war itself (organisations, legal powers, pressure groups) Popular support? Enemies demonised Limits to war?.

Home Front Industrialisation of warfare : ‘reserved occupations’ categories recognised 1916 Hindenburg Programme to mobilise all domestic resources Recategorisation of civilians as ‘combatants’?

area bombing of civilian areas: Berlin Sherman’s ‘March Through Georgia’ 1864