The Ordre de Bataille
In planning the movements of a force it is desirable to keep the Sub-Commands in the same relative position throughout. Thus, a corps originally on the right of another should not get to the left of it, nor one in rear pass another in front of it. This will avoid useless marching and delays, and confusion in the trains in rear.
This may be summed up as the principle of maintaining the original Ordre de Bataille. This expression, which originally meant the “battle array,” or order in which the Army was drawn up for battle, is sometimes used to denote the strategical array, or the composition and distribution of the various formations which make up the Army. The Ordre de Bataille has no longer any reference to their relative positions on the battle ground, which necessarily change with the circumstances of each engagement. But this document is still indispensable for an army. No Orders can be drafted except by referring to it, and without it the direction and control of an army would be impossible. A knowledge of the Ordre de Bataille of the enemy—that is, of the composition and distribution of the Subordinate Commands of his army—is obviously of the first importance in planning movements and combinations against him. It can generally be arrived at from a study of his peace organization and his railway facilities for concentration, corrected by any information procurable as to the position of his troops. This information may come from various sources, such as newspaper reports of the progress of his concentration, captured documents and letters, deserters, and spies. After an action, the insignia on the uniforms of dead, wounded, and prisoners, the lettering of captured guns, wagons, and baggage, give valuable hints as to the units engaged. It is open to question whether such information might not be withheld from the enemy.
In the Manchurian War the Japanese carefully avoided helping the enemy by indicating units on uniforms, and instructed their men, when wounded or captured, to refrain from stating their Corps. They increased the strength of their Divisions, altered the number of Divisions composing each Army, and even formed an additional Army out of time-expired reserves, without the facts leaking out. This greatly hindered the Russians from estimating the Japanese strength in the different sections of the great battles.
Napoleon made a practice of allotting larger numbers to the Army Corps and Divisions commanded by his best Generals, and this irregularity was increased by his constantly raising additional battalions and squadrons to meet special exigencies, and by incorporating foreign contingents in his armies. The result was, the French Ordre de Bataille was so irregular as to make any a priori calculation of strength on the part of his enemies of doubtful value.
The difficulty consequently found by the historian in calculating the strengths, and following the movements, of the French Armies in the Napoleonic Wars is a measure of that which his enemy’s Staff must have met in arriving at a definite idea of the strength and disposition of the French Forces at any given moment.
It is plain that the modern aim of making organization so logical and methodical that the Staff can more easily plan operations, and write correct Orders, had little weight with Napoleon. He was himself his own Chief of the General Staff, and had a memory which no complexity could confuse. It may be a question whether modern symmetry of organization may not be really injurious to success, because highly informing to the enemy. Simplicity and symmetry are obviously useful in saving difficulties to the Staff; but this advantage may be bought too dearly, and a complicated and illogical organization might be the best for war, so as to prevent the enemy acquiring information.
PART II
BRITISH WAR ORGANIZATION
CHAPTER VIII
THE EXPEDITIONARY FORCE
FIGHTING TROOPS
The British Troops organized for service in the field consist of the Expeditionary Force, formed by the Regular Army and its Reserves, and the Territorial Force, composed of troops which are virtually Militia, undergoing only a slight annual training, and engaged in their civil avocations during the rest of the year. To these may be added the regular troops in the Mediterranean (Gibraltar, Malta, and Egypt), and in South Africa, from which a Division may be formed to add to the Expeditionary Force. The forces of the self-governing Dominions need not be considered. They are hardly as yet organized as Field Armies, and are kept up for Local Defence. There is also the Indian Army, composed of regular troops, British and Indian.
The Expeditionary Force corresponds to what in foreign countries is termed the Army of First Line, and the Territorial Force to the Army of Second Line; the former being intended for action against our enemies abroad, and the latter for Home Defence.