Battle Studies; Ancient and Modern Battle

by Charles Jean Jacques Joseph Ardant du Picq

As there are few losses between cavalry and cavalry, so there is little fighting.

Hannibal's Numidians, like the Russian Cossacks, inspired a veritable terror by the incessant alarms they caused. They tired out without fighting and killed by surprise.

Why is the cavalry handled so badly?—It is true that infantry is not used better.—Because its rôle is one of movement, of morale, of morale and movement so united, that movement alone, often without a charge or shock action of any sort can drive the enemy into retreat, and, if followed closely, into rout. That is a result of the quickness of cavalry. One who knows how to make use of this quickness alone can obtain such results.

All writers on cavalry will tell you that the charge pushed home of two cavalry bodies and the shock at top speed do not exist. Always before the encounter, the weaker runs away, if there is not a face to face check. What becomes then of the MV squared? If this famous MV squared is an empty word, why then crush your horses under giants, forgetting that in the formula besides M there is V squared. In a charge, there is M, there is V squared, there is this and that. There is resolution, and I believe, nothing else that counts!

Cohesion and unity give force to the charge. Alignment is impossible at a fast gait where the most rapid pass the others. Only when the moral effect has been produced should the gait be increased to take advantage of it by falling upon an enemy already in disorder, in the act of fleeing. The cuirassiers charge at a trot. This calm steadiness frightens the enemy into an about face. Then they charge at his back, at a gallop.

They say that at Eckmühl, for every French cuirassier down, fourteen Austrians were struck in the back. Was it because they had no back-plate? It is evident that it was because they offered their backs to the blows.

Jomini speaks of charges at a trot against cavalry at a gallop. He cites Lasalle who used the trot and who, seeing cavalry approach at a gallop, would say: "There are lost men." Jomini insists on the effect of shock. The trot permits that compactness which the gallop breaks up. That may be true. But the effect is moral above all. A troop at the gallop sees a massed squadron coming towards it at a trot. It is surprised at first at such coolness. The material impulse of the gallop is superior; but there are no intervals, no gaps through which to penetrate the line in order to avoid the shock, the shock that overcomes men and horses. These men must be very resolute, as their close ranks do not permit them to escape by about facing. If they move at such a steady gait, it is because their resolution is also firm and they do not feel the need of running away, of diverting themselves by the unchecked speed of the unrestrained gallop, etc. [43]

Galloping men do not reason these things out, but they know them instinctively. They understand that they have before them a moral impulse superior to theirs. They become uneasy, hesitate. Their hands instinctively turn their horses aside. There is no longer freedom in the attack at a gallop. Some go on to the end, but three-fourths have already tried to avoid the shock. There is complete disorder, demoralization, flight. Then begins the pursuit at a gallop by the men who attacked at the trot.

The charge at a trot exacts of leaders and men complete confidence and steadfastness. It is the experience of battle only that can give this temper to all. But this charge, depending on a moral effect, will not always succeed. It is a question of surprise. Xenophon [44] recommended, in his work on cavalry operations, the use of surprise, the use of the gallop when the trot is customary, and vice-versa. "Because," he says, "agreeable or terrible, the less a thing is foreseen, the more pleasure or fright does it cause. This is nowhere seen better than in war, where every surprise strikes terror even to the strongest."

As a general rule, the gallop is and should be necessary in the charge; it is the winning, intoxicating gait, for men and horses. It is taken up at such a distance as may be necessary to insure its success, whatever it may cost in men and horses. The regulations are correct in prescribing that the charge be started close up. If the troopers waited until the charge was ordered, they would always succeed. I say that strong men, moved by pride or fear, by taking up too soon the charge against a firm enemy, have caused more charges to fail than to succeed. Keeping men in hand until the command "charge," seizing the precise instant for this command, are both difficult. They exact of the energetic leader domination over his men and a keen eye, at a moment when three out of four men no longer see anything, so that good cavalry leaders, squadron leaders in general are very rare. Real charges are just as rare.