Motor Transports in War

by Horace Wyatt

Although we, in Great Britain, have developed the industrial motor vehicle almost entirely with a view to the improvement of communications in time of peace, various circumstances, which will be referred to in more detail in a later chapter, have led other countries to fasten their attention more firmly on to the application of mechanical power to military needs. Very considerable sums of money have been expended during the past five or six years with this end in view, and such expenditure could only have been justified if a full study of the probable course of a great war under modern conditions had led to the conclusion that the motor is something more than an accessory and convenience, but is rather one of the prime essentials of success. In order to prove that this view is, in fact, held by those who have devoted their whole time to the study of modern warfare, one need go no further than the now famous or notorious book on Germany and the Next War by General F. von Bernhardi:

“In a future European war ‘masses’ will be employed to an extent unprecedented in any previous one. Weapons will be used whose deadliness will exceed all previous experience. More effective and varied means of communication will be available than were known in earlier wars. These three momentous factors will mark the war of the future.”

From this statement it is clear that, even if only improvement in means of communication is considered, the motor vehicle forms one of the three greatest factors in moulding the course of modern warfare. Railways have been available in many previous wars, and there can be no doubt that the reference to more effective and varied means of communication is occasioned almost entirely by the development of motor vehicles suitable for use in the transport and supply columns. Simultaneously, both of the other prime factors are affected by the introduction of motor vehicles. Road motors can assist materially in massing men rapidly at any desired point, and mechanical power is absolutely essential for the transport of guns of enormous calibre, the employment of which in the field is only in this way rendered possible.

Quoting again from the same authority we get an idea of the bearing of our subject upon a military theory now universally accepted as true.

“The commander who can carry out all operations quicker than the enemy, and can concentrate and employ greater masses in a narrow space than they can, will always be in a position to collect a numerically superior force in the decisive direction; if he controls the more effective troops he will gain decisive successes against one part of the hostile army, and will be able to exploit them against other divisions of it before the enemy can gain equivalent advantages in other parts of the field.... If the assailant can advance in the decisive direction with superior numbers, and can win the day, because the enemy cannot utilise his numerical superiority, there is a possibility of an ultimate victory over the arithmetically stronger army.”

Taking this statement in conjunction with the well-known German theory that safety only lies in offensive warfare, we realise immediately the incalculable importance of the introduction of any new system which will give to large bodies of men the powers of more free and more rapid movement. When armies are increased beyond certain numerical limits, it becomes absolutely necessary for them to depend upon supplies brought up regularly from the rear, and not upon the uncertainties of living upon the country.

“Improved means of communication facilitate the handling and feeding of large masses, but tie them down to railway systems and main roads, and must, if they fail or break down in the course of a campaign, aggravate the difficulties, because the troops were accustomed to their use, and the commanders counted upon them.”

We have here a complete recognition of two most important points. The first is, that the use of motors in the transport and supply columns, if successfully carried on, represents an enormous advantage, which may even allow ultimate victory to come to a numerically inferior army. In the second place, we have the acknowledgment that any breakdown in the service for which the motor vehicles are responsible, will be fatal to success.

A military correspondent of the Daily Telegraph has recently emphasised the same point. He has pointed out that hitherto the massing of an army of about a quarter of a million men has represented the probable limit of possibilities, and that even then such numbers could only be massed for a short period. The Russo-Japanese war, in which larger numbers were engaged, has by no means disproved this theory, since it partook of the nature of a siege rather than that of a field campaign. At the present moment, the enormous numbers dealt with envolve certain limitations in movement, the scope of which is dictated by the distribution of railways and of roads. Without motor transport, the rate of movement of huge armies would be necessarily very slow, the radius of action from railhead would be small, and the daily movement of the troops would be strictly circumscribed for more reasons than one. The effect of the introduction of motor transport is somewhat similar to that which would be obtained if the railway could, in a few hours, be extended in any direction along any made road for a distance of about forty or fifty miles. The delivery of supplies, as it were in retail, to the troops must still be carried out by horse transport, since motor lorries are not suitable for continuous use where made roads do not exist. The comparatively slow movement of horsed vehicles even now affects the rate of progress of an army. When huge bodies of men are in motion, the depth from the front to the rear of the army is very considerable, and at the end of the day the supplies have to be brought up from the rear to the front in time to enable the whole force to be fed.