The spirit of routine that prevails in an army officered by soldiers of regular professional training is often responsible for the promotion to high command of men too old for the effective direction of a long and exhausting war like the present one.
There is no reason to think that the American people, any more than the British and the French, will meet with serious difficulties in recruiting and quickly training a strong staff of officers of all ranks. They will also, like the Allies, find no insuperable difficulties in filling the gaps which the enemy’s fire will make among them.
4. A word about cavalry. If in this treatise we have not devoted a chapter to the use of cavalry it is because, since September, 1914, cavalry has had but few opportunities to operate as such.
The cavalry has been generally used in the present trench warfare in the same manner as the infantry. It has been reduced in number; that of the army corps has been suppressed, and only two squadrons have been allotted to each division.
Some regiments of cuirassiers have been dismounted, for want of proper horses.
But we think that, notwithstanding the small part the cavalry has taken in the war during the last thirty months, its opportunity is bound to come.
Some cavalry corps, comprising several divisions, have been retained, and during the offensives they are held in readiness to move to the front in case the enemy lines should be broken.
Cavalry squadrons rendered good services to the British and French during the pursuit in March, 1917.
The Germans will perhaps not always be able to protect their retreats by the desert-like devastation of thirty or forty kilometres of country. Their weak point will be found some day or other, and on that day the cavalry will resume its importance.
The difficulty in feeding and obtaining horses seems to have compelled the Germans to reduce their cavalry forces considerably.