2. The 1870 and American Wars confused the issues and led in some cases
to sticky action by cavalry on South African battlefields.
3. In Manchuria the Japanese adopted correct tactics in view of Russian
want of enterprise and their own want of cavalry. The rôle of the
weaker cavalry was exemplified in some respects.
4. Push on the part of one side will compel the other to bring up more
squadrons and lead to the fight of cavalry masses.
5. It is only by special training that cavalry leaders can learn their
duties in a general engagement.
6. Much depends on the leader’s initiative, whilst this again depends
on his knowledge gained by previous practice in similar circumstances.
There are those who ask, “But where are the Ziethen and Seydlitz
cavalry charges nowadays?” Let them call to mind, for it is
instructive to do so, the combination of circumstances, and, be it
noted, circumstances which may well rise again, which conduced to the
success of the cavalry of Frederick the Great.
I. A king general, who had a taste for and knowledge of training
cavalry.
II. A training of all ranks suited to the war about to be undertaken.
III. A cavalry with picked leaders quite unencumbered by officers past
or unsuited to their work.
IV. Horses well conditioned under the eye of an autocrat, who had the
common sense to demand and see that he got, not fat, but fit horses.
V. A skilled direction of the cavalry on the battlefield by a cool
and intensely determined generalissimo, such as Frederick the Great
undoubtedly was.
Now let us, on the other hand, state the case in the South African
operations of 1899-1902. (In almost the same words as regards some
paragraphs as were used in 1897.)
I. An unskilled training and inspection of cavalry in the large
proportion of cases, often conducted by officers of other arms, and
such as tended to inspire all ranks with a desire for display and fine
appearance on parade, rather than with a whole-souled yearning for
efficiency for the war in hand.
II. The training of cavalry regiments in small, flat twelve-acre
drill-fields walled in from the slums of a city, in which cavalry were
still stationed for hopelessly out-of-date political reasons. What
real cavalry training was possible along the tram lines and between
rows of suburban villas?
III. A personnel too largely drawn from towns, and ignorant of the
exigencies of campaigning horse-management.
IV. Horses, three-quarters bred, of fair pace and condition, but the
latter necessary qualification for a campaign entirely spoiled in
most cases by, say, a thirty days’ voyage, followed by a five or six
days’ railway journey, then semi-starvation at the end of a line of
communication, then some quick work followed by two or three days’
total starvation, then more work, and so on. Constantly our strategy
outran our supply arrangements and the condition of our horses.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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