The Art of War in the Western World

by Jones, Archer

• ISBN13: 9780195062410
• ISBN10: 0195062418
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1989-12-14
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

This highly acclaimed volume--the magnum opus of one of America's most respected military historians--presents a broad-spectrum history of warfare in the Western world from ancient times to the latter half of the twentieth century. Archer Jones begins his story 2,500 years ago, when the Greeks and Macedonians first supplemented their spears with missiles--slings, arrows, and javelins--and carries it to our time, when missiles have become the ultimate weapon. He argues that, while weaponry may have increased a thousandfold since the Spartans battled the Thebans in the fourth century B.C., military strategy has in some ways changed very little. Concentrating on recurring themes in tactics and strategy, he depicts the outcome of battles, campaigns, and wars in order to demonstrate the continuity in strategy over time. Two themes--continuity and change--give unity to the book and make the remote past useful for understanding recent events. Providing a thorough description of the Israeli-Egyptian War of 1973, for example, Jones demonstrates how tactics and strategy sometimes paralleled those employed by Caesar at Ilerda and by the Germans in their 1940 defeat of France. Throughout, he offers thorough treatments of subjects such as guerrilla warfare, introduced in the first chapter when used against Alexander the Great, as well as of major topics such as how centuries of change culminated in World War II. The Art of War in the Western World will stand for years to come as the standard work on how men conduct war.

Table of Contents

Introduction
Ancient Warfare	p. 1
Tactics	p. 2
Logistics	p. 45
Strategy	p. 54
Summary of Warfare on Land	p. 81
Naval Warfare	p. 86
The Diversity of the Medieval Ways of War, 200-1200	p. 92
The Dissolution of the Roman Empire	p. 92
Changes in Military Organization and Tactical Emphasis	p. 93
Least Effort Exemplified: Byzantine Tactics and Strategy	p. 95
The Stirrup's Enhancement of the Effectiveness of Cavalry	p. 102
Western Europe's Struggle against Raiders	p. 104
William's Combined-Arms Army in the Conquest of England	p. 109
Attack and Defense of Fortifications	p. 114
Medieval Tactics	p. 118
Medieval Strategy: The Evesham and Bouvines Campaigns	p. 123
Examples of an Offensive Persisting Strategy against Raiders	p. 127
Combined-Arms Combat in the Crusades	p. 134
Jenghiz Khan and Mongol Warfare	p. 142
Summary of Medieval Tactics and Strategy	p. 144
The Emergence of a New Combined-Arms Tactical Synthesis, 1200-1600	p. 148
The French Version of Medieval Warfare	p. 148
Changes in Logistics	p. 150
Changes in Weapons	p. 151
Persisting Strategy and the Completion of the English Conquest of Wales	p. 154
The English Combined-Arms Tactical System in Scotland	p. 156
The Beginning of the Hundred Years' War and the Crecy Campaign	p. 161
The Hundred Years' War: English Raids and French Persisting Strategy	p. 165
English Persisting Strategy in the Last Phase of the Hundred Years' War	p. 169
The Experience of the English Tactical System in Spain	p. 173
The Wagenburg	p. 174
The Swiss Heavy Infantry	p. 175
The Least Effort Warfare of the Italian Condottieri	p. 178
Regional Tactical Systems in Conflict: The French Invasion of Italy	p. 182
The Search for a Combined-Arms Synthesis: Italian Battles, 1512-25	p. 186
The Spanish Combined-Arms Tactics	p. 190
The New Fortifications	p. 194
Another Influence of Technology on Tactics	p. 195
The Manpower System in 1600	p. 199
Sixteenth-Century Battles, Campaigns, and Strategy	p. 202
Revolution in Naval Tactics and Logistics	p. 209
The New Tactical Synthesis in Transition, 1600-1700	p. 214
The Logistics of the Thirty Years' War	p. 214
Gustavus Adolphus's Development of the Dutch Tactical System	p. 221
Gustavus's Persisting Strategy and Employment of Distraction	p. 223
Gustavus's Exploitation of the Triumph of His Linear System at Breitenfeld	p. 232
Gustavus against Wallenstein: Logistic and Combat Strategies	p. 237
The Impact of Gustavus's Tactics	p. 243
The Logistics of the Late Seventeenth Century	p. 252
Representative Late Seventeenth-Century Campaigns and Battles	p. 256
The Development of Missile Warfare at Sea	p. 263
The Primacy of the Line of Bayoneted Muskets, 1700-1791	p. 267
The Bayonet, the Flintlock, and Further Changes in Tactics	p. 267
Eighteenth-Century Logistics	p. 272
The Strategy and Tactics of Marlborough's Campaigns	p. 274
Persisting Strategy in North Italy	p. 283
The Evolution of the Linear System	p. 289
Tactics and Strategy as Exemplified in the Silesian Wars of Frederick the Great	p. 294
The Seven Years' War: Tactics and Strategy in Defense against the Logistic Effects of a Persisting Strategy	p. 297
Changes in Attrition in Relation to the Composition of Armies	p. 308
Significant Developments in French Military Thought	p. 309
Warfare in the Western Hemisphere	p. 317
Warfare at Sea	p. 318
Tactical and Strategic Transformation in the Era of the French Revolution and Napoleon, 1791-1815	p. 320
The Tactics and Strategy of the Opening Campaigns in the North	p. 320
The Advent of General Bonaparte	p. 330
The Strategic Turning Movement of the Marengo Campaign	p. 337
Napoleonic Operations on a Larger Scale: The Strategic Turning Movement of Ulm and Distraction and Concentration at Austerlitz	p. 342
Some Characteristics of Napoleon's Campaigns	p. 347
The Augmented Significance of Numerical Superiority	p. 351
Some Later Napoleonic Campaigns	p. 353
Operations in Spain: The French Encounter the Raiding Strategy of Guerrilla Warfare	p. 358
The Foundations of the French Conquests	p. 367
The Military Legacy of the Napoleonic Era	p. 372
The Tactics of Warfare at Sea	p. 377
The Strategy of Warfare at Sea	p. 381
Technological Change and Doctrinal Stability, 1815-1914	p. 387
The Continuation of the Napoleonic Tradition in Radetzky's Victories	p. 387
The Midcentury's New Infantry Weapons	p. 390
The Prussian Staff and Manpower System	p. 392
The New Prussian Army in Action against Austria	p. 396
Decisive Turning Movements in the Franco-Prussian War	p. 398
A Summary of the Tactics, Logistics, and Strategy of the Franco-Prussian War	p. 407
The Strategy of the American Civil War	p. 409
Two Instances of Combating the Raiding Strategy of Guerrilla Warfare	p. 418
European Weapons, Armies, and Doctrine on the Eve of World War I	p. 419
The Revolution in Naval Materiel and its Use in the Russo-Japanese War	p. 423
The Apogee of the Defense: World War I, 1914-18	p. 434
The German Concentration on Interior and Effort to Turn the French	p. 434
The Tactical, Logistical, and Strategic Conditions of the War	p. 439
The German Exploitation of Interior Lines and a Turning Movement to Defeat the Russians	p. 441
The Opening Naval Campaigns	p. 443
Allied Naval Predominance Confirmed: The Battle of Jutland	p. 446
The Submarine as a Commerce Raider	p. 447
The Dominance of Artillery in the Siege Warfare on Land	p. 449
The Development and Utility of Air Forces	p. 450
The Tactics of Trench Warfare	p. 456
The War in 1915 and 1916	p. 459
The Search for a Technological Solution to the Tactical Deadlock	p. 463
The German Quest for Victory through a Logistic Strategy Using Submarines	p. 467
The New German Method of Defense	p. 467
The New German Doctrine for Attack	p. 472
The Campaigns of 1918 on the Western Front	p. 475
The Turning Movement through Superior Mobility: The Megiddo Campaign	p. 480
Summary of the Changes in Weapons, Tactics, and Logistics	p. 483
Prelude to Renewed Conflict, 1919-39	p. 489
The Full Development of Four New Weapon Systems	p. 489
The French in Morocco: New Weapons and Old Strategy	p. 497
Tactical and Strategic Use of Aircraft	p. 501
A Russian Cannae	p. 501
The Navies' Response to the New Weapons	p. 502
Doctrinal Diversity	p. 504
The Climax of Modern Warfare: World War II, 1939-45	p. 508
The German Victory over Poland	p. 508
The French and German Armies	p. 510
French and German Plans	p. 518
The New German Offensive Plan	p. 520
The German Breakthrough in May 1940	p. 523
The Causes of the German Breakthrough	p. 534
The German Turning Movement	p. 535
The German Victory: Napoleonic Warfare with Four Weapon Systems	p. 539
Air Power in a Decisive Role: The Battle of Britain	p. 544
The Strategic and Tactical Conditions of the Russo-German War	p. 548
The Strategic Envelopments of the 1941 Campaign in Russia	p. 552
The Debacle of the German Logistic Strategy of 1942 and the Conclusion of the Russo-German War	p. 557
Distraction, Concentration, and Turning Movement Again: The Landing and Campaign in Normandy	p. 559
The British Inauguration of Mounted Warfare in North Africa and the Defeat of the Italians	p. 563
The Warfare of the Mounted British and German Armies	p. 565
New and Improved Weapons	p. 569
The Interaction of Technology with Strategy	p. 576
Strategic Bombing	p. 578
Combat at Sea with Two Types of Capital Ships	p. 583
The German Submarine Campaign	p. 589
After the World Wars: Consolidation and Technological Change, 1945-85	p. 596
Changes in Weapons	p. 596
The All-Mounted Army	p. 601
The Israeli-Egyptian War of 1973	p. 602
The Tactical Mixture of Old and New	p. 609
Continuity and Change	p. 613
Sea and Air Warfare	p. 613
Tactics	p. 622
Logistics	p. 643
Strategy	p. 648
Notes	p. 717
Index	p. 725
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