Читать книгу The Art of War - baron de Antoine Henri Jomini - Страница 23

Table of Contents

Although wars of opinion, national wars, and civil wars are sometimes confounded, they differ enough to require separate notice.

Wars of opinion may be intestine, both intestine and foreign, and, lastly, (which, however, is rare,) they may be foreign or exterior without being intestine or civil.

Wars of opinion between two states belong also to the class of wars of intervention; for they result either from doctrines which one party desires to propagate among its neighbors, or from dogmas which it desires to crush—in both cases leading to intervention. Although originating in religious or political dogmas, these wars are most deplorable; for, like national wars, they enlist the worst passions, and become vindictive, cruel, and terrible.

The wars of Islamism, the Crusades, the Thirty Years' War, the wars of the League, present nearly the same characteristics. Often religion is the pretext to obtain political power, and the war is not really one of dogmas. The successors of Mohammed cared more to extend their empire than to preach the Koran, and Philip II., bigot as he was, did not sustain the League in France for the purpose of advancing the Roman Church. We agree with M. Ancelot that Louis IX., when he went on a crusade in Egypt, thought more of the commerce of the Indies than of gaining possession of the Holy Sepulcher.

The dogma sometimes is not only a pretext, but is a powerful ally; for it excites the ardor of the people, and also creates a party. For instance, the Swedes in the Thirty Years' War, and Philip II. in France, had allies in the country more powerful than their armies. It may, however, happen, as in the Crusades and the wars of Islamism, that the dogma for which the war is waged, instead of friends, finds only bitter enemies in the country invaded; and then the contest becomes fearful.

The chances of support and resistance in wars of political opinions are about equal. It may be recollected how in 1792 associations of fanatics thought it possible to propagate throughout Europe the famous declaration of the rights of man, and how governments became justly alarmed, and rushed to arms probably with the intention of only forcing the lava of this volcano back into its crater and there extinguishing it. The means were not fortunate; for war and aggression are inappropriate measures for arresting an evil which lies wholly in the human passions, excited in a temporary paroxysm, of less duration as it is the more violent. Time is the true remedy for all bad passions and for all anarchical doctrines. A civilized nation may bear the yoke of a factious and unrestrained multitude for a short interval; but these storms soon pass away, and reason resumes her sway. To attempt to restrain such a mob by a foreign force is to attempt to restrain the explosion of a mine when the powder has already been ignited: it is far better to await the explosion and afterward fill up the crater than to try to prevent it and to perish in the attempt.

After a profound study of the Revolution, I am convinced that, if the Girondists and National Assembly had not been threatened by foreign armaments, they would never have dared to lay their sacrilegious hands upon the feeble but venerable head of Louis XVI. The Girondists would never have been crushed by the Mountain but for the reverses of Dumouriez and the threats of invasion. And if they had been permitted to clash and quarrel with each other to their hearts' content, it is probable that, instead of giving place to the terrible Convention, the Assembly would slowly have returned to the restoration of good, temperate, monarchical doctrines, in accordance with the necessities and the immemorial traditions of the French.

In a military view these wars are fearful, since the invading force not only is met by the armies of the enemy, but is exposed to the attacks of an exasperated people. It may be said that the violence of one party will necessarily create support for the invaders by the formation of another and opposite one; but, if the exasperated party possesses all the public resources, the armies, the forts, the arsenals, and if it is supported by a large majority of the people, of what avail will be the support of the faction which possesses no such means? What service did one hundred thousand Vendeans and one hundred thousand Federalists do for the Coalition in 1793?

History contains but a single example of a struggle like that of the Revolution; and it appears to clearly demonstrate the danger of attacking an intensely-excited nation. However the bad management of the military operations was one cause of the unexpected result, and before deducing any certain maxims from this war, we should ascertain what would have been the result if after the flight of Dumouriez, instead of destroying and capturing fortresses, the allies had informed the commanders of those fortresses that they contemplated no wrong to France, to her forts or her brave armies, and had marched on Paris with two hundred thousand men. They might have restored the monarchy; and, again, they might never have returned, at least without the protection of an equal force on their retreat to the Rhine. It is difficult to decide this, since the experiment was never made, and as all would have depended upon the course of the French nation and the army. The problem thus presents two equally grave solutions. The campaign of 1793 gave one; whether the other might have been obtained, it is difficult to say. Experiment alone could have determined it.

The military precepts for such wars are nearly the same as for national wars, differing, however, in a vital point. In national wars the country should be occupied and subjugated, the fortified places besieged and reduced, and the armies destroyed; whereas in wars of opinion it is of less importance to subjugate the country; here great efforts should be made to gain the end speedily, without delaying for details, care being constantly taken to avoid any acts which might alarm the nation for its independence or the integrity of its territory.

The war in Spain in 1823 is an example which may be cited in favor of this course in opposition to that of the Revolution. It is true that the conditions were slightly different; for the French army of 1792 was made up of more solid elements than that of the Radicals of the Isla de Leon. The war of the Revolution was at once a war of opinion, a national war, and a civil war—while, if the first war in Spain in 1808 was thoroughly a national war, that of 1823 was a partial struggle of opinions without the element of nationality; and hence the enormous difference in the results.

Moreover, the expedition of the Duke of Angoulême was well carried out. Instead of attacking fortresses, he acted in conformity to the above-mentioned precepts. Pushing on rapidly to the Ebro, he there divided his forces, to seize, at their sources, all the elements of strength of their enemies—which they could safely do, since they were sustained by a majority of the inhabitants. If he had followed the instructions of the Ministry, to proceed methodically to the conquest of the country and the reduction of the fortresses between the Pyrenees and the Ebro, in order to provide a base of operations, he would perhaps have failed in his mission, or at least made the war a long and bloody one, by exciting the national spirit by an occupation of the country similar to that of 1807.

Emboldened by the hearty welcome of the people, he comprehended that it was a political operation rather than a military one, and that it behooved him to consummate it rapidly. His conduct, so different from that of the allies in 1793, deserves careful attention from all charged with similar missions. In three months the army was under the walls of Cadiz.

If the events now transpiring in the Peninsula prove that statesmanship was not able to profit by success in order to found a suitable and solid order of things, the fault was neither in the army nor in its commanders, but in the Spanish government, which, yielding to the counsel of violent reactionaries, was unable to rise to the height of its mission. The arbiter between two great hostile interests, Ferdinand blindly threw himself into the arms of the party which professed a deep veneration for the throne, but which intended to use the royal authority for the furtherance of its own ends, regardless of consequences. The nation remained divided in two hostile camps, which it would not have been impossible to calm and reconcile in time. These camps came anew into collision, as I predicted in Verona in 1823—a striking lesson, by which no one is disposed to profit in that beautiful and unhappy land, although history is not wanting in examples to prove that violent reactions, any more than revolutions, are not elements with which to construct and consolidate. May God grant that from this frightful conflict may emerge a strong and respected monarchy, equally separated from all factions, and based upon a disciplined army as well as upon the general interests of the country—a monarchy capable of rallying to its support this incomprehensible Spanish nation, which, with merits not less extraordinary than its faults, was always a problem for those who were in the best position to know it.