Litchfield enquirer., 1870-09-01
The Prussian Method.


 The Prussian method of making war re- minds one of the feudal ages rather than of modern warfare. It 'smobilizes" a whole population, and precipitates them on an enemy, disregards frontier Notifications, and marches on hostile capital with the evident design of concentrating into few weeks what modern military art has usually made the business of years. The old feu- dal levy en nsasse was only for forty days. Every man was 8 soldier and armies out of all proportion to the population fought great battles, made short but decisive cam paigns in @ manner totally different from the methodical military style of the last three centuries. With the rise of standing armies it was found that small number of well disciplined troops was more effective than many times their number of nasty levies, and the battles of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth centuries were almost ex- clusively those of standing armies.
 The French Revelation savo almost the first instance of the success of numbers against discipline. The grand levy of over @ million of men during the Reign of Ter TOT, not only saved France from defeat and dismemberment, and repulsed the combin- ed standing armies of aristocratic Europe, but pushed her boundaries to the Rhine. From that time. for nearly twenty years, France fought for conquest, sacrificing over four millions of soldiers in the terrible wars of the Republic and the Empire.
 It was during the supremacy of the First Napoleon that the present Prussian system was organized. In 1906. that Emperor had completely overthrown, in six weeks campaign, the military power of Prussia. One of the harsh conditions of peace which he imposed on the conquered country. was a limitation of the size of the standing army Prussia was allowed to maintain. While keeping the letter of this agreement, the shrewd statesmen of that nation really formed large army by disciplining their soldiers as fast as possible, retiring them, and disciplining more, till, when the fail ure of the Moscow campaign rendered re- distance practicable, Napoleon found him. self confronted by nation in arms. Though the wonderful genius of the great Napoleon enabled him to make a terrible and at times successful struggle against heavy odds, he finally went down, and the Prussian system won it's first great triumph. : The campaign of Sadowa showed the wonderful force of the perfected Prussian system. Nearly the whole adult male pop. ulation of the country had been through a term of military service, and the enormous force thrown upon Austria proved irresis- table. Napoleon TIT endeavored to estab- hsh counter-system, and when he thought he had perfected it, commenced the pres- ent war. The result indicates a terrible miscalculation on his part. Military peo. pie as the French consider themselves, they have never submitted to that rigorous discipline which has made Prussia a nation of soldiers. With probably the largest avail able standing army in the world, France has nothing like thePrussian reserve force, and for six weeks campaign is decidedly inferior to North Germany.
 The great disadvantage of the Prussian system. however, will be in its want of ca pacity for . sustained effort. A failure to conquer peace within two months would be practical defeat. No civilized country can keep in the field for any length of time % large proportion of its population as Prussia now has under arms. The pros pect now is, however, that the Germans will soon be before Paris and unless tha, great city can really stand seize the wa, is not likely to be a long one.