The Morris County chronicle. [volume] (Morristown, N.J.) 1877-1915, 1908-07-28
USE OF THE AERoPLANE
VIII Create Revofution in Military
Strategy

1
Strategy
Although it has become truism
that the aeroplane. and in a less de-
gree the airship, will find their most
useful sphere in the field of military
scouting, few people seem to have real
lied what a revolutionary effect the
new means of locomotion will have.
For if the airship can only fulfill it's
present promise, the time is not far
distant when the art of war, as prac-
tised to-day, will be stripped of it's
most important element of success,
and it's prosecution, at least along
modern lines, will be rendered we'll
nigh impossible.
The strategy of ancient and medic
val times was simple compared with
the complexity introduced by the in
vention of gunpower and the present.
day development of offensive weapons.
The futility of frontal attacks made
by massed bodies Of troops the neces-
sity for bringing bodies of men into
action only over ground where more
or less cover is available; the decisive
part played by the natural topography
of the field of battle in determining
the issues of the day, have given to
strategy and tactics, but particularly
to the former, an Importance far
greater than they held in ancient or
medieval times, or even in the wars Of
the nineteenth century. And success
full strategy is possible only when the
movement of troops and their various
dispositions can be clouded under a
veil of close secrecy. Secrecy is, in
deed, the very soul OF strategy, and
without it strategy becomes worse
than useless, and merely waste of
time and energy. Should secrecy for
some reason become impossible, war
would revert to the methods of earlier
times, and the outcome Of BATTLES
would depend upon superior weight
and numbers.
|
the world to-day is in possession, or
very soon will be, of a system Of scout
| ing which will destroy at once that
very secrecy which is essential to sue
cessful strategy. Only a few weeks
| ago, as recorded by themselves in this
| journal, the Wright brothers were
sweeping over the sand dunes on the
coast of northern North Carolina in a
machine which was perfectly under
control, at a speed of from 38 to AZ
miles an hour. Moreover, only few
days ago Count Zeppelin, in his Brob-
dingnagian steel and aluminium air.
ship, proved that it is possible to re-
main in the air all day, and maneuver
at speeds Of over 80 miles an hour, and
to perform these evolutions, if need be,
at an altitude Of several thousand
feet.
The possession Of fleet Of scout air
ships by two opposing armies would
mean the complete Generalization OF
the art of war as it is now practised.
Thanking movements; the position
and strength of reserves; masked bat
teries; concealed troops and unsus-
pected difficulties in the natural lay OF
the ground on the field of operations,
would be perfectly we'll known to the
enemy. The game of war would be
come almost as ridiculous as game Of
chess in which each player told his op-
ponent what was his general plan Of at
, tack, and what, in all probability
would be his next move. 1t certainly
looks as though the present rapid de
velopment of aeronautics would reduce
modern war TO something very much
like an absurdity ; unless, indeed, some
form of gun OF small weight, great
velocity, and capable of being trained
rapidly over wide areas of the heavens
be devised, that can wing" an aero.
plane at several Thousand yards.
Scientific American"