The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1914-10-06
HOW A MODERN BATTLE looks
AS VIEWED BY A BYSTANDFR
Officer M, OF General Staff of Army Gives Out Interview
Which Throws Light on Subject Ahout Wh ite 1 sle"
of Average Person Are Very Hazv winch Ideas

ItA dIS
cal, yet persistently insistent, the ma-
jority of Americas 100, o0O, 600 are
asking themselves each day.
For the dispatches from Euro,.
though they fill columns of the
dailies. are held down, by reason of
disjointed censorship, to more or less
disjointed items-from a battIeline 2OO
miles long-sprinkled through with
poetic metaphors of how a division
was moved down" or some fort was
"a veritable hell" or some brigade
was surrounded and swept away:
all which take the reader back To
youthful Friday afternoons at school
when in fear and trembling he recited
The Charge of the Light Brigade
and "Hohenlinden,' but doesn't get
him very far in forming an idea of
what "A real battle looks like"
Nowhere, indeed, thanks to this
same censorship, has the public been
able to get a clear and coherent &C
count of the actual details as con-
trasted with the battlefields of half a
century ago. If lodging bullets on
the firing line were an v y-day oc-
currence to the everyday man. like
lodging automobiles on the street
crossings, the dispatches would con-
vey some idea. But unfortunately
not one man in 10000 has any data
or experience from which to visualize
the things that actually occur when
thousands Of men, armed with mod
ern arms, clash upon the battlefield
an article in the Washington Star
says.
The pictures and accounts Ct the
battles in our civil war are worse than
useless as guides, or even aids. 20 an
understanding Of the modern con-
fiict. for conditions have been so rad
lcally changed by the marvellous adj
vance made in hath n ffavrx 80 4
fensive in the last fifty
years that any conclusions drawn from
the battles OF a generation ago are as
Worthless as those drawn from the
battles around Troy a thousand wears
before Christ.
The censorship. with lines drawn TO
II uGhtness in all previous
wars. renders 1t impossible for the
most enterprising war correspondent
10 obtain the facts and details # the
actual battlefields hat he would Gag
trly write, could they be gotten at.
And the survivors of the civil war can
only emphasize the fact that battles
today are mighty different frcm what
they were in their fighting days, with
out being able clearly to set forth
the difference.
Yet, through all these recent and
radical changes in the form Of battle
wrought by the tremendous r%evolutian
In firearms, Uncle Sam has been able
10 obtain. for his own private use, a
pretty clean-cut conception Of list
now a modern battle is fought today.
IN ms army he has an organization,
Known as the general staff, composed
OF his best soldiers, whose business is
10 keep abreast of all thin gS martial
Inc world over. And not only abreast
are they: if it comes to actual fighting.
inns general staff will probably be
found ahead of the line in ~up-to-date
tactics and strategy.
Officer Gives Interview.
y Star representative, therefore
sought out and obtained an interview
win an officer of this body, who, While
Kindly consenting TO give all necessary
information, for obvious reasons with
holds his name.
TIT changes in the actual opera
IONS of battle made in the last fifty
years are most radical" said this of
hccr. Indeed, they are almost revo-
~iutionary. The direct cause of this
Is the marvellous advance made in Of
leilSlNe There is almost as
much difference between the modern
quick-firing field gun, as compared tC
the cannon of 1861, or the modern
rifle, as compared to the old muzzle-
ioader of the same period, as there
was between those weapons and the
NaSS
therefore, upon their introduction
INTO practical war, the methods of at
tack and defense had to undergo
changes equally radical: for a field
operation that. in the civil war, would
nave been perfectly feasible, would
~ the face OF .odern guns be sui.
eide"
what are the most marked
shanses IN the actual conduct of Z
"a,te!' was asked the officer.
1 think that the infantry attack
upon an intrenched position has prob.
a"fy undergone more radical change:
.nah anything else" was the reply
That, by the way, is the most i'm
poItant OF all movements in battle
.sueed, 1t is upon such infantry at.
.acks that pitched battles generally
urn. The raids and reconnaissance.
"i the cavalry, the Smelling of tn
'nemys positions by the artillery are
az mere preliminaries to the heart O
me battie-the attack of infantry IL
IfTGe 1Dnn ~