Evening star., 1939-09-14
BY JOSEPH S. EDGERTON.

There is no prototype for the
modern army and the campaigns
now under way in Poland and West
ern Germany are showing with in
creasing clarity that the outcome of
given military situations today can
not be anticipated on the basis of
experience in the past history of
warfare.
Modern armies are unique crea-
tions-the outgroWth of mechanis-
tic world physically and Of crassly
materialistic world psychologically.
The professional soldier today is a
different being than he has been:
the methods of conducting warfare
and the effects upon the general
populations of the warning countries
cannot be measured by any yard
stick of the past.
Modern armies, it is becoming
painfully apparents to Mortified
world, conform to different ideologies
than those Of former days-they are
becoming more ruthless: the de-
struction of non-c n-combatants and
their homes and cities, despite
pledges and treaties, is the accepted
feature OF the modern war and un-
questionably this trend is becoming
and will become more pronounced.
Deliberate Military Policy.
Warfare today means, even more
than in 1914-1918, the mobilization
Of the whole power of the state for
destruction, civilians sharing the
burden with the military. AS a re-
suit the line of demarcation between
the enemy soldier and the enemy
civilian is becoming less and less
marked; there is less and less re-
pugnance evidenced toward the
slaughter of the civilian population.
Not since the days when the Mon
gols overran Europe has there been
more cold-blooded destruction of
non-combatants than the world wit
messed in China, in Ethiopia, in
Spain and, If present indications are
to be credited. in Poland. Nor. If we
are to believe the evidence of re-
cent years, has there ever been
time when the destruction of civil
populations and their works has
been so much deliberate part of
military policy as it has become.
Not so many years ago warfare
was the occupation of small armies
of skilled, professional soldiers. War
was a trade, with certain profess
sional ethics and standards. Except
as they were called upon to bear
the economic burdens of warfare,
civilian populations were little con-
cerned unless they happened to be
in the direct path of battle. Even
then there was no deliberate at
tempt to massacre them or uproot
them. They took shelter and quickly
returned to their normal occupa-
tions under whichever army hap
pened to be in control there at the
time.
Whole Peoples Take Part.
The modern war is, as never be-
fore, an emotional explosion in
which whole peoples, not mere pro-
fessional corps representing only a
small proportion of the population,
participate. Warfare has become
for the warning nation full-scale
affair requiring for its full success
a mass hysteria and a rabble-rous-
ing leadership.
THE components of the modern
war machine are the army, the in
dustry that supplies its materials,
and the people-the soldier reser-
voir," says Maj. j. Halpin Connolly
in the Infantry Journal. Those
elements are not separate; they are
integral and correlated parts of one
whole-the war power Of people.
Attack any element and war is
being made Attack them all at the
propitious moment, and the totali-
tartan war is under way. And this
totalitarian war is not field armies
fighting but cultures at war, using
every possible agency for damaging
all three war elements-army, peo-
pie, industry"
The bombing of industrial plants
and other establishments behind
the battle lines which contribute to
the battle efficiency of a people will
become increasingly desirable If
enemy armies cannot be reached
and smashed easily. In earlier days
wars were won by defeating armies