SubText: On War

I only got a bit of it, on account of playing Stellaris for a lot of the last section, but here are my main take aways:

1. war is informed by political goals. You don't go to war for no reason you do it to accomplish a given political goal. All strategy, and tactic is subservient to this goal. To accomplish this goal is to win the war, if you win every battle and don't accomplish this goal, you have still lost the war.

2. interestingly Von Clausewitz does not believe military officers should be involved in setting that goal, only advising on its feasibility and the cost of accomplishing it. It is the 'intelligent faculty' of the state that makes the decision in the end, the military simply carries it out.

3. superior numbers, at the crucial moment will usually win the engagement

4. so, the heart of tactics is to make sure that you have the superior numbers at the crucial moment in any given engagement

5. therefore the ability to choose the time of the engagement, to anticipate the crucial moment, and commit the forces necessary at that time, is the science to which Von Clausewitz aspires

6. therefore mobility is superior to fortification as fortification sacrifices the control of the time and location of engagement, if you've fortified the mountain pass, for example, it just means your attackers will sacrifice the troops to go around. As long as they would lose fewer troops climbing the mountain than taking the fort, it's worth it. (maginot line)

7.  fortification also creates a permanent position, which can be studied, understood and overcome, it makes you a target. To have fortifications is to invite attack.

8. seiges are terrible for everyone and should be avoided at all cost. Forts are built with sieges in mind, and as a rule you should never be doing what your enemy wants you to do.

9. fortification is inferior to mobility, but it is also very notable that Von Clausewitz considers the defending position to be significantly stronger, even if only lightly fortified. Supply lines are short, reserve troops easy to come by, familiarity with the terrain is a given.

10. there is no such thing as the element of surprise, or rather its nothing to depend on. If someone is dug in to a defensive position they are by definition unsurprisable. If you find them in an undefended state, your opposite general is an incompetent (or you're attacking civilians, see next point)

11. supply lines are preferable but a long offensive campaign may require requisition from surrounding areas. They will hide food and supplies from you, so you should send your requisition officers ahead and to the flanking towns with troops if possible to find and steal the food and kill anyone who doesn't want to sell it to you. (I am only editorializing a little)

12. People's armies are undisciplined and basically shit for offense, but hellish at defense as they make a fortification of every inch of the country.

13. People's armies led by Napoleon are unbeatable on offense and defense.

14. Napoleon was sent by God to let every other general know that they are clowns.

Von Clausewitz was writing during and about a period where military scholarship and technology was very even amongst European states.

Gunnery technology is about to take off with some new metallurgical discoveries making it possible to demolish whole cities, therefore rendering the definitions of ‘fortification’, ‘mobility’, and ‘superior numbers’ much different.

Von Clausewitz died trying to quarantine a cholera outbreak before that happened though. In many ways this is an interesting historical document, a snapshot of some of the attitudes of an aristocratic warrior class right after a giant upset (Napoleon kicking the shit out of them) a restoration (them beating Napoleon) and right before a change (artillery, in particular Krupp guns, and other industrial terrors) in the whole structure of warfare leading to a change in the make up of that warrior class.

In some cases its dissolution.

Von Clausewitz himself is a pleasant writer and his observations on warfare are quite edifying to anyone with a professional or personal interest in logistics under pressure. But its important to remember that him and the rest of the gentleman generals of his age were shoveling people into combat and death for their own glory. And that they made no bones about what happened to the civilians in their way.