Group Cohesion and Unit Esprit

Abstract

Military tactics—whether a phalanx, a bayonet drill like that adopted by the royal troops before the Battle of Culloden in 1746, or one of the many variants of fire and movement developed during the twentieth century—have traditionally been based on the need for mutual support among fighting men. It would be platitudinous to enlarge on the theme that warfare involves highly institutionalized groups . The interrelationship of the group and the individual is important in determining the soldier’s willingness to fight for the group, his resistance to psychiatric breakdown, and his relationship with the formal structure of the army. The investigation of the interrelationship came into its own during the Second World War with the “discovery” of the primary group, though the term primary group was probably first used by C. H. Cooley in a book published in 1909. Moreover, regimental panegyrists had long since recognized, if not always explicitly, the salience of group processes in combat effectiveness.