Keywords

Introduction

War is a human phenomena that occurs everywhere and has done so throughout the ages. This has given rise to both military history and military theory as fields of study. The relationship between them is not a simple one. At the heart of the problem lies the way in which historical experience can be turned into generalizations and principles for warfare to suit an agenda. To what degree are such generalizations applicable in other contexts than the historical setting in which they originated? There is no absolute contradiction between the Humanities and Social Sciences in approaching theory and history, but there are nevertheless significant differences in approach. Military historians study unique, particular, concrete events and processes to establish (as best as possible) the facts surrounding events. Social scientists study structural similarities, to draw general conclusions about them. Historians stress historical context and theorists stress the use of historical evidence for theory. In 1992, the then Under Secretary for the United States Air Force wrote, “It is up to historians to forge a client relationship [with the military] and innovate and create the products that will prove most effective in contributing to policy and decision making” (Foremann 1992, p. XII). This illustrates a demand on history that history simply cannot deliver.

Over 60 years ago, historian Sir Michael Howard pointed out that for the military, historical experience serves as a guide for military action. History allows the military to study their own profession when there are no wars to fight (Howard 1962). Through studying history, it is possible to understand military development and doctrine. In contrast to military officers, many historians claim that they study “what really happened” as opposed to what other commentators say happened. Many historians also find the “use” of history problematic, as they believe that history is studied in its own right. Historians often try to understand history, as opposed to theoretical approaches aimed at analyzing broad similarities to predict future developments based upon it. Herein lies the philosophical dilemma – will history repeat itself? Can it be used as foundation for theory and doctrine? Military history is an important foundation for military theory, but there are also other sources. For example, experiments can be used in some theoretical contexts. There are also axioms not founded in military history present in military theory. In fact, military history and military theory are intertwined and cannot easily be separated. Historian Margaret MacMillan discusses the abuse of history by the military and above all by political leaders. Historical experiences have been consciously neglected, misinterpreted, or made unrecognizable. British leaders in 2002, before the invasion of Iraq, consciously neglected the advice of the experts on Iraqi history and society. The 2008 report on the war in Iraq mentioned a lack of information on the country in the initial stages, although said information evidently had been ignored (MacMillan 2010).

This chronological account of the relationship between military history and military theory in the Western World starts with a discussion on history and military theory in antiquity and the medieval world. This is followed by the simultaneous scientific and military revolutions. Modern military theory was born in the Napoleonic wars, after which Jomini and Clausewitz changed military theory forever. Up until then, military theory consisted of advice and ideas of best practice. Clausewitz and Jomini have been reinterpreted many times and still influence military thought. Before Jomini and Clausewitz, there was no real difference between military history and military theory. Many theorists emerge at the turn of the twentieth century, all departing from Jomini and Clausewitz, in different combinations.

Antiquity and the Medieval World

In antiquity, history was the moral code of society and supplied a gallery of good and evil characters, describing the nature of leaders and states. In ancient thinking, outcome in wars rested in the morality of the leaders involved. In ancient historiography, there were few accounts of real events but rather idealized stories portraying good and evil. In Greek historiography of military campaigns, factors such as victory, loss, courage, and surprise were described. Herodotos (approx. 485–425 BC) described the known world and the background to the Persian Wars (492–449 BC) in his Historia. For Herodotos, war was the result of low morality among the leaders (Tejada 2004; Waters 2013).

Thucydides (approx. 460–399 BC), a general during the Peloponnesian Wars (431–404 BC), was the most important ancient historian. Thucydides formulated a military theory based on his own experience and the collection of firsthand sources, focusing on the different aspects of war. He differed from his predecessors in using eyewitness accounts as sources (albeit he seldom referenced them). Although a skeptic of storytelling, Thucydided still explained victory and loss in war as functions of individual character (Zagorin 2008; Rood 2004; Greenwood 2015). Another approach is found in Xenophon (approx. 430–355 BC), himself a mercenary, describing campaigns in Persia in Anabasis, and in the Hellenica, he described the history of the latter parts of the Peloponnesian Wars, analyzing the Spartan victory. His books were especially dedicated to military men featuring advice, but as an historian, he is widely considered to be unreliable (Tuplin 2004; Dillery 2013).

The Greek texts lived on in the Roman Empire, and historiography continued to portray history as moral examples. In Histories, Polybius (approx. 200–118 BC) described the Punic Wars (264–146 BC), analyzing Roman victory as one of superior morality – the creation of military force was a moral achievement, but his texts also described Roman tactics (Hau 2016). Through Histories, Polybius’s ideas on personal discipline, frugality, and Roman traditions were spread as military knowledge.

Chronicles of emperors and events were also important in Roman historiography. Julius Caesar (100–44 BC) wrote treatises on the civil war and the war in Gaul, Commentarii De Bello Gallico. These “commentaries” were certainly political documents as opposed to historical accounts. Caesar himself was uninterested in writing about military theory or in spreading knowledge on military matters for future generations. His interests were solely political (Schauer 2016). Roman historians like Tacitus (56–120 AD) and Suetonius (69–122 AD) both wrote historical chronicles, describing events, travels, and emperors, focusing on character as well as particularities. But, many of the Roman chronicles were heavily biased and are unreliable as historical sources.

Most ancient texts were lost to the West with the fall of Rome but lived on in Moslem and Byzantine worlds. The most influential writer of the late Roman Empire was Vegetius (fourth century). In De Rei Militaris, he advocated the return to heavy infantry drawn from Roman citizens, as opposed to recruiting barbarian mercenaries. Vegetius described ideal military institutions, training, discipline, rules, and practices for officers and soldiers, preaching caution and to avoid battle unless conditions were beneficial. His popularity increased during the Middle Ages, with around 150 known copies, and his thoughts remained influential well into the 1700s. One reason for this is that De Rei Militaris contains short enlightening maxims, for example, “if you want peace, prepare for war” (Allmand 2011; Phillips 1985). In that respect, he somewhat resembles Sun Tzu (approx. 544–496 BC).

In the Middle Ages, military theory and military history were linked to religion and to the Roman chronicle tradition. Chronicles listed events as occurrences but without causal links to why they occurred. There was no interest in theorizing over military matters as history and war were seen as exercises in morality, leadership, and virtue. One of the more interesting thinkers of the Medieval period was Christine de Pizan with Livre des fais d’armes et de chevalèrie. It was a set of military and political advice for the French royal family during the Hundred Years War (1337–1453), often referencing Roman history (Adams 2014). Her writings were not only influential in her time but also taken up in later centuries if not always attributed directly by subsequent authors.

Many ancient texts reemerged in the West during the fifteenth-century Renaissance. The most important factor was the Gutenberg printing press decreasing the price of books – one of first military texts printed was Thucydides, followed by Xenofon, Herodotos, Tacitus, Polybius, and Caesar. Vegetius was printed for the first time in 1473 initializing the spread of military theory based on history. Although Vegetius wrote a historical work in the fourth century, he was used in the 1500s as inspiration for the optimum infantry organization. Vegetius inspired military thinkers in finding the perfect formation of troops (Allmand 2011; Neill 1998). A more independent literature on military matters developed in the Italian city-states during the Renaissance. Niccolò Machiavellis (1469–1527) Dell’arte della guerra from 1521 became influential, although Machiavelli departed from Vegetius. Machiavelli was interested in the essence of war and used history as an argument for the use of citizen soldiers as opposed to condottieri, much in the same manner as Vegetius preferred Roman citizen-soldiers to mercenaries (Gilbert 1986).

Although ancient and medieval history were chronical descriptions of morality and events, ancient and medieval historians aspired to truthful representations of history, if conclusions were to be drawn. Military history and theory were supposed to bring practical advice, as well as illustrating strategy and tactics. Contemporary historians and military theorists believed that it was both possible and desirable to draw far-reaching conclusions from history.

Military and Scientific Revolution

During the 1500s, standing armies and a professional officer corps emerged, calling for more substantial military theory. Gunpowder did not change the character of warfare until around 1600, when the military gunpowder revolution occurred. The new way of war combined agile units of musketeers with mobile artillery and new cavalry tactics. Dutch proponents of this revolutionary way of war combined tactical reforms with finances, military education, armaments, and fortifications. Part of this revolution meant the construction of fortresses in the Italian city-states. Important was also the French Marshal Sébastien La Prestre de Vauban (1633–1707), the foremost expert of the time, in combining artillery and fortifications (Roberts 1992; Glete 1993; Parker 1996; Ostwald 2007).

Military theory in the 1500s and 1600s was characterized by slightly updated classical works. A wide variety of literature was published on military matters – mostly in the form of summaries of what military officers should know, condensed historical accounts, technical advice, and moral lessons (Ericson Wolke 2007). The scientific revolution of the 1600s saw the rise of more “scientific” military thinking – one of the more important proponents was Raimondo Montecuccoli, R. (1609–1680) with his primary work Memorie della Guerra (On the Art of War or Treatise of War) combined contemporary mysticism and alchemy with classical military thought and contemporary thinkers. His universal claims systematized war – defining it as the inflicting of damage in every way to achieve victory (Rothenberg 1986; Gat 2001). Montecuccoli borrowed from other writers, for example, the diary of Scottish general Robert Monro (1601–1680) in Swedish service (in turn Monro referenced Roman historians such as Plinius and Vegetius) (Murdoch and Grosjean 2014). The military thinking of Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus (1594–1632) was very influential, for example, through the book The Swedish Discipline in 1632. Montecuccoli himself was not immediately influential but was only posthumously referred to by many military theorists.

Despite this, it is important to note that Montecuccoli and his contemporaries frequently used rediscovered ancient texts in their writings. Greek and Roman histories remained important sources of knowledge in the 1600s, and ancient historiography was seen as factual historical descriptions (Ericson Wolke 2007). With the scientific revolution and the Enlightenment came the notion of natural laws governing everything in human existence. For military theory, this meant the notion that there were scientific principles of war, based on history, that could be codified (Duffy 1987; Gat 2001).

Maurice de Saxe (1696–1750), one of the more influential military thinkers of the period, saw war as systematic scientific exercises. In Les Rêveries from 1732, he incorporated thoughts on coincidence, declaring that both generalship and genius were needed to transform scientific laws of war into proper action. In the book Esprit des loix de la tactique et de differents institutions militaires from 1762, he discussed the importance of strategy as opposed to most of his contemporaries (and predecessors) obsessed with tactics and ideal formations. De Saxe promoted the formation of a modern “Roman legion” – a brigade consisting of infantry, cavalry, artillery, and a permanent staff. This was an early version of combined arms apt at fighting by itself or together with other “legions” (Ericson Wolke 2007; Gat 2001).

Jacques François de Chesteret de Puységur (1656–1743) conveyed an important view on the relationship between military history and military theory in Art de la Guerre par principles et par régles from 1748. Puységur maintained that war lacked theoretical and systematic study, instead relying on tradition and experience. The solution was historical observation of the full scope of historical experience as a source of military theory. But for Puységur, history was complex and could not easily be transformed into scientific principles, just because it rested on uncertain, personal experiences (Gat 2001).

During the Enlightenment, historiography was at a turning point. Historical truth, realism, and factual descriptions were debated. To formulate military theory, history had to be a proper, truthful description of reality, to use as a source for theory. During the Enlightenment, classical works were still used as reliable sources, although the texts mixed superstition, myths, and fables with factual information. Radical historian Edward Gibbon (1737–1794) in The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1776–1789) maintained that Rome fell to barbarian invasions through the loss of civic virtue – the highpoint was the Roman republic and successive emperors had defiled the civic virtues that made Rome great. Gibbon used antiquity to debate contemporary problems, basing his assumptions in classical texts.

During the Enlightenment, military theory became more “scientific” – in some respects geometrical. Theories of war were about reason, control, equilibrium, and balance, aiming to establish strategic principles based on quantifiable data. Historical examples were used to illustrate defined theoretical principles. Frederick “the Great” (1712–1786), Henry Lloyd (approx. 1718–1783), and Comte de Guibert (1743–17909) all used military history as evidence for systematic and mechanical theories. Guibert sought inspiration in the Macedonian phalanx of Alexander the Great (356–323 BC) when he promoted the use of columns to break up the regulated linear tactics of the 1700s (Palmer 1986; Gat 2001).

The most influential military thinker to emerge from the Enlightenment was Antoine Henri Jomini (1779–1869), himself a soldier. Serving under Napoleon (1769–1821), he wrote two crucial treatises – Traité de grand tactique and Traité des grands opérations militaires. In these treatises, he combined historical evidence from older periods with thoughts from other military authors and his own experience. Jomini proclaimed that “principles of war” were fundamental and eternal. It was the task of the genius to apply the principles of war in the right way. Jomini lived through a period of stark military change and he structured the military knowledge of his contemporaries. He maintained that the evidence of military history all pointed to the same type of principles. For Jomini, and also for Napoleon, history played the crucial role of forming rational principles that did not take human factors into account. These reason-based principles portrayed warfare as predictable as long as the principles of war were followed (Shy 1986; Pitchichero 2017). Jomini’s writings were full of historical references, as well as references to the operational principles of Napoleon. Jomini is still an important military thinker, particularly influencing American military theory during the twentieth century. Even today, the notion of eternal principles of war remains strong among many military practitioners and theorists.

The Romantic Revolution

The Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars symbolized the entry into the modern world, not least regarding the way history is written. German philosophers – Kant, Hegel, Goethe, Herder, Fichte, Leibnitz, Schelling, and others – contributed to historicism and historism. At the core of Romantic thinking stood the concept that human existence could not be reduced to abstract mechanical principles (Garrard 2006).

Historicism meant explaining different social and cultural phenomena by studying its history. G.W.F. Hegel (1770–1831) promoted historicism through dialectics. The “dialectic” or opposing forces of human purpose and the current situation drove historical development. The Hegelian system is often described as thesis – antithesis – synthesis, although Hegel himself never used those words. The human drive towards the “ultimate purpose” was described by Hegel as geist (spirit) – an abstraction explaining historical change. In history, the term zeitgeist, means the particular spirit of a certain era – that can explain why people thought and acted the way they did during a period. Hegel has inspired Marxism, particularly through concepts of ultimate purpose, as teleological reasoning – that history has a distinct predetermined direction.

Leopold von Ranke (1795–1886), the father of historism, on the other hand, held that the purpose is to study history for its own sake. Historism denounces teleological reasoning and sees history as unpredictable. History does not, accordingly, have any particular purpose. It is just there, waiting to be interpreted. Ranke and other historists advocated understanding and hermeneutics to interpret the past. Ranke was a nonspeculative historian – it was unacceptable for him to “fill in the blanks” through recreating historical dialogue and courses of events if sources were unavailable. Ranke, like Hegel, believed that history was an expression of some sort of divine intelligence or geist. For Ranke, history should be studied objectively, with universal and factual aspirations. He formulated a modern version of source critique, i.e., a system to assess historical sources. The task of the historian was to investigate what really happened, through the use of credible sources, as expressed through the phrase – “Wie es eigentlich gewesen” (how it really was) (Iggers 1968; Ranke & Iggers 1973; Boldt 2019). The Romantic schools of history were reactions against the ideals of rationality and reason of the Enlightenment.

Carl von Clausewitz (1780–1831) was a product of both the Enlightenment and Romanticism, mixing concepts from both schools. A forerunner to Clausewitz was Georg Heinrich von Berenhorst (1733–1814), who in Betrachtungen über die Kriegskunst (Reflections of the Art of War 1796–1799) concluded that war is an a posteriori science derived from experience (Gat 2001; Allert 1996). Gerhard von Scharnhorst (1755–1813) believed that only the study of history was insufficient to create laws of warfare. The art of war was partly subject to mathematical laws, but depended at the same time on circumstance. Scharnhorst influenced officer education through handbooks, emphasizing the use of military history (Dupuy 1977; Gat 2001). Scharnhorst was the father of the Prussian general staff founded in 1816, with military history being one of the five original departments. To Scharnhorst, military studies, theory, and military history were one and the same (Friedman 2021).

Clausewitz was just as much a historicist as many of his contemporaries. He separated science and art, maintaining that individual motivation and genius of generals were crucial. Morale and motivation could not be scientifically explained. Clausewitz searched for a complete theory, encompassing all aspects of war. In the study of the campaigns of Gustavus Adolphus, he concluded that the outcome of war depended on the state of the adversaries, the role of the people, their customs, politics, spirit, and culture. In Vom Kriege (On War), Clausewitz wrote that circumstance influenced war in a way that cut across general principles. As such, historical experience became the source of all knowledge (Paret 1976; Gat 2001).

In Vom Kriege, Book II chapter 6, Clausewitz discussed military history and the use of historical examples in the same way as Scharnhorst. For Clausewitz, war was an art as well as an empirical science. The nature of things could only be understood through experience – history. Sources had to be correctly processed and come from the most recent military history. For Clausewitz, there were four uses for historical examples:

  1. 1.

    As an explanation of an idea or an abstract relationship

  2. 2.

    To show applications of an idea

  3. 3.

    To invoke a historical fact to contradict an idea

  4. 4.

    To draw conclusions through a complete account of a historical event or a compilation of several events (Clausewitz 1991/2006)

To Clausewitz, military history was about determining historical facts and derive causal relationships in history to become a better officer. When there was a lack of sources, the task was to come as “close to the truth” as possible with the sources available. History was about understanding context and give insight, revealing the nature of things, and could as such be used as theory. Clausewitz wanted to determine the nature of war, not define scientific laws or positive doctrines in warfare – in the positivist sense. For Clausewitz, doctrine was contrary to understanding war. Related to this was Clausewitz’s use of the term “friction.” Because the nature of war was too complex, things would not proceed according to a preconceived plan, hence the futility of trying to establish natural laws on war. Clausewitz believed that warfare contained universal elements – he believed there to be a universal theory of war that correlated to the nature of war itself. But human nature was irrational and consequently war was just as much an irrational occurrence. In the same way as other early historicists, he believed that certain universal elements, although hard to find, existed governing the course of history (Heuser 2002).

The German School

The technical and ideological revolutions of the nineteenth century changed warfare through the upgrading of roads and the establishment of railways, the telegraph, quick-firing weapons, conscription, and burgeoning “nationalism.” The telegraph allowed centralization in command, railways allowed the transport, and subsistence of troops and armaments development strengthened defensive warfare. The concepts of the decisive battle came to dominate military thinking of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Concepts of war combined with modern nationalism bred ideas of manifest national destiny expressed as offensive and decisive battle. National destiny was a transfer of the geist to a nation. In Germany, Helmuth von Moltke the Elder (1800–1891) symbolized a fusion of historicism and critical-historical realism (Kessel 1957). War was about Clausewitzian intuition and understanding war in its own context, without overarching principles. Moltke (and Alfred von Schlieffen, 1833–1913) dogmatized decisive battle, through their Clausewitz-interpretation (Wallach 1967; Johansson 1988).

Hans Delbrück (1848–1929), distinguished himself from most military theorists of the time in being a trained historian. He was the father of modern military history. Delbrück believed that the military leaders of Germany based their assumptions on inadequate historical standards and a dogmatized understanding of history. As a modern historian, Delbrück proposed critical source studies to dismiss older history writing. In Geschichte der Kriegskunst im Rahmen der Politische Geschichte (History of the Art of War within the Framework of Political History, 1900–1920), Delbrück created a categorization of war – different wars had different strategic aims depending on the particular circumstances in which they were fought. Through studying the Peloponnesian War, he concluded that there were two main means to achieve victory – either by annihilation or by attrition. Consequently, maneuvering to avoid battle was equal to fighting a battle in a theoretical sense. He concluded that different historical settings gave rise to different parts of strategy, and history could be used to analyze war as part of human culture (Bucholz 1985). Before the First World War, Delbrück promoted a German strategy of attrition. He therefore came at odds with German General Staff in the Strategiestreit. Delbrück’s thinking was anathema to the General Staff’s goal of annihilating the enemy. Delbrück is still an influential military historian through his methodological approach to military history, including demographics and economy in the analysis.

Naval theorists, such as Alfred Thayer Mahan (1840–1914) and Julian Corbett (1854–1922), both used history to formulate comprehensive theories of warfare. Mahan’s The Influence of Sea Power Upon History 1660–1783 (1890) was a historical study of naval warfare and the projection of power. Mahan belonged to the same historical zeitgeist as his contemporaries but combined it with a Jominist approach. For Mahan, sea power rested upon geographical considerations (position, natural resources, territorial expanse, and population) governing trade, as well as cultural factors (the character of peoples and governments). Mahan believed in the existence of specific national characters and used history to illustrate the impact of this – the English and Dutch were born traders and as such managed to create trading empires; conversely, Spaniards and the Portuguese created empires but were unsuccessful traders. The vision of the decisive battle, and the risks involved, influenced Mahan’s thinking (Mahan 1890; Hattendorf 1991). Corbett published his seminal work Some Principles of Maritime Strategy in 1918. He maintained that through historical analysis and comparisons, it was possible to formulate theoretical laws. Corbett’s studies were influenced by his contemporary thoughts on war – he discussed the nature of war, offensive or defensive, limited or unlimited, and relating both to a variety of historical examples, much in the way of Clausewitz and Scharnhorst before him (Corbett 1918). Both Mahan and Corbett used history as prescribed by Clausewitz, both as examples to promote ideas, and also through giving a complete account of history as pertinent to the situation at hand. At the same time, Mahan was also influenced by the Jominist concepts of principles. Both formulated influential theories of naval warfare – “fleet in being,” concentration or dispersion and commercial raiding.

The World Wars

The experiences of the First World War can be summarized in the dialectic between defensive and offensive, combined with modern technology of aeroplanes and armored warfare. The analysis of the war was not different from earlier studies of the Napoleonic wars, i.e., a historical analysis of the most recently fought war (Posen 1984; Kier 1997). Nonetheless, the experiences of the First World War were tremendous for the world, individual states, and armies. The experiences of war influenced military theory, particularly concerning defensive versus offensive warfare, but there were distinct differences between different actors. Germany was defeated and incorporated reforms, the British and French, less so.

J.F.C. Fuller (1878–1966), a prolific writer and influential theorist, published The Foundations of the Science of War in 1926. It was an attempt at formulating a scientific approach to military history, the author believing that history had never previously been treated in a scientific manner. Fuller used archetypes and taxonomies to establish nine principles of war, which in turn have collectively become an important inspiration in the training of officers. Fuller has particularly influenced American military thinking. In his The Decisive Battles of the Western World and Their Influence upon History (1954–1956), he discussed military battles from antiquity to the Second World War. He was not a trained historian, and his conclusions were sometimes peculiar and sometimes conveying mythological descriptions of ancient warfare. Nonetheless, Fuller has influenced the formulation of military principles through the use of history. He was a late successor of both Jomini and of Charles Ardant du Picq (1821–1870), a French officer promoting the idea of élan vital – manifest spirit as a way to win wars. Fuller wanted to formulate principles and regarded spirit and morale as important elements in warfare. He has made an everlasting impact on military theory through his definition of the basic elements of combat – movement, fire, and protection.

Basil Liddell Hart (1895–1970), a contemporary of Fuller, is one of the more influential military theorists of the twentieth century. In the 1929 Decisive Wars in History, he stressed the importance of maneuver and surprise. The most desirable outcome was to make the enemy surrender without a fight. Liddell Hart relied heavily on military history to draw his theoretical conclusions. He promoted the concept on indirect warfare, as opposed to direct, with attacks on the point where the enemy was strongest. He criticized the thoughts of the decisive battle prior to the First World War, as being too direct and costly. In his later book Strategy (1954), Liddell Hart advocated the indirect approach – basing his conclusions on historical precedents drawing on historical conclusions. According to him, history had to be studied broadly to draw meaningful conclusions, as opposed to narrowly scrutinizing single campaigns in search of individual solutions (Liddell Hart reprint 1991). Nevertheless, also Liddell Hart interpreted historical evidence in a way that strengthened his own concepts – examples were chosen ad hoc and he himself used history much in the same way as the victims of his critique. For example, he proclaimed that the German strategy of the Second World War was indirect, because the Germans tried to win the war by surprise and psychology – explained by the example of the German attack on France in 1940. When Germany turned on the USSR in a direct attack, according to Liddell Hart, the Wehrmacht became bogged down and eventually lost the war. The problem lies in Liddel Hart’s use of military history which raises many difficult questions. For example, what actually differed between the German campaign in France in 1940 and against the USSR in 1941? Is it possible to take different examples and compare them in this way? Which were the causal explanations for the outcome? Liddell Hart evidently cherry-picked history to find examples to reinforce his arguments rather than approaching history holistically.

Both Liddell Hart and Fuller were positivists in the spirit of Jomini, reducing history into theoretical principles of war. Liddell Hart in particular has influenced Western military theory of the Cold War, and Fuller has influenced officer training. Both are still read in military schools throughout the Western World despite the contentious nature of their writings.

Marxism, Communism, and Military History

The Communist Manifesto of 1848 spurred the development of the Marxist theory of history, historical materialism. For Karl Marx (1818–1883) and Friedrich Engels (1820–1895) class, labor, means of production and social institutions/superstructure were expressions of production and ownership. Historical development was teleological, occurred in stages, each characterized by modes of production and technological level. Revolutions occurred or stagnation followed when production no longer could develop within its social institutions. Revolutions were violent upheavals transferring power between classes. The ultimate stage was the classless or communist society. Marxism is a deterministic school of historical realism (Anderson 1983).

Engels was the most important Marxist military historian. In Der Deutsche Bauernkrieg from 1850, Engels accredited the entry of capitalism to the German Peasant War (1524–1526). He was inspired by Clausewitz in as much as wars were seen as political, and for Engels, politics was a continuation of class struggle. Also, Marx published texts on military history, for instance, on the guerilla fighting in the Peninsular War (1807–1814). In the guise of Lenin (1870–1924), Marxism became the driving force for revolutionary war. In State and Revolution from 1917, Lenin took the experiences from the 1848 revolution and the 1871 Paris Commune, and transformed them into a theory of revolutionary warfare. For Marxist-Leninists, this ideology of war was useful as a way to break down state structures. It represented a materialist historiography transformed into a military “manual.” Subsequently, however, conflicts between Leninists, Stalinists, and Trotskyists created different approaches to revolutionary warfare (Benvenuti 1988).

In the 1930s, Soviet military theorists set out to reformulate Marxist-Leninist concepts of warfare. Marxists were obsessed with technological change (new means and forms of war), identifying revolutions and various stages in military history – collectively as elements of Marxist analysis. The most important factor was the definition of depth and breakthrough – i.e., striking at the enemy’s rear (not unlike Liddell Hart’s discussions on striking the lines of communication) and the “invention” of operational art (Adamsky 2010; Harrison 2001). The military thinking of Mikhail Tuchachevsky (1893–1937), Vladimir Triandafillov (1894–1931), Mikhail Frunze (1885–1925), and Georgii Isserson (1898–1976) are exemples of Marxist studies in military history. As an example, Isserson – a relatively unknown military theorist – wrote The Evolution of Operation Art in 1932. A large part of the book dealt with the heritage of the past. He defined the Napoleonic wars as a new era in warfare and studied the battles of Napoleon, the American Civil War, Franco-Prussian War, Russo-Japanese War, and the First World War. The insights from history were transformed into concepts of depth, breakthrough, and how to organize the operational level in war (Harrison 2010). The Soviet concepts of Deep Battle built on a Marxist analysis of military history and continuously developed during the Second World War and thereafter.

Guerilla War, Counterinsurgency, and Military History

It is common to distinguish between regular and irregular warfare. The division is in itself ahistorical – what is the definition of regular warfare? Is it war fought according to particular principles? Is then an irregular war fought without principles? States have troughout history fought insurrections of different kinds, particularly the great empires. Clausewitz talked of Kleinkrieg as opposed to Volkskrieg. Several examples of military theorists fighting irregular wars have written about their experiences, notably T.E. Lawrence (1888–1935) in Seven Pillars of Wisdom from 1935. As a concept, “Counter-insurgency” also had supporting theorists, for example, C.E. Callwell (1859–1928), the author of Small Wars: Their Principles and Practice from 1896. One of the more influential theorists was David Galula (1919–1967), a French officer fighting in Indochina and Algeria. He studied Mao Zedong (1893–1976) and other Marxist thinkers to be able to fight the guerillas inspired by these thinkers. In his books Pacification in Algeria and Contre-insurrection: théorie et pratique, from 1963 and 1964, respectively, Galula contributed to the theoretical and historical analysis of conflicts. From a military standpoint, the French operations in Algeria were successful (Corum 2008), not least because of the influence of Galula. However, the French won the battles but lost the war on the political level.

Connected to Marxist ideology is Revolutionary War/Guerilla War, and the most influential thinker on the topic is Mao Zedong with his On Guerilla Warfare from 1937. Mao wrote in the tradition of Chinese philosophy and particularly Sun Tzu. Mao conceived guerilla war as consisting of three phases – organization/consolidation, progressive expansion, and destruction of the enemy – the same kind of deterministic stages found in Marxist theory of historical development. Mao departed from a historical class-analysis of Chinese society, negating the working class as the revolutionary vanguard, promoting the peasants. Mao based his assumptions on an analysis of Chinese society and history but was still influenced by the Western way of war. He stated that a guerilla movement that followed his principles could not be defeated. The use of history is evident in all Marxist military theory, and during the Cold War, guerillas were inspired by Maoist thinking.

The problem of trying to utilize a successful counterinsurgency campaign is found in trying to transfer insights from one historical setting to another. The Malayan Insurgency in the 1950s proved to be one of the few successful operations of that kind of operation. However, experiences from Malaya could not easily be transferred to Kenya, Cyprus, Vietnam, or other places. This is the problem of principles of war, as opposed to understanding the complexity of each individual case. This illuminates the differences between Jomini and Clausewitz. It is not uncommon that military theorists try to interpret current phenomena and look for evidence in history, without taking the changing historical context into account. The historian, on the other hand, rarely realizes tactical and technical challenges, and consequently finds it hard to draw military conclusions (Howard 1962).

Returning to Michael Howard’s statements on the military uses of history. War occurs again and again and military historians can draw conclusions from historical cases of what is victory, what is defeat, and what were the reasons for war. It is therefore possible to draw conclusions through historical studies of the past. Consequently Howard proposed three rules for the military in studying history. Firstly, study history broadly and with a long chronological perspective to learn from continuity and discontinuity in military actions across the ages. Secondly, scrutinize case studies in depth, using firsthand accounts in an effort to understand in detail what happened in particular events. Thirdly, study history in context by understanding all available perspectives and seeing all aspects of society to be able to distinguish social, economic, and political factors in military history (Howard 1962). There are similarities in the way Clausewitz viewed history and in the thoughts put forth by Howard. The reason for this is that Clausewitz was inspired by Hegelian historicism – as many historians of the twentieth century were. Howard was intimately familiar with the work of Clausewitz and participated in the English translation of his works. Although Howard first set forth his views in his speech in 1961, it was published in 1962, and it still provides valid advice for a military study of history – and a solid reminder that formulating principles and theories on the basis of military history is a difficult task.

Military theory typically builds on history, although theory can in principle also be derived from other sources, such as axioms or experiments. The problem is usually the arbitrary nature of historical examples and the lack of a wider holistic approach that can help determining the usefulness of the theory and the validity of its empirical foundations. Whereas military history, at least according to Clausewitz, can explain and clarify theory. Historical examples can easily be falsified when they are turned into principles. History is not a collection for the military to cherry-pick fitting examples depending on the setting. History is ever changing and cannot be understood outside its context, since according to Herakleitos, one cannot dive into the same river twice. History replaces personal experience of warfare, when educating military personal – but the purpose of military history is not to “deliver” theory.

Cross-References