What constitutes a General?
There seems to be a great diversity of opinion with regard to this subject.
One party insists upon it that nobody can be a great General who has not been educated at a military school, another, that such education is not necessary; a third, that it is absolutely injurious.
We suspect that the second class of disputants some nearer the truth than either of the others.
That education at a military school, and the habits acquired thereby, are of great service to the officer, cannot, we think, he disputed with any show of reason.
But there is great danger, in making appointments, of trusting too much to that species of qualification.
A great General must be a great genius, and nobody but the
Supreme Being can confer genius.
Most assuredly, schools and colleges cannot do it, although, in some instances, they may assist in its development.
Cambridge did not make
Newton a great mathematician, or
Milton a great post.
Brienne and Angers did not make
Napoleon and
Wellington great
Generals.--Prince Eugene, of
Savoy, one of the few great
Generals whose campaigns
Napoleon deemed worthy of the military student's particular attention, thought it better, as a general rule, to select for a
Commander-in-Chief a man of large mind and great force of character, who had never had anything to do with the army, than a veteran who had risen, by hard service, from an inferior position through all the grades.
The latter, he thought, would be too apt to be cramped and confined by precedents, technicalities, and the received traditions of the service, like the
Earl of Cork, who, according to
Macaulay, executed the most precise and beautiful manœuvres, all faultless, according to the drill book, on the field of Almansa, and wound up by losing all his artillery, all his baggage, all his munitions of war, and 13,000 men out of 25,000.
So much for technical routine.
The danger is, that the pupils of a military school, unless they have genius enough to escape from its trammels, after a sufficient lapse of time spent in the army to bring them up to the grade of
Colonels, will become the slaves of the system, instead of using it as an instrument to accomplish their ends.
It was by breaking through all rules that
Napoleon overran
Italy in nine months, after destroying five armies, each of them doubly as large as his own.
It has been contended that because we live in an age when steam and heavy artillery play a very important part in warfare, the
General must necessarily, therefore, be an educated man — must have received a military education.
Let us see what young gentlemen are taught at
West Point: They study a course of mathematics.
They pass through
Newton's
Principia isogamies to suit the advances of science in modern times.
They learn as much chemistry as can be taught in a winter.
They are taught to construct a French book, (not to speak the language, we presume,) and they read
Jomini's Art of War. Besides this, they attend to the practical part of mathematics, engineering, surveying, descriptive geometry, &c. They drill in all the arms, regularly, like a regiment in active services.
Now, we should be sorry to think that all this could not be taught, and is not taught, at the University of Virginia, with the exception of the drill, as well and as thoroughly as it is taught at
West Point.
Indeed, without intending any disparagement of the latter institution — for it is an excellent school — we would not be afraid to stake the pupils of the
University, selected according to our own pleasure, against the very best that
West Point ever sent forth, the trial being confined to mathematics and the physical sciences.
As for the drill, it is notorious that there are many officers connected with our army, who never saw a military institution, who drill our troops as well as the very best that
West Point has furnished us. A Drill-Sergeant can perform that duty better than the
Duke of
Wellington could have done it, the day before, or the day after, the
battle of Waterloo.
We are told that "war" in the time of
Hannibal and Cæear, "was an art, not a science." It might have been added that it was so even in the time of the first
Napoleon, at least he said it was. Nor do we see any reason to think that it is otherwise even now. Of all the pursuits of which we have any account, it is the least certain, and the most liable to fluctuations and reverses. "The fortune of war" has become a proverbial expression, indicative of the uncertainty of its results.
Science may change and multiply the weapons of war; but when those changed or multiplied weapons are in the hands of both parties, and they are thereby thus far on an equality, genius plays as important a part in producing results as it did in the days of
Hannibal and Cæear.
In this connexion, we may observe that
Napoleon, who made more use of artillery than any other General had ever done before him, and who was accused by his detractors of undue partiality to that limb of the service, tells us that the art of war cannot be learned by studying systems of war, (he was commenting on
Jomini's book at the time, and a scathing commentary it is;) that the best school is the field — and that the next best is the campaigns of certain great
Generals whom he enumerates, viz;
Alexander the
Great,
Hannibal, and
Julius Caesar, in ancient times; in modern times
Gustavus Adolphus,
Marshal Turenne, Prince Eugene of
Savoy, and the
Duke of
Marlborough, and Frederick the
Great.
He might have added himself and the
Duke of
Wellington.
It is evident that he thought something more than a mare knowledge of the manner in which heavy artillery was to be managed was requisite to the constitution of a consummate General.
He tells us, in another place, that he is the greatest commander who, "with the smallest number of men in the field, can bring the largest number to bear upon the critical point" The
Duke of
Wellington when asked in what the superiority of
Napoleon consisted, replied: "In bringing an overwhelming force upon the critical point at the right moment." A General may do this, provided only he genius, without ever having rubbed his shoulders against the walls of
West Point, and without genius he cannot do it, notwithstanding he may be as well acquainted with the working of heavy guns as any seaman engaged in
Capt. Buchanan's glorious fight, a few weeks ago.
It is presumed that the
Commander-in-Chief of a large army will have his forts constructed by competent engineers, and that he will put the proper sort of persons in them to command them.
Now, this came
Napoleon tells us that the duty of a commander-in-chief is at distinct from the duty of a captain as the duty of a captain is from the duty of a common soldier.
The man to command a fort should not be, we think, the
general-in-chief himself.
He should be a man of approved courage, thoroughly acquainted with the handling, of great guns.--When he wished to render
Antwerp impregnable,
Napoleon employed the sughteering skill and talent of
Bernard.
When he wished a commander for the army in
Spain, he selected
Marshal Souls, who never was famous, as far as we know, for any peculiar skill in this management of heavy artillery.
If we were called on to appoint a Commander-in-chief, and had a soles, among many a of talents, who had distinguished themselves, we should certainly choose that man who, we thought, united in his person the greatest amount of courage and talent.
The two, says
Napoleon, must be evenly balanced.
If a General has more bravery than brains, he will be too rash; if he has more brains than bravery; he will be too timid.
In making the selection, we should not be governed in the least by the circumstance of his having been educated at
West Point.
What is the object of a West Point education?
Is it not to make good officers?
And if you have a good officer, what does it matter whether he was educated at
West Point or not?
