Readers seeking to analyze Maneuver Warfare’s applicability to combat on the seas that cover most of the globe can be forgiven for noticing the absence of scholarly interest in this theme and thinking that, in short, Maneuver Warfare must have no applicability at sea. One can, however, easily find many fine examples of what is now called Maneuver Warfare in seapower’s long history. This article draws from one such example – splendidly manifest in the person of Britain’s greatest fighting seaman, Vice-Admiral Horatio, Lord Nelson (1758–1805) – to demonstrate that students of maneuver need not fear turning their attention occasionally from land battles towards those fought at sea. They may indeed be greatly enriched by doing so. While being mindful to avoid anachronism (Maneuver Warfare’s conceptual framework, after all, is very recent), this article shows that Lord Nelson’s warfighting style closely resembles the modern Maneuver Warfare paradigm. He was not fighting according to any paradigm, of course, much less one that dates from almost 200 years after his death. He understood naval tactics and battle according to the norms and behavioral patterns of his own era and continuously experimented and tested ideas, rejecting some, keeping others. The article naturally makes no claim that Nelson’s warfighting style was unique among sea warriors or that he contributed disproportionately to conceptual or doctrinal developments in tactics or operational art. Even a cursory glance at the careers of John Paul Jones, Edward Hawke and John Jervis (one of Nelson’s mentors), to mention but a few, reveals that their names fit almost as aptly as Nelson’s alongside Napoleon Bonaparte’s, Erwin Rommel’s and George S. Patton’s in studies of effective maneuverists. Yet Lord Nelson makes an ideal focus for a case study of Maneuver Warfare at sea. Extant sources pertaining to his fascinating life are unusually abundant and reveal that he raised the art of war at sea to unsurpassed heights, all the while perfecting the highly maneuverist warfighting style that gave him victory in several of naval history’s grandest battles.
A Case Study in Early Joint Warfare: An Analysis of the Wehrmacht's Crimean C...Professor Joel Hayward
Military theorists and commentators believe that joint operations prove more effective in most circumstances of modern warfare than operations involving only one service or involving two or more services but without systematic integration or unified command. Many see Nazi Germany's armed forces, the Wehrmacht, as early pioneers of 'jointness'. This essay demonstrates that the Wehrmacht did indeed understand the value of synchronizing its land, sea and air forces and placing them under operational commanders who had at least a rudimentary understanding of the tactics, techniques, needs, capabilities and limitations of each of the services functioning in their combat zones. It also shows that the Wehrmacht's efforts in this direction produced the desired result of improved combat effectiveness. Yet it argues that the Wehrmacht lacked elements considered by today's theorists to be essential to the attainment of truly productive jointness - a single tri-service commander, a proper joint staff and an absence of inter-service rivalry - and that, as a result, it often suffered needless difficulties in combat.
Too Little, Too Late: An Analysis of Hitler's Failure in August 1942 to Damag...Professor Joel Hayward
Even before Operation Barbarossa petered out in December 1941, Germany's oil reserves were severely depleted. Adolf Hitler worried that his armed forces would soon grind to a halt for want of petroleum products. During the last months of 1941 and the first of 1942, economic considerations played as much of a role in the formulation of a new strategy as did the run-down state of the eastern armies and air fleets. Hitler feared heavy Soviet bombing attacks on Rumanian oilfields, his main source of oil, and knew that the Reich's reserves were almost exhausted. Consequently, he considered the protection of the Rumanian oilfields and the acquisition of new sources of oil crucial if he were to wage a prolonged war against the growing list of nations he opposed.1 He therefore formulated Fall Blau (Case Blue), a major campaign for summer 1942. This aimed first, through preliminary offensives in the Crimea, to protect Rumanian oil centres from Soviet air attacks, and second, through a powerful thrust to the Don River and then into the Caucasus, to deliver that oil-rich region into German hands. The capture of the Caucasus oilfields, he believed, would relieve Germany's critical oil shortages and deliver a massive, and hopefully mortal, blow to the Soviet economy and war effort. The consequences of that ill-fated campaign are well known, and need little discussion here. Hitler became distracted by Stalingrad (which was not even a main campaign objective) and lost an entire army trying to take it. Soviet forces also drove his armies from the Caucasus and pushed them back to the line they had held before Blau started nine months earlier. This study analyses a little-known and poorly documented aspect of the 1942 campaign: Hitler's employment of airpower in the Caucasus region. It focuses on his reluctant admission in October that his ground forces would probably not reach the main oilfields before adverse weather conditions forced them to take up winter positions, and on his subsequent decision to have the Luftwaffe attempt the oilfields' destruction. He believed that if he could not have the oilfields (at present, anyway), he should at least deny Josef Stalin's agriculture, industry, and armed forces their vast output. The essay argues for the first time that the Luftwaffe could have dealt the Soviet economy a major blow, from which it would have taken at least several months to recover, if Hitler had not been so obsessed with Stalingrad and wasted his airpower assets on its destruction. During August and early September 1942, the Luftwaffe possessed the means to inflict heavy damage on Baku, the Caucasus oil metropolis that alone accounted for 80 percent of all Soviet production. The Luftwaffe still possessed a strong bomber force and airfields within striking range and the Soviet Air Force's presence in the Caucasus was still weak. By October, however, when Hitler finally ordered attacks on oilfields, the Luftwaffe's eastern bomber fleet was ...
Stalingrad: An Examination-of Hitler's Decision to Airlift, by Professor Joel...Professor Joel Hayward
After February 1943, the shadow of Stalingrad ever lengthened ahead of Adolf Hitler. The battle for that city had ended in disastrous defeat, shattering the myth of his military "Midas touch," ending his chances of defeating the Red Army, permanently damaging relations with Italy, Rumania, Hungary, and other allied nations, and, of course, inflicting heavy losses on his eastern armies. More than 150,000 Axis soldiers, most of them German, had been killed or wounded in the city's approaches or ruins; 108,000 others stumbled into Soviet captivity, 91,000 in the battle's last three days alone. (Although Hitler never learned of their fate, only six thousand ever returned to Germany.) The battle has attracted considerable scholarly and journalistic attention. Literally scores of books and articles on Stalingrad have appeared during the 50 years since Stalin's armies bulldozed into Berlin, bringing the war in Europe to a close. Most have been published in Germany and, to a lesser degree, Russia, where the name "Stalingrad" still conjures up powerful and emotional imagery. Comparatively few have been published in the English-speaking world, and this is understandable. Because no British, Common wealth, or American forces took part in the battle, they can number none of their own among its many heroes, martyrs, prisoners, and victims. Moreover, although the German defeat at Stalin grad was immediately seen in the West as a turning point, its effects were not directly felt by the Anglo- - American nations. The main focus of Stalin grad historiography, including the dozen books published in 1992 and 1993 to commemorate the battle's 50th anniversary, has been the fighting, encirclement, suffering, and destruction of Generalfeldmarschall Friedrich Paulus's Sixth Army. Few books and articles have devoted adequate attention to the activities of the Luftwaffe, although it made substantial contributions to all battles throughout the 1942 summer campaign—of which Stalingrad was the climax—and it alone was responsible for the maintenance of Sixth Army after Marshal G. K. Zhukov's forces severed it from all but radio contact with other German army formations. Even fewer works—and none in English—have analyzed in depth Hitler's decision to supply the forces trapped at Stalin grad from the air, even though this decision led to the destruction of those forces after the Luftwaffe failed to keep them adequately supplied.
The German Use of Airpower at Kharkov, May 1942, by Professor Joel HaywardProfessor Joel Hayward
This archival source-based analysis of the role and effectiveness of airpower during the Battle of Kharkov in May 1942 demonstrates that it was the critical factor in determining German success. Masterfully commanded by Generaloberst Wolfram Freiherr von Richthofen, the Third Reich's leading close air support expert, the Luftwaffe delivered highly effective support to the German army and prevented a major Soviet encirclement attempt from succeeding.
Von Richthofen's 'giant fire-magic': The Luftwaffe's Contribution to the Batt...Professor Joel Hayward
Adolf Hitler's directive for the 1942 summer campaign in the east clearly reflects the unfinished nature of the previous year's campaign. Although the Fuehrer claimed to Mussolini on 30 April 1942 that, with the exception of just a few 'blemishes which will shortly be eradicated, ... the Crimea finds itself in our hands,' the reality was very different.1 In April 1942 the Crimea was neither firmly nor entirely in German hands, as Hitler well knew. It was certainly not the 'bastion in the Black Sea' that he described to his Italian counterpart. On the contrary, powerful Soviet forces still held both Sevastopol, the Soviet Union's main naval base and shipyard in the Black Sea, and the strategically important Kerch Peninsula, which Hitler planned to use as a springboard to the Caucasus. Therefore, he stated in his directive for the 1942 summer campaign, before the major offensive into the Caucasus could commence it would be necessary 'to clear up the Kerch Peninsula in the Crimea and to bring about the fall of Sevastopol.'2 In May and June, the powerful Eleventh Army, commanded by Generaloberst Erich von Manstein, reputed to be Hitler's best operational army commander, launched strong attacks on the Soviet forces at each end of the Crimea. These attacks proved stunningly successful, destroying the enemy and finally giving Hitler total mastery of the Crimea. Von Manstein's Kerch offensive, codenamed Operation Trappenjagd (Bustard Hunt), and his assault on Sevastopol, codenamed Operation Storfang (Sturgeon Catch), deserve their prominent place in historical works on the Eastern campaigns. Skillfully guided by von Manstein, Eleventh Army defeated numerically superior and better-situated forces quickly and, especially during the Kerch offensive, with relatively few losses. However, the role of the Luftwaffe, which performed superbly as it provided the army with an unprecedented level of tactical air support, has been poorly covered by historians of these events, whose works focus primarily on army operations and von Manstein's much-touted tactical genius. Describing and explaining Luftwaffe operations during Trappenjagd, the first of the two Crimean campaigns of 1942, this study attempts to correct that imbalance. Eleventh Army, it argues, would not have succeeded were it not for the outstanding efforts of Luftwaffe forces, led by a commander of equal genius.
Hitler's Quest for Oil: The Impact of Economic Considerations on Military Str...Professor Joel Hayward
When asked by his Allied captors in 1945 to what extent German military strategy had been influenced at various stages by economic considerations, Albert Speer, Hitler's outstanding Armaments Minister, replied that in the case of Operation BARBAROSSA the need for oil was certainly a prime motive.' Indeed, even during the initial discussions of his plan to invade the Soviet Union, Hitler stressed the absolute necessity of seizing key oilfields, particularly those in the Caucasus region, which accounted for around 90 per cent of all oil produced in the Soviet Union. For example, during a war conference at the Berghof on 31 July 1940, Hitler revealed to high-ranking commanders his intention to shatter Russia 'to its roots with one blow'2 After achieving the 'destruction of Russian manpower', he explained, the German Army must drive on towards the Baku oilfield, by far the richest of those in the Caucasus and one of the most productive in the world. Despite Hitler's optimism, the 1941 campaign - which opened along a 2,000 km front and involved 148 combat divisions - failed to shatter Russia 'to its roots with one blow'. Consequently, it failed to bring the huge oil region of the Caucasus under German control. After reverses in the winter of 1941/42, it was no longer possible for the Wehrmacht to undertake wide-ranging offensives along the entire front, by then over 2,500 km in length. The summer campaign of 1942, although still immense, was necessarily less ambitious. It opened along a front of around 725 km, and involved 68 German and 25 allied combat divisions. Soviet oil remained a major attraction for Hitler. The offensive's objectives were to destroy the main Russian forces between the Donets and the Don river, capture the crossings into the mountainous Caucasus region and then deliver the rich oilfields into German hands. The perceived importance of these oilfields to the German economy, and hence the war effort, cannot be overstated. On 1 June 1942, four weeks to the day before the summer campaign began, Hitler told the assembled senior officers of Army Group South that 'If I do not get the oil of Maikop and Grozny then I must end this war'.3 The purpose of this study is not to provide a narrative description of the planning of the 1942 campaign, but, rather, to reveal the central role which economic considerations played in the planning of that ill-fated endeavor. In the following pages I shall appraise Hitler's preoccupation with the Caucasus region and its oilfields, and describe how Germany's own oil situation in the first two years of the war led him to believe that the capture of those oilfields was an essential prerequisite to waging a prolonged war of economic attrition. I shall then outline and explain the lengthy planning of the 1942 campaign, which aimed first at protecting the vulnerable Rumanian oilfields - upon which the German war economy was already heavily reliant - and secondly (and more importantly) at possessing the far ...
A Case Study in Early Joint Warfare: An Analysis of the Wehrmacht's Crimean C...Professor Joel Hayward
Military theorists and commentators believe that joint operations prove more effective in most circumstances of modern warfare than operations involving only one service or involving two or more services but without systematic integration or unified command. Many see Nazi Germany's armed forces, the Wehrmacht, as early pioneers of 'jointness'. This essay demonstrates that the Wehrmacht did indeed understand the value of synchronizing its land, sea and air forces and placing them under operational commanders who had at least a rudimentary understanding of the tactics, techniques, needs, capabilities and limitations of each of the services functioning in their combat zones. It also shows that the Wehrmacht's efforts in this direction produced the desired result of improved combat effectiveness. Yet it argues that the Wehrmacht lacked elements considered by today's theorists to be essential to the attainment of truly productive jointness - a single tri-service commander, a proper joint staff and an absence of inter-service rivalry - and that, as a result, it often suffered needless difficulties in combat.
Too Little, Too Late: An Analysis of Hitler's Failure in August 1942 to Damag...Professor Joel Hayward
Even before Operation Barbarossa petered out in December 1941, Germany's oil reserves were severely depleted. Adolf Hitler worried that his armed forces would soon grind to a halt for want of petroleum products. During the last months of 1941 and the first of 1942, economic considerations played as much of a role in the formulation of a new strategy as did the run-down state of the eastern armies and air fleets. Hitler feared heavy Soviet bombing attacks on Rumanian oilfields, his main source of oil, and knew that the Reich's reserves were almost exhausted. Consequently, he considered the protection of the Rumanian oilfields and the acquisition of new sources of oil crucial if he were to wage a prolonged war against the growing list of nations he opposed.1 He therefore formulated Fall Blau (Case Blue), a major campaign for summer 1942. This aimed first, through preliminary offensives in the Crimea, to protect Rumanian oil centres from Soviet air attacks, and second, through a powerful thrust to the Don River and then into the Caucasus, to deliver that oil-rich region into German hands. The capture of the Caucasus oilfields, he believed, would relieve Germany's critical oil shortages and deliver a massive, and hopefully mortal, blow to the Soviet economy and war effort. The consequences of that ill-fated campaign are well known, and need little discussion here. Hitler became distracted by Stalingrad (which was not even a main campaign objective) and lost an entire army trying to take it. Soviet forces also drove his armies from the Caucasus and pushed them back to the line they had held before Blau started nine months earlier. This study analyses a little-known and poorly documented aspect of the 1942 campaign: Hitler's employment of airpower in the Caucasus region. It focuses on his reluctant admission in October that his ground forces would probably not reach the main oilfields before adverse weather conditions forced them to take up winter positions, and on his subsequent decision to have the Luftwaffe attempt the oilfields' destruction. He believed that if he could not have the oilfields (at present, anyway), he should at least deny Josef Stalin's agriculture, industry, and armed forces their vast output. The essay argues for the first time that the Luftwaffe could have dealt the Soviet economy a major blow, from which it would have taken at least several months to recover, if Hitler had not been so obsessed with Stalingrad and wasted his airpower assets on its destruction. During August and early September 1942, the Luftwaffe possessed the means to inflict heavy damage on Baku, the Caucasus oil metropolis that alone accounted for 80 percent of all Soviet production. The Luftwaffe still possessed a strong bomber force and airfields within striking range and the Soviet Air Force's presence in the Caucasus was still weak. By October, however, when Hitler finally ordered attacks on oilfields, the Luftwaffe's eastern bomber fleet was ...
Stalingrad: An Examination-of Hitler's Decision to Airlift, by Professor Joel...Professor Joel Hayward
After February 1943, the shadow of Stalingrad ever lengthened ahead of Adolf Hitler. The battle for that city had ended in disastrous defeat, shattering the myth of his military "Midas touch," ending his chances of defeating the Red Army, permanently damaging relations with Italy, Rumania, Hungary, and other allied nations, and, of course, inflicting heavy losses on his eastern armies. More than 150,000 Axis soldiers, most of them German, had been killed or wounded in the city's approaches or ruins; 108,000 others stumbled into Soviet captivity, 91,000 in the battle's last three days alone. (Although Hitler never learned of their fate, only six thousand ever returned to Germany.) The battle has attracted considerable scholarly and journalistic attention. Literally scores of books and articles on Stalingrad have appeared during the 50 years since Stalin's armies bulldozed into Berlin, bringing the war in Europe to a close. Most have been published in Germany and, to a lesser degree, Russia, where the name "Stalingrad" still conjures up powerful and emotional imagery. Comparatively few have been published in the English-speaking world, and this is understandable. Because no British, Common wealth, or American forces took part in the battle, they can number none of their own among its many heroes, martyrs, prisoners, and victims. Moreover, although the German defeat at Stalin grad was immediately seen in the West as a turning point, its effects were not directly felt by the Anglo- - American nations. The main focus of Stalin grad historiography, including the dozen books published in 1992 and 1993 to commemorate the battle's 50th anniversary, has been the fighting, encirclement, suffering, and destruction of Generalfeldmarschall Friedrich Paulus's Sixth Army. Few books and articles have devoted adequate attention to the activities of the Luftwaffe, although it made substantial contributions to all battles throughout the 1942 summer campaign—of which Stalingrad was the climax—and it alone was responsible for the maintenance of Sixth Army after Marshal G. K. Zhukov's forces severed it from all but radio contact with other German army formations. Even fewer works—and none in English—have analyzed in depth Hitler's decision to supply the forces trapped at Stalin grad from the air, even though this decision led to the destruction of those forces after the Luftwaffe failed to keep them adequately supplied.
The German Use of Airpower at Kharkov, May 1942, by Professor Joel HaywardProfessor Joel Hayward
This archival source-based analysis of the role and effectiveness of airpower during the Battle of Kharkov in May 1942 demonstrates that it was the critical factor in determining German success. Masterfully commanded by Generaloberst Wolfram Freiherr von Richthofen, the Third Reich's leading close air support expert, the Luftwaffe delivered highly effective support to the German army and prevented a major Soviet encirclement attempt from succeeding.
Von Richthofen's 'giant fire-magic': The Luftwaffe's Contribution to the Batt...Professor Joel Hayward
Adolf Hitler's directive for the 1942 summer campaign in the east clearly reflects the unfinished nature of the previous year's campaign. Although the Fuehrer claimed to Mussolini on 30 April 1942 that, with the exception of just a few 'blemishes which will shortly be eradicated, ... the Crimea finds itself in our hands,' the reality was very different.1 In April 1942 the Crimea was neither firmly nor entirely in German hands, as Hitler well knew. It was certainly not the 'bastion in the Black Sea' that he described to his Italian counterpart. On the contrary, powerful Soviet forces still held both Sevastopol, the Soviet Union's main naval base and shipyard in the Black Sea, and the strategically important Kerch Peninsula, which Hitler planned to use as a springboard to the Caucasus. Therefore, he stated in his directive for the 1942 summer campaign, before the major offensive into the Caucasus could commence it would be necessary 'to clear up the Kerch Peninsula in the Crimea and to bring about the fall of Sevastopol.'2 In May and June, the powerful Eleventh Army, commanded by Generaloberst Erich von Manstein, reputed to be Hitler's best operational army commander, launched strong attacks on the Soviet forces at each end of the Crimea. These attacks proved stunningly successful, destroying the enemy and finally giving Hitler total mastery of the Crimea. Von Manstein's Kerch offensive, codenamed Operation Trappenjagd (Bustard Hunt), and his assault on Sevastopol, codenamed Operation Storfang (Sturgeon Catch), deserve their prominent place in historical works on the Eastern campaigns. Skillfully guided by von Manstein, Eleventh Army defeated numerically superior and better-situated forces quickly and, especially during the Kerch offensive, with relatively few losses. However, the role of the Luftwaffe, which performed superbly as it provided the army with an unprecedented level of tactical air support, has been poorly covered by historians of these events, whose works focus primarily on army operations and von Manstein's much-touted tactical genius. Describing and explaining Luftwaffe operations during Trappenjagd, the first of the two Crimean campaigns of 1942, this study attempts to correct that imbalance. Eleventh Army, it argues, would not have succeeded were it not for the outstanding efforts of Luftwaffe forces, led by a commander of equal genius.
Hitler's Quest for Oil: The Impact of Economic Considerations on Military Str...Professor Joel Hayward
When asked by his Allied captors in 1945 to what extent German military strategy had been influenced at various stages by economic considerations, Albert Speer, Hitler's outstanding Armaments Minister, replied that in the case of Operation BARBAROSSA the need for oil was certainly a prime motive.' Indeed, even during the initial discussions of his plan to invade the Soviet Union, Hitler stressed the absolute necessity of seizing key oilfields, particularly those in the Caucasus region, which accounted for around 90 per cent of all oil produced in the Soviet Union. For example, during a war conference at the Berghof on 31 July 1940, Hitler revealed to high-ranking commanders his intention to shatter Russia 'to its roots with one blow'2 After achieving the 'destruction of Russian manpower', he explained, the German Army must drive on towards the Baku oilfield, by far the richest of those in the Caucasus and one of the most productive in the world. Despite Hitler's optimism, the 1941 campaign - which opened along a 2,000 km front and involved 148 combat divisions - failed to shatter Russia 'to its roots with one blow'. Consequently, it failed to bring the huge oil region of the Caucasus under German control. After reverses in the winter of 1941/42, it was no longer possible for the Wehrmacht to undertake wide-ranging offensives along the entire front, by then over 2,500 km in length. The summer campaign of 1942, although still immense, was necessarily less ambitious. It opened along a front of around 725 km, and involved 68 German and 25 allied combat divisions. Soviet oil remained a major attraction for Hitler. The offensive's objectives were to destroy the main Russian forces between the Donets and the Don river, capture the crossings into the mountainous Caucasus region and then deliver the rich oilfields into German hands. The perceived importance of these oilfields to the German economy, and hence the war effort, cannot be overstated. On 1 June 1942, four weeks to the day before the summer campaign began, Hitler told the assembled senior officers of Army Group South that 'If I do not get the oil of Maikop and Grozny then I must end this war'.3 The purpose of this study is not to provide a narrative description of the planning of the 1942 campaign, but, rather, to reveal the central role which economic considerations played in the planning of that ill-fated endeavor. In the following pages I shall appraise Hitler's preoccupation with the Caucasus region and its oilfields, and describe how Germany's own oil situation in the first two years of the war led him to believe that the capture of those oilfields was an essential prerequisite to waging a prolonged war of economic attrition. I shall then outline and explain the lengthy planning of the 1942 campaign, which aimed first at protecting the vulnerable Rumanian oilfields - upon which the German war economy was already heavily reliant - and secondly (and more importantly) at possessing the far ...
Doctrine is an army’s game plan. Doctrine not only tells an army how to fight but it communicates intent from the institutional Army to the fighting forces. The progression that leads to doctrine stretches across a temporal “reverse highway” that begins well into the future with a vision of how future wars will be fought. At some point along the highway visioning solidifies into warfighting concepts. All too often, the concept phase of this journey is where dead ends and misleading road signs appear. Visioning is cheap and ephemeral. Concepts, on the other hand, tend to ossify ideas that eventually turn into opinions. Opinions, even false ones, are defended by those whose influences are at stake. Opinions lead to investments that launch programs. Eventually the highway ends at the doctrinal present as organizations and weapons emerge to provide the tools and formations to fight wars
This treatise on the recent shortcomings of the Army organizational culture challenges leaders at all levels to evaluate their personal leadership practices and their application of Army policies.
Sieg im Westen, 1939-1940; part 3 of 12-Year ReichJim Powers
This presentation describes the first year of the war, Poland, the Phony War, Denmark and Norway, the Low Countries, France, the Blitz, and Hitler's dilemma when Britain fails to give in.
The Evolution of Integrated Air Power (air-land integration), 1, by Professor...Professor Joel Hayward
By the end of this lecture students should be able to understand that:
WWI included attempts at independent and integrated air power
independent ops were a tiny minority of the air power effort
the war prompted very unusual ideas about strategy
most unusual: the attempted removal of battle from war
Doctrine is an army’s game plan. Doctrine not only tells an army how to fight but it communicates intent from the institutional Army to the fighting forces. The progression that leads to doctrine stretches across a temporal “reverse highway” that begins well into the future with a vision of how future wars will be fought. At some point along the highway visioning solidifies into warfighting concepts. All too often, the concept phase of this journey is where dead ends and misleading road signs appear. Visioning is cheap and ephemeral. Concepts, on the other hand, tend to ossify ideas that eventually turn into opinions. Opinions, even false ones, are defended by those whose influences are at stake. Opinions lead to investments that launch programs. Eventually the highway ends at the doctrinal present as organizations and weapons emerge to provide the tools and formations to fight wars
This treatise on the recent shortcomings of the Army organizational culture challenges leaders at all levels to evaluate their personal leadership practices and their application of Army policies.
Sieg im Westen, 1939-1940; part 3 of 12-Year ReichJim Powers
This presentation describes the first year of the war, Poland, the Phony War, Denmark and Norway, the Low Countries, France, the Blitz, and Hitler's dilemma when Britain fails to give in.
The Evolution of Integrated Air Power (air-land integration), 1, by Professor...Professor Joel Hayward
By the end of this lecture students should be able to understand that:
WWI included attempts at independent and integrated air power
independent ops were a tiny minority of the air power effort
the war prompted very unusual ideas about strategy
most unusual: the attempted removal of battle from war
China's Naval Strategy: Strategic Evolution and Emerging Concepts of WarfarePierre Memheld
Throughout modern history, the symbiotic relationship between the rise of global powers and the emergence of a strong naval component to their security strategies appears to be a thematic rule.
The Battle of Dhi Qar (Arabic: يوم ذي قار), also known as the Battle of Dhu Qar,was a pre-Islamic battle fought between Arab tribes and the Sassanid Empire in Southern Iraq. The battle occurred after the death of Al-Nu'man III by the orders of Khosrow II.
By the end of this lecture students should be able to:
Understand Middle Eastern political and strategic dynamics in late antiquity
Analyze the nature of Arab-Persian relations
Analyze the causes, the course, and the consequences of the Battle of Dhi Qar
An Introduction to Terrorism, by Professor Joel hayward
By the end of this lecture students should be able to:
Recognise some major forms of terrorism
Understand some basic motivations behind them
Understand the nature and scope of the threat to us
An Introduction to Insurgency, by Professor Joel Hayward
At the end of this lecture you should be able to:
Define both insurgency and terrorism
Recognise that these terms are not synonyms
Understand some of the key similarities and differences between them
The Battle of Britain 1940 by Professor Joel Hayward
By the end of the lecture students should be able to understand:
The differing strategic objectives of both sides in the air campaign
The importance of control of the air to achieving these objectives
The qualities of Dowding’s Integrated Air Defence System
The Characteristics and Utility of Airpower, by Professor Joel HaywardProfessor Joel Hayward
By the end of this lecture students should be able to understand that:
Air power represents a technological revolution
Air power has tremendously changed the conduct of warfare
Air power has not changed the nature of warfare
The Evolution of Integrated Air Power (air-land integration), 3, by Professor...Professor Joel Hayward
By the end of this lecture student will be able to understand that, in any return to conventional air-land integration, air forces will face:
Vastly improved precision capabilities
Greater intolerance of harm to civilian objects and infrastructure
Greater demands for ubiquity
Greater intolerance of fratricide
A return to conventionally contested airspace
The Evolution of Integrated Air Power (air-land integration), 2, by Professor...Professor Joel Hayward
By the end of this lecture students should be able to understand:
Different approaches to air-land integration between 1939-1953
The challenges of coordinating air power and land power
Some of the efforts made to overcome these challenges
The enduring importance of battle to strategic decision
Maneuver Warfare (the Maneuverist Approach), by Professor Joel HaywardProfessor Joel Hayward
By the end of this lecture students should be able to understand:
the relationship between maneuver and firepower
key Maneuver Warfare concepts
that flexibility is necessary in their interpretation and application
الحصانة المدنية في الفكر الاستراتيجي الإسلامي التأسيسي تحقيقٌ تاريخي البروفيس...Professor Joel Hayward
الحصانة المدنية في الفكر الاستراتيجي الإسلامي التأسيسي
تحقيقٌ تاريخي
البروفيسور جويل هيوارد
تحلل هذه الدراسة الوحي القرآني ووعظ وممارسات النبي محمد من أجل التحقق مما قام الإسلام بتعليمه في مستهل ظهوره فيما يتعلق بمسؤوليات الجيوش الإسلامية والمحاربين اتجاه الأشخاص الذين نسميهم في الوقت الحاضر بالمدنيين وغيرهم من غير المقاتلين. من الواضح أن الوحي الإلهي ونبي الإسلام قد هدوا في عصر الإنسانية خلال حربٍ تفوق تلك التي وجدت في وقت سابق في الجزيرة العربية وفي الواقع في أي مكان في العالم. لم يتعمد محمد الحرب ودمارها لتشمل مجتمعات بأكملها، بل بالأحرى لتطال المقاتلين فقط، الذين جعلتهم عدوانيتهم ورغبتهم في حمل السلاح مذنبين وخاضعين للمقاومة المسلحة. مدركين بأن الله قد سمح بالدفاع عن النفس ضد الهجوم، وقد قام بتوجيه الحرب على المهاجمين، ولكن ليس على نساء قوات العدو، وأطفالهم، وكبار السن. في الواقع، متمشياً مع القانون الدولي الإنساني المعاصر، فقد حظر محمد الإستهداف المتعمد لهم، مالم يتنازلوا عن حقوقهم في الحماية بالمشاركة في القتال. موسّعاً حق الحماية هذا إلى الرهبان وغيرهم من رجال الدين الذين كرسّوا حياتهم للممارسات الدينية، ومن ثمّ إلى أنواع من الممتلكات التي نسميها الآن بالبنية التحتية المدنية، أنشأ محمد بيئة واسعة من الأمان والتي حافظت على أرواح وطرق معيشة الناس حتى في المجتماعات المتحاربة. إن المفاهيم الخاطئة الشائعة التي أججتها الأفعال الوحشية غير المسؤولة لتنظيم القاعدة وتنظيم الدولة الإسلامية ، وبوكو حرام وغيرها من التنظيمات الإرهابية المتطرفة، هي وببساطة لا تستند على قراءة عادلة للدليل التاريخي. حيث يحكي ذلك الدليل قصة مغايرة تماماً لما يرونه: للإنسجام الوثيق بين الممارسات الإسلامية الأولى بتوجيهات محمد وبين المدونة الأخلاقية للحصانة المدنية الراسغة في نظرية الحرب العادلة الغربية والقانون الدولي الانساني. بمعزلٍ عن المقاتلين، لم يكن المسلمين ليقتلوا أو على نحو آخر ليلحقوا الأذى بالأبريا، ولم يكونوا ليدمروا منازلهم، والبنية التحتية أو مستلزمات معيشتهم.
The Qur’an is among the most widely read books on earth, yet it is also commonly misunderstood and misquoted. Islam’s critics say that it contains exhortations of violence against non-Muslims and a concept of war that is far more unbridled and indiscriminate than the western Just War theory.
This study is not a general overview or critique of the Islamic laws of war, which are the varied and sometimes contradictory opinions of medieval Islamic jurists ― mainly from the ninth to thirteenth centuries CE. Instead, this study analyses only the Qur’anic text itself and, by putting its verses into historical context, attempts to explain its codes of conduct in order to determine what it actually requires or permits Muslims to do in terms of the use of military force.
It concludes that the Qur’an is clear: Muslims must not undertake offensive violence and are instructed, if defensive warfare should become unavoidable, always to act within a code of ethical behavior that is closely similar to the western Just War tradition. This study attempts to dispel any misperceptions that Islam’s holy book advocates the subjugation or killing of non-Muslims and reveals that, on the contrary, its key and unequivocal concepts governing warfare are based on justice and a profound belief in the sanctity of human life.
Civilian Immunity and "Collateral Damage", by Professor Joel HaywardProfessor Joel Hayward
By the end of this lecture you should be able to understand:
why civilians are to be considered “innocent”
the moral and legal importance of civilian immunity
that the attacking force carries responsibility for protecting civilians
that even the accidental killing of civilians is politically damaging
Ecologists, activists, lobbyists and of course politicians are already turning their attention to ecological aspects of modern warfare. As a consequence, governments and their armed forces will have to pay more attention to the serious ecological ramifications of conflict. Air forces face the greatest challenges. During both peace and war they have far greater carbon footprints than armies and navies. They use potentially more devastating ordnance. Their targets traditionally include objects in or near population centers and the aquifers, waterways, soils and food sources that sustain them. And air forces cause far worse damage to environmentally significant production, storage and distribution infrastructure (much of it based on petroleum, oil, lubricants or chemicals). This lecture does not recommend the blanket exclusion of any potential target sets from planning processes. Rather, it argues that, when we utilize our existing warrior code, the Just War ethical framework, we must now slightly expand our time-honored moral and legal constructs of proportionality and discrimination to include environmental issues. That is, the lecture argues for the inclusion of ecological protection in military planning and for it to be weighed expertly, along with the likely need for post-war remediation activities, among the factors that will ultimately determine the justifiability of military actions.
Air Power, Ethics and Civilian Immunity during the Great War and its Aftermat...Professor Joel Hayward
Little has been published on the ethical and legal basis of air attacks on non-combatants during the First World War. Existing works have focused mainly on the injustice of the German Zeppelin and Gotha raids on British towns. They present British air campaigns on German towns and the formation of the Royal Air Force as a reasoned self-defensive response. This article breaks new ground as it attempts to paint a richer picture by explaining the influence of retributive passions – vengeance – on British thinking about how best to respond to the villainy of German air raids. By using unpublished primary sources to uncover the moral and legal rationale used by British decision-makers, it shows that they (as their German counterparts had) exploited ambiguities or "loopholes" in the ethical and legal prohibitions on the bombardment of non-combatants and explained away their own air attacks on civilian towns and villages as legitimate acts of reprisal. It ends by demonstrating that, far from feeling grave concerns about the inhumanity of targeting civilians and their environs, the most influential air power thinkers after the war were relatively uninterested in moral concepts of proportionality and discrimination. They saw air power's ability to punish the strong and culpable by attacking the weak and vulnerable as a way of making wars shorter and therefore less expensive.
Air Power: The Quest to remove Battle from War, by Professor Joel HaywardProfessor Joel Hayward
Air power emerged from the Great War as a third primary form of military force, along armies and navies. Its early theorists made astounding claims that air power alone could delivery strategy – that is, the war-winning outcomes that involved the enemy’s defeat – without the significant and inevitably bloody contributions of soldiers and sailors. Throughout the next century their ideas were attempted and almost without exception they proved inadequate. The so-called strategic air campaigns damaged enemy production, but only in a zero-sum way, with the cost of producing and maintaining massive air fleets and soaking up their ghastly attrition balancing out the gains being made. The exception might be the nuclear bombings of Japan, but the atomic weapon itself was the game-changer, with air power being merely its delivery system for a brief time before missiles became the major delivery instrument and source of deterrence. Air power’s most effective role was not away from the battlefield, with cities, civilians and industry the focus of attack, but was on the battlefield in coordination with the other services. Air power’s most significant contributions to strategy came in what looks superficially like a tactical role: as close air support, interdiction, reconnaissance, air supply, counter-air operations, and medical evacuation. These, especially the former, close air support, have proven devastating and enabled joint forces to inflict strategic wins.
A Case Study in Effective Command: An Analysis of Field Marshal Richthofen's ...Professor Joel Hayward
This article analyzes the leadership of Wolfram Freiherr von Richthofen, a senior Luftwaffe commander and one of the most effective air strategists, tacticians and leaders of all time. It focuses on his masterful command of Luftflotte 4 and Fliegerkorps VIII on the eastern front during World War II, including during the Stalingrad campaign.
Joint operations involve the closely synchronized employment of two or more service branches under a unified command. Military theorists and commentators now believe that they prove more effective in most circumstances of modern warfare than operations involving only one service or involving two or more services but without systematic integration or unified command. Many consider the Wehrmacht, Nazi Germany's armed forces, pioneers of "jointness". They point out that Blitzkrieg, the war-fighting style that brought the Wehrmacht stunning victories between 1939 and 1941, depended upon the close integration of ground and air (and sometimes naval) forces and that, even after the Blitzkrieg campaigns gave way to a drawn-out war of attrition, the Wehrmacht routinely conducted operations in a fashion that would today be called "joint". That is, elements of two or more services participated in close cooperation with mutually agreed goals, relatively little inter-service rivalry, and a command structure that, at least at the "sharp end" of operations, promoted, rather than inhibited, a spirit of jointness. As a result, the scholars claim, the Wehrmacht enhanced its capabilities and improved its combat effectiveness. This view of the Wehrmacht goes back a long way; back, in fact, to the war itself. For example, in 1941 the United States War Department, which, closely monitored events in Europe and North Africa, claimed in its Handbook of German Military Forces: "The outstanding characteristic of German military operations in the present war has been the remarkable coordination of the three sister services, Army, Navy and Air Force, into a unified command for definite tasks. These services do not [merely] cooperate in a campaign; rather their operations are coordinated by the High Command of the Armed Forces."
Without becoming anachronistic — after all, jointness as a defined concept is very recent ― this monograph attempts something long overdue: an analysis of Adolf Hitler's influence on the Wehrmacht's efforts to integrate the employment of its forces and thereby increase its effectiveness. The study demonstrates two main points: first, that Hitler certainly understood the value of integrating his land, sea and air forces and placing them under a unified command (first Field Marshal Blomberg's; later his own); and second, that he also saw the benefit of placing them under operational commanders who possessed at least a rudimentary understanding of the tactics, techniques, needs, capabilities and limitations of each of the services functioning in their combat zone. Hitler was thus innovative and several years ahead of his peers in the democracies, Italy and the Soviet Union. Yet this study concludes that, largely because of Hitler's unusual command style and difficulties with delegation, the Wehrmacht lacked elements that today's theorists consider essential to the attainment of truly productive jointness (a single joint commander or Joint Chief of ...
Justice, Jihad and Duty: The Qur’anic Concept of Armed Conflict, by Professo...Professor Joel Hayward
The Qur’an is among the most widely read books on earth, yet it is also commonly misunderstood and misquoted. Islam’s critics say that it contains exhortations of violence against non-Muslims and a concept of war that is far more unbridled and indiscriminate than the western Just War theory. This study is not a general overview or critique of the Islamic laws of war, which are the varied and sometimes contradictory opinions of medieval Islamic jurists ― mainly from the ninth to thirteenth centuries CE. Instead, this study analyses only the Qur’anic text itself and, by putting its verses into historical context, attempts to explain its codes of conduct in order to determine what it actually requires or permits Muslims to do in terms of the use of military force. It concludes that the Qur’an is clear: Muslims must not undertake offensive violence and are instructed, if defensive warfare should become unavoidable, always to act within a code of ethical behavior that is closely similar to the western Just War tradition. This study attempts to dispel any misperceptions that Islam’s holy book advocates the subjugation or killing of non-Muslims and reveals that, on the contrary, its key and unequivocal concepts governing warfare are based on justice and a profound belief in the sanctity of human life.
Revisiting the Past: The Value of Teaching Islamic Military History, by Pr...Professor Joel Hayward
This article will argue that Muslim scholars should not feel the slightest awkwardness or embarrassment about Islam’s past martial successes, and should indeed return to writing on Islamic military history, teaching it and ensuring its survival within the curricula of cadet and staff colleges. Far from damaging Islam’s reputation, an objective and fair-minded reading of Islam’s military history (according to the methodology and principles accepted within the discipline of history) will directly counter the current western misperception that Islam is somehow more aggressive and accepting of disproportionate or indiscriminate violence than the other great religions. It will in fact show that the Islamic laws and ethics of war have minimized violence and constrained misconduct and ensured that warfare was fought according to guiding principles which are very similar to those found within western “just war” teachings. And far from lending credence to Jihadist or Islamist assertions that warfare should be used by any Muslims who want to bring about political or social change, an honest and thorough recounting of Islamic military history will demonstrate clearly that recourse to violence had never been the prerogative of any individuals, however disgruntled they may be. It was always a right and responsibility bestowed only upon legitimate national leaders (caliphs, kings, emirs and presidents). The teaching of Islamic history is also replete with examples of strategic brilliance and leadership excellence that make wonderfully illuminating and inspiring case studies for today’s civil and military leaders. It goes without saying that studying the campaigns and commanders of the past will develop a Muslim’s civilizational self-respect and esprit de corps in the same way that any western reader would have their sense of civilizational or cultural pride enhanced by studying the World Wars or the strategies and lives of great commanders like Washington, Wellington, Nelson, Grant, Lee, Haig, Montgomery, and Patton.
“War is Deceit”: An Analysis of a Contentious Hadith on the Morality of Milit...Professor Joel Hayward
Particularly since that dreadful day in September 2001, when nineteen Muslims hijacked commercial airliners and deliberately crashed them into buildings or the ground in history’s worst terrorist attack, killing almost three thousand people, Islam has become a much-discussed and distrusted religion. Despite the fact that over 1.6 billion Muslims live entirely peacefully alongside or amidst people of other faith and cultural communities, Islam has attracted more ideological opponents than other religions have. In terms of the antipathy towards Islam expressed by these people, only anti-Semites seem as antagonistic towards a world religion.
This monograph is not an attack on Islam’s critics. The author believes that people have the right to like or dislike any or all religions and, regardless of perceived taste, to express their views via peaceful discourse. Islam’s most bitter critics, on the other hand, should not be surprised when their views are challenged. Islam has extraordinarily positive features which its adherents, including this author, believe should be presented as a counterbalance to the claims of its critics.
This monograph is not intended as an all-encompassing critique of Islam-hatred, nor even of its worst aspects. It is merely an attempt to build on the author’s previous work ― which argues that the Qur’an is not inherently martial and has a clear ethical code governing and constraining the use of violence for political purposes ― by analyzing one particular associated claim seemingly endlessly made by Islam’s critics. They assert that, far from being a paragon of virtue, the Islamic prophet Muhammad was deceitful and, indeed, boasted of it in several sayings recalled by followers. “War,” they quote him saying, “is deceit.” They contextualize their criticism of Muhammad’s statement that “war is deceit” by arguing that his unashamed statement proves that he was personally dishonest whenever expedient and that Islam consequently tolerates dishonesty in a way that other religions do not.
This study rejects the view that, in the wars fought by Muhammad, he acted immorally through any acts of wanton personal dishonesty (“deceit”) that constitute severe character imperfections and stain his reputation as a holy man. It argues instead that, in his quest to defeat the forces within Arabia which sought to destroy his fledgling community, Muhammad used ruse and bluff and strategic and tactical deception as a reasonable, necessary and eminently legitimate means of gaining military advantage so as to minimize suffering on both sides. It argues that, if Muhammad is to be condemned for using ruses during warfare, then for consistency and fairness his critics must also consider earlier prophets including Moses, Joshua and David, and all of history’s greatest military leaders, to have been morally corrupt merely because they also esteemed the advantages obtained through ruse.
Islamic Principles of War for the Twenty-first Century, by Professor Joel Hay...Professor Joel Hayward
Almost all western and other developed states use Principles of War as guiding ideas for military practitioners (especially those who serve at the operational and tactical levels) on how best to use combat power in order to gain maximum advantage. These Principles of War are virtually ubiquitous in cadet and officer colleges and in doctrine manuals. Islamic law, on the other hand, has nothing comparable, and least nothing from the modern world. It has always seriously and proactively engaged with ideas about how to ensure that war is fought for morally just causes. Yet, since the medieval period, Islam has not updated its thoughts on what principles might best enhance combat effectiveness in order to win battles and wars with the maximum effectiveness, the minimum use of force and the minimum likelihood of harm to the innocent. This study investigates whether one can draw such principles from the Qur’an and the life of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad that might serve as guidelines for Islamic armed forces in the twenty-first century, an era dominated by careless disregard for human life and by what is euphemistically called Collateral Damage. Within the earliest extant Arabic sources, this study identifies nine principles—these being Virtuous Objective, Legitimacy, Unity of Command and Effort, Consultative Decision-Making, Offensive Action, Defensive Security, Morale, Restraint, and Deception—that were integral in the warfighting of the Prophet. The author hopes that the analysis might, if widely read in the right circles, prompt further thought and research within Islamic states and their militaries so that something like an agreed set of Islamic Principles of War could eventually emerge and be of utility.
A Strategic Approach: GenAI in EducationPeter Windle
Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies such as Generative AI, Image Generators and Large Language Models have had a dramatic impact on teaching, learning and assessment over the past 18 months. The most immediate threat AI posed was to Academic Integrity with Higher Education Institutes (HEIs) focusing their efforts on combating the use of GenAI in assessment. Guidelines were developed for staff and students, policies put in place too. Innovative educators have forged paths in the use of Generative AI for teaching, learning and assessments leading to pockets of transformation springing up across HEIs, often with little or no top-down guidance, support or direction.
This Gasta posits a strategic approach to integrating AI into HEIs to prepare staff, students and the curriculum for an evolving world and workplace. We will highlight the advantages of working with these technologies beyond the realm of teaching, learning and assessment by considering prompt engineering skills, industry impact, curriculum changes, and the need for staff upskilling. In contrast, not engaging strategically with Generative AI poses risks, including falling behind peers, missed opportunities and failing to ensure our graduates remain employable. The rapid evolution of AI technologies necessitates a proactive and strategic approach if we are to remain relevant.
2024.06.01 Introducing a competency framework for languag learning materials ...Sandy Millin
http://sandymillin.wordpress.com/iateflwebinar2024
Published classroom materials form the basis of syllabuses, drive teacher professional development, and have a potentially huge influence on learners, teachers and education systems. All teachers also create their own materials, whether a few sentences on a blackboard, a highly-structured fully-realised online course, or anything in between. Despite this, the knowledge and skills needed to create effective language learning materials are rarely part of teacher training, and are mostly learnt by trial and error.
Knowledge and skills frameworks, generally called competency frameworks, for ELT teachers, trainers and managers have existed for a few years now. However, until I created one for my MA dissertation, there wasn’t one drawing together what we need to know and do to be able to effectively produce language learning materials.
This webinar will introduce you to my framework, highlighting the key competencies I identified from my research. It will also show how anybody involved in language teaching (any language, not just English!), teacher training, managing schools or developing language learning materials can benefit from using the framework.
June 3, 2024 Anti-Semitism Letter Sent to MIT President Kornbluth and MIT Cor...Levi Shapiro
Letter from the Congress of the United States regarding Anti-Semitism sent June 3rd to MIT President Sally Kornbluth, MIT Corp Chair, Mark Gorenberg
Dear Dr. Kornbluth and Mr. Gorenberg,
The US House of Representatives is deeply concerned by ongoing and pervasive acts of antisemitic
harassment and intimidation at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Failing to act decisively to ensure a safe learning environment for all students would be a grave dereliction of your responsibilities as President of MIT and Chair of the MIT Corporation.
This Congress will not stand idly by and allow an environment hostile to Jewish students to persist. The House believes that your institution is in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, and the inability or
unwillingness to rectify this violation through action requires accountability.
Postsecondary education is a unique opportunity for students to learn and have their ideas and beliefs challenged. However, universities receiving hundreds of millions of federal funds annually have denied
students that opportunity and have been hijacked to become venues for the promotion of terrorism, antisemitic harassment and intimidation, unlawful encampments, and in some cases, assaults and riots.
The House of Representatives will not countenance the use of federal funds to indoctrinate students into hateful, antisemitic, anti-American supporters of terrorism. Investigations into campus antisemitism by the Committee on Education and the Workforce and the Committee on Ways and Means have been expanded into a Congress-wide probe across all relevant jurisdictions to address this national crisis. The undersigned Committees will conduct oversight into the use of federal funds at MIT and its learning environment under authorities granted to each Committee.
• The Committee on Education and the Workforce has been investigating your institution since December 7, 2023. The Committee has broad jurisdiction over postsecondary education, including its compliance with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, campus safety concerns over disruptions to the learning environment, and the awarding of federal student aid under the Higher Education Act.
• The Committee on Oversight and Accountability is investigating the sources of funding and other support flowing to groups espousing pro-Hamas propaganda and engaged in antisemitic harassment and intimidation of students. The Committee on Oversight and Accountability is the principal oversight committee of the US House of Representatives and has broad authority to investigate “any matter” at “any time” under House Rule X.
• The Committee on Ways and Means has been investigating several universities since November 15, 2023, when the Committee held a hearing entitled From Ivory Towers to Dark Corners: Investigating the Nexus Between Antisemitism, Tax-Exempt Universities, and Terror Financing. The Committee followed the hearing with letters to those institutions on January 10, 202
Honest Reviews of Tim Han LMA Course Program.pptxtimhan337
Personal development courses are widely available today, with each one promising life-changing outcomes. Tim Han’s Life Mastery Achievers (LMA) Course has drawn a lot of interest. In addition to offering my frank assessment of Success Insider’s LMA Course, this piece examines the course’s effects via a variety of Tim Han LMA course reviews and Success Insider comments.
Welcome to TechSoup New Member Orientation and Q&A (May 2024).pdfTechSoup
In this webinar you will learn how your organization can access TechSoup's wide variety of product discount and donation programs. From hardware to software, we'll give you a tour of the tools available to help your nonprofit with productivity, collaboration, financial management, donor tracking, security, and more.
Horatio Lord Nelson's Warfighting Style and the Maneuver Warfare Paradigm, by Professor Joel Hayward
1. Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at
https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=fdef20
Defence Studies
ISSN: 1470-2436 (Print) 1743-9698 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/fdef20
Horatio Lord Nelson's Warfighting Style and the
Maneuver Warfare Paradigm
J. Hayward
To cite this article: J. Hayward (2001) Horatio Lord Nelson's Warfighting Style and the Maneuver
Warfare Paradigm, Defence Studies, 1:2, 15-37, DOI: 10.1080/714000025
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/714000025
Published online: 06 Sep 2010.
Submit your article to this journal
Article views: 105
View related articles
2. Horatio Lord Nelson’s Warfighting
Style and the Maneuver Warfare
Paradigm
JOEL HAYWARD
For the last 20 years or so, students of land warfare have come increasingly
to see the warfighting style called Maneuver Warfare as the apex of military
theory. The United States Marine Corps, which has formally embraced
this style as doctrine, succinctly defines it as:
a warfighting philosophy that seeks to shatter the enemy’s cohesion
through a variety of rapid, focused and unexpected actions which
create a turbulent and rapidly deteriorating situation with which the
enemy cannot cope.1
Proponents of this style call themselves maneuverists. They argue that
adoption of the ‘package’ of components integral to Maneuver Warfare
will greatly enhance combat effectiveness to the degree that smaller
maneuverist land forces can even engage and defeat far larger forces that
adhere to less sophisticated doctrines or behavioural patterns.
Maneuverists claim that the components in their package –
reconnaissance pull, the application of strength against weakness,
decentralised command, focal points of effort, maneuver, tempo and the
aim of achieving victory by collapsing the enemy’s cohesion and morale –
are not in themselves new to warfighting, but are the long-established
habits of successful commanders.
Yet, while maneuverists also claim that the combination of all these
components occurred in many battles or campaigns throughout the ages,
and brought dazzling results (both specious claims, according to other
commentators2
), they provide examples mainly from the twentieth
century and, more important, only from land warfare. The two standard
works on Maneuver Warfare,3
products of the early 1990s when this
Defence Studies, Vol.1, No.2 (Summer 2001), pp.15–37
PUBLISHED BY FRANK CASS, LONDON
Joel Hayward, Senior Lecturer in Defence and Strategic Studies, Massey University, New
Zealand.
ARTICLE
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 15
3. warfighting style soared in popularity after its claimed use in the Persian
Gulf War, provide no examples from, and few references to, the rich
treasure chest of naval history.
It is the same with the articles on Maneuver Warfare now appearing in
military journals. They focus overwhelmingly on land campaigns and
battles, with the few exceptions demonstrating that certain airpower and
joint campaigns – such as those conducted by Hitler’s Wehrmacht or the
Israeli Defense Forces – also reveal the prowess of well applied Maneuver
Warfare. Readers seeking to analyse Maneuver Warfare’s applicability to
combat on the seas that cover most of the globe can be forgiven for
noticing the absence of scholarly interest in this theme and thinking that,
in short, Maneuver Warfare must have no applicability at sea.
One can, however, easily find many fine examples of what is now
called Maneuver Warfare in seapower’s long history. This article draws
from one such example – splendidly manifest in the person of Britain’s
greatest fighting seaman, Vice-Admiral Horatio, Lord Nelson
(1758–1805) – to demonstrate that students of maneuver need not fear
turning their attention occasionally from land battles towards those fought
at sea. They may indeed be greatly enriched by doing so.
While being mindful to avoid anachronism (Maneuver Warfare’s
conceptual framework, after all, is very recent), this article shows that
Lord Nelson’s warfighting style closely resembles the modern Maneuver
Warfare paradigm. He was not fighting according to any paradigm, of
course, much less one that dates from almost 200 years after his death. He
understood naval tactics and battle according to the norms and
behavioural patterns of his own era and continuously experimented and
tested ideas, rejecting some, keeping others.
The article naturally makes no claim that Nelson’s warfighting style
was unique among sea warriors or that he contributed disproportionately
to conceptual or doctrinal developments in tactics or operational art. Even
a cursory glance at the careers of John Paul Jones, Edward Hawke and
John Jervis (one of Nelson’s mentors), to mention but a few, reveals that
their names fit almost as aptly as Nelson’s alongside Napoleon
Bonaparte’s, Erwin Rommel’s and George S. Patton’s in studies of
effective maneuverists. Yet Lord Nelson makes an ideal focus for a case
study of Maneuver Warfare at sea. Extant sources pertaining to his
fascinating life are unusually abundant and reveal that he raised the art of
war at sea to unsurpassed heights, all the while perfecting the highly
maneuverist warfighting style that gave him victory in several of naval
history’s grandest battles.
DEFENCE STUDIES
16
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 16
4. I
Maneuverists place much emphasis on what they term ‘reconnaissance
pull’, by which they mean that attacks should move in directions
identified by forward reconnaissance units, not by commanders in the rear
who want to push their forces forward along pre-selected routes. Ideally,
reconnaissance units should not only find the enemy, but also probe for
undefended or lightly defended ‘gaps’ in the enemy line (or ‘surface’) that
lead to the enemy rear.4
Then the whole force should, upon orders from
forward unit commanders, follow the ‘pull’ of the reconnaissance units
and stream through the gaps to achieve one or more penetrations and
hopefully a breakthrough.
The aim of reconnaissance pull is to transfer some decision-making
authority to forward commanders, who purportedly have a clearer and
more immediate picture of enemy strengths, dispositions and morale than
senior commanders at the rear. It is also to ensure that one’s strength is not
directed at opposing strength, but at weakness.5
This concept of avoiding
or bypassing points of strong resistance to attack critical weaknesses, a
central tenet of contemporary Maneuver Warfare, emerged as a popular
theme from the writings of British military commentator Sir Basil Liddell
Hart in the years immediately before and after World War II. It represents
a clear departure from traditional ‘Clausewitzian’ military thought. Major
General Carl von Clausewitz, the great Prussian philosopher of warfare,
writing in the 1820s, had explicitly advised that the most effective target
for any blows is found where the enemy’s mass is concentrated most
densely.6
Clausewitz was not advocating inexpert, bloody frontal assaults
against this concentrated mass, of course; merely that decision ultimately
rests upon the destruction or neutralisation of that mass so that, logically,
the primary aim of combat is to achieve that destruction or neutralisation
through aggressive and highly skilful attacks against the enemy’s mass.
Nonetheless, following Liddell Hart’s advice and ignoring
Clausewitz’s, maneuverists now argue that it makes more sense to avoid
attacking mass and, following the tactics of surfaces and gaps, to maneuver
around strength in order to attack those shaky, weak parts of the enemy
upon which he is critically reliant. Doing so, they say, offers no promise of
bloodless combat, ‘but it does offer less bloody war than a head-on bash
directly into the enemy’s strength’.7
This maneuverist emphasis on reconnaissance pull, with information
and decisions flowing upward as well as downward in the chain of
authority, and the application of strength against weakness, with strength-
on-strength clashes avoided in favour of attacks on enemy vulnerabilities,
will doubtless create a happy resonance in the minds of those who have
LORD NELSON’S WARFIGHTING STYLE 17
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 17
5. studied Lord Nelson’s fighting style. They will see many similarities
between what he and other successful naval commanders were doing and
what is now extolled as ‘best practice’.
Nelson always relied heavily on his reconnaissance elements, and
insisted on maintaining the greatest degree of tactical and operational
flexibility so that he could respond immediately to circumstances revealed
by those elements. This is not to suggest that the conduct of
reconnaissance at sea is the same as it in on land. At sea opposing fleets or
squadrons spend most of their time out of direct contact with each other,
whereas opposing land forces are routinely in direct contact or close
proximity, even when not actually in combat. This creates different
battlespace dynamics, and places different obligations on reconnaissance
assets. At sea far more effort is devoted to finding the enemy, whose
location and direction are constantly changing (unless its vessels are riding
at anchor), than on land, where the location of the enemy is usually
known, even if its strength, disposition and plans are not. Yet this does not
negate the fact that fleets have always devoted as much effort to attaining
battlespace awareness as army formations have. And Nelson, like other
great admirals, routinely allowed the flow of intelligence from his
reconnaissance vessels to shape his campaigns and determine his tactics.
Since the mid-1700s, frigates – single-gundeck warships that
functioned as scouts and convoy escort vessels due to their speed being
several knots faster than larger ships of the line – bore the lion’s share of
all naval reconnaissance responsibilities.8
Nimble yet well armed for their
size, frigates served as the ‘eyes’ of fleets and detached squadrons, trying to
locate the enemy, establish his strength, dispositions and direction of
movement and then report that information with all speed to larger fleet
units. Nelson himself, although not uniquely, referred to frigates as his
‘eyes’ at sea. ‘I am most exceedingly anxious for more eyes’, he complained
to the Secretary of State for War and Colonies shortly before the Battle of
Trafalgar in October 1805, ‘and hope the Admiralty are hastening them to
me. The last [enemy] Fleet was lost to me for want of Frigates; God forbid
this should.’9
A lack of ‘eyes’ had long plagued Nelson’s efforts to bring the enemy
to battle in advantageous circumstances. A full seven years before
Trafalgar, but only a week after his stunning victory at the Battle of the
Nile, Nelson had written to the First Lord of the Admiralty Earl Spencer:
‘My Lord, Was I to die this moment, “Want of Frigates” would be found
stamped on my heart. … [I] am suffering for want of them.’10
Nelson used his reconnaissance elements to draw him into contact
with the enemy, and also relied on them to help shape particular tactics for
DEFENCE STUDIES
18
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 18
6. employment once contact had been made. This did not involve frigates
only, but any other vessels – including larger warships – which could
probe the enemy line for weaknesses to exploit. Although the maneuverist
concept of surfaces and gaps seems applicable only to linear formations in
land battles, it does has relevance at sea, even in a slightly different form.
A line of warships (in the age of sail fleets or squadrons formed into lines
before joining battle) still had points of strength and weakness, dictated
not only by the positions of certain warships in the line, but also by tides,
winds, currents and the shape and proximity of nearby coastlines.
Early in the afternoon of 1 August 1798, for instance, the masthead
lookout in one of Nelson’s scouting ships sighted Napoleon Bonaparte’s
powerful fleet anchored in compact order of battle in Aboukir Bay, Egypt,
thus ending Nelson’s two-month hunt throughout virtually the entire
Mediterranean Sea. By the time Nelson’s 15-strong fleet closed on the
French and formed its own line of battle it was almost 5.30p.m. and
darkness was fast approaching. Few naval battles had ever occurred at
night and the French commander, Vice-Admiral François Paul, Comte de
Brueys d’Aigalliers, doubtless assumed that any reasonable foe would wait
until morning to launch an attack rather than risk a night battle on an
unfamiliar coast, which could result in ‘friendly fire’ incidents and
groundings on dangerous shoals.
Brueys had long anticipated an attack and had deployed his 13
battleships and six lesser vessels, slightly stronger than Nelson’s in overall
strength and firepower, with the possibility of a defensive battle in mind.
He anchored his ships close to the shore in line of battle, with the head of
the line close to shoals and a battery on an islet and with gaps of perhaps
160 yards between each ship. Given common winds, the shape of the bay
and the shoals near the head of the line, Brueys presumed that the British
would enter the bay in a traditional line of battle, sail from the tail of his
own line towards the van (the ships at the head) and bring his vessels
under fire in sequence. With this in mind, Brueys had placed his strongest
ships in the rear and centre, believing that Nelson’s ships would face
devastating fire as they attempted to pass alongside them toward the van.
Nelson was unorthodox, however, and had an unusually quick and
agile mind. ‘Without much previous preparation or plan’, one of his
closest friends recalled, he had ‘the faculty of discovering advantages as
they arise, and the good judgement to turn them to his use’.11
Indeed,
Nelson quickly identified the major gap in Brueys’s surfaces (to use
maneuverist parlance) which was the short stretch of water between Le
Guerrier, a 74-gun ship at the head of the French line, and the nearest
shoal. The French ships rode on single anchors, Nelson had noticed,
LORD NELSON’S WARFIGHTING STYLE 19
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 19
7. which logically meant that if there was room for the ships to swing on
single anchors, there should be room for some of his own ships to pass
around the head of the French line, hard up against the shoals, and to sail
down the landward side.12
There, Nelson presumed, lay the enemy’s critical vulnerability (to use
maneuverist jargon again): unmanned or unprepared guns, leaving no real
means of opposing an attack from the port (landward) side. Expecting to
face the British sailing along the starboard (outward) side of his ships,
Brueys would naturally have all his starboard guns and crews ready and
waiting, but not anticipating any attack from inshore, his port guns would
probably be unprepared for action. This would allow British ships sailing
along the port side of the French to fire at will while receiving, at least
initially, relatively little return fire. It would also allow them to ‘double’
(attack vessels from both sides simultaneously) several ships in the van.
There is still much debate among ‘Nelsonians’ about whether Nelson
specifically ordered one or more of his captains to squeeze through the gap
between Brueys’s van and the shoals, or whether they made the attempt
on their own initiative while aware that the daring maneuver matched
their commander’s intent and would, therefore, meet with his approval.13
The current writer is persuaded by the evidence that Nelson initiated the
bold move by hailing Captain Samuel Hood of the Zealous and asking
whether his ship could pass inshore of the French.14
This initiated a
friendly race between the Zealous and Captain Thomas Foley’s Goliath as
they jockeyed to be first to get inshore of the French in order to move
along the port side that would surely be ill defended.
Yet even if this view is wrong, and the initiative came from Foley, as
some writers insist, the move is still a splendid early example of the
Maneuver Warfare concepts of surfaces and gaps and the application of
strength against weakness, as well as with another important maneuverist
concept to be explained below: a form of decentralised command called
Directive Control. And even if Foley initiated the move, Nelson also
deserves credit. During the frustrating two-month chase through the
Mediterranean he had regularly assembled his captains and other senior
officers on his flagship and explained to them his intentions as well as
detailed tactical suggestions for attaining them regardless of whatever
particular circumstances prevailed when the enemy was located. Equally
important, he also encouraged them never to fear using initiative by acting
without orders as circumstances demanded. As one writer observed: ‘It
was Foley’s genius that he spotted the weakness. It was Nelson’s genius
that his captain felt secure enough in the admiral’s trust to exploit the
opportunity.’15
DEFENCE STUDIES
20
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 20
8. Four of Nelson’s ships were able to pass inshore of the French line,
and a fifth passed between the first and second ships to join them. The rest
completed the envelopment by sailing down the outer side of the enemy,
from the van towards the rear. Thus, with British ships engaging the
French van and centre first and moving steadily down the line towards the
rear, with the wind behind them, they were able to attack the weakest
French ships while the strong French rear was unable to come to their
rescue. This is a fine historical example of the maneuverist concept of
pitting strength against weakness. And it worked marvellously. As
Nelson’s ships came up they anchored in succession next to French ships,
so that 13 were soon engaging 8 French, and from positions of great
advantage. Their concentrated firepower proved overwhelming, especially
given that the British rate of fire almost doubled that of the less expert
French, forcing the French ships to strike their colours one by one.
They then turned their attention to the French ships in the rear.
Shortly after dawn the last guns stopped firing to reveal a British victory
of unimagined totality. Indeed, it was the most devastating naval victory of
the eighteenth century. For no ships lost of their own the British had
virtually annihilated the French fleet in a matter of 10 hours. Six ships of
the line had struck their colours, Brueys’s flagship had sunk after a huge
explosion ripped her apart and four other ships were grounded on the
beach with heavy damage. Only two ships of the line escaped (to be
recaptured at a later date anyway). Casualty figures were equally one-
sided, to mention only the dead: 218 British and 1,700 French perished.
The Battle of the Nile is a superb early example of the maneuverist
concepts of surfaces and gaps and the application of strength against
weakness, but it is only one of many examples to be found in Nelson’s
illustrious career. Before he attained flag rank and commanded his own
squadrons and fleets he had already demonstrated on several occasions
that he understood these principles. Even when captain of a single ship
within a fleet he skillfully attacked far stronger opponents by avoiding
their firepower and targeting their weaknesses. Off Genoa on 13 March
1795, for instance, Nelson pulled his 64-gun Agamemnon out of the British
line and sailed straight for the 84-gun Ça Ira, which was being towed by a
frigate after suffering damage to her masts during a collision with Jean
Bart, another French ship of 74 guns.
Supporting Ça Ira was the 120-gun Sans Culotte (later renamed L’Orient
and made famous as Brueys’s flagship at the Nile) and the Jean Bart.
Nelson was massively outgunned and would have suffered quick
destruction if he fell under the enemy’s broadside fire. Undaunted, he
sought and immediately found a chink in the enemy’s armour: the stern
LORD NELSON’S WARFIGHTING STYLE 21
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 21
9. of Ça Ira, which, being towed, was less maneuverable than usual. Like all
ships of the line, Ça Ira’s stern had few guns and was highly vulnerable to
attack. With skill and courage (he later told his wife that ‘a brave man runs
no more risk than a coward’16
), Nelson tacked the Agamemnon up under
the rear of the heavily-armed Frenchman, thus gaining safety from the
other French ships, and, at almost point-blank range, fired double-loaded
broadsides again and again into her vulnerable stern. For over two hours
he maneuvered back and forth behind Ça Ira, which he continuously
raked while never allowing her to turn her own broadside against him.
When Agamemnon finally broke off the engagement, with only seven men
wounded, 110 Frenchmen lay dead and dying17
and their ship was, Nelson
said, ‘a perfect wreck’.18
II
As noted, Nelson’s command style before and during the Battle of the
Nile is a nice early example of the Maneuver Warfare concept now called
Directive Control. Actually, maneuverists use various terms
synonymously to denote this form of decentralised command: Directive
Control, Mission Tactics and even the German phrase, Auftragstaktik (lit.
‘task-focused tactics’). Put simply, Directive Control means teaching
subordinates mastery of their individual jobs and collective tactics,
trusting them to act responsibly and with initiative, telling them what result
is intended (usually defined as the condition or position you want the
enemy to be in after the engagement), then leaving them with the freedom
and confidence to determine how best to attain it.19
In other words, commanders need to convey their intent, telling their
trusted subordinates what they want achieved, but not, at least in much
detail, the method they must employ to do it. General George S. Patton,
Junior, the warrior Nelson resembles most (for his vanity and craving for
fame as well as his great flair for battle), expressed it thus: ‘Never tell
people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you
with their ingenuity.’20
Even a superficial reading of Nelson’s 35-year naval career, from 12-
year-old midshipman to 47-year-old martyr and immortal hero, reveals
him as one of military history’s greatest and most consistent proponents
of what we now call Directive Control.21
As a young officer learning his
‘trade’ he was keen to study what had brought success in previous
generations to the giants of British seapower, Admirals Lords Hawke and
Howe.22
The then Sir Edward Hawke’s victory at Quiberon Bay in 1759,
for example, was, despite the limitations of eighteenth century naval
DEFENCE STUDIES
22
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 22
10. technology and tactics, a splendid example of maneuverist warfighting. It
demonstrated to young officers like Nelson just how much could be
accomplished with the minimum of direct command and control when
subordinate captains were thoroughly familiar with their commander’s
intent, schooled in appropriate tactics, inspired by the commander’s
example and trusted by him to use their initiative. Hawke and Nelson
actually had a connection; Captain William Locker, one of Nelson’s
important early mentors, had served with Hawke and come under his
influence during his period of famous activity.
Shortly before his own great victory at the Nile Nelson also had the
good fortune of serving under Admiral Sir John Jervis, who demanded
very high standards from his captains, but, by training and trusting them,
achieved excellent results. On 1 December 1796, for instance, Jervis
entrusted Nelson with what he knew would be a difficult mission: the
evacuation of British forces from Corsica. Jervis’s written order is a model
of its kind. He stated his intent clearly but simply and then informed
Nelson that he should feel at liberty to accomplish it as he saw best.
‘Having experienced the most important effects from your enterprise and
ability’, said Jervis, ‘upon various occasions since I have had the honour to
command the Mediterranean, I leave entirely to your judgement the time and
manner of carrying this critical and arduous service into execution.’23
Needless to say, Nelson lived up to Jervis’s expectations.
Jervis’s respect for Nelson bore sweet fruit again on 14 February 1797,
when the old admiral gained victory in the Battle of Cape St Vincent. This
battle firmly proved the worth of trust – both of and from one’s
subordinates – and the clear communication of expectations, expressed
not only in terms of the results that are wanted but also of the skills,
commitment and initiative that each person must possess. Jervis’s 15-
strong fleet encountered a greatly superior Spanish force off Cape St
Vincent in Spain and the admiral immediately ordered its attack, aware
that the 27 Spanish vessels were of adequate quality but their crews and
commanders were not.
Jervis may have trusted his subordinates, and wanted them to use
initiative, but he was nonetheless of an older generation, was accustomed
to exercising authority through centralised command, and therefore liked
to control his engagements and battles by issuing signals from the
flagship.24
Nelson recognised this, of course, but also knew that the
spontaneous circumstances of battle often rendered centralised command
ineffective.
During the action off Cape St Vincent, Nelson, then a commodore on
board the 74-gun Captain, watched with mounting frustration and then
LORD NELSON’S WARFIGHTING STYLE 23
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 23
11. outright angst as circumstances developed beyond Jervis’s ability to
control them with traditional maneuvers and communications by signals.
Nelson saw a fleeting opportunity to cut off several ships in the Spanish
van that seemed likely to escape due to slow and complex British
maneuvers ordered by Jervis. On his own initiative, but still with Jervis’s
overall battle objectives in mind,25
he spontaneously wore the Captain
from last ship but two out of the British line of battle, passed back through
it, and attacked the Spanish van. Even though Nelson knew that Spanish
ships were poorly manned and incapable of reaching the British rate of
gunfire (and he had long favoured regular tactical drills to make his crews
as fast and efficient as possible26
), his action was still highly courageous. It
also directly violated the Fighting Orders that had governed British naval
tactics for generations, and occurred without approval from Jervis.
Yet even the conservative old admiral saw its genius and, with the same
signal system that had almost allowed his enemy to escape, promptly
ordered its reinforcement (a marvellous early example of reconnaissance
pull). Nelson’s actions secured the victory and earned Jervis’s eternal
gratitude. Sir Robert Calder, the cautious Flag Captain, later complained
to Jervis that Nelson’s action was unauthorised, to which the admiral
replied: ‘It certainly was so … and if you ever commit such a breach of
your orders, I will forgive you also.’27
This battle, the Nile and Nelson’s one-eyed 1801 disobedience of
Vice-Admiral Sir Hyde Parker’s signals during the Battle of Copenhagen,
when he chose not to break off battle as his less aggressive commander had
instructed, made Horatio Nelson a household name in England. More
important, these actions reinforced in his mind the great value of
imparting to his own subordinates the wealth of tactical and operational
knowledge he had spent decades learning, as well as empowering them
with confidence that he completely trusted them to act on their own
initiative when tactical circumstances dictated.
Five months after the Battle of Cape St Vincent, Admiral Jervis
dispatched Nelson, now a Rear-Admiral, with a detached squadron of
eight ships to attack the Spanish town of Santa Cruz de Tenerife in the
Canary Islands. To ensure that his plans were well understood, Nelson
summoned his captains to the Theseus for conferences no fewer than four
times; once before sailing and again on 17, 20, and 21 July.28
They
discussed the disposition of forces and assets, Nelson’s tactical plans and
the desired endstate, but Nelson reassured his captains that, as
circumstances dictated, they were trusted to use their initiative and would
be given considerable tactical latitude. To Captain Thomas Troubridge, for
example, who was to lead the forces landed at Santa Cruz, Nelson advised
DEFENCE STUDIES
24
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 24
12. that he could ‘pursue such other methods as you judge most proper for
speedily effecting my orders, which are to possess myself of all cargoes and
treasures which may be landed in the Island of Teneriffe’.29
The attack on Santa Cruz was a miserable failure – the glaring
aberration in Nelson’s career – and cost him 343 casualties, either killed
or wounded, and the loss of his own right arm, amputated after taking a
shot above the elbow. Three factors largely outside of Nelson’s control –
the state of the sea off Santa Cruz during the summer, unfamiliarity with
the mountains behind Santa Cruz and the prevailing July heat – caused
initial setbacks. But the defeat itself stemmed from Nelson’s response to
those setbacks: allowing pride to prevail over sound judgement, he made
a valiant but ill-considered departure from his usual maneuverist instincts
by launching a frontal attack on the enemy’s strongest point.30
Although he
placed no blame on others, and no-one placed it on him, the defeat at
Santa Cruz was a bitter pill for Nelson to swallow.
During both the Battle of the Nile, discussed above, and the Battle of
Copenhagen (2 April 1801), Nelson continued to bring his captains and
officers into his confidence, brief them fully on his intentions, and convey
his trust in their ability to respond to unforeseen circumstances by looking
for and making the most of opportunities without waiting for orders. He
took communication, training and trust very seriously, and remarked with
all honesty after the Nile that, without knowing and trusting his captains,
‘he would not have hazarded the attack: that there was little room, but he
was sure each would find a hole to creep in at’.31
Nelson’s statements of
total trust in his captains can be contrasted with Napoleon’s contempt for
his marshals. ‘These people think they are indispensable’, the French
emperor harshly claimed. ‘They don’t know I have a hundred division
commanders who can take their place.’32
Even during the critical Trafalgar campaign of 1805, when the weight
of the British people’s faith in him caused him acute anxiety, Nelson never
displayed concern at the ability of his commanders, much less treated
them with Napoleonic disdain. But then he never shared Napoleon’s
petty guarding of military knowledge and fear of sharing glory. On the
contrary, Nelson wanted his captains to know as much as possible and
went to great lengths to pass on his accumulated wisdom. Though he
initially knew a minority of the captains in his new command, and realised
that not many had ever participated in fleet battle, he immediately took
steps to school them in a wide range of tactical options and to familiarise
them with the particular plan (the so-called ‘Nelson touch’33
) he intended
to execute. In a series of conferences disguised as dinner parties aboard his
flagship, he gave tactical lessons that distilled complex maneuvers down to
LORD NELSON’S WARFIGHTING STYLE 25
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 25
13. a level that each captain could understand. One lieutenant in the Victory
later recalled that ‘the frequent communications he [Nelson] had with his
Admirals and captains put them in possession of all his plans’ and made
his intentions known to virtually every officer of the fleet.34
Nelson also stressed to them the importance of flexibility. ‘Something
must be left to chance’, he told them in a tactical memorandum of 9
October 1805, ‘nothing is sure in a Sea Fight beyond all others.’35
He added
that, if communications became confused during battle, they need not
worry unduly because ‘no Captain can do very wrong if he places his Ship
alongside that of an enemy’. There, he knew, the better British rate of fire
would really count. To Vice-Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood, his second in
command, he wrote a marvellous note that so perfectly sums up Directive
Control that it deserves to be read by every maneuverist: ‘I send you my
Plan of Attack’, he wrote, ‘as far as a man dare venture to guess at the very
uncertain position the Enemy may be found in. But, my dear friend, it is
[designed only] to place you perfectly at ease respecting my intentions, and
to give full scope to your judgement for carrying them into effect.’36
III
Proponents of Maneuver Warfare happily call themselves maneuverists
because they believe that skilful and effective maneuvering is the cardinal
feature in their warfighting style. By maneuver they mean something
more than just the movement of troops. In other words, merely moving
reinforcements from rear areas to the front does not constitute maneuver;
nor does advancing in linear fashion against an enemy line, à la some of
Napoleonic land warfare and much of World War I on the Western Front.
Maneuverists use the term far more specifically to denote the movement
of forces to gain either positional or psychological advantage over the
enemy with the aim of seeking his defeat, even if not necessarily his
destruction.37
Inexpert head-to-head clashes of forces, especially in linear
formations, is not covered by this definition.
For more than a century before the age of Nelson fleet tactics had been
based on the line of battle, which involved fleets or squadrons
approaching in long but orderly lines. They engaged each other obliquely
or in parallel, with each ship seeking to place itself alongside a similar or
weaker opponent. Broadsides dominated this linear form of battle, and
victory almost always went to the side that possessed the most and fastest
guns (usually the better trained British). Yet victory was seldom complete,
and usually consisted of the capture or destruction of a small number of
enemy vessels (perhaps two or three), while the majority escaped to fight
another day.
DEFENCE STUDIES
26
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 26
14. Nelson was a passionate student of naval tactics.38
Deeply impressed by
the more significant victories gained in the Battle of the Saintes (1782), the
Glorious First of June (1794), the Battle of St Vincent (1797) and the
Battle of Camperdown (also 1797), he could not help but notice that
tactical innovations brought positive results. He consequently developed
his own theory of warfighting, one that placed great emphasis on a new
type of maneuver: concentrating all his focus and strength on a portion of
the enemy’s line (usually the most vulnerable section, as noted above),
separating it from possible support, defeating it in detail and then dealing
with the rest.
This idea is remarkably similar to the Maneuver Warfare concept of the
‘Schwerpunkt’ (lit. ‘heavy point’, or focal point), which refers to the
concentration of focus, effort and strength at a particular point in space and
time. Using all available intelligence as well as reconnaissance pull, the
commander should determine the most effective place to direct his effort
and forces towards in order to have the maximum effect on the opponent.
He should then use skilful maneuver to engage the enemy at that point,
ensuring that the strike comes at the most useful time, usually in order to
maximise surprise and pre-empt enemy reinforcements.39
In the
Napoleonic period, only two of the famous warriors to emerge in that era
stand out as consistent practitioners of this idea: Napoleon and Nelson.
Like Napoleon, Nelson clearly aimed for complete victories, and used
maneuver and focal points as vital tools. He conducted some frightfully
bold squadron and fleet maneuvers to gain positional advantage over, and
concentration against, carefully selected enemy elements. ‘I am of the
opinion’, he once told a cautious senior commander when recommending
a daring attack, ‘that the boldest measures are the safest; and our Country
demands a most vigorous exertion of her force, directed with
judgement.’40
His ‘vigorous’ maneuvers included the Battles of St Vincent,
when he pulled his vessel (and several supporting ships) out of the line
without instructions to cut off a Spanish movement; the Battle of the
Nile, when he swooped down on the French fleet from the unexpected
end of the line and placed ships inside where the French thought they
would never sail; and the Battle of Copenhagen, when he sailed along the
Danish line from an unexpected direction (up a shallow channel behind a
mud bank, where Danish firepower was weakest).
These maneuvers all included great risk, speed, surprise and
concentration, as did Nelson’s greatest fleet maneuver: his bold but very
dangerous two-squadron attack to break the Combined Franco-Spanish
line off Cape Trafalgar. Through skilful maneuver he concentrated 27
British ships against 20 of the enemy’s and, through British superiority in
LORD NELSON’S WARFIGHTING STYLE 27
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 27
15. ship-to-ship tactics and a faster rate of fire, gained his most impressive
victory.
While Nelson rejected the traditional line-ahead approach and
maneuvered to gain positional advantage, he also believed that his new
tactics – which exploited the elements of speed, surprise and
concentration of fire – would greatly enhance the likelihood of attaining
the enemy’s destruction or collapse because of their psychological shock
value. In short, he became convinced that his bold attacks would (to quote
again from the modern US Marine Corps definition of Maneuver
Warfare) ‘shatter the enemy’s cohesion … and create a turbulent and
rapidly deteriorating situation with which the enemy cannot cope’.41
Collingwood later acknowledged that Nelson’s warfighting style
simply overwhelmed enemies, who were unable to think of effective
responses before it was too late. ‘It was indeed a charming thing,’ he
observed, recalling Nelson’s tactics at the Battle of the Nile.42
‘It was the
promptitude, as much as the vigour of the attack, which gave him the
superiority so very soon; the Frenchman found himself assailed before he
determined how best he should repel the assault.’ On another occasion
Collingwood recalled that, ‘an enemy that commits a false step in his
[Nelson’s] view is ruined, and it comes on him with an impetuosity that
allows him no time to recover’.43
Nelson’s emphasis on audacious and fast moves designed to confuse
and hopefully paralyse enemy commanders (I ‘can’t bear tame and slow
measures,’ he once told his wife44
) is a superb early example of the modern
maneuverist concept of ‘tempo’. This proffers that ‘all actions cause
reactions’ and the unit or person who acts consistently at a faster pace than
the opponent will force him to react defensively and without time to
advance his own plans or create adequate responses. This concept is now
referred to in military circles by the buzzword ‘OODA Loop’, which
stands for the sequential steps in any rational decision: Observe, Orient,
Decide, Act.45
According to Korean War veteran Colonel John Boyd, who
first articulated the concept in terms of its role in warfighting, the person
who goes through this series of steps (or ‘loop’) quicker than his opponent
does will be ‘inside his decision-cycle’ and thus able to prevent him
resisting effectively.46
It would be anachronistic to say that Nelson understood combat in
these terms. He naturally had no idea that he was conducting time-
competitive ‘OODA Loops’ to get inside his enemy’s decision-cycle. Yet
the general idea is the same: he knew he was hitting the enemy so fast,
hard and cunningly that he was rendering him unable to see through the
chaos and disorder in time to plan responses. Demanding an immediate
DEFENCE STUDIES
28
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 28
16. attack that would take the Danes by surprise and rob them of any
initiative, he said before the Battle of Copenhagen: ‘Let it [the attack] be
by the Sound, by the Belt, or anyhow; only lose not an hour.’47
He clearly
understood the psychological impact of rapid, audacious or unusual
moves. As he explained to a confidant shortly before the Battle of
Trafalgar: ‘I will tell you what I think of it [the maneuver he planned to
use]. I think it will surprise and confound the enemy. They won’t know
what I am about.’48
IV
One might think that the remarkable similarities between Nelson’s
warfighting style and the modern Maneuver Warfare paradigm end once
the concept of destruction is analysed. Many biographers of Nelson insist
(to quote one) that he ‘always sought the annihilation of his enemy’,
meaning that he aimed for nothing less than the physical destruction of all
engaged vessels and, by logical extension, the crews that kept them
functioning.49
This would certainly put him at odds with most modern
maneuverists, who argue that one need not destroy the enemy physically
if, through applying all the principles of Maneuver Warfare outlined
above, one can so wreak havoc with his ability to resist and wage further
warfare that he becomes irrelevant as a threat or a restriction on national
will. In other words, it is not necessary to destroy an enemy to defeat him.
A cursory survey of Nelson’s words and deeds suggests that he did
indeed want to destroy his enemies. After the engagement with the Ça Ira,
outlined above, he was bitterly disappointed that Vice-Admiral William
Hotham had not ordered a pursuit of the French fleet. Fourteen British
ships had captured only two French, yet Hotham said: ‘We must be
contented. We have done very well.’50
Nelson insisted that, had they taken
ten ships and allowed the eleventh to escape, he would not have
considered the victory total.51
Similarly, for months after the Battle of the
Nile (which established a grim ‘record’ for its level of destruction and
damage inflicted by British warships on an enemy fleet) he regretted that
two French ships of the line and two frigates had managed to escape. He
took great delight in learning of their eventual capture or damage.
Nelson despised partial measures – ‘half a victory would but half
content me’, he told his friend and prize agent on 6 September 180552
–
and often used blunt language to describe his intentions. Reassuring the
same person three weeks later that he was not depressed by his failure to
catch the Combined Fleet, he added: ‘my mind is calm, and I have only to
think of destroying our inveterate foe’.53
LORD NELSON’S WARFIGHTING STYLE 29
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 29
17. The word ‘annihilation’ had also begun creeping more frequently into
his letters and dispatches after the Peace of Amiens collapsed in May 1803
and he realised he would have to defend Britain in a final showdown with
Napoleon’s fleet. Arriving off Toulon in July 1803 to watch a French fleet
within the port, he stated: ‘My first object must be to keep the French fleet
in check and, if they put to sea, to have force enough with me to annihilate
them.’54
When it appeared in April 1805 that the enemy fleet might be engaged
by a British force under Admiral Lord Gardner, Nelson wished him luck
and hoped that he would ‘annihilate’ them.55
Even during a period of
home leave in late August 1805, only seven weeks before Trafalgar, he
expressed hope that the Combined Franco-Spanish Fleet, if engaged by
another British admiral in his absence, would be ‘met with and
annihilated’.56
And on 5 October 1805, less than three weeks before the climactic
battle, he informed Lord Barham, First Lord of the Admiralty, that he
hoped more British ships would soon arrive to spoil the plans of the
Franco-Spanish force and that, ‘as an Enemy’s Fleet they may be
annihilated’.57
This was real fighting talk.
The word ‘annihilation’ is almost identical in meaning and usage to the
German word ‘Vernichtung’ (now often translated as ‘extermination’, a far
more specific and cruel meaning than its earlier rendering as ‘destruction’)
used by the Prussian war philosopher Clausewitz to describe the type of
battle best able to deliver total victory. During the Napoleonic period both
‘annihilation’ and ‘Vernichtung’ denoted reduction of something to the
state of nothing; that is, an object’s physical destruction or disintegration.
An action that might fit this meaning, for instance, is the grinding of a
dense solid into a fine powder by a pharmacist using a mortar and pestle.
Many students of war believe that both Clausewitz and Nelson
advocated inflicting the maximum bloodshed on the battlefield; in other
words, that they measured success in terms of a friend-foe casualty
calculation and considered victory was won by the side that inflicted
unsustainable or unbearable losses on the enemy. This interpretation
overstates Clausewitz’s argument. He did write such bloodthirsty-
sounding things as ‘Destruction of the enemy’s military forces is in reality
the object of all combat’58
and ‘What is overcoming the enemy? Always the
destruction [‘Vernichtung’] of his military force, whether it be by death,
or wounds, or any means.’59
Yet a careful reading of Clausewitz shows that he never saw blood-
letting as the end in itself, merely as a means to the end, and he never said
that it was the only, or even most desirable means. The objective
DEFENCE STUDIES
30
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 30
18. Clausewitz advocated was the imposition of one’s will over the enemy so
that he would cease to threaten safety and interfere with the attainment or
continuation of national policies. This could be achieved through a variety
of non-military means, particularly diplomacy, but, if battle had to be
joined, the desired goal was still not destruction for its own sake or as a
measure of victory, but the eradication of the enemy’s ability to spread
fear, cause harm, or inflict loss of life. In other words, the desired goal of
battle was disarming the enemy and rendering him non-functional.60
‘Destruction’, Clausewitz explained, means ‘reducing a military force to
such a state that it is no longer able to prosecute warfare.’61
Lord Nelson’s position, it would seem, has been likewise overstated.
He never set down his military ideas in a thorough and systematic fashion
– and certainly never wrote anything comparable to Clausewitz’s
masterpiece, On War – so scholars have had little alternative but to pick out
passages scattered throughout his letters and dispatches and to compare
them to the conduct and outcome of his battles. When they do so, they
notice that Nelson said certain things that eventually occurred. They
logically deduce, therefore, that they happened in their precise manner
because Nelson planned them to do so. In other words, if Nelson used
certain words to describe a forthcoming battle, and that description
matched the actual event, he must not only have chosen his words
carefully and with precise meanings in mind, but also resolved to put
them into action. According to this logic, Nelson must have really aimed
to destroy physically all enemies in each of his major engagements.
It is clear that Nelson aimed for total victory, and in battle showed little
concern for resulting enemy deaths (‘I hope and believe that some
hundreds of French are gone to hell’, he told Emma Hamilton after a very
unsuccessful raid on Boulogne in August 180162
). But that does not mean
he desired the enemy’s total physical annihilation, despite his frequent
rhetoric to this effect after the collapse of the Peace of Amiens in May
1803. He was in fact a remarkably complex mixture of ruthlessness and
humanity, who mercilessly unleashed the full power of his forces at the
start of battles but, once victory had been attained, usually ended them
with an almost paradoxical humanity. Available sources actually indicate
that, while he did hope his last big battle with the French would end in a
victory surpassing his previous achievements,63
his thinking was similar to
Clausewitz’s (and more in keeping with modern maneuverists than
previously thought). Nelson saw battle as a means of gaining personal
glory (which he always craved) but, much more important, he recognised
that the primary function of battle was the removal of all threats to British
safety and interests caused by the enemy’s forces. This need not be
LORD NELSON’S WARFIGHTING STYLE 31
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 31
19. achieved by total physical destruction and great bloodshed if the enemy’s
cohesion, morale and will to fight could be otherwise shattered and his
forces reduced to irrelevance.
Ships of the line were, in any event, remarkably tough vessels, and
their physical destruction through burning or sinking was not easily
achieved. Damaging them to the point of combat uselessness or capturing
them for prize money and later addition to the British fleet were easier and
were usually attempted as a battle objective. Throughout the entire
Napoleonic period these actions were also accomplished at a greater rate.
This, it seems, is what Nelson, like most of his contemporaries, aimed for
as much as he did physical destruction. The result of all these actions –
capturing, seriously crippling, forcing aground, burning and sinking – was
the removal of enemy ships from any future use in threats, coercion or
combat, and that was precisely what Nelson wanted. He saw no real
difference in the relative value of these actions (he certainly never
expressed greater pleasure in sinking a ship and killing her crew than in
capturing them) and considered all these actions ‘destruction’ if it resulted
in ship losses to the enemy.
Throughout late 1804, for instance, Nelson complained bitterly about
the many pirates and privateers that interdicted British shipping and
caused other problems to his fleet. He informed one of his captains that
he wanted the pirates ‘kept in pretty good check, and destroyed the
moment they attempt to proceed without the protection of neutrality’.64
Yet he mentioned to another officer his hope that he would soon ‘capture
or destroy more of those piratical Privateers’.65
Likewise, when Spain
formally sided with France against Britain in November 1804 Nelson
instructed his captains and commanders to use their ‘utmost endeavour to
capture, seize, burn, sink or destroy’ any Spanish vessels.66
This also applied to fleet actions. Capturing or sinking ships was all the
same to Nelson, so long as they were robbed from enemy service and
consequently eradicated as a threat and nuisance. On 23 July 1805, for
instance, he notified Lord Barham that he had almost caught the enemy
fleet in the West Indies and that, even though the outcome of battle ‘would
have been in the hands of Providence’, he humbly believed that ‘the
Enemy would have been fit for no active service after such a Battle’.67
This view of ‘destruction’ – that it includes the capture and crippling
as well as the sinking or wrecking of enemy ships – allows us to make
more sense of Nelson’s afore-mentioned complaints about Admiral
Hotham’s failure to pursue the French fleet after the inconclusive
engagements in 1795 had resulted in only two French ships captured. Had
they taken 10 ships out of 11, Nelson had said, it still would not have
DEFENCE STUDIES
32
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 32
20. satisfied him. Clearly his word ‘taken’ does not refer specifically to the
physical destruction of vessels, but to their removal from French service
through capture, permanent damage or sinking. It is the same with
Trafalgar. On the day of battle Nelson asked Captain Henry Blackwood
what he would consider a victory, to which the frigate captain replied: ‘if
14 ships were captured, it would be a glorious result’.68
Nelson replied that
he would not be satisfied with anything short of 20. Again, this
demonstrates that in the great commander’s mind the important thing was
to rob the enemy of effective naval strength, and this could be
accomplished by physical destruction or capture.
In fact, if one looks at the Trafalgar campaign of September and
October 1805 one does not find Nelson aiming to destroy the same
percentage of ships as he had during the Battle of the Nile in August 1798.
Then he had captured and destroyed 11 of 13 ships of the line and most
frigates and smaller craft (thereby reducing Napoleon’s Egyptian fleet by
almost 90 per cent).
Even though he often threatened destruction and annihilation and
wanted a battle of unsurpassed totality, and never shied away from
inflicting a lot of bloodshed, in 1805 he realistically aimed for the level of
accomplishment that would secure mastery of the seas for Britain,
reassure the British people that their islands were safe69
, remove the threat
of invasion or mischief by Napoleon, and provide security to Britain’s
allies. He measured this level of accomplishment at 20 enemy ships of the
line robbed from Napoleon’s fleet of 3370
, which means that he aimed to
reduce (or ‘degrade’, to use today’s jargon) the Combined Fleet by 60 per
cent. This was remarkably ambitious (at Trafalgar he was slightly
outnumbered, and none of his illustrious predecessors had taken 20 ships
in all their battles put together) but it does not support the claim, often made
by writers, that ‘the total destruction of the enemy force’ had become the
admiral’s goal.71
As it happened, the British fleet at Trafalgar lost none of its own ships
but took or destroyed 19 French and Spanish ships in about six hours.
Nelson would have been ecstatic about the safety of his fleet and the
destruction of the enemy. ‘I would willingly have half of mine burned to
affect their destruction’, he had claimed during a moment of gloom nine
months earlier.72
This Franco-Spanish destruction rate of 57 per cent may
sound highly attritional and make some maneuverists squeamish. Yet one
must remember that this refers to ship, not human, losses. For only 1,690
casualties of their own, the British killed and wounded 5,860 Frenchmen
and Spaniards and took a further 20,000 prisoner. In terms of the numbers
present at the battle (over 50,000) and the scale and significance of the
LORD NELSON’S WARFIGHTING STYLE 33
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 33
21. victory gained these are certainly not horrific losses. They compare
favourably – almost identically – with the battlefield casualty rate (8 per
cent friendly, 20 per cent enemy) achieved by the German Wehrmacht,
hailed by modern maneuverists as fine exponents of their warfighting
style, during its successful Blitzkrieg campaigns from 1939 to 1941.
And they compare extremely well with the casualty rates of many
Napoleonic land battles, which were more attritional than many people
think. At Albuera (1811), for example, the British and French both
suffered 44 per cent casualties, and at Waterloo (1815), 24 and 35 per cent
respectively.73
In short, although Nelson clearly realised that taking ships
inevitably meant killing many crewmen, he was no ‘attritionist’.
Conclusions
Lord Nelson developed a warfighting style that, given allowances for
differences between land and sea environments, is very similar to that now
called Maneuver Warfare and hailed by its many advocates as the most
intelligent and effective means of waging war at the tactical and
operational levels. Nelson saw warfare in the same uncomplicated terms
as George S. Patton. ‘War is a very simple thing’, the best Allied
maneuverist of World War II said, ‘and the determining characteristics are
self-confidence, speed and audacity.’74
Were Nelson listening from the
grave, he doubtless would have replied: ‘Hear, Hear!’
Nelson learned by studying battles fought in previous generations by
the naval heroes he idolised, and by experimenting with feelings and ideas
given to him by instinct and intuition. His success, he knew, depended on
psychological as well as physical attack, and he endeavoured to master
both. Endowed with an aggressive spirit and an awareness that partial
victories only meant more battles to fight at later stages, he aimed for total
victory. That does not mean, despite his own bombast, that he aimed for
total annihilation. He aimed for what would shatter the enemy’s will to
fight, give Britain and its allies safety and freedom to carry out their
national policies, and deny the enemy the ability to cause further mischief
to them. That meant defeating the enemy, not necessarily destroying him.
Yet, Nelson, a complex mix of ruthlessness and humanity, never
flinched from hitting the enemy cunningly and ruthlessly to inflict as
much damage and bloodshed as possible for the minimum loss of his own
sailors’ lives. He instinctively used virtually all the concepts now extolled
by maneuverists – reconnaissance pull, the application of strength against
weakness, directive control, focal points of effort, maneuver, tempo and
the aim of achieving victory through pre-empting the enemy’s decisions
DEFENCE STUDIES
34
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 34
22. and shattering his will to fight – to gain the stunning victories that gave his
country naval supremacy for a full century. He never knew it in these
terms, but a maneuverist Nelson surely was.
NOTES
1. MCDP 1: Warfighting (US Marine Corps 1997) p.73.
2. Cf. Daniel P
. Bolger, ‘Maneuver Warfare Reconsidered’, in Richard D. Hooker Jr (ed.)
Maneuver Warfare: An Anthology (Novato, CA: Presidio Press 1993) pp.19–41.
3. Hooker, Maneuver Warfare (note 2); Robert Leonhard, The Art of Maneuver: Maneuver-Warfare
Theory and AirLand Battle (Novato, CA: Presidio Press 1991). Both authors draw inspiration
from the ‘grand-daddy’ of maneuverist works: Richard E. Simpkin’s seminal Race to the
Swift: Thoughts on Twenty-first Century Warfare (London: Brassey’s 1984). They also refer
frequently to another pioneering but less sturdy work: William S. Lind’s Maneuver Warfare
Handbook (Boulder, CO: Westview Press 1985). These studies also pay no attention to
warfare at sea.
4. Hooker (note 2) p. 10; Leonhard (note 3) p.114.
5. MCDP 1-3: Tactics (USMarine Corps 1997) p.30.
6. Carl von Clausewitz, Vom Kriege: Hinterlassenes Werk Ungekürzter Text (Berlin: Ullstein,
1999 edition. First published in 1832) pp.671–2.
7. Hooker (note 2) p.10.
8. Steven E. Maffeo, Most Secret and Confidential: Intelligence in the Age of Nelson (Annapolis,
MD: Naval Institute Press 2000) pp.91–103.
9. Letter to Viscount Castlereagh, 5 Oct. 1805, in Vice-Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson, The
Dispatches and Letters of Vice-Admiral Lord Viscount Nelson, with Notes by Sir Nicholas Harris
Nicolas, GCMG, 7 vols. (London: Chatham, 1998 reprint edition. First published in
1844–46) [Hereafter cited as DLLN], Volume VII, p.76.
10. Letter to Earl Spencer, 9 Aug. 1798, DLLN, Vol.III, p.98.
11. Rear-Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood to Dr Alexander Carlyle, 24 Aug. 1801, in E. Hughes
(ed.) The Private Correspondence of Admiral Lord Collingwood (London: Navy Records Society
1957) p.130.
12. Berry’s narrative in DLLN, Vol.III, p.50.
13. Several writers believe the bold maneuver was the spontaneous decision of Captain
Thomas Foley of the Goliath, who moved inside the French fleet without waiting for
Nelson’s order. See L. Kennedy, Nelson’s Band of Brothers (London: Odhams 1951) p.128;
E. Bradford, Nelson: The Essential Hero (London: Macmillan 1977) p.200; L. Foreman and
E.B. Phillips, Napoleon’s Lost Fleet: Bonaparte, Nelson and the Battle of the Nile (London:
Discovery Books 1999) pp.123–4.
14. I am especially persuaded by Captain Hood’s letter to Lord Bridport shortly after the battle,
published in DLLN, Vol. III, pp.63–4. See also G. Bennett, Nelson the Commander (NY:
Scribner’s 1972) p.131; T. Pocock, Horatio Nelson (London: Pimlico 1994, orig. 1988)
p.163.
15. Foreman and Phillips (note 13) p.124.
16. Nelson’s Letter to His Wife, 12 April 1795, in G. Naish (ed.) Nelson’s Letters to His Wife and
Other Documents 1785–1831 (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul/Navy Records Society
1958) p.206.
17. Nelson’s Letter to His Wife, 14 March 1795, ibid. p.200.
18. DLLN, Vol.II, p.14.
19. Hooker (note 2) pp.10–13; Leonhard, pp.113–18.
20. G. Patton, War as I Knew It (NY: Bantam, 1979 edition. First published 1947) p.338.
21. The best analysis of Nelson’s command and control style is undoubtedly found in Michael
A. Palmer, ‘The Soul’s Right Hand: Command and Control in the Age of Fighting Sail,
1652–1827’, The Journal of Military History 61 (Oct. 1997) pp.679–706.
LORD NELSON’S WARFIGHTING STYLE 35
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 35
23. 22. He also made a close study of British naval tactics used against the American colonies
during the War of Independence. J.S. Clarke and J. M’Arthur, The Life of Admiral Lord
Nelson, K.B., from His Lordship’s Manuscripts (London: Cadell and Davies, 1810 ed.) p.93.
23. C. White, 1797: Nelson’s Year of Destiny (Stroud, UK: Sutton/Royal Naval Museum 1998),
p.21.
24. A fine study of Jervis’s signals during the Battle of Cape St Vincent can be found in M. A.
Palmer, ‘Sir John’s Victory: The Battle of Cape St Vincent Reconsidered’, The Mariner’s
Mirror 77/1 (Feb. 1991) pp.31–46.
25. D. King (ed.) Every Man Will Do His Duty: An Anthology of Firsthand Accounts from the Age of
Nelson (NY: Henry Holt 1997) p.81; DLLN, Vol.II, p.347.
26. Clarke and M’Arthur (note 22), p.101.
27. N. Tracy, Nelson’s Battles: The Art of Victory in the Age of Sail (London: Chatham 1996) p.97.
28. White, 1797 (note 23) p.105.
29. DLLN, Vol.II, p.417.
30. A. Guimerá, Nelson and Tenerife 1797 (Shelton: The 1805 Club 1999) p.7. This work and
White’s are the finest accounts of Nelson’s darkest moments.
31. Lady Minto to Lady Malmesbury, 7 Sept. 1800, in Life and Letters of Sir Gilbert Elliot, First
Earl of Minto from 1751 to 1806, Edited by His Great-Niece the Countess of Minto in Three Volumes
(London: Longmans, Green 1874) Vol.III, p.150.
32. J.C. Herold (ed.) The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection from His Written and Spoken Words (NY:
Columbia UP 1955) p.218.
33. Letter to Lady Hamilton, 1 Oct. 1805, DLLN, Vol.VII, p.60.
34. Tracy (note 27) p.10.
35. DLLN, Vol.VII, pp.89–92.
36. Letter to Vice-Admiral Collingwood, 9 Oct. 1805, ibid. p.95. Collingwood had been a close
friend of Nelson since 1778.
37. Hooker (note 2) pp.63, 80, 81; Leonhard (note 2), p.18.
38. J. Thursfield, Nelson and Other Naval Studies (London: John Murray 1920) p.16; Letter to
William Locker, 25 Feb. 1783, DLLN, Vol.I. p.72.
39. W. Lind, ‘Misconceptions of Maneuver Warfare’, Marine Corps Gazette 72/1 (Jan. 1988),
p.17.
40. Letter to Admiral Sir Hyde Parker, 24 March 1801, DLLN, Vol. IV, pp. 297–8.
41. MCDP 1: Warfighting (US Marine Corps 1997) p.73.
42. Hughes (note 11) p.92.
43. Ibid. p.130.
44. Letter to Fanny Nelson, 1 April 1795, in Naish (note 16) p.204.
45. MCDP 1-3: Tactics (US Marine Corps 1997) pp.57–78.
46. M. van Creveld, Air Power and Maneuver Warfare (Montgomery, AL: Air UP 1994) p.3;
Leonhard (note 2) pp.51, 87–8.
47. D. Bonner-Smith (ed.) Letters of Admiral of the Fleet the Earl of St Vincent whilst First Lord of the
Admiralty, 1801–1804 (London: Navy Records Society 1922) Vol.I, p.64. Italics added for
emphasis.
48. DLLN, Vol.VII, p.241 n.
49. Tracy (note 27) p.13; J. Terraine, Trafalgar (Ware: Wordsworth 1998. First published in 1976)
p.51.
50. Letter to Fanny Nelson, 1 April 1795, in Naish (note 16) p.204.
51. Ibid.; DLLN, Vol.II, p.26.
52. Letter to Alexander Davison, 6 Sept. 1805, DLLN, Vol.VII, p.30.
53. Letter to Alexander Davison, 30 Sept. 1805, ibid. Vol.VII, p.56.
54. O. Warner, A Portrait of Lord Nelson (London: Chatto and Windus 1959) p.251.
55. Letter to Admiral Lord Gardner, Commander-in-Chief, Ireland, 19 April 1805, DLLN,
Vol.VI, p.413.
56 Letter to William Beckford, 31 Aug. 1805, DLLN, Vol.VII, p.22.
57. DLLN, Vol.VII, p.76.
58. Clausewitz, Vom Kriege (note 6) p.225.
DEFENCE STUDIES
36
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 36
24. 59. Ibid. p.214.
60. Ibid. p.47.
61. Ibid.
62. J. Russell, Nelson and the Hamiltons (Harmondsworth: Penguin 1972) p.312.
63. Letter to Alexander Davison, 28 March 1804, DLLN, Vol.V, p.476.
64. Letter to Captain Cracraft, H.M. Ship Anson, 4 Oct. 1804, DLLN, Vol.VI, p.217. See also
ibid. pp.129, 247.
65. Letter to Lieutenant Harding Shaw, Commanding His Majesty’s Brig Spider, 28 July 1804,
DLLN, ibid. p.118. See also Letter to Captain Ross Donnelly, H.M. Ship Narcissus, 14 July
1804, ibid. pp.109–10.
66. Ibid. Vol.VI, pp.271–2.
67. Ibid. Vol.VI, p.489.
68. DLLN, Vol.VII, p.148.
69. Letter to the Right Hon. George Rose, 6 Oct. 1805, DLLN, Vol.VII, p.80.
70. DLLN, Vol.VII, p.148, 251.
71. Cf. J. Callo, Legacy of Leadership: Lessons from Admiral Lord Nelson (Central Point: Hellgate
1999) pp.87, 88.
72. Letter to Sir John Acton, 26 Jan. 1805, in The Collection of Autograph Letters and Historical
Documents formed by Alfred Morrison (Second Series, 1882-1893), The Hamilton and Nelson
Papers, Vol.I: 1756–1797; Vol.II: 1798–1815 (privately printed 1893, 1894) Vol.II, p.253.
73. G. Rothenberg, The Art of War in the Age of Napoleon (Bloomington: Indiana UP 1980) p.81.
74. Patton (note 20) p.335.
LORD NELSON’S WARFIGHTING STYLE 37
12ds02.qxd 06/11/2001 14:56 Page 37