this post was submitted on 19 Feb 2024
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Napoleonic tactics worked fairly well in the 19th century. Mixed results in mid to late-19th.
It’s when they tried to apply them to WW1 that the body counts got ridiculous.
It’s my understanding that they really didn’t. The American Revolution was won in part because the Americans more often “adopted Native tactics” (I.e. attacking from tree lines, on paths on unsuspecting units moving from place to place, aiming for officers, etc).
The big Napoleonic blocks were done, but often just out of honor and so officers had some sense of “control” over the battle so they could both easily pull out before it descended into a large brawl where they might actually be killed
The American Revolution was won because Britain was fighting a real war against France, Spain and the Netherlands. And those countries basically used the US as a cheap way to distract the British.
See: “in part” in my comment.
Wars can be won or lost for multiple reasons
This just in, it's a fake war if it doesn't meet my weirdly politicized definition of warfare.
Not really. The American Revolution was still fought with the same Napoleonic tactics used by the regular army. The irregulars might have adopted more guerrilla methods in the frontier, but they weren’t widely adopted.
Reinforcements from the French army and navy won the war. The French Revolution followed shortly after.
And IIRC those Napoleonic tactics were still used in the American civil war and beyond. The “big Napoleonic blocks” led to trench warfare in WW1.
I agree, also important to note that the "big square" actually served a purpose in preventing cavalry from picking off separated infantry and detering cavalry charges. From my understanding the formation was genuinely effective until horses stopped being a factor in war.
I mean maybe "honour" played a role in why they did things but i think we're sometimes too quick to assume people in the past were idiots.
I mean, ancient people could make proper megalithic buildings and we can barely make prefabricated houses that resist a few tremors...so yeah, they were intelligent as well, except they had different tools
Coordination is essential to any military action. The better you can coordinate your actions, the greater the objectives you can achieve.
When your ability to coordinate is limited to the distance that people can hear a drum or a trumpet, you're not capable of coordinating across any area larger than a few city blocks. You're a sitting duck against any massed troops, unless you also mass enough troops to stop them from marching right through you.
Small unit tactics are largely ineffective against massed troops until the invention of the telegraph, 30-40 years after the revolution.
Then there was wireless, and that makes me think of the French or Dutch Resistance during WWII - units of even just one individual.
Yep. Trench warfare was a thing because effective communication was only possible through wires, and wires required fixed locations. Defense could be effectively coordinated, but advancing more than a couple thousand yards put attackers out of communication with commanders.
People like to argue that armored vehicles put an end to trench warfare, but it wasn't really the armor or the vehicle. It was the radio carried inside those vehicles that allowed units to coordinate their attacks.
They didn't use guerrilla tactics against massed formations. They used them against the British supply lines, and they were effective at it.
From what I recall from my history classes, one of the most critical battles of the American Revolution was won because a bunch of red coats were slacking off and taken by surprise. So while the use of guerilla tactics was an important factor in victory, sheer dumb luck also played a major role.
Sort of. My understanding is the Revolutionary War was won by causing enough attrition (disease and deserters) among the British that they decided it wasn't worth it. Washington lost more battles than he won, but he mostly focused on supply lines and whatnot, so he generally caused enough damage to be successful. American soldiers could resupply locally, the British had to ship it in, and Britain wasn't super invested in keeping the supplies coming.
Please refer to the “in part”, part of my comment.
But yes, you’re correct on those fronts as well. Again, attacking supply lines and such is essentially what my comment is describing
The colonial army fought in the same manner as the British. The British just had awful leadership and were preoccupied with other things. The battle of bunker hill set the tone of the war from the start if you want to look it up.
Nobody used those tactics after the machine gun was invented.
Mechanised warfare was a game changer
See also the French entering WW1 in bright red pants, versus Germans in such boring uniforms that onlookers said they blended into the landscape.
Which is what historians call "a hint."
Eh. I'm still convinced it could have been better, and resulted in less death.
After watching scenes from The Patriot, I was thinking ”why not kneel, or go prone!?”
But no, let's just stand up right and risk getting hit in the head by a cannonball.
You couldn't easily reload one of those bad boys while prone.
The moment breach loaders became available Prussia used them to absolutely destroy Austria-Hungary and their muzzle loaders in battle.
This shows that the soldiers back then where limited by technology not their intellect.
They did do this sometimes. The Patriot isn't so great for this
Didn't the first row kneel so the second could shoot over their shoulders?