1918; but that which followed was not the open warfare of Frederick the Great, Napoleon or Wellington. Even to the very end, in Nov., the opposing lines were continuous for 300 miles, and no open flank afforded opportunity for crushing defeat. Local flank attacks there were in plenty, and some on quite a big scale, but there was no Waterloo or Sedan. It had been a national war, and the German nation had suffered a crushing national defeat; but even when the Emperor had deserted and fled ignominiously to Holland the beaten army was still able to withdraw across the Rhine in some semblance of order.
Palestine. Different in almost every respect, and therefore also in the tactics employed, were the campaigns conducted in parts of the world outside Europe. This was especially so in Palestine, and for that reason will it be well to devote some space to the special conditions of that theatre of war and upon the resulting conduct of operations. In the first place the theatre of war was practically a neutral country. Nominally a part of the Turkish Empire, Palestine was in actual fact extra-national, or extra-imperial, with a population by no means united or enthusiastic in support of the Turkish power. The Russo- Japanese War offers another, and even more remarkable, instance of a quarrel between two nations being settled on the territory of a third. In such conditions the war can have none of those national characteristics which formed such a dominating and distinctive feature of the war in the west of Europe. This was the fundamental difference between the main campaign and the subsidiaries, from which it came about that the defeat of Turkey was less national and far more military than was the defeat of Germany. A second important feature of difference is to be seen in the railway development of the theatre of war. It is only through a complete network of railways, supplemented by road transport, that a nation is able to concentrate the whole efforts not only of its manhood, but of its entire population upon the one purpose of winning a war, just as in peace the whole efforts of a population are concentrated upon various forms of industry. When the necessary conditions are lacking, the resultant warfare must inevitably be, if not exactly more primitive in form than in a highly developed country, at least nearer to that waged by the professional armies of the past.
The preparatory stages of this campaign, including the Turkish raids against the Suez Canal and the subsequent advance to El Arish and the neighbourhood of Gaza, need not detain us beyond noting the construction of the broad-gauge railway from Kantara across the Sinai desert. It was wise strategical and tactical foresight which had led Allenby's predecessor, Sir A. Murray, to insist upon a broad-gauge line and so be prepared for operations on a large scale instead of yielding to the temptation to content himself with a narrow- gauge line, which could have been more easily and rapidly constructed and would have sufficed for his own immediate requirements. A false, or at least a different, decision on his part in the spring of 1916 would have had a most hampering effect upon subsequent operations, of which it was at that time only possible to foresee the most shadowy possibility.
For the purely tactical study, we may pass at once to the period of Lord Allenby's command and the advance in Pales- tine. This period may itself be divided into two phases: first, that campaign which began with the capture of Beersheba on Aug. 31 1917 and culminated in the entry into Jerusalem on Dec. ii of the same year; secondly, the dramatic series of operations which, between Sept. 19 and Oct. 26 1918, resulted in the destruction of the IV., VII. and VIII. Turkish Armies.
Allenby's strength in mounted men was significant of the possibilities of the theatre in which he was to operate. In i iiscussing the development of the tactics on the western front 10 mention has been made of the mounted arm, simply because ifter the first weeks of the war it had no scope for acting in its peculiar sphere; there was no scope for mobility and the mounted nan never really found his opportunity. It was exactly the everse with the Palestine campaign. So we find that in all
- hese operations the infantry gets from the cavalry or other
mounted troops far more of the support which it always requires
and from the artillery far less. There are no long preliminary bombardments, for as a rule there are neither guns nor targets, but in the very first operation undertaken, the capture of Beersheba, " a mounted attack by Australian Light Horse, who rode straight at the town from the east, proved completely successful. They galloped over two deep trenches held by the enemy just outside the town, and entered the town about 7 P.M., capturing numerous prisoners." 1 In passing, it is worth noting that the operation against Beersheba was undertaken expressly because " when it was in our hands we should have an open flank against which to operate, and I could make full use of our superiority in mounted troops"; and again, when the city had been taken, with 2,000 prisoners and thirteen guns : " This success laid open the left flank of the main Turkish position for a decisive blow." Surprise and movement had taken the place of costly infantry assaults, simply because local conditions had made them possible.
Exactly the same experience was repeated in the second stage of this campaign, which began in Sept. 1918 and ended when the armistice came into force on Oct. 31. At the commencement of these operations the Egyptian Expeditionary Force was holding a line from the river Jordan on the right to a point where the left rested on the Mediterranean coast, 10 miles north of Jaffa. The total fighting strength of the force was 12,000 mounted men, 57,000 infantry and 540 guns. Opposing them, the Turkish IV. Army watched Lord Allenby's right on the Jordan, in the centre was the VII. Army on a front of some 20 miles, while on the right was the VIII. Army holding a similar length of front. Including reserves, but excluding certain posts on the Hejaz railway which were more than fully occupied defending themselves against the Arabs, the Turkish commander-in-chief had at his disposal some 4,000 mounted men, 26,000 infantry, with 400 guns, by no means a strong force with which to stand on the defensive on a front of over 50 miles against an active and resolute enemy.
Allenby's numerical superiority, it will be noted, was especially in mounted men, and this he decided to turn to full advantage when he resolved to make Nazareth, a good 40 miles to the north, the objective of his next advance; but to set his cavalry free it was first necessary for the infantry and artillery to force an opening through the Turkish front. By using every device to deceive the enemy as to his intentions, Allenby was able to concentrate 35,000 rifles and 383 guns on his left, where they were opposed by no more than 8,000 rifles and 130 guns, while two cavalry divisions and one Australian mounted division were immediately available. 2 The infantry attack was launched at 4:45 A.M. on Sept. 19 after an artillery bombardment last- ing no more than fifteen minutes, the exact object of which is not clearly evident. The attack was completely successful, and the cavalry, dashing through the opening afforded to them, seized the communications and closed all lines of retreat to the north. Nazareth was entered on the second day of the operations, and four days later " the last remnant of the Turkish VII. and VIII. Armies had been collected." The IV. Army met the same fate only a few days later, and on Oct. i the Arab army and Allenby's Mounted Corps entered Damascus, which lies nearly 100 miles in a straight line to the north-east of Nazareth. Still pressing northward, and completing as they went the unutterable destruction of the Turkish armies, the mounted troops, with a few armoured cars, entered Aleppo, more than 200 miles north of Damascus, on Oct. 26, and when the armistice was signed on the 3ist were within striking distance of Alexandretta.
II. TACTICS AFTER THE WORLD WAR
An effort has been made so far to give in outline some idea of the tactical conditions on the western front and in Palestine,
'From Lord Allenby's despatch, dated 16.12.1917: "What would not the British or French cavalry on the western front have given for such an opportunity! But wire, mud, shell holes, and especially German machine guns, effectually prevented any such possibility."
a Lord Allenby's despatch, dated 31.10.18.
