Girlfriends

Every so often I pick up a book that surprises me. Usually they are a pathetic attempt to be more "with it" when live people are talking. The shocker is when they are of more than passing interest. There are quite a group of these now that have been written by women, many of whom are still alive. This leads to an interesting duality in my list of books to read soon. Also a largely pointless inner debate on whether to post on these works or not. After all, what business does a living lady author have on a cite about dead men? At least deceased authors can be said to fill the first category irregardless of gender. I suppose given the number of nameless authors there could be lots of women authors represented here. Like I said, pointless ponderings.

So the prompt for this spate of naval gazing was reading The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. It was good. I inhaled it today and then started thinking about women's lit in general. There have been other books that fall into the genera that have been interesting or influenced me deeply. Notable examples are YO and Loving in the War Years. I'd have to check the list for others. This has led to an interesting question: is there such a thing as men's lit? If not, why on earth isn't there? And if there is: where are the classes or sections in bookstores? Why the weird one-sided publicity?

I'd like to promise an end to this habit of excessively introspective posts but there will likely be more.

von Clausewitz

On War may be the most quoted treatise on war written in any modern language.


Carl von Clausewitz was an officer in the Prussian army during the Napoleonic wars. He began his career in the army at the age of 12 and served in one way or another until his death of cholera at the age of 51. He was the officer selected to tutor the crown prince in running an army and left, on his death, an eight book rough draft that his widow published the following year as 'On War'.

Clausewitz was a staff officer in one of the most strictly disciplined armies of his day. He saw the agony not only of the campaigns in what is now Germany, but also fought as part of the Russian army during Napoleon's invasion in 1812 and was held as a POW in France. The armies and technologies of his times loom large in his work. Advice on finding fodder for horses and billeting for troops, who marched and camped without tents or anything else that the generals believed could be spared, is plentiful. If ever a man could tell you the advantages of steady supply lines, good discipline and the enthusiasm of the men, it was Clausewitz. More importantly, he could also tell you what makes the difference in a battle that causes loss of life and equipment to no purpose and one that seals the fate of your enemy.

Clausewitz had attended the war college of the Prussian army and studied from many of the best. His guiding maxim at first might be surprising but he knew it worked: never follow a rule that doesn't serve the situation. He had been drilled in the art of following rules but he had seen them fail. Rather than writing new rules that would be followed slavishly to the destruction of the army, he focused on the ideas and principles behind the rules; the sort of background that would enable new generals to plan strategy that could be used in new theatres and with resources that might not be what he had used.

Lots of people have used Clausewitz since his work was published. Armies as far apart as England and Japan have looked at his ideas. This is remarkable and in many cases unfortunate. There is lots of space in On War and lots of vague spots that would probably have been fixed in a final draft. People have used these qualities to see what they want to in the work.

One of the cherished objections of the English-speaking world has been that the work deals largely with ‘absolute war’. This criticism is used as evidence of the savagery and cruelty of the 'Prussianism' that often cites Clausewitz; it is not only highly biased but also unjust. Clausewitz is very clear on several points and some of the first he makes are that war is ugly and brutal and bloody and that it should serve some greater goal. To Clausewitz war is an implement of the state to accomplish a political goal. If the nature of war is violence its point is a better peace. He talks about 'absolute war' in both the sense of a theoretical, unrestrained force and, more often, as a war whose political drive is so demanding that it calls for the mobilization of whole societies and a level of victory that leaves the defeated in a position where he has no choice but to accept the victors terms. Given the campaigns he had seen this must have looked like an inevitability for many future wars. It does not follow that he thought it was a good thing; only that it was likely. Officers who had been schooled in how to maneuver and fight without actually having pitched battles had just been squashed by a man who knew only the restraint exhaustion imposed. As long as Napoleon had an army and land to use it on, he was looking for another fight. The solution, destroy his army, was obvious. Not a bloodthirsty joy in slaughter but a desire to avoid repeated bloody defeats echoes as the general’s warnings.

Aside from those sections that show their age in means, Clausewitz also limited which ways of waging war he addressed. It would be fascinating to hear his views on guerrilla warfare in more detail (he had organized militias himself and refers to their potential uses but seems wary of them on the whole) or anything about the uses of the navy (mentioned in a plan to subdue future French trouble but not otherwise). He even leaves us to guess about his views on the wars in the colonies, merely offering us an opinion on why people fight the way they do and a glimpse of his own ideals for proper conduct.

“If, then, civilized nations do not put their prisoners to death or devastate cities and countries, it is because intelligence plays a larger part in their methods of warfare and has taught them more effective ways of using force than the crude expression of instinct.”

oops

Ok. So I meant to share some of the fun I was having. Now I have a long backlog of authors who will probably never get posts written. I owe them many hours of pleasure but have been remiss in sharing the joys. Well, so go the vicissituds of living.

One of the difficulties in discussing dead authors is that they frequently have left us no name. It is cumbersome to give them one at times. (the author or authors and editors of work x; bleck) Also, when works are read in translation, there is the added layer of separation in the translator. This being said, such works are well worth reading. The next few posts are about works that are separated from the present by such difficulties but which are fascinating.