INDEX




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INTRODUCTION

The Theoretical Study of War--Its Use and
Limitations

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At first sight nothing can appear more unpractical, less promising of
useful result, than to approach the study of war with a theory. There seems
indeed to be something essentially antagonistic between the habit of mind
that seeks theoretical guidance and that which makes for the successful
conduct of war. The conduct of war is so much a question of personality, of
character, of common-sense, of rapid decision upon complex and
ever-shifting factors, and those factors themselves are so varied, so
intangible, so dependent upon unstable moral and physical conditions, that
it seems incapable of being reduced to anything like true scientific
analysis. At the bare idea of a theory or "science" of war the mind recurs
uneasily to well-known cases where highly "scientific" officers failed as
leaders. Yet, on the other hand, no one will deny that since the great
theorists of the early nineteenth century attempted to produce a reasoned
theory of war, its planning and conduct have acquired a method, a
precision, and a certainty of grasp which were unknown before. Still less
will any one deny the value which the shrewdest and most successful leaders