Part 14
On the night of February 10-11, 1917, the 32nd Division attacked and captured 1,500 yards of trench {149} line at the foot of the _Serre Hill_. The division formed up after dark and the attack began at 8.30 p.m., the objective was captured, and at 5 a.m. a determined counter-attack was repulsed. The capture of the _Vimy Ridge_ by Canadian troops was due to an assault launched some time before dawn on April 9, 1917: and the British victory of Messines (June 7, 1917) to an assault launched at 3.10 a.m. In the latter case the Wytschaete-Messines position, "one of the Germans' most important strongholds on the Western Front, consisted of forward defences with an elaborate and intricate system of well-wired trenches and strong points, forming a defensive belt over a mile in depth, and the Germans had omitted no precautions to make the position impregnable" (Sir D. Haig's Dispatches). Nineteen deep mines under this position were fired at 3.10 a.m., and this was the signal for the assault, which was immediately successful and was carried out under intense artillery protecting fire. By nightfall of June 7 the whole position had been recaptured, heavy losses inflicted, and over 7,000 prisoners taken at a comparatively slight cost, by the II. Army, under General Sir H. C. O. Plumer. During the German offensive in 1918 a counter-attack by three brigades was launched by night against the village of _Villers Brétonneux_. The attack was launched at 10 p.m. on the night of April 24-25. By daybreak the village was surrounded, and by the afternoon it was entirely recaptured with upwards of 1,000 prisoners. Among the offensive operations which preceded the general advance of the Allies in July, 1918, was a highly successful night attack by the 2nd Australian Division, on a front of about 2 miles, south of _Morlancourt_ (June 10, 1918). At 4.35 a.m. on May 12, 1864, one of General Ulysses Grant's Corps, under General Hancock, assaulted "the Salient," part of General Robert Lee's entrenchments in The Wilderness of Virginia (_Spottsylvania_). 20,000 men were assembled and a night advance was made, {150} directed by compass, on an unusually dark and stormy night, with part of the line of the advance densely wooded. The assault was ordered for 4 a.m., but a dense fog delayed the signal until 4.35 a.m. When the order was given, one of the divisions had some difficulty in making its way through a wood and marsh, but contrived to keep up with the others, and reached the abattis at the same time. The assault resulted in the capture of 4,000 prisoners and inflicted losses with the bayonet of over 2,000, with a total loss to the assailants of about 2,000. This manoeuvre consisted of a night march by compass of a whole corps to a Position of Assembly within 1,200 yards of the hostile outposts, of an advance before dawn, and of a final assault of 20,000 troops. The captured salient was afterwards retaken by the Confederates by a decisive counter-attack, rendered possible by the provision, in rear of the salient, of a second line of entrenchments (see _Battle of Spottsylvania_).
Owing to the risks of confusion and the limitations imposed on the attacking movement, Night Assaults do not now carry the same comparative advantages over Daylight Attacks as was the case before the introduction of _Smoke_. Hence they will be restricted to attacks on a very limited objective, as in the case of raids or attempts to capture special tactical localities. But by employing Smoke only two elements of Surprise can be achieved. The _direction_ and _weight_ of the blow are concealed, but the appearance of Smoke will warn the enemy to expect an attack, and the _time_ of the blow is thus revealed. Smoke will probably be employed extensively in modern warfare and, except against an ill-trained and undisciplined enemy, assaults by night will generally be undertaken to gain tactical points, to drive in advanced troops and Outposts, to capture advanced and detached posts, to rush an isolated force guarding a bridge or defile, and in carrying out enterprises of a similar nature, in order to gain advantages {151} for further operations in daylight. When more important assaults are made, a larger force than a brigade will seldom be thrown against a single objective, although a series of objectives may be simultaneously attacked with success over a wide front. A Night Assault was delivered by two Federal brigades on the Confederate bridgehead at _Rappahannock Station_ (November 7, 1863). One of the brigades was ultimately repulsed, but the other penetrated the Confederate position and cut off the retreat. Upwards of 1,500 of the defenders were captured or killed, and the small remnant evacuated the bridgehead. In the Second Afghan War, General Sir F. Roberts marched up to the high passes leading out of the Kurram into the interior of Afghanistan, with a column of 3,200 all ranks and 13 guns. He was opposed by the Amir's force of about 18,000 men with 11 guns at _Peiwar Kotal_ (December 2, 1878). Sir F. Roberts detached the greater part of his force to occupy the heights on the flank of the Afghan position and attacked at daylight. The Night March and subsequent attack were completely successful. The enemy was defeated with great loss and all his guns captured, the British losses being 20 killed and 78 wounded. _Tel-el-Kebir_ was an example of a Night March in battle formation of a force of 11,000 infantry, 2,000 cavalry, and 60 guns, to attack an entrenched position at dawn, the object being to surprise the enemy and to cross the danger zone without exposing the assaulting troops to a prolonged fire action. It resulted in a victory which decided the Egyptian campaign, and added the Nile Valley to the British Empire. Sir Garnet Wolesley's force advanced in four columns marching abreast, with its left resting on the railway, and was successfully carried out, the troops reaching a position, varying from 300 to 900 yards distance from the objective, the assault being delivered at the conclusion of the march. The Egyptian Army, under Arabi Pasha, fought steadily, and again and again renewed the fight, after falling back {152} within their entrenchments, but their flank was turned and the whole position captured. The British loss was only 459 all ranks, and the Egyptians lost upwards of 2,500 killed and wounded, the remaining 23,000 being dispersed or captured. A daylight advance and assault of so strong a position could not have been successfully carried through at so small a cost to the attacking troops. In the South African War there were two examples of the unsuccessful Night Attack. Major-General Gatacre essayed a Night March followed by a Night Attack upon the Boers' position at _Stormberg_ (December 10, 1899), but he was misled by his guides in unknown ground and was himself surprised by the Boers and forced to retire with a loss of over 700 officers and other ranks. On the following day Lord Methuen delivered an attack upon Cronje's position between the Upper Modder River and the Kimberley road. In a Night Attack on _Magersfontein Hill_ (December 11, 1899) the Highland Brigade came under heavy fire while still in assembly formation and lost its Brigadier (A. G. Wauchope) and 750 officers and other ranks. In the later stages of the South African War, however, Night Marches followed by Raids were employed with marked success, particularly in the Eastern Transvaal in November and December, 1901.
Except when the assaulting troops are already in position, it will be necessary to choose Positions of Assembly and of Deployment, and to precede the advance in the preliminary stages by lines of scouts, ahead and on the flanks, within 100 yards of the following troops. On arrival at the jumping-off place these advanced scouts will await the arrival of the assaulting force, and they should be directed to mark the ground for the various units. A scout from each Forward Platoon can thus mark the inner flank on which his Platoon will rest, and the direction of the whole line will be assured.
The troops will usually advance, during the earlier {153} stages, in shallow columns on narrow frontages, at deploying intervals, and may maintain this formation until the halted line of scouts is reached. Owing to the frequent necessity for halts to correct intervals, etc., and the inherent difficulties of movements by night in open formations, no greater rate than 1 mile an hour can be counted on. When several objectives are in view a corresponding series of Positions of Assembly and Deployment will be required, and care must be taken that the various advancing forces do not converge.
Owing to the difficulty of recognition, a distinguishing mark will usually be worn by the troops engaged, a watchword will usually be adopted and made known to all ranks, and the commander and staff should wear easily distinguishable badges. If hostile patrols are encountered it is essential that they should be silenced, and any one encountered who is deficient of the badge and ignorant of the watchword should be similarly treated.
The risk of an assault being held up by unforeseen obstacles must also be provided against, and Engineers or Pioneer Infantry should be present for removing such obstacles. If fire is opened by the enemy it is clear that all hope of surprise has vanished, and the troops must then press on at all costs; for if they advance as rapidly as possible they have a reasonable prospect of achieving their object, whereas a halt will increase the enemy's power of resistance, and withdrawal will almost certainly end in disaster.
In order that secrecy may be observed, details of the assault will usually be withheld from all except superior commanders from whom action is required, until the Position of Assembly is reached; but before the troops leave that position all ranks must be made to understand the objective in general, the particular task of the unit, and the formation to be adopted at the Position of Deployment. In addition to this information, and to a knowledge of the general tactical principles involved, {154} there are certain axioms which must become "rules of thumb" with all ranks:--
Fire must not be opened without orders.
Magazines must be charged but no cartridge placed in the chamber.
Until daylight the bayonet only to be used.
Absolute silence to be maintained until the signal for the assault is given.
No smoking; no lights.
If obstacles are encountered each man will lie down in his place until they are removed.
If hostile fire is opened, all ranks must press on at once with the utmost spirit and determination and overpower the enemy with the bayonet.
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FIGHTING IN CLOSE COUNTRY
Close country has a marked influence on Tactics owing to the restrictions it imposes on view and on movement. Forest, jungle, and bush, mountains and ravines, rivers and streams are natural obstacles, while cultivation adds woods and plantations, fences and hedges, high growing crops, farm houses, villages and towns, with sunken roads below the surface of the adjoining land, and civilisation brings in its train a network of railways and canals with embankments and bridges, and the natural difficulties of close country are thereby increased. The obstruction to movement is more or less constant, except in "continental" climates, where frost and snow render movement possible in winter over the deepest rivers or marshes, and over roads and tracks which are scarcely practicable in the summer season. The obstruction to view is greater when trees and hedges are in leaf than when the leaves have fallen.
When the advantages and disadvantages of fighting in close country are weighed in the balance there appears to be a distinct tendency in favour of the Attack over the Defence.
An Attacking force can usually obtain cover in the early stages of the action and loss can therefore be avoided in approaching the objective, while the screening of its movements and dispositions generally enables the Attacking force to surprise the Defence as to the direction and weight of the blow to be delivered. Troops fighting in close country are often unable to see what is going on around them, and the "sense of security" is lessened by the knowledge that a flank may be successfully assailed without warning. This favours the {156} Attack more than the Defence, as the counter-attack, which is the soul of all defensive operations, requires previous organisation to be thoroughly effective.
SAVAGE WARFARE.--In Savage Warfare the inherent difficulties of fighting in close country are often increased by the disparity of numbers on the side of the civilised troops and by the fanatical courage of the savages. Discipline, self-reliance, vigilance, and judgment in the application of the Principles of War, are required to overcome these added difficulties. A vigorous offensive, Strategical as well as Tactical, is _always_ the best method of conducting operations in Savage Warfare, and for the purpose of Protection vigilance must be exercised to an even greater degree than in any other form of warfare. At _Isandhlwana_ (January 22, 1879) the British camp at the foot of Isandhlwana Hill was surprised and overwhelmed by a Zulu Army, 10,000 strong, and almost the whole of the garrison killed; and yet in the evening of the same day 120 all ranks (40 sick being included in that number) beat off the repeated attacks of 4,000 Zulus at _Rorke's Drift_. In the operations after the fall of Khartoum a desert column under Major-General Sir J. McNeill was surprised in dense bush while constructing a zeriba at _Tofrik_ (March 22, 1885), but after twenty minutes' fierce fighting the Mahdist Arabs were driven off with more than 1,000 killed. In the operations in Upper Egypt against the invading Mahdists a vigorous strategical and tactical offensive led to the _Battle of Toski_ (August 3, 1889) and resulted in the defeat and complete destruction of the invaders, with but slight loss to the Anglo-Egyptian force under General Sir F. W. Grenfell. At the beginning of the Christian Era three well-disciplined Roman legions were decoyed into the fastnesses of the _Teutoberger Wald_ (A.D. 9) and there attacked and annihilated by the Cherusci, a Saxon tribe, under their king Arminius, and this defeat of Quintilius Varus is included by Sir Edward Creasey among the {157} "Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World." Fighting in close country against more or less savage tribes is frequently the task of British troops in East and West Africa, while the Indian Frontier constantly requires to be defended by expeditions against tribal levies in hilly and mountainous districts. In "Field Service Regulations" (Part II.), 1921, the peculiarities of various savage races by whom the Outposts of the British Empire are liable to be assailed are carefully noted.
IN CIVILIZED WARFARE.--The military history of Europe and America abounds with accounts of fierce fighting in close country. In all ages woods and villages play an important part in war. They form natural magnets for troops operating in their neighbourhood. The fact of their being easily visible, and named on maps, causes them to be adopted as objectives in the Attack or as boundaries in the Defence, and in all operations troops are instinctively drawn towards them in search of cover, or to obtain water, supplies, and shelter. Their situation is also likely to make them of tactical importance, as woods are frequently on the slopes of hills and may be occupied in a defensive scheme to force an assailant to deploy before reaching the main position, while villages are naturally situated on roads, which must be guarded as they are the normal avenues of approach for all troops. In Position Warfare the wood and the village are of the highest importance, and whenever they are situated along the alignment, or near the front, of a defensive position, they may always be assumed to be occupied and strongly organised as part of a series of mutually supporting tactical points. The names of woods, large and small, and of the most insignificant villages, were of everyday occurrence in reports on the fighting on the Western Front in the Great War as the scene of furious encounters, of attacks and counter-attacks, and there are 67 references to copses, woods, and forests in Marshal Haig's Dispatches. It {158} appears, however, to be generally admitted that close country in general, and woods and villages in particular, favour Delaying Action rather than a protracted Defence, and in Position Warfare the advantages are therefore in favour of the Attack on account of the facilities offered for surprise through the concealment of movement.
There are many instances of successful Delaying Action in woods and villages. Some of the characteristics of such fighting were exemplified in the Franco-Prussian War. At the _Battle of Gravelotte_ (August 18, 1870) the Bois de Vaux, on the left of the French position, induced Marshal Bazaine to mass his reserves on that flank, as it appeared to invite attack; whereas he was defeated by a turning movement on the _other_ flank. During an attack through the Bois de Vaux a Prussian infantry battalion became so scattered that all cohesion was lost, a common danger in wood fighting. At the earlier _Battle of Spicheren_ (August 6, 1870), however, two battalions maintained their order and cohesion in Pfaffen Wood, and by moving through it in narrow columns were able to debouch in good order. A tendency to loss of discipline through loss of control was exemplified at the same battle. Other Prussian troops had captured Gifert Wood and the officers were unable to organise an attack on a further position through the reluctance of the troops to leave the shelter of the wood. At the _Battle of Worth_ (August 6, 1870) two French battalions held up the attack of 18,000 Prussians for over an hour in the Niederwald, although no fortifications were employed; the difficulty of debouching from a captured wood was then experienced by the Prussians, as the farther edge was kept under heavy fire by French troops in the neighbouring Elsasshausen Copse. A decisive counter-attack cannot usually be organised in such warfare, although Lee managed to employ 17,000 troops for that purpose with complete success at the _Battle of the Wilderness_ (May 5-6, 1864). Local {159} counter-attacks, however, are the normal incidents of defensive operations in woods, and in the Niederwald, at the _Battle of Worth_, several spirited counter-attacks were made by the 96th French Regiment.
Villages are even more attractive to troops than woods, and they figure in all battles as local centres of resistance. One of the most spirited defences of a village took place at the _Battle of Sedan_ (September 1, 1870) when a heroic struggle was maintained by French marine infantry in the village of _Bazeilles_, and after the white flag had been hoisted over the Fortress of Sedan the fight was stubbornly maintained at the village of Balan, the second line of defence of the Bazeilles position. Visitors to the battlefield of Sedan are shown a little inn with the title, _A La Dernière Cartouche_, in commemoration of the struggle. A highly successful Night Attack was made by the French on the village of _Noisseville_ (August 31, 1870), the normal difficulties of defending the village being increased by the surprise and the darkness.
THE ATTACK ON WOODS.--The opening stages of the attack on a wood resemble those in the attack on any other position, but once the outer fringe is gained the potential advantages offered by the narrow field of view and fire must be exploited to the full and surprise at weak points must be achieved. Flank attacks are exceptionally deadly under these circumstances, as they may succeed before the other defending troops are aware of the threatened attack, but the utmost precaution is necessary to avoid traps, and scouts must precede all movement, while advances must be made by rapid bounds to avoid aimed fire at close range. Supports and reserves must follow close to the forward troops in order to preserve cohesion and to afford immediate help. Machine guns and light mortars are of very great value to give close support, the latter taking the place of artillery and inflicting losses on {160} stockaded defenders. Small woods should usually be attacked from the flanks under heavy fire from artillery until the attack turns inwards, while machine guns and Lewis guns are posted to prevent reinforcements reaching the wood and to cut off the retreat of the defenders. During the German counter-attacks at Cambrai (November 30-December 4, 1917) _Tanks_ were effectively employed in wood and village fighting, and were in a great measure responsible for the capture of _Gauche Wood_, acting in co-operation with dismounted Indian cavalry of the 5th Cavalry Division and with the Guards' Division; but although they reached the outskirts of _Villers Guislain_ they were forced to withdraw, as the supporting infantry were unable to co-operate owing to the fire of the enemy's machine guns. At the _Battle of Messines_ (June 7, 1917) a tank enabled the infantry to proceed with the advance by overcoming the machine guns posted in Fanny's Farm. Generally speaking, however, tanks are unable to manoeuvre in woods, owing to the many insuperable obstructions, and their sphere of usefulness is limited by the availability of rides or other cleared avenues of approach. During the fighting for the interior of the wood "reconnaissance during battle" is of the highest importance, and the flanks of the attacking force will need to be specially guarded, on account of the liability to counter-attack. Touch must also be kept, to avoid loss of direction. In the _advance from the captured position_ great tactical skill is required, and if the defenders have established a fire position within close range it may only be possible to issue from the wood when co-operating troops have cleared or neutralised that position. It may even be necessary to hold the rear edge against counter-attack and to debouch, after reorganisation, from both flanks or from the opposite edge, to advance in two bodies against the flanks of the fire position under harassing fire from the troops in the further edge. If the fire position is to be carried by direct assault, or if {161} it can be got under control and the advance is to be continued, the successful troops must be reorganised within the wood (care being taken to avoid concentration in salients) and must deploy before advancing, to bound forward in one rush until clear of the wood.