rear guards. Note this important
difference: if, in an advance upon the enemy, your advance guard should
suddenly be fired upon, your main body would (temporarily) halt. If, in
a retreat, your rear guard is halted by the enemy's fire, your main body
would normally be marching farther from it. In the first case assistance
is near at hand. In the second it is withdrawing. The rear guard in a
retreat should therefore be a little larger than in an advance. It must
be able to extricate itself from any situation however difficult or it
loses its usefulness. Its commander should have a cool, level head. To
delay the enemy and thus assist the main body to escape is his mission.
For him to remain too long in a good position might endanger not only
his safety but that of the main body as well.

CHAPTER VIII

ATTACK AND DEFENSE

The European War has demonstrated more clearly than ever before two
points in attack and defense. First, no people, or group of people, can
claim a monopoly on bravery. They all move forward and give up their
lives with the same utter abandon. Courage being equal, the advantage
goes to him in the attack who possesses superior leaders, greater
training, and better equipment. Second, a man's training and courage,
his clear eye and steady nerve, his soul's blood and iron, constitute a
better defense than steel and concrete.

A soldier has little business attacking or defending anything in this
day unless he is an athlete, unless he is skilled in the technique of
manoeuver, unless he is a good shot, unless he knows the value of many
features of the terrain (which means the nature of the country--its
hills, rivers, mountains, depressions, etc.--considered from a military
point of view), unless he is disciplined to a splendid degree, and
unless his training has imbued him with an irresistible desire to push
forward, to get at his opponent. Assuming, at least, as much as this, we
are prepared to consider the subject of the attack (the offensive).

To have your troops superior in number, condition, training, equipment,
and morale to that of your enemy; to be at the right place, at the right
time, and there to deliver a smashing, terrific blow--this is the
greatest principle of the attack. And history shows that victory goes
more often to him who attacks.

Initiative in war is no less valuable than in business life. Become at
once imbued with the desire to put "the other fellow" on the defensive.