rly if he belong to the state which is not a
principal party; as may be learned from the campaign of 1805. General
Koutousoff advanced on the Inn to the boundaries of Bavaria with thirty
thousand Russians, to effect a junction with Mack, whose army in the
mean time had been destroyed, with the exception of eighteen thousand
men brought back from Donauwerth by Kienmayer. The Russian general thus
found himself with fifty thousand men exposed to the impetuous activity
of Napoleon with one hundred and fifty thousand, and, to complete his
misfortune, he was separated from his own frontiers by a distance of
about seven hundred and fifty miles. His position would have been
hopeless if fifty thousand men had not arrived to reinforce him. The
battle of Austerlitz--due to a fault of Weyrother--endangered the
Russian army anew, since it was so far from its base. It almost became
the victim of a distant alliance; and it was only peace that gave it the
opportunity of regaining its own country.

The fate of Suwaroff after the victory of Novi, especially in the
expedition to Switzerland, and that of Hermann's corps at Bergen in
Holland, are examples which should be well studied by every commander
under such circumstances. General Benningsen's position in 1807 was less
disadvantageous, because, being between the Vistula and the Niemen, his
communications with his base were preserved and his operations were in
no respect dependent upon his allies. We may also refer to the fate of
the French in Bohemia and Bavaria in 1742, when Frederick the Great
abandoned them and made a separate peace. In this case the parties were
allies rather than auxiliaries; but in the latter relation the political
ties are never woven so closely as to remove all points of dissension
which may compromise military operations. Examples of this kind have
been cited in Article XIX., on political objective points.

History alone furnishes us instruction in reference to distant invasions
across extensive territories. When half of Europe was covered with
forests, pasturages, and flocks, and when only horses and iron were
necessary to transplant whole nations from one end of the continent to
the other, the Goths, Huns, Vandals, Normans, Arabs, and Tartars overran
empires in succession. But since the invention of powder and artillery
and the organization of formidable standing armies, and particularly
since civilization and statesmanship have brought nations closer
toget