old smooth bore flintlocks. The
Prussians however by the introduction of company columns had made an
attempt to discover a method of fighting more suitable to the new
system of arming. But on the 18th of August at St. Privat the Prussian
guard which employed the company column formation lost the most part
of five regiments, over a third of its strength in two hours (176
officers and 5114 men) after which the company column form of battle
order came in for no less criticism than the battalion column form and
the line formation. Every attempt to oppose a solid formation to the
fire of the enemy was thereafter abandoned. The battle was thereafter,
on the German side, carried on by dense swarms of riflemen into which
the columns dissolved under the fire of the enemy spontaneously,
without orders from the superior officers, and this was, in fact, the
only possible method of advance under fire. The private soldier was
again cleverer than his officer; he had discovered the only form of
fighting formation, and set himself to follow it in spite of the
resistance of his leaders.

In the Franco-German war there is a point of departure of entirely
different significance from all preceding wars. In the first place the
weapons are now so complete that a new revolutionary departure in this
respect is no longer possible. When you have cannon with which you can
decimate a battalion as far as your eye can make it out, and when you
have rifles by which you can aim at individuals, and which take less
time to load than to aim, all further advances as far as battle in the
field goes are immaterial. The era of progress on this side is
substantially closed. In the second place, however, this war has
induced all the great states of the continent to adopt the highly
developed Prussian militia system and thus to take up a military
burden which will ruin them in a few years. The army has become the
main object of the state, it has become an object in itself. The
people only exist to furnish and maintain soldiers. Militarism
dominates and devours Europe. But this militarism has in it the seeds
of its own destruction. The competition of the various states with
each other necessitates the spending of more money every year on the
army, the fleet, weapons of destruction, etc., and thus accelerates
financial breakdown. On the other hand, with the increasingly rigid
military service, the whole people becomes familiar with the use of
military weapons. It