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ans maintained in this connection not only, as I have said, that they could get their men to stand the punishment involved in close formation, but also that:-- (_a_) The great rapidity of such attacks would make the _total_ and _final_ wastage less than was expected, and further:-- (_b_) That the heavy wastage, such as it was, was worth while, because it would lead to very rapid strategical decision as well as tactical. In other words, because once you had got your men to stand these heavy _local_ losses and to suffer heavy _initial_ wastage, you would win your campaign in a short time, so that the high-rate wastage not being prolonged need not be feared. Well, in the matter of this theory, the war conclusively proved the following points:-- (_a_) The Germans were right and the Allies were wrong with regard to the mere possibility of using close formations. The German temper, coupled with the type of discipline in the modern German service, did prove capable of compelling men to stand losses out of all proportion to what the Allies expected they could stand, and yet to continue to advance neither broken nor brought to a standstill. But-- (_b_) The war also proved that, upon the whole, and taking the operations in their entirety, such formations were an error. In case after case, a swarm of Germans advancing against inferior numbers got home after a third, a half, or even more than a half of their men had fallen in the first few minutes of the rush. But in many, many more cases this tactical experiment failed. Those who can speak as eye-witnesses tell us that, though the occasions on which such attacks actually broke were much rarer than was expected before the war began, yet the occasions on which the attack was thrown into hopeless confusion, and in which the few members of it that got home had lost all power to do harm to the defenders, were so numerous that the experiment must be regarded as, upon the whole, a failure. It may be one that no troops but Germans could employ. It is certainly not one which any troops, after the experience of this war, will copy. (_c_) Further, the war proved even more conclusively that the wastage was not worth while. The immense expense in men only succeeded where there was an overwhelming superiority in number. The strategical result was not arrived at quickly (as the Germans had expected) through this tactical method, and after six months of war, the enemy had thrown away
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