were waged by standing armies and not by the whole nation in arms. The
distinction of course is real and of far-reaching consequences, but it has
no relation to the distinction between "Limited" and "Unlimited" war. War
may be waged on the Napoleonic system either for a limited or an unlimited
object.

A modern instance will serve to clear the field. The recent Russo-Japanese
War was fought for a limited object--the assertion of certain claims over
territory which formed no part of the possessions of either belligerent.
Hostilities were conducted on entirely modern lines by two armed nations
and not by standing armies alone. But in the case of one belligerent her
interest in the object was so limited as to cause her to abandon it long
before her whole force as an armed nation was exhausted or even put forth.
The expense of life and treasure which the struggle was involving was
beyond what the object was worth.

This second distinction--that is, between Limited and Unlimited
wars--Clausewitz regarded as of greater importance than his previous one
founded on the negative or positive nature of the object. He was long in
reaching it. His great work _On War_ as he left it proceeds almost entirely
on the conception of offensive or defensive as applied to the Napoleonic
ideal of absolute war. The new idea came to him towards the end in the full
maturity of his prolonged study, and it came to him in endeavouring to
apply his strategical speculations to the practical process of framing a
war plan in anticipation of a threatened breach with France. It was only in
his final section _On War Plans_ that he began to deal with it. By that
time he had grasped the first practical result to which his theory led. He
saw that the distinction between Limited and Unlimited war connoted a
cardinal distinction in the methods of waging it. When the object was
unlimited, and would consequently call forth your enemy's whole war power,
it was evident that no firm decision of the struggle could be reached till
his war power was entirely crushed. Unless you had a reasonable hope of
being able to do this it was bad policy to seek your end by force--that is,
you ought not to go to war. In the case of a limited object, however, the
complete destruction of the enemy's armed force was beyond what was
necessary. Clearly you could achieve your end if you could seize the
object, and by availing yourself of the elements of strength inherent in
the defensiv