UK intervention in Franco-Prussian war of 1870

Cueg

Banned
What about the Indian Mutiny? I mean, by definition the mutiny had a hard core of experienced troops with modern tactics.


And to make it clear, your argument here is that:


1) The French were terrible compared to the Prussians.
2) The British were terrible compared to the French.

And you're essentially, I presume, demanding that I show you an actual historical battle to prove otherwise - but rejecting any that don't involve fighting Europeans.
That's silly.

If one looks at their handbooks and manuals one can see a fairly modern outlook. If one looks at the tactics and weapons deployed against non-European forces one sees a massive over-application of force including artillery and rapid-firing weapons deployed in the appropriate manners. (rapid firing weapons well forward.)
If one looks at their exercises then one sees a quite modern force.
And if one looks at what they were armed with one sees a continuous updating of the main artillery pieces and small arms to keep them competitive with continental armies.


We of course cannot know how well they would actually do. But when one looks at each of the components of fighting a modern war considered in isolation then they all seem to be there.
Weapons - Sniders and rifled breech loading artillery, along with a tendency (shown later) to use rapid fire weapons in the front lines instead of with the artillery.
Courage - certainly present and well tested in the field.
Accuracy - Crimea demonstrates this one, and uniquely the British trained against man-shaped targets. This would improve their ability to actually shoot real people.
Numbers - the number of British regulars present at home was enough for at least one large field army.
Tactical sophistication - the quick adaptation to various different combat environments, as well as their handbooks from the time.
Ability to learn - the Crimea demonstrates this.
Logistics - the British handled much of the Crimea logistics effort, and proved capable to deploy a force pretty much anywhere in the world.

Are you fucking kidding me? Courage is a component of modern war? Aside from the fact that you are literally grasping at straws almost ALL sources indicate that both the British and French suffered from very similar inadequacies when it came to logistics. In fact, one can reasonably argue that the French were much more proficient when it came to logistics when compared to their English counterparts. The intendance militarie centralized French military command through its responsibility of maintaining the entire support infrastructure of the french army.
Henri Ortholan, L’Armée du Second Empire (Saint Cloud: Editions du Napoleon III, 2010), p. 181; Paddy Griffith, Military Thought in the French Army 1815–1851 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1989), p. 153.
Meanwhile, the British lacked the aforementioned centralization. Instead having a mix of both the military and civilian apparatus under several different department heads.
Report of the Commissioners Appointed to Inquire into the System of Purchase and Sale of Commissions in the Army (London: H. M. Stationery Office, 1857), p. 123.
Ultimately though the centralized French model suffered from its own structural issues, as would become evident during the Franco-Prussian war.

From what i could ascertain you are making the assertion that for some inexplicable reason the British would have an easier time then the French in managing the logistics of an army numbering over 100,000. If the consensus is that France lost the war primarily due to logistics doesn't this essentially destroy your 'argument' in its entirety? Tell me HOW the British could possible supply said army when the logistical base didn't even exist for the French to begin with. How many pack animals would you suggest they ship across the channel because we know for a FACT that the rails simply aren't an option.
 

Saphroneth

Banned
The fact you go off on one about the idea of courage being important in warfare in the 1870s is itself kind of laughable. Courage was an important component of warfare in those days because those were the days when bayonet attacks were still used. Heck, in 1861 the main feature of First Bull Run was armies breaking and running or otherwise having serious morale collapses.


It is in fact one of the main things that separates well trained troops from poorly trained conscripts in this period - steadiness under fire.


Logistics... that the British can deploy troops anywhere in the world means they have a flexible logistics setup that can handle sending troops and supplies halfway around the world. It's certainly up to delivering supplies TO France, and since France has an extensive canal system that's certainly one option. Another is to send over engineers to help repair the rails.
Or they could just send over their sniders and artillery.

And the consensus isn't, AFAICT, that the French lost the war due to logistics problems. It was a combination of poor tactical and doctrinal choices, enemy artillery supremacy, and a lack of depth of modern equipment.


As for the Indian Mutiny, this involved troops who had previously been trained in European tactics (that is, British East India Company Soldiers) forming the core of the mutiny. They'd previously engaged in battles against other Indian states and won pretty much every time, which is how come the Brits had so much of India by that point.
They also had modern weapons available.
They revolted over religious issues, and the British quickly deployed home troops to suppress the mutiny (maintaining their home strength, there was no real drawdown at home due to speedy raising of new regiments) and promptly did so.
 
1) I'd like you to elaborate on your point on accuracy,
The Ecole du Tir, the system of musketry instruction, originated also with them; but they seem to have halted at an early stage, and to have refrained from carrying it to its fullest development. The French soldier of the line is only trained to fire up to 400 yards, and instead of using a sight, is taught to make allowance for the different distances by aiming at different points of the target, or different parts in a man's body; and it is evident that they do not consider this method to be of much avail beyond 300 yards... (source)

besides being taught to judge distances, the men have another course of instruction to undergo, before they are put into the first class for ball-practice at the target. They must be taught the principles on which accuracy of aim depends with the peculiar weapon they are to use... When he has been made to level his musket with tolerable accuracy in this way, the pupil is ready to commence firing at the target in the first class; that is, among those who are to fire at a distance of from 100 up to 300 yards. The Enfield rifle being sighted to 900 yards, three classes have been established for practice - namely, of those in the first class, who fire from 100 to 300 yards; of those in the second class, firing from 300 up to 600 yards; and of those in the third class, who fire from 600 to 900 yards; every man being obliged to obtain so many points in the first class before he can pass into the second, and in the second before he can pass into the third. As soon as he has obtained the required number of points in the last class, his course of instruction is complete. (source; this is the third time I've linked it)

tactical sophistication and adaptability
"These constraints required not only careful logistical preparation, but also considerable flexibility. Commanders had to adapt their transport arrangements and their tactical planning to the local circumstances, and, after the Abyssinian campaign, to the expectation that every war should be conducted as economically as possible... The colonial wars differed radically in the weapons, tactics and military organisations encountered. At one extreme Colonel Arabi's Egyptian army, trained and armed by Europeans, closely resembled a regular army in organisation, if not the passivity of its tactics. At the other extreme, the primitively armed Ashanti were able to lay ambushes and mount flank attacks, but lacked the discipline and the cohesion to survive determined assaults. In between these extremes, the highly disciplined Zulu impis were capable of manoeuvring with speed and precision across the veld.... Better armed, but less mobile and less wedded to the offensive, the Maoris proved resourceful defensive fighters...The adaptation required by this multiplicity of different foes, employing different weapons and tactics, did not simply involve the planning of separate operations for separate theatres. Sometimes British forces had to adapt their tactics rapidly as they fought the Xhosa and Zulus or the Zulus and Boers in successive years (the 94th Foot fought all three adversaries). Even in the same campaigns British tactics had to be modified; after the disaster at Isandhlwana, the line formation was replaced by the square... Tactical adaptation was essential, as the enemy held the strategic advantage of operating in his own country or over familiar terrain, and could deploy his men much more easily." (Edward M. Spiers, The Late Victorian Army 1868-1902, pp. 276-8)

2) Being able to deploy a force anywgere in the world isnlt much of a bonus. It's happening right next door.

Tell me HOW the British could possible supply said army when the logistical base didn't even exist for the French to begin with. How many pack animals would you suggest they ship across the channel because we know for a FACT that the rails simply aren't an option.
Do you two want to sort this one out between yourselves?

3) Can you expand on the Indian mutiny?
The basic points are that the British were fighting their own Indian troops, who had been trained in European-style tactics for about a century, and who in many cases possessed new Enfield rifles while the British were armed with only muskets.

Are you fucking kidding me? Courage is a component of modern war?
When hasn't courage been a component of war? The thing about skirmishing tactics is that it's very easy to go to ground and remain there given the limited amount of supervision by officers and NCOs. In the opening battles of the war, Prussian observers are furious that the Bavarians just go to ground, refuse to advance, leave gaps in the firing line to carry wounded soldiers to the rear, and fire off their ammunition as quickly as possible in the hope of being relieved.

Meanwhile, the British lacked the aforementioned centralization. Instead having a mix of both the military and civilian apparatus under several different department heads.
Except that in 1869 the Commissariat, military train, barrack, purveyors, and military store departments were brought together as the Army Service Corps under a single head. I know it's asking a lot, but is there any chance of us talking about the 1870 British army in this thread and not some nebulous entity composed of every single failing British forces demonstrated at any stage from 1850 to 1900?
 
The fact you go off on one about the idea of courage being important in warfare in the 1870s is itself kind of laughable. Courage was an important component of warfare in those days because those were the days when bayonet attacks were still used. Heck, in 1861 the main feature of First Bull Run was armies breaking and running or otherwise having serious morale collapses.

It is in fact one of the main things that separates well trained troops from poorly trained conscripts in this period - steadiness under fire.

Logistics... that the British can deploy troops anywhere in the world means they have a flexible logistics setup that can handle sending troops and supplies halfway around the world. It's certainly up to delivering supplies TO France, and since France has an extensive canal system that's certainly one option. Another is to send over engineers to help repair the rails.
Or they could just send over their sniders and artillery.

And the consensus isn't, AFAICT, that the French lost the war due to logistics problems. It was a combination of poor tactical and doctrinal choices, enemy artillery supremacy, and a lack of depth of modern equipment.

As for the Indian Mutiny, this involved troops who had previously been trained in European tactics (that is, British East India Company Soldiers) forming the core of the mutiny. They'd previously engaged in battles against other Indian states and won pretty much every time, which is how come the Brits had so much of India by that point.
They also had modern weapons available.
They revolted over religious issues, and the British quickly deployed home troops to suppress the mutiny (maintaining their home strength, there was no real drawdown at home due to speedy raising of new regiments) and promptly did so.
1) What's going on, Saphroneth? You seem to be taking this very personally.

2) I never said courage wasn't important in war. It still is.
 

Cueg

Banned
The fact you go off on one about the idea of courage being important in warfare in the 1870s is itself kind of laughable. Courage was an important component of warfare in those days because those were the days when bayonet attacks were still used. Heck, in 1861 the main feature of First Bull Run was armies breaking and running or otherwise having serious morale collapses.


It is in fact one of the main things that separates well trained troops from poorly trained conscripts in this period - steadiness under fire.


Logistics... that the British can deploy troops anywhere in the world means they have a flexible logistics setup that can handle sending troops and supplies halfway around the world. It's certainly up to delivering supplies TO France, and since France has an extensive canal system that's certainly one option. Another is to send over engineers to help repair the rails.
Or they could just send over their sniders and artillery.

And the consensus isn't, AFAICT, that the French lost the war due to logistics problems. It was a combination of poor tactical and doctrinal choices, enemy artillery supremacy, and a lack of depth of modern equipment.


As for the Indian Mutiny, this involved troops who had previously been trained in European tactics (that is, British East India Company Soldiers) forming the core of the mutiny. They'd previously engaged in battles against other Indian states and won pretty much every time, which is how come the Brits had so much of India by that point.
They also had modern weapons available.
They revolted over religious issues, and the British quickly deployed home troops to suppress the mutiny (maintaining their home strength, there was no real drawdown at home due to speedy raising of new regiments) and promptly did so.

Assuming the french artillery and equipment was on par with the Prussians they still would have lost the war with the same logistical situation. However i will concede your point in that logistics was not the only factor.

However the question the OP presents is what effect a British entry in the war would have on the ground and you seem to be of the opinion that they could substantially alter the course of the war. (Correct me if im wrong)

If we revert back to that argument numerous questions begin to pop up. For example, when do the British enter and how quickly could they get an army onto Continental Europe. Beyond that, is getting a sizable army into the fighting even possible and if so how large could this army be?

Something that should be kept in mind is that the Prussians are praised logistically because they were able to get a massive number of troops (much more then the French) to the front ALOT faster then the French. As a result, they caught the French completely by surprise and entire armies that were praised by the British as being the epitome of professionalism and courage were isolated and demolished.

The reason i singled out your mention of courage (perhaps with a bit too much hostility) is because this was literally THE war that negated that aspect of warfare. It was during this war and the American Civil War that 'Industrial Warfare' became the standard. Professional Armies became irrelevant the moment levee en masse was instituted and France fought Europe and all of its professional armies for TWO decades.
 

Saphroneth

Banned
The reason i singled out your mention of courage (perhaps with a bit too much hostility) is because this was literally THE war that negated that aspect of warfare. It was during this war and the American Civil War that 'Industrial Warfare' became the standard. Professional Armies became irrelevant the moment levee en masse was instituted and France fought Europe and all of its professional armies in its entirety for TWO decades.

Professional armies were not invalidated by the levee en masse. If they were then the British would never have won in the Peninsula.
And... uh, the ACW also showed the value of courage in all kinds of situations for winning individual battles. It's that both sides had the same amount of courage, not that neither did.

If you want a better example, try 1918. The British held under German assault in Michael, then counterattacked and the Germans did not hold... because the previous years of war had been harder on the German morale than the British. The Somme in particular crippled the pre-war army of Germany, as noted by Germans themselves.


Anyway. My position is that they can have at least some impact on the course of the war, by making the Prussians more worried about their situation.

1) What's going on, Saphroneth? You seem to be taking this very personally.

2) I never said courage wasn't important in war. It still is.
1) I rather dislike the stereotype of the British army being incompetent.
2) Cueg did.
 

Cueg

Banned
Professional armies were not invalidated by the levee en masse. If they were then the British would never have won in the Peninsula.
And... uh, the ACW also showed the value of courage in all kinds of situations for winning individual battles. It's that both sides had the same amount of courage, not that neither did.

If you want a better example, try 1918. The British held under German assault in Michael, then counterattacked and the Germans did not hold... because the previous years of war had been harder on the German morale than the British. The Somme in particular crippled the pre-war army of Germany, as noted by Germans themselves.


Anyway. My position is that they can have at least some impact on the course of the war, by making the Prussians more worried about their situation.
Come on man... Are you being purposefully disingenuous? The difficulty the French experienced during the Peninsular War was primarily caused by two factors. Guerrilla Warfare and Logistics. The effects of levee en masse were not realized because the French couldn't form up into a large enough force without starving to death. Prussian logistics solved the issue of supply.

Without delving into an argument on the abstract courage of the British solider i am still of the opinion that a British army on Continental Europe during the war would get utterly annihilated. Nobody but Prussia appreciated the massive advantages they possessed until after the war and any field army mustered by the British would suffer the same fate as the French during the Siege of Metz and Sedan.

The problem with the Spring Offensives in regards to German 'morale' is that your conflating two entirely different scenarios. The German soldiers were starving(and thus not to keen on fighting) because there was no food to ship up the logistical chain; not because logistics were inadequate. Keep in mind that i am not saying 'courage' plays no part in the success of an army in battle. Of course it does. However what i am saying is that Industrial Warfare substantially negated the effect it had on deciding the outcome of a war.

So yes, relative to the Prussian army of 1870 the British army was sub-par not just in numerical strength but in its ability to win wars (and battles) on Continental Europe.
 

Saphroneth

Banned
No, I'm not being purposefully disingenuous. I'm just rather shocked by your claim that neither courage nor training matters in wars after 1860.

And the British army had the same equipment types (if not marginally superior in rifles) to the Prussians. Is this also irrelevant?

I mean, I'm all for the prospect that logistics is important, but it's not the only thing that matters.
 

Cueg

Banned
No, I'm not being purposefully disingenuous. I'm just rather shocked by your claim that neither courage nor training matters in wars after 1860.

And the British army had the same equipment types (if not marginally superior in rifles) to the Prussians. Is this also irrelevant?

I mean, I'm all for the prospect that logistics is important, but it's not the only thing that matters.

Logistics is the only thing that matters because it makes any other advantage in equipment marginal. Lets assume for a moment that the British are able to conjure up a force equal to that of the Prussians with 'marginally superior rifles'. The British will still loose the war because they would (like the french) be outmaneuvered and as a result outnumbered in every single engagement.

EDIT: Again, im not saying that courage and training don't matter in wars after 1860. What i am saying is that 'courage' (often synonymous with professional armies) became irrelevant with the advent of Industrial Warfare. The reason i default to professional armies is a matter of context. You seem to be implying/stating (correct me if im wrong) that the courage of British soldiers could somehow affect a war against Prussia in any way that's even worth mentioning. I'm also not at all inferring that soldiers aren't courageous. What i am saying is that the collective courage of an army means almost nothing against an army that's superior in both logistics AND equipment
 
Last edited:
Logistics is the only thing that matters because it makes any other advantage in equipment marginal. Lets assume for a moment that the British are able to conjure up a force equal to that of the Prussians with 'marginally superior rifles'. The British will still loose the war because they would (like the french) be outmaneuvered and as a result outnumbered in every single engagement.

If the British turn up with a substantial force the Prussians and their German allies have to pull forces away from other engagements to face them, further depending on the exact point of the war in which the British arrive it is the Prussians who are operating on the more stretched logistical lines.

Any intervention by the British is going to have an impact beneficial to the French. Most British posters however have claimed earlier in this thread that such an impact would not be overwhelming. Yet you Cueg claim that Prussia and her armies could plunge deeper into France and annihilate with greater ease than they had so far demonstrated a fresh field army.

Logistics if the only thing that matters you say but here is the thing British can deploy expeditionary forces around the world including to regions with very poor or non-existent roads and yet here they are deploying within a few hundred miles from London and Portsmouth in a region with good roads, good canals and even railways.

The Prussians being hostile to the French are almost entirely reliant on horse drawn transport and that is ever more stretched as they advance away from the frontier.

If logistics is the only thing that matters ITTL some Prussian General is in for a very bad day.
 
Professional armies were not invalidated by the levee en masse. If they were then the British would never have won in the Peninsula.
And... uh, the ACW also showed the value of courage in all kinds of situations for winning individual battles. It's that both sides had the same amount of courage, not that neither did.

If you want a better example, try 1918. The British held under German assault in Michael, then counterattacked and the Germans did not hold... because the previous years of war had been harder on the German morale than the British. The Somme in particular crippled the pre-war army of Germany, as noted by Germans themselves.

Anyway. My position is that they can have at least some impact on the course of the war, by making the Prussians more worried about their situation.

1) I rather dislike the stereotype of the British army being incompetent.
2) Cueg did.
1) Is it a stereotype? They just weren't up to the same standards as the French or the Prussians. Those two were at the top of the world. There's no shame in not being the best. No country is always at their best. It just so happened that the British weren't at there best in the mid 19th century. They performed well in WW1. In particular the Hundred Days Offensive. I'd even say the British performed better than France in WW2 (although part of that is because France didn't get a chance to retreat and fix the weaknesses in their armed forces). I don't mean to bash the British.:)

2) I disagree. Soldiers put their lives on the line. There's never going to be a time when that's not important.
 
Actually, Germany produced 1,240,000 tons of pig iron in 1870 compared to 1,178,000 tons in France and 5,964,000 tons in the UK: in steel, both France and Prussia prduce about 300,000 tons and Britain produces 700,000 tons. In 1869, Prussia alone produced 350,230,000 tons of coal compared to 198,000,000 in France and 1,632,000,000 in the UK. So the answer is: France's industrial capacity wasn't bigger, and it would have made quite a lot of difference.

I said Prussia not Germany as a whole

So two battles (not wars, just battles, neither fought by somebody who was in high command in 1870) prove that British general staff decision making is terrible. However, similar instances of incompetence among Prussian generals don't prove the same thing. More importantly: when are you going to guess my general?

Prussia didn't really have any embarrassing defeats

More importantly: when are you going to guess my general?

If you keep mentioning it. But Steinmetz wasn't even that incompetent. He beat the French, and his logistics were fine. His stupid charge was just an iteration of the Vorwartz spirit of the Prussian army, ad under figures like Zastrow that spirit worked a lot.

But the French didn't have a superior tactical system: they didn't even have a tactical system that made the best use of their weapons. They should have used skirmishers to conceal their lines, spreading their main infantry line out, and allowing independent aimed fire by their long-service soldiers. Instead, they keep the skirmishers close, insist on a tight and narrowly-focused formation, and ban soldiers from firing more than five shots at a time. This plays right into Prussian hands, because they can use the swarm formations to try and feel out the French flanks and turn their position, or blow the tightly-packed French troops out of their trenches with artillery. What I've done, by going back to the original manuals, is shown how the British might have avoided that (I did a lot of other stuff as well, but it doesn't seem like you can contest any of that in anything other than the vaguest generalities).

And Edison should have invented alternate current, but what do ya know. In hindsight it's easy to say it was bad, but who was better? The British tactics in the Boer war showed they were just as bad at predicting what they'd need to do.

Given that historically Austria was in hermit mode, France was defeated and Britain had a tiny, puny, incompetent army, why did they wait seven years?

Britain's incompetent army could still hold off the Russians, as proven in 1856. Russia is no Prussia.

I've looked extensively at the orders of battle, and I don't believe you: . There are troops holding captured fortresses and troops holding the line of communications, but those aren't strategic reserves. If Moltke had troops spare, why did he strip the siege of Paris of troops to fight at Orleans (I Bavarian corps and 22nd Prussian Division) rather than bringing up these supposedly ample reserves? Why did Prince Leopold of Bavaria find himself "horribly expsed, surrounded by far more numerous troops" campaigning on the Loire? Why would Moltke let Tann get defeated at Coulmiers and only then reinforce him with troops taken from the siege of Metz if he has a massive strategic reserve sat round doing nothing?

How do troops from Alsace get to Orleans in time?

Loire and Coulmiers are far from Eastern France and Alsace. Metz is close.

Who said anything about Austria? You know that Wissembourg is the first battle in the war of 1870, surely?

You're implying we think nothing will beat Prussia. No, some things will. Just not what you're suggesting.

If you think Britain makes a difference, yes. If you think it gets a lighter peace for France, haha no. The longer hundreds of thousands of Prussians have to do what they don't want to, what their leaders don't want to and occupy more of France, the harsher the peace will be.
 

Cueg

Banned
If the British turn up with a substantial force the Prussians and their German allies have to pull forces away from other engagements to face them, further depending on the exact point of the war in which the British arrive it is the Prussians who are operating on the more stretched logistical lines.

Any intervention by the British is going to have an impact beneficial to the French. Most British posters however have claimed earlier in this thread that such an impact would not be overwhelming. Yet you Cueg claim that Prussia and her armies could plunge deeper into France and annihilate with greater ease than they had so far demonstrated a fresh field army.

Logistics if the only thing that matters you say but here is the thing British can deploy expeditionary forces around the world including to regions with very poor or non-existent roads and yet here they are deploying within a few hundred miles from London and Portsmouth in a region with good roads, good canals and even railways.

The Prussians being hostile to the French are almost entirely reliant on horse drawn transport and that is ever more stretched as they advance away from the frontier.

If logistics is the only thing that matters ITTL some Prussian General is in for a very bad day.

The advantage the Prussians had was in the speed with which they could transport troops and supplies to the front. This allowed them to concentrate their forces much more quickly then the French and as a result you had battles skewed numerically entirely in Prussias favor during the opening phases of the war. See the following
Battle of Wissembourg
Battle of Spicheren
Battle of Wörth
Battle of Mars-La-Tour (This one was a fluke on the part of the Prussians in that the armies were numerically equal because of misinformed Prussian intelligence)
Battle of Gravelotte(This battle culminated into the Siege of Metz that forced Nappy III to march with an army of 125k. An army that would also be heavily outnumbered, encircled, and ultimately captured.)

In every single engagement (Except for Mars-La-Tour) the Prussians had a 2-1 numerical advantage that practically assured victory. This massive numerical disparity was made possible through the effective concentration of Prussian forces through their superior logistical system. Had it been less efficient Napoleon III would have marched to the front with a mobilized army of at least 200k strong and joined up with Bazaine.

In regards to the importance of logistics i will try to rephrase the point I've been trying to make. Better logistics means outnumbering the enemy in almost every single engagement. Keep in mind that this is before the deployment of millions of conscripts reached max efficiency at the onset of World War One. By then the French understood why they lost the previous war to the Germans (again, better concentration of troops very quickly) and met the new standard of warfare set by the Prussians in 1870.
 
Last edited:

Saphroneth

Banned
In regards to the importance of logistics i will try to rephrase the point I've been trying to make. Better logistics means outnumbering the enemy in almost every single engagement. Keep in mind that this is before the deployment of millions of conscripts reached max efficiency at the onset of World War One. By then the French understood why they lost the previous war to the Germans (again, better concentration of troops very quickly) and met the new standard of warfare set by the Prussians in 1870.
...actually, the battles of the frontiers are an excellent example of how doctrine matters a huge amount.
The French lost hundreds of thousands of men because of terrible doctrine.
 
1) I rather dislike the stereotype of the British army being incompetent.
It's not just the stereotype- it's the fact that it will not die. Every time one of these threads come up, you see the knee-jerk reaction of zulus boers afghans redcoats crimea purchase flogging irish rebellion. So you sigh, and then you laboriously explain how perhaps the battles that the British army lost are famous because they lost them, and maybe the Hollywood version of history isn't quite accurate. And the next thread comes up, and it's zulus boers afghans redcoats crimea purchase flogging irish rebellion. Which is a shame, because there's a really interesting conversation to be had here: how might British tactics work against the Prussian swarm, would the Armstrong have proved itself in combat or were its issues too fundamental, does the British colonial experience give junior officers a greater degree of self-reliance than the French armies. And instead, what we've got is zulus boers afghans redcoats crimea purchase flogging irish rebellion. Speaking of which:
I said Prussia not Germany as a whole
Yes, but because France is fighting Germany and not Prussia alone I thought I'd take the liberty of correcting your comparison. Some might call it intellectually dishonest to leave a load of industrial production out when your point is only proved statistically by the leaving out of said production.
Prussia didn't really have any embarrassing defeats
Didn't say defeats, though they did have those (Coulmiers, Villepion, Hallue, Villersexel): I said instances of incompetence. For instance, Steinmetz throwing his armies into Second Army's route of march, causing logistical chaos and running the risk of annihilation from a superior French force, strewing the field of Spicheren with Prussian dead, arriving too late to command his army at Borny, lurching into action before the Saxon diversion was ready at Gravelotte, throwing thousands of lives away by hurling Prussian battalions into futile head-on assaults across the Mance ravine, and stealing VIII Corps from Second Army in defiance of Moltke's orders so that he can have more meat for the grinder. And what's your treatment of him?
Steinmetz wasn't even that incompetent. He beat the French, and his logistics were fine. His stupid charge was just an iteration of the Vorwartz spirit of the Prussian army, ad under figures like Zastrow that spirit worked a lot.
And voila. General Charles Frederick Stoneman is an incompetent buffoon whose single defeat proves that the British army is a bunch of no-hopers: General der Infanterie Karl Friedrich von Steinmetz gets a pass because he managed to grind out a positive result and other generals did better than he did. Of course, the British ground out positive results and other generals did better than the ones highlighted- but that's a completely different matter.
In hindsight it's easy to say it was bad, but who was better?
The British? I mean, that's sort of what we're trying to establish here. Who knows, perhaps we could even look at some of their tactical manuals and draw conclusions from them.
Britain's incompetent army could still hold off the Russians, as proven in 1856. Russia is no Prussia.
Except that the Ottoman army threw the Russian armies back before the Allies arrived in the theatre, forcing them to transfer to the Crimea. Why are they scared of the British and not the Turks?
How do troops from Alsace get to Orleans in time? Loire and Coulmiers are far from Eastern France and Alsace. Metz is close.
So Moltke, the strategic genius, sited his reserve too far from the theatre of war to contribute to the conflict against any of the French still in existence? What's it sat in Alsace for, in case Switzerland joins in? Give us corps numbers and divisional titles for the troops that form it, and we can validate whether they're actually a strategic reserve or if they're protecting supply lines and capturing French fortresses.
The longer hundreds of thousands of Prussians have to do what they don't want to, what their leaders don't want to and occupy more of France, the harsher the peace will be.
By this logic, the Vietnam war should have resulted in the Americans annexing most of Asia. Harsh peaces emerge when countries have the ability to enforce them: in this case, Prussia's consciousness of their tenuous position will result in them trying to convert their advantage into a peace treaty as soon as possible. That's assuming we're dealing with the real Prussians, of course, and not the Terminators in pickelhaubes you seem to believe they were.
 
It's not just the stereotype- it's the fact that it will not die. Every time one of these threads come up, you see the knee-jerk reaction of zulus boers afghans redcoats crimea purchase flogging irish rebellion. So you sigh, and then you laboriously explain how perhaps the battles that the British army lost are famous because they lost them, and maybe the Hollywood version of history isn't quite accurate. And the next thread comes up, and it's zulus boers afghans redcoats crimea purchase flogging irish rebellion. Which is a shame, because there's a really interesting conversation to be had here: how might British tactics work against the Prussian swarm, would the Armstrong have proved itself in combat or were its issues too fundamental, does the British colonial experience give junior officers a greater degree of self-reliance than the French armies. And instead, what we've got is zulus boers afghans redcoats crimea purchase flogging irish rebellion.
I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone, I've never seen this. Not around here. Do you have a link?
 

Saphroneth

Banned
I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone, I've never seen this. Not around here. Do you have a link?
Try searching for anything posted by TFSmith.

(That's an exaggeration, but not by much. He's a frequent poster of that kind.)


edit - sorry, quote here was in fact an artfully done parody. I didn't realize.
As I say, just check his post history - any thread about British intervention in the US civil war will do, really, that sets off the fireworks.
 
Last edited:
Try searching for anything posted by TFSmith.

(That's an exaggeration, but not by much. He's a frequent poster of that kind.)
I see. It sounds like he has an axe to grind, but he's not entirely wrong. For Island countries a powerful Navy is more important than a powerful army and by keeping a small army they had more money to spend on their development. There protection from continental wars helped make GB the worlds dominant economic power, but I don't think they've ever exerted influence through military strength on the continent without a (militarily) more powerful ally. They had Russia in the Napoleonic wars, France in the Crimean War, Russia and France in WW1 and the US and Russia in WW2. That doesn't mean they didn't produce some great military leaders. The Duke of Marlborough and the Duke of Wellington top the list.
 

Saphroneth

Banned
I see. It sounds like he has an axe to grind, but he's not entirely wrong. For Island countries a powerful Navy is more important than a powerful army and by keeping a small army they had more money to spend on their development. There protection from continental wars helped make GB the worlds dominant economic power, but I don't think they've ever exerted influence through military strength on the continent without a (militarily) more powerful ally. They had Russia in the Napoleonic wars, France in the Crimean War, Russia and France in WW1 and the US and Russia in WW2. That doesn't mean they didn't produce some great military leaders. The Duke of Marlborough and the Duke of Wellington top the list.
That's just the one I can grab immediately. There's loads of it - seriously, search in his post history and you'll see what I mean.
 
I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone, I've never seen this. Not around here. Do you have a link?
I don't feel right calling people out by name, but I'll post the conversations and if you really need to verify them you can do. These are taken solely from threads in which my last 200 posts feature: there are other threads I didn't participate in, and it doesn't include any of TFSmith's stuff because I blocked him ages ago. However, if you want an decent example of his modus operandi have a look at this thread in which he argued that in a war with Britain starting in November 1859 the US could occupy everything west of Montreal by spring 1860; called a quarter of a million smoothbore muskets altered from flintlock to percussion "modern weapons" comparable to British breech-loading rifles; and accused three of the posters, including me, of being sock-puppets for one another. I'm pretty sure he will have mentioned the Zulus and the Crimea at some point in it.

the Royal Navy could cause havok for the Union in this era but the British Army (50-60K worldwide) was tiny and still recovering from their dismal performance in the Crimea.
Actually, they had 70,536 men on the Indian establishment alone (1 November 1861). There were a further 148,680 men on the British establishment at the same date, 114,003 all ranks present at the 1861 militia inspection, and 162,935 enrolled volunteers (1863).
IF the British lost all sanity and did intervene in the ACW on either side there are one or two minor problems!
1. Two little puddles each side of the American continent between any sort of suitable British Army and the conflicts.
2. The British Commanders at the time were so brilliant! They had just mucked up Crimea and a few years later were initially so successful against the Zulus.
(Damn I'm agreeing with TFSmith121's usual arguments)

Of course the British have a massive army that they can move at a moments notice. (Sarcasm) Seriously, the British have no army available to send to the Americas without seriously jeopardizing their control over their colonies
Nor are they really particularly well equipped to fight anything other than a rag tag colonial war
I would have thought the fifty thousand men they deployed from the UK to South Africa in a matter of weeks at the start of the Boer War would count? I mean that's nearly twice the size of the US Army in the period we're talking about.
For that matter the British Army ended up deploying over a third of a million regulars to South Africa, better equipped in rifles, machine-guns and artillery than the US Army.

The British land forces in 1871 were pitiful, with terrible coordination, Crimea war era doctrine, and a string of military defeats up until the Boer wars. Even in those wars, there was a massive horse shortage, men were treated awfully, and coordination was terrible. The British military history until everyone adopted von Moltke and Prussian doctrine after the Franco-Prussian war, and were able to fully implement it by 1910, was terrible and a string of blunders and idiocy. Mahdi revolt, Anglo-Zulu War, Crimean War

And another one, not because it's pertinent but because I still find it amusing:
Except that Britain was winning the naval race on lake Ontario and would have definitely pulled ahead on Lake Champlain had the war progressed. Only on Lake Erie were the Americans truly winning the naval race, and their lead narrows in future years as Canada becomes more settled.
I'm sorry, I know this will upset you, but:


"Canada can win the Great Lakes Naval Race"
sounds an AWFUL lot like:
"[fill-in country's name here] can win the naval race against Great Britain" pre-1920 (1)
Fun for a wankfest, but don't such ATLs (esp. the 20th century German ones) draw the most fire from not just Britons but any serious student of history?​
Yes, but Germany can beat the Brazilian national football team also sounds like Bristol Rovers can beat the Brazilian national football team. The comparison needs to be slightly more rigorous than that, making the case that [fill-in country's name here] is in the same position in terms of finance, naval design experience and construction capacity to Great Britain as Canada (with Britain behind her, obviously) is to the US on the Great Lakes. Given that the advantage changed hands several times during the War of 1812, whereas Britain maintained a more-or-less unbroken record for the largest navy in the world between c.1700 and c.1930, I'm not sure the mere similarity in vocabulary is enough to render the situations parallel.
How exactly do the British get their ships-of-the-line up the St.Lawrence?:rolleyes:
In one case they BUILT one.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_St_Lawrence_(1814)

I'm by no means suggesting you should have noticed that this is a recurring theme: if you don't frequently participate in these conversations on the British side you have no opportunity to have done so. But hopefully, if in future you spot someone getting a little short while trying to argue in favour of the competence of the Victorian British army, you'll know it's just frustration and nothing personal.
 
Top