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Georg Wetzell
Actual War and the Military Commander of the Future
My illustration of the 'modern military commander' is based on real war conditions, on the actual concentration and disposition of the armies in 1914, as well as on the information which the German High Command then had about the general disposition of the opposing forces. To repeat, my description emanates from the situation which actually prevailed and not from the Schlieffen Plan of 1905 which was never executed and, as Ludendorff says, 'did not even conform to the situation in 1914'.
It goes without saying, however, that my proposed dispositions might meet with misinterpretations and erroneous decisions on the part of the subordinate commanders. It is impossible for the commander-in-chief, from his desk and by telephone, to avoid this friction, of which not only Moltke, but Goltz, Schlieffen, and Freytag-Loringhoven, as well as others, warn that each army commander, in war and even in peacetime war games and staff rides, has his own special operations plan. This friction can be avoided only by personal intervention and oral discussion, as demonstrated by the example of the great Moltke. That is my conception of the modern military commander
On the whole, Ludendorff exercised his command in this manner. He did not continuously remain at his desk, notwithstanding the excess of work which had been heaped onto his shoulders or which he had assumed voluntarily. Wherever possible, he would rush to the armies, in order to explain his objectives and intentions personally as well as to hear the views of the commanders on the front and their chiefs of staff and to learn of the opinions and wishes of the troops in the line.
Unfortunately, General von Falkenhayn failed to do this when he took over his most difficult office. His strategic idea was sound and promised great results. If he had paid an immediate visit to the decisive right flank of the armies, especially to the Second Army Commander, the greatly abused Field Marshal von Bülow, he would have found a splendid foundation and excellent support for his new and highly promising strategic idea. However, he neglected all this in order to remain at his desk at G. H. Q.
Like his predecessor had done four weeks previously, Falkenhayn permitted his chief of operations to sway him from the right path; to persuade him to direct the tired troops of the First to Fifth Armies to make a frontal attack; and to issue the ominous orders to 'run under the hostile artillery fire'. This marked the beginning of the 'confidence crisis'.
This crisis was aggravated by the failed 'race to the sea' of 1914 and the operations around Verdun in 1916. It came to an end with the entry of Rumania into war. Such were the consequences of a high command exercised from the desk. The much-needed contact with the front line was frequently missing.
The German official history the World War calls Falkenhayn a 'stranger at the front’. Only by maintaining the essential close contact between the commander and his instrument of war, which consists in as many visits to the various army head quarters as possible, can the commander-in-chief prevent becoming a stranger at the front and assuming the role of that lonely learned thinker at the desk whom a sound conception of war may for ever spare us.
In the early stages of the World War, a wrong conception of the conduct of war created havoc not only at G. H. Q., but among the individual armies as well; the commanding generals were under the impression that they could remain as far as 20 miles behind the front line on important days of a battle and conduct the operations without maintaining close contact with the corps commanders in action.
In the winter of 1917-1918, the third High Command [the team of Hindenburg and Ludendorff] emphasized in its directives for the spring offensive (of 1918):
The location of the command posts is of vital importance; all staffs, including those of the corps and armies, must be on the battlefield. The division command posts must be well forward. And yet, to the detriment of the cause, not all commanders heeded these instructions despite four years of war fare. Thus it occurred that the gap at Amiens and that at Montdidier were not recognized in time and exploited or reported to the High Command, which had moved to nearby Avesnes. This helped to prevent the ultimate success of the offensive.
The conduct of the Eighth Army by Hindenburg-Ludendorff in the battle of Tannenberg will for all times serve as an outstanding example also for the exercise of a high command.
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