GREAT WAR 1898: CRISIS TO QUAGMIRE (PART 21)

by bmovievillain, Jan 26, 2014, 1:00:06 AM
Literature / Prose / Fiction / General Fiction / Introductions & Chapters

Hot Time In the Old Town

The photographs, from the time, show long lines of soldiers marching down broad avenues with flag waving crowds that were gathered along the sides of the streets. Women were rushing out to steal kisses while the on lookers from the windows above tossed confetti and streamers. Such scenes repeated themselves all around the world in the early months of the war. What the photographs cannot convey are the sounds. Modern movies often flood you with the tunes of the various national anthems, however, the accounts we have of these parades tell a different story.

In the English speaking world, the Confederacy, England, Canada, and their principal enemy the United States, the national anthems were usurped a good deal by a tune that was very popular at the time. It had been released some two years earlier and had become quite a staple for saloon hall piano players. The song was the early jazz hit, There’ll be a Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight. These soldiers who first marched off to war, within a month of the opening hostilities, all did so with this particular tune on their lips. Their chorus was echoed by the civilian on lookers and as a result the cities of the English speaking world all became giant horns that were blaring this same tune.

The fact that both the soldiers and civilians were singing along is telling. It signified that this first wave of reservist heading for war were really nothing more than civilians in uniform. That is not to say they were the caliber of militia in earlier conflicts. Quite to the contrary, they were all trained professionals at the art of killing but, many were out of practice and all of them had a civilian mindset that would become very telling, very quickly.

Since the dawn of time, the question of how to bring the full weight, of a given population, to bare has been key. For most of human history it seemed an impossible task. Civilians simply never could stand up to regular soldiers or full time warriors. The rigors of war were too much and the civilians most often dropped their weapons and fled. By the end of the 19th Century this question had not only been answered but, the solution had turned into a science. The western powers had effectively militarized their entire population and turned their countries into armed camps ready for war.

Despite this success, in increasing national armies in size, and relieving their reliance on mercenaries, the part time reservists were still not the same caliber as their full time counterparts. It was impossible to make them so even if the generals of the time did not seem to understand this. There were several reasons why. The first reason seems to be something as simple as age. At the opening of the war the average age, of the full time soldier, was 19 years while that of the reservist was 25. That’s a significant difference.

Most national conscriptions, of the time, inducted a large number of their 18 year olds, once a year, for a two year period of service. In the United States there were generally enough volunteers to fill the 18 year old quota. That left the rest, of the military eligible men, waiting for a conscription notice until their 21st birthday. You could also defer your conscription until your 23rd birthday by volunteering for a three year period of service. All men went at some point which is why so many opted to get it over with at the age of 18.

Your service would not be over at the end of your initial term since it was mostly training. Different nations had a wide variation of systems to cover later military service. The United States adopted a horrible system that had the effect of putting men together, who had never met each other, into active duty units as needed. Most of these active duty units consisted of a skeleton staff of cadre’s who “kept the pilot light burning” until they were fleshed out with reservists. They normally had a small contingent of active duty reservists, at any given time, who rotated in and out on an almost constant basis.

For the first five years, after your initial two, you were obligated to three months of active duty per year. How the individual made up that time differed from man to man and situation to situation. You had to work that out with your local draft board and the process usually consisted of a great deal of haggling. It also led to a great deal of corruption and, so much so, that one of the most coveted jobs for US Army Sergeants were sitting on those draft boards.

Many of the weaknesses of this system was countered by the fact that the majority of men normally served their active duty time in regiments that were close to home. In rural area’s this meant you would know, with reasonable certainty, where you would serve and who you would be with. In more urban areas, that housed more regiments, this was never the case. The system looked good on paper but was quite a nightmare in practice, yet, the US made it work well enough.

The Confederates were actually luckier here. Despite their chaotic, state centered, military system that they used, they did have the luck of adopting the basic British regimental model. Once a man was inducted into a regiment he would serve that regiment for life. This system was used across the board, in every Confederate State, and went a great deal towards making up for the political mess that their land forces had to deal with.

The only real exception to this system of reserves was Great Britain. She relied exclusively on her small professional army and had only a limited conscription system in place. This force, while considered the best in the world, was completely inadequate for fighting the war they now faced. The British would find themselves having to invent a system, from scratch, while fighting the war at the same time.

This inadequacy was not true of her colonies however. Primarily, here, the most noteworthy example was Canada. They had no illusions as to who the enemy was, what he was capable of, and how vulnerable they were. Most of Canada’s population lived within a hundred miles of the US border. That population was significantly smaller than that of the US and Canada’s only real help lay on the other side of an ocean. Canadians were fully aware that they would be on their own for at least the first six months of the war and quite possibly longer. As a result their citizens of military age spent more time on active duty than did those of any other nation. It told in the quality of Canada’s small military and would win them praise from friend and enemy alike.

It would be these men, the reservists from around the world, who would carry most of the war and do the bulk of the fighting. No matter how good they were they were not in as good a shape as the regular militaries. They were not as well practiced and, most important of all, they had a very different mindset. By the time a man turns twenty-five years of age, he has a better idea about his own mortality and will not take as many risks as a nineteen year old who has not quite figured out that he is mortal. There is also the fact that once a man has been reintroduced into civilian life, no matter how many military training days he has afterwards, he will lean towards, and expect, the comfort that is considered normal by most civilians.

As a result, reserve formations would march fewer miles, attack with less enthusiasm, and on average be far less efficient than the regular troops. This fact would not be obvious to the war planners for some time and normally only after their plans had failed. Their time tables, and estimates of capabilities, rested on their experience. All of this had been gained in fighting colonial battles that usually involved elite troops covering great distances and ending with a single decisive battle. None of this would be true once the nations of planet earth brought their full weight to bare. The early lessons would be expensive ones and by the end of the first round of fighting many of the military leaders of the world would finally realize, with great horror, that they had to learn some new lessons. Too many generals never would and their men would suffer accordingly.

GREAT WAR 1898: CRISIS TO QUAGMIRE (PART 21) by bmovievillain

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Many alternate histories have dealt with the subject of an alternative ending to the American Civil War. This story differs in that it does not exclusively concern itself with events in North America. It draws back and looks at the world picture. Set in the victorian age, at the end of the nineteenth cenuty, a series of incidents converge and spark the first world war, in 1898. Explore the differences in a world with a CSA, and how it changes the dynamics between the great powers of that age and by extension, ultimately, the twentieth century. Enjoy the first book in this series.

Jessica42 Featured By Owner Jan 26, 2014 Writer

Actually prolonged military training within the Canada would have killed one the main reasons why the Canadian Military achieved the fame that it did have during The First World War our time. Namely the Canadian solider WAS a thinking and educated civilian who could handle demands of an industrial battle field and who could suggests things to commissioned officers in such a way that they were listened too. That combined with harsh discipline, the elan of a truly elite unit, and command staff that worked years together is what lead to legend of the Canadian Corps.

bmovievillain Featured By Owner Jan 27, 2014 Professional Digital Artist

Having had prolonged conversations with Canadian Officers while I was in the military, I've heard all kinds of stuff like that, from them, and most of it I have largely dismissed as nationalistic rhetoric. What you are describing here is not limited to Canada and it is well known to anyone who has ever done military staff work. One study after another has shown that nations with a well established middle class, and descent universal education, turns out better armies because those are the men who contribute largely to the ranks of the NCO's. The dependability of those sergeants is what makes or breaks a military. Canada does not have any more of an advantage there than any other western nation. Modern Canadian regular military units usually get a rating of 8, on the Chadwick Scale, and that's about as high as you can get for a formation of brigade size or larger. The reasons for this is doctrine, equipment, training standards, and the small size of the Canadian military. It's staffed by volunteers who are largely lifetime professionals and when you combine all of that an 8 is usually what you get. In the particular scenario of this story, and I thought I had made this pretty clear, the reservists aren't going to be as good as the full time military. I also pointed out that when you have an army that is comprised of men who know they're going to be literally defending their homes they tend to take their military service far more seriously and, on average, tend to make better soldiers. That's all I was expressing here.

Jessica42 Featured By Owner Jan 27, 2014 Writer

You missed my point. The Canadian army did as well as it did in WWI because it did not have to unlearn the doctrines that armies had been drilled to an inch of their life before the war, that caused the horrendous casualties for no results that were indicative of much of the first world war. Instead Canadians just learned and were willing examine new ideas and new technologies to get results, even if they had been rejected by the more tradition bound British. Echo location and it use for counter battery work for example.

I was trying to point out something I saw as ironic. And how in talking about their performance you may have been too generous with your praise.