Page:"The next war"; an appeal to common sense (IA thenextwarappeal01irwi).pdf/79

 will be able, by “the next war,” to go twenty or twenty-five miles an hour. Hitherto, armies have needed roads in order to advance. But the caterpillar wheel makes artillery comparatively independent of highways.

These, then, will probably be the tactics of the next war on land, provided that we make no great basic discovery in the art of killing, but only improve up to their best possibilities the instruments we have and know. The better to imagine the scene, let us repeat the situation of the last war, and imagine a thoroughly-prepared Germany attacking and trying to invade a thoroughly-prepared France.

The attackers will probably dispense with a declaration of hostilities, following the precedent established by the Japanese in their war against Russia. “Wars will no longer be declared,” says the Colonel Fuller so often quoted above, “but like a tropical tornado there will be a darkening of the sky, and then the flood. To dally over the declaration will be considered as foolish as a Fontenoy courtesy—a wave of a plumed hat—'Gentlemen of France, fire first!’” Germany will start from her frontier an army of tanks, big and little, gas-proof, their guns provided with gas shells to kill, with explosive shells to open the way for killing. They will be backed by the heavy artillery on caterpillar trucks. The French will probably have a defence ready for this form of attack. Across their frontiers will stretch a line of retorts capable of setting up a lethal cloud four