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 CHAPTER III

EMPLOYMENT IN THE FIELD WITH THE INDEPENDENT CAVALRY

The Germans have resolutely adopted the plan of attaching machine guns to cavalry, and they seem thus to understand the modern combination of fire and shock tactics. To the machine gun the fire action, to the horseman the moral action—so much the more easy and productive of results, as the machine gun is the more powerful.—, French General Staff.

Since this was written it has been generally recognised by the leading military authorities of the world that the machine gun is essentially a cavalry weapon; and Colonel Zaleski in a recent article on the lessons of the Russo-Japanese War goes so far as to say, "Even their addition to squadrons cannot be carried out too rapidly, and this weapon would now appear to be indispensable to cavalry."

The truth of this statement is obvious to the student of modern tactics who is also acquainted with the machine gun as organised and equipped on the Continent and in the United States, where it is as mobile as the cavalryman himself and as quick in coming into action.[A] When its true rôle is understood and its tremendous fire power made full use of, it will go far to render cavalry independent of the rifle, and to restore