Alexander : a history of the origin and growth of the art of war from ...

STRATEGY. 3these maps he stuck colored pins to indicate where his divisionswere to move. Having thus wrought out his plan, heissued orders accordingly.To the general the map is a chessboard,and upon this he moves his troops as players movequeen and knight. Strategy is, in other words, the art bywhich a general so moves his army about the country in relationto but beyond the proximity ofthe enemy, that when hefinally reaches him, the enemy shall be placed in a disadvantageousposition for battle or other manoeuvre. The movementsof an army in the immediate presence of the enemy,or on the field of battle, belong to the domain of grand tactics.Strategy is the common law or common sense of war. Asthe common law has arisen from the decisions of great judgesrelating to the common affairs of life, so strategy has arisenfrom the action of the great masters of war in the eventsthey were called on to control. The word is very properlyderived from stt'citegos, the name given by the Greeksto the leader of a certain unit of service — to a general. Itis not the army, nor the people, nor the territory, nor thecause which are the origin of strategic movements, though,indeed, all these bear their due part in the calculation. Itis the head and heart of the leader which always have furnishedand always must furnish the strategic values ofeverycampaign.words, hisFrom his intellectual and moral vigor — in otherpersonal equipment—must ever come the motivepower and direction.Strategy has its rules, like every science. Until within alittle over a century these have been unwritten. They arein principle inflexible, in practice elastic. They are but thetools of the trade, the nomenclature of the science ; the" Barbara Celarent " of logic. The strictness or laxity ofthe maxims of strategy is measured by the ability of the general.The second-rate commander transcends them at his