should the Emperor move to the aid of Hungary. But while they had been fulfilling this final phase of their mission of security, Subutai had wiped out the Hungarian army. VII. While Subutai had taken the foregoing measures to ensure flank security, his grasp of war and its unforeseen happenings had led him not to rely exclusively on it. He advanced into Hungary in three columns, of which the two flank columns traversed the circumference of an elongated circle, while he himself with the control mass started later and went through the diameter. Thus he set up his forces in a close-linked and secure system with true economy of force, as was later the Napoleonic method. The dates of departure and the routes were evidently so arranged that the three columns should converge and join hands on the Danube near the Hungarian capital, where the main enemy forces were likely to be met. The plan was carried out like clockwork. The right column moved westwards to the north of the Carpathians, its exposed flank covered directly by the Vistula and indirectly by Kaidu's flank detachment, then crossed the mountains by the pass of Jablonika and neighbouring passes, and in two bodies turned south-west down the banks of the March and Vag rivers. Sweeping round in a long curving advance, it guarded the right flank of the main army against interference from Austria, until on the 17th of March it joined Subutai near Gran. Meanwhile the left column had executed a circular sweep to the south-east through Transylvania until it also rejoined Subutai, on the 3rd of April. The central mass-the last to move,-strengthened as usual by the Guard, forced the pass of Ruska on the 12th of March, and advanced by the valley of the Theiss to the Danube near Gran. Rarely, if ever, in history has the speed of its advance been approached. Subutai's advanced-guard arrived at the Danube on the 15th, and Subutai himself with the main body came up on the 17th of April. In three days the advancedguard had covered 180 miles through a hostile country deep in snow! By the 4th of April, Subutai, his three armies assembled, faced across the Danube Bela of Hungary, who had an army of 100,000 men. At this moment, however, Kaidu's detachment had yet to fight the battle of Liegnitz, and Subutai would be uncertain of the situation as regards the other allied armies. Moreover, it would have been diffi cult for him to force the crossings of the river under the eyes of the enemy, nor would it have been wise to fight a decisive battle with the Danube at his back. Bold as he is in execution-the very embodiment of the principles of mobility and the offensive, his every move is guided by the principle of security. We see him executing a true strategic retreat towards his base at Munkacz, luring on his enemy away from the protection of the Danube and the chance of reinforcement. The retirement is carried out slowly, taking six days to reach the Sajo river, half the distance. Then suddenly he delivers his crushing sur prise blow. In the night he crosses the Sajo, and a daybreak on the 10th of April he strikes. By midday the Hungarian army has ceased to exist, Bela is in flight, and more than 70,000 of his men are left dead on the battlefield. Be it noted that it is the morrow of Liegnitz, away in distant Silesia. We are ignorant of the Mongol means of intercommunication, but such synchronisation as is seen here, as also in the junction of the three columns on the Danube, and in the coincidence of Subutai's own departure with the first successes of Kaidu's detachment in Poland, can hardly be matters of chance. VIII. For this battle we have accounts sufficiently reliable to grasp the Mongol tactics. Contemporary observers are impressed, above all, by two features: first, the speed, silence, and mechanical perfection of their evolutions carried out by signals with the black-and-white flags of the squadrons; second, the deadliness of their fire. Their opponents, in the words of a chronicler, "fell to the right and left like the leaves of winter." The armies of the Middle Ages, until the English archers in the next century, relied almost entirely on shock tactics. But the Mongols, as Duplan Carpin says, "wounded and killed men and horses, and only when the men and horses are worn down by the arrows, do they come to close quarters.' It is the first time in military history that "fire" is ployed systematically to pave the way for the assault. In this battle, while the Prince Batu, the nominal commander, delivers a frontal attack, Subutai crosses the river lower down, and falls on the flank and rear of the enemy. He had, the day before, reconnoitred and found a ford. Before dawn, Batu seizes the bridge over the river to his front, and covers the passage of his troops by the fire of his catapults and archers. Then the attack is launched, the enemy are fixed, when suddenly Subutai's surprise blow takes the Hungarians in rear. Magyars, Germans, Croats, and French volunteers all are cut to pieces; the Knights Templars die fighting to the last man. After this holocaust, Hungary was occupied without further fighting. An organised administration was set up, and the land settled down under its new conquerors. There was no attempt to push farther into Europe, apart from one reconnaissance into Austria, which, strangely enough, was carried out under an English Knight Templar who held command in the Mongol Army. But at the end of the year Ogdai died at Karakorum, and the princes were all eager to compete for the succession. On this account the Mongol armies and their leaders decided to return East. The evacuation of Hungary was carried out systematically and without interference. As a final gesture to show their contempt for the Holy Roman Empire, and to dispel any idea that they were being forced to retire, the Mongols sent an expedition to ravage Eastern Austria before leaving. Nor did this evacuation mean any diminution of their influence, for Ogdai's successor received the homage and embassies of the world. The great commander himself, Subutai, when he felt old age creeping on, took his leave of the Mongol court, and retired to die alone, in his tent, on the northern IX. steppes. From China to the Danube "he had conquered thirty-two nations and won sixty-five pitched battles." What is the value of this fragment of history to us, and what are its practical lessons ? In the first place, it dissipates the illusion that Europe alone is the home of military genius. The Japanese have reminded us that courageous and disciplined fighting troops can come from the Orient, but the Mongol campaigns reveal to us that Asia has also produced consummate military leaders who in strategical ability may vie with any in history. What she has done in the past, it is possible for her to do again. Again, as very perfect exemplars of the principles of war in practice, the Mongol campaigns are of great value in helping students of war to understand what these principles actually mean when translated into definite operations, which is a very different matter from being able merely to recite them like a catechism. Next, we come to the features of the Mongol tactics and organisation. Their continuous run of victories, usually over superior numbers, were achieved in defiance of most of the canons on which European armies, of the present equally with the Hannibal, it formed merely the mobile wings hinged on an essentially protective infantry centre, which was the pivot on which it manoeuvred. The prime feature of the Mongol military system was therefore its simplicity, due to the use of a single arm, in contrast to the inevitably complex organisation of a combination of several arms which has always characterised European armies. In this way the Mongols solved the ever-difficult problem of cooperation between arms which have radically different qualities and limitations. The single arm they used was that which possessed the highest degree of mobility, and in this lay the secret of their unbroken run of victory. At such local points where greater loco-mobility was needed than mounted troops could achieve, a proportion of the troops were temporarily dismounted and fought on foot. past, have based their systems. arm alike of Alexander and Nor can these successes be discounted in the way that is common when discussing victories over Asiatic troops, who are regarded as lacking the staying power, discipline, and equipment of European soldiers. Subutai's warriors proved themselves more than a match for the finest men - at arms of mediæval Europe, who had superiority both of numbers and armour. The Mongol tactics were never to close with the adversary until he was weakened and disorganised by fire. If charged by the heavy European cavalry, they never let themselves be drawn into a clash, but dispersed on a signal, rallied by signal at a distance, and again assailed the enemy with fire, repeating the process until the phase of usure was complete, and the way paved for a decisive charge. Thus they proved that mobility is the king-pin of tactics, as of strategy; that lightly armed troops can beat more heavily armed ones if their mobility is sufficiently superior, demonstrating that the "weight" of a force is its weapon - power multiplied by its mobility, and that this mobility is a far better protection than armour or any such form of negative defence. In naval parlance, the battle cruiser is superior to the battleship. 66 Another canon that they tore up was that mobile troops, such as cavalry, must needs rest on a stable infantry base. Although cavalry was the decisive Is there not a lesson here for the armies of to-day? Mobility was the weakest point in the Great War. The armies of Europe were relatively as immobile as those of the Shah of Karismia and medieval Christendom, because they based their organisation on a multiplicity of arms, and tied their mobile arms to the service of the less mobile. The development of mechanical firepower has negatived the hitting power of cavalry against a properly equipped enemy. But on land the armoured caterpillar car or light tank appears the natural heir of the Mongol horseman, for the "caterpillars" are essentially mechanical cavalry. Reflection suggests that we might well regain the Mongol mobility and offensive power by reverting to the simplicity of a single highly mobile arm, employing the crews to act on foot as land marines wherever the special loco-mobility of infantry is needed. Further, aeroplanes would seem to have the same qualities in even higher degree, and it may be that in the future they will prove the successors of the Mongol horsemen. methods and the secrets of their success may at least serve to clear our minds of longinherited prejudices, and reveal the unsoundness of conventional objections to a new and mobile arm which are based on its minor limitations for movement in certain localities and over occasional types of ground. The deduction from the Mongol campaigns would surely seem to be that superior general mobility when allied with hitting power is both a more powerful and a more secure tool than the mere loco-mobility and defensive power of an army A study of the Mongol founded on infantry. 2 C VOL. CCXV.—NO. MCCCIII. |