Influence of the Political Object on the Military Object
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In one word,
the art of war in its highest point of view is policy, but, no doubt, a policy which fights battles, instead of writing notes.
According to this view, to leave a great military enterprise, or the plan for one, to a purely military judgment and decision, is a distinction which cannot be allowed, and is even prejudicial;
indeed, it is an irrational proceeding to consult professional soldiers on the plan of a war, that they may give a purely military opinion upon what the cabinet should do; but still more absurd is the demand of Theorists that a statement of the available means of war should be laid before the general, that he may draw out a purely military plan for the war or for a campaign, in accordance with those means. Experience in general also teaches us that notwithstanding the multifarious branches and scientific character of military art in the present day, still
the leading outlines of a war are always determined by the cabinet, that is, if we would use technical language, by a political not a military functionary.
This is perfectly natural.
None of the principal plans which are required for a war can be made without an insight into the political relations; and, in reality, when people speak, as they often do, of the prejudicial influence of policy on the conduct of a war, they say in reality something very different to what they intend. It is not this influence but the policy itself which should be found fault with.
If policy is right, that is, if it succeeds in hitting the object, then it can only act on the war in its sense, with advantage also; and if this influence of policy causes a divergence from the object, the cause is only to be looked for in a mistaken policy.
It is only when policy promises itself a wrong effect from certain military means and measures, an effect opposed to their nature, that it can exercise a prejudicial effect on war by the course it prescribes. Just as a person in a language with which he is not conversant sometimes says what he does not intend, so policy, when intending right, may often order things which do not tally with its own views.
This has happened times without end, and it shows that a certain knowledge of the nature of war is essential to the management of political commerce.
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If war is to harmonise entirely with the political views and policy, to accommodate itself to the means available for war, there is only one alternative to be recommended when the statesman and soldier are not combined in one person, which is, to make the chief commander a member of the cabinet, that he may take part in its councils and decisions on important occasions. But then again, this is only possible when the cabinet, that is the government itself, is near the theatre of war, so that things can be settled without a serious waste of time.
"The art of war in its highest point of view is policy"
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