Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in
Book cover

European Warfare 1815–2000 pp 27–50Cite as

Europe’s Way of War, 1815–64

  • Chapter

  • 93 Accesses

Part of the book series: Problems in Focus Series ((PFS))

Abstract

Military history is arguably the last stronghold of what historiographers call the ‘Whig interpretation’. Reduced to its simplest terms, this approach sees the development of warfare as progressive. From the Macedonian phalanx, through the legions of Rome and the grenadiers of Frederick the Great, to the panzers of Nazi Germany and the information-age warfare currently touted in US military circles, the conduct of conflict is presented as becoming more sophisticated and more effective.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Notes and References

  1. H. Winton, D. Mets (eds) The Challenge of War.- Military Institutions and New Realities, 1918–1941 (Lincoln, Nebraska, 2000) offers a set of comparative case studies in the process.

    Google Scholar 

  2. Norman Dixon, On the Psychology of Military Incompetence (London, 1984).

    Google Scholar 

  3. Geoffrey Wawro, ‘Inside the Whale: The Tangled Finances of the Austrian Army, 1848–1866’, War in History 3 (1996), 42–65.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Jeremy Black, Culloden and the 45 (London, 1990).

    Google Scholar 

  5. Cf. Helmuth Fechner, ‘Westpreussen unter Friderizianischen Verwaltung’, In Deutschland und Polen, ed. H. Fechner (Wuerzburg, 1964 ), pp. 30–46;

    Google Scholar 

  6. and Walther Hubatsch, ‘Friedrich der Grosse und Westpreussen’, Westpreussische Jahrbuch 22 (1972), 5–14.

    Google Scholar 

  7. Scott Hughes Myerly, British Military Spectacle From the Napoleonic Wars Through the Crimea (Cambridge, Mass., 1996) is a pathbreaking study of this phenomenon.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  8. Sabrina Mueller, Soldaten in der deutschen Revolution von 1848/49 (Paderborn, 1999).

    Google Scholar 

  9. Douglas Porch, Army and Revolution: France 1815–1848 (London, 1974), pp. 75–92.

    Google Scholar 

  10. See as a case study Lawrence Sondhaus, In the Service of the Emperor: Italians in the Austrian Armed Forces, 1814–1918 (Boulder, Colorado, 1990).

    Google Scholar 

  11. Burkhard Koester, Militaer und Eisenbahn in der Habsburgermonarchie 1825–1859 (Munich, 1999) is an excellent overview.

    Google Scholar 

  12. Gerald S. Graham, The Politics of Naval Supremacy (Cambridge, 1965), pp. 69–71.

    Google Scholar 

  13. Robert M. Epstein, Napoleon’s Last Victory and the Emergence of Modern War ( Lawrence, Kansas, 1994 ).

    Google Scholar 

  14. Cf. inter alia Gary Cox, The Halt in the Mud: French Strategic Planning from Waterloo to Sedan (Boulder, Colorado, 1994)

    Google Scholar 

  15. P. G. Griffith, Military Thought in the French Army (Manchester, 1989)

    Google Scholar 

  16. and E. Carris, La pensee militaire française (Paris, 1960), pp. 226–62.

    Google Scholar 

  17. Richard Holmes, The Road to Sedan: The French Army, 1866–1870 (London, 1984), pp. 11–125, incorporates an excellent overview of the army’s developing images and realities.

    Google Scholar 

  18. Rory Muir, Tactics and the Experience of Battle in the Age of Napoleon ( New Haven, CT, 1998 ).

    Google Scholar 

  19. Henriduc d’Aumale, Les Zouaves et les chasseurs à pied (Paris, 1855).

    Google Scholar 

  20. Thomas S. Abler, Hinterland Warriors and Military Dress: European Empires and Exotic Uniforms (New York, 1999), especially, pp. 100–110.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  21. Cf. Geoffrey Wawro, ‘An “Army of Pigs”: The Technical, Social, and Political Bases of Austrian Shock Tactics, 1859–1866’, The, journal of Military History 59 (1995), 407–434;

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. and J. S. Curtiss, The Russian Army under Nicholas I ( Durham, NC, 1965 ), pp. 113–30.

    Google Scholar 

  23. On that subJect see Gerd Stolz, Die schleswig-holsteinisch Erhebung: Die nationale Auseiandersetxung in und um Schleswig-Holstein von 1848–51 (Husum, 1996).

    Google Scholar 

  24. C. I. Hamilton, Anglo-French Naval Rivalry, 1840–1870 (Oxford, 1993 ), pp. 183–9.

    Google Scholar 

  25. James L. Morrison, ‘The United States Military Academy, 1833–1866: Years of Progress and Turmoil’, Dissertation, Columbia University, 1970.

    Google Scholar 

  26. W. S. Serman, Les origines des of~ciers français, 1848–1870 (Paris, 1979), remains definitive for statistics and mentalities.

    Google Scholar 

  27. The quotation is paraphrased from Raoul Girardet, La Société militare dans la France contemporaine, 1815–1939 (Paris,1953), p. 110.

    Google Scholar 

  28. A particular point of M. D. Welch, Science and the British Officer: The Early Days of the Royal United Services Institute For Defence Studies (1829–1869) (Weymouth, 1998 ).

    Google Scholar 

  29. Anatol Lieven, ‘Nasty Little Wars’, The National Interest 62 (Winter, 2000/01),65–76.

    Google Scholar 

  30. Arden Bucholz, Moltke, Schlieffen, and Prussian War Planning (New York, 1991), pp. 25–7.

    Google Scholar 

  31. John Sweetman, War and Administration: The Significance of the Crimean War for the British Army (Edinburgh, 1984).

    Google Scholar 

  32. Sir James Outram, The Conquest of Scinde: A Commentary, 2 vols in 1 (Edinburgh, 1846) demonstrates matters were no less complex when dealt with on the spot.

    Google Scholar 

  33. Geoffrey Wawro, ‘Austria versus the Risorgimento: A New look at Austria’s Italian Strategy in the 1860s’, European History Quarterly 26 (1996), 7–29.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  34. Ellis Kimerling Wirtschafter, From Serf to Russian Soldier (Princeton, 1990).

    Book  Google Scholar 

  35. Lawrence Sondhaus, The Habsburg Empire and the Sea: Austrian Naval Policy, 1797–1866 (West Lafayette, Indiana, 1989), is a good case study of that process.

    Google Scholar 

  36. Jacob Kipp, ‘Consequences of Defeat: Modernizing the Russian Navy, 1856–1863’,, jahrbuecher fuer die Geschichte Osteuropas, 20 (1973), 210–25.

    Google Scholar 

  37. Dennis Showalter, ‘Weapons, Technology, and the Military in Metternich’s Germany: A Study In Stagnation?’, Australian Journal of Politics and History 24 (1978), 227–38.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  38. Dennis E. Showalter, ‘Infantry Weapons, Infantry Tactics, and the Armies of Germany, 1849–64’, European Studies Review 4 (1974), 119–140, remains a useful case study and overview.

    Google Scholar 

  39. Dennis E. Showalter, Railroads and Rifies: Soldiers, Technology, and the Unification of Germany ( Hamden, CT, 1975 ), pp. 167–178.

    Google Scholar 

  40. Christopher Hall, British Strategy in the Napoleonic War, 1803–1815 (Manchester, 1992).

    Google Scholar 

  41. J. Y. Wong, ‘The Limits of Naval Power: British Gunboat Diplomacy in China from the Nemesis to the Amethyst, 1839–1949’, War and Society 18 (2000), 93–120.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  42. Stacey R. Davis, ‘Transforming the Enemy: Algerian Colonization, Imperial Clemency, and the Rehabilitation of France’s 1851 Republican Insurrectionaries’, Dissertation, Yale University, 1999.

    Google Scholar 

  43. Anthony Clayton, France, Soldiers, and Africa (London, 1988), pp. 245–6.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Authors
  1. Dennis Showalter
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Editor information

Jeremy Black

Copyright information

© 2002 Dennis Showalter

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Showalter, D. (2002). Europe’s Way of War, 1815–64. In: Black, J. (eds) European Warfare 1815–2000. Problems in Focus Series. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4039-0705-9_2

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4039-0705-9_2

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave, London

  • Print ISBN: 978-0-333-78668-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4039-0705-9

  • eBook Packages: Palgrave History CollectionHistory (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation