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"Evolution
of Weaponry"
Weapons
as Devices to Overcome Physical and Psychological Limitations
Posturing
as a Psychological Weapon: The
resistance to killing can be overcome, or at least bypassed,
by a variety of techniques. One technique is to cause the
enemy to run (often by getting in their flank or rear, which
almost always causes a rout), and it is in the subsequent
pursuit of a broken or defeated enemy that the vast majority
of the killing happens.
It is widely known that most killing happens after the battle,
in the pursuit phase (Clausewitz and Ardant du Picq both
commented on this), and this is apparently due to two factors.
First, the pursuer doesn't have to look in his victim's
eyes, and it appears to be much easier to deny an opponent's
humanity if you can stab or shoot them in the back and don't
have to look into their eyes when you kill them. Second
(and probably much more importantly), in the midbrain, during
a pursuit, the opponent has changed from a fellow male engaged
in a primitive, simplistic, ritualistic, head-to-head, territorial
or mating battle to prey who must to be pursued, pulled
down, and killed. Anyone who has ever worked with dogs understands
this process: you are generally safe if you face a dog down,
and you should always back away from a dog (or almost any
animal) in a threatening situation because if you turn around
and run you are in great danger of being viciously attacked.
The same is true of soldiers in combat.
Thus
one key to the battle is simply to get the enemy to run.
The battlefield is truly psychological in nature, and in
this realm the individual who puffs himself up the biggest,
or makes the loudest noise, is most likely to win. The actual
battle is, from one perspective, a process of posturing
until one side or another turns and runs, and then the real
killing begins. Thus posturing is critical to warfare, and
victory can he achieved through superior posturing.
Bagpipes,
bugles, drums, shiny armor, tall hats, chariots, elephants,
and cavalry have all been factors in successful posturing
(convincing oneself of one's prowess while daunting one's
enemy), but, ultimately, gunpowder proved to be the ultimate
posturing tool. For example, the long bow was significantly
more accurate and had a far greater rate of fire and a much
greater accurate range than the muzzle-loading muskets used
up to the early part of the American Civil War. Furthermore,
the long bow did not need the industrial base (iron and
gunpowder) required by muskets, and the training of a long
bowman was not really all that difficult.
Thus, mechanically speaking there are few reasons why there
should not have been regiments of long bowmen at Waterloo
and the 1st Bull Run cutting vast swaths through the enemy.
[Similarly there were highly efficient, air-pressure-powered
weapons available as early as the Napoleonic era (similar
to modern paintball guns), which had a far higher firing
rate than the muskets of that era, but were never used.]
But it must be constantly remembered that, to paraphrase
Napoleon, in war, psychological factors are three times
more important than mechanical factors. The reality is that,
on the battlefield, if you are going "doink, doink," no
matter how effectively, and the enemy is going "BANG!, BANG!,"
no matter how ineffectively, ultimately the "doinkers" lose.
This phenomenon helps explain the effectiveness of high-noise-producing
weapons ranging from Gustavus Adolphus' small, mobile cannons
assigned to infantry units to the U.S. Army's M-60 machine
gun in Vietnam, which fired large, very loud, 7.62-mm ammunition
at a slow rate of fire vs the M-16's smaller (and comparatively
much less noisy) 5.56-mm ammunition firing at a rapid rate
of fire. (Note that both the machine gun and the cannon
are also crew-served weapons, which is a key factor to be
addressed shortly.)
Mobility
as a Psychological Weapon: Once
it is understood that most of the killing (and thereby the
true destruction and defeat of an enemy) happens in the
pursuit, then the true utility of weapons that provide a
mobility advantage becomes clear. First, a mobility advantage
often permits a force to get in the enemy's flank or rear.
Combatants seem to have an intuitive understanding of their
vulnerability (both psychological and physical) from an
opponent in their rear, and this almost always results in
a mass panic and rout. Second, it is during the pursuit
of a defeated enemy that a mobility advantage is needed
if a pursuing force is to kill the enemy. An opponent who
has cast aside his weapons and armor can generally outrun
an armed pursuer, but a man on foot cannot outrun chariots
or cavalry, and it is here, in stabbing and shooting men
in the back, that chariots and cavalry had their greatest
utility.
Distance
as a Psychological Weapon:
Another key factor in overcoming the resistance to killing
is distance, which has been partially addressed earlier.
The utility of weapons that kill from a distance cannot
be truly understood without understanding the psychological
enabling aspect of distance, which, simply stated, means
that the further away you are the easier it is to kill.
Thus, dropping bombs from 20,000 feet or firing artillery
from 2 miles away is, psychologically speaking, not at all
difficult (and there is no indication of any noncompliance
in these situations), but hand-to-hand combat and firing
a rifle from 20 feet is very difficult (with high incidence
of nonfirers) and from a few feet away it is virtually impossible
to stab an opponent. John Keegan's landmark book The
Face of Battle makes a comparative study of Agincourt
(1415), Waterloo (1815), and the Somme (1916). In his analysis
of these three battles spanning over 500 years, Keegan repeatedly
notes the amazing absence of bayonet wounds incurred during
the massed bayonet attacks at Waterloo and the Somme. At
Waterloo Keegan notes that, "There were numbers of sword
and lance wounds to be treated and some bayonet wounds,
though these had usually been inflicted after the man had
already been disabled, there being no evidence of the armies
having crossed bayonets at Waterloo." By World War I edged-weapon
combat had almost disappeared, and Keegan notes that in
the Battle of the Somme, "edged-weapon wounds were a fraction
of one per cent of all wounds inflicted in the First World
War." Indeed, all evidence indicates that ancient battles
were not much more than great shoving matches, until one
side or the other fled. This can be observed in the battle
record of Alexander the Great, who (according to Ardant
du Picq's studies of ancient records) lost a total of approximately
700 men "to the sword" in all his battles put together,
and this is simply because Alexander the Great always won,
and the actual killing happened only to the losers after
the battle (Fig. 1).
The
only thing greater than the resistance to killing at close
range is the resistance to being killed at close range.
Close-range interpersonal aggression is the universal human
phobia, which is why the initiation of midbrain processing
is so powerful and intense in these situations. Thus, one
limitation to killing at long range is that greater distance
results in a reduced psychological effect on the enemy.
This manifests itself in the constant thwarting of each
new generation of air power advocates and other adherents
of sterile, long-range, high-tech warfare and a constant
need for close combat troops to defeat an enemy.
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