War and Peace Warfare Quotes

And the conversation turned again to the war, to Bonaparte, and to today's generals and statesmen.  The old prince [Bolkonsky] seemed to be convinced not only that all present-day men of action were mere boys, who did not even understand the ABC's of military and state affairs, and that Bonaparte was a worthless little Frenchman who was successful only because there were no Potemkins and Suvorovs to oppose him; but he was also convinced that there were no political difficulties in Europe, nor was there a war; but only some sort of marionette comedy that today's people played at, pretending they meant business. Prince Andrei cheerfully endured his father's mockery of the new people, and provoked his father to talk and listened to him with obvious delight. (1.1.24.18)

Though the wording of the order seemed unclear to the regimental commander and the question arose of how to take the wording of the order—in marching uniform or not?—in the council of battalion commanders it was decided to present the regiment for review in parade uniform, on the grounds that it is always better to bow too much than not to bow enough. And so the soldiers, after a twenty mile march, without a wink of sleep, spent the whole night mending and cleaning [...] and by morning the regiment, instead of the straggling, disorderly crowd it had been the day before, during the latest march, was a well ordered mass of two thousand men, each of whom knew his place, his duty, each of whose buttons and straps was in its place and sparkling clean.  [...] There was only one circumstance with regard to which no one could be at ease. This was footgear. More than half the men had their boots falling to pieces. But this shortcoming was not the regimental commander's fault, since, despite his repeated requests, the Austrian department had not released a supply, and the regiment had walked seven hundred miles. [...] The adjutant had been sent from headquarters to confirm to the regimental commander what had been said unclearly in the previous day's order, namely, that the commander in chief wished to see the regiment in exactly the same condition it had been in on the march—in greatcoats, in dustcovers, and without any preparations. (1.2.1.3-10)

Looking down over the railing, Prince Nesvitsky saw the swift, noisy, low waves of the Enns, which, merging, rippling, and swirling around the pilings of the bridge, drove on one after the other. Looking at the bridge, he saw the same monotonous living waves of soldiers, shoulder braids, shakos with dustcovers, packs, bayonets, long muskets, and under the shakos faces with wide cheekbones, sunken cheeks, and carefree, weary faces, and feet moving over the sticky mud that covered the planks of the bridge. Occasionally, amidst the monotonous waves of soldiers, like a spray of white foam on the waves of the Enns, an officer pushed his way through, in a cape, with his physiognomy distinct from the soldiers'; occasionally, like a chip of wood swirled along by the river, a dismounted hussar, an orderly, or a local inhabitant was borne across the bridge by the waves of infantry; occasionally, like a log floating down the river, a company's or an officer's cart floated across the bridge, surrounded on all sides, loaded to the top, and covered with leather. (1.2.7.5)

Despite the fact that the troops were ill clad, worn out, weakened by a third with the stragglers, the wounded, the dead, and the sick; despite the fact that the sick and the wounded had been left on the other side of the Danube with a letter from Kutuzov entrusting them to the humaneness of the enemy; despite the fact that the big hospitals and the houses in Krems that had been turned into infirmaries could no longer accommodate all the sick and wounded—despite all that, the halt at Krems and the victory over Mortier raised the spirits of the troops significantly. Throughout the army and in headquarters joyful, though incorrect, rumors were rife about the imaginary approach of columns from Russia, about some victory won by the Austrians, and about the retreat of the frightened Bonaparte. (1.2.9.2)

The further ahead he moved, the closer to the enemy, the more orderly and cheerful the troops looked. The greatest disorder and despondency had been in that baggage train [...] some seven miles away from the French. [...] But the closer Prince Andrei rode to the French line, the more self assured our troops looked. [...] Prince Andrei, having reached the front line, rode along it. Our line and the enemy's stood far from each other on the left and right flanks, but in the center, where the envoys had passed that morning, the lines came so close that the men could see each other's faces and talk to each other. Besides the soldiers who occupied the line at that place, many of the curious stood on both sides and gazed, laughing, at their strange and foreign looking enemies." (1.2.15.22-28)

Though none of the column leaders rode up to the ranks and spoke to the soldiers [...] the soldiers marched on cheerily, as always when going into action, especially on the offensive. But, having gone for about an hour in the thick fog, the major part of the troops were forced to halt, and an unpleasant awareness of disorder and muddle-headedness passed through the ranks. How such awareness is conveyed is quite difficult to define; but it is unquestionable that it is conveyed with extraordinary sureness, and flows swiftly, imperceptibly and irresistibly, like water through a glen. (1.3.14.6)

Rostov, in common with the whole army from which he came, was far from having experienced the change of feeling toward Napoleon and the French – who from being foes had suddenly become friends – that had taken place at headquarters and in Boris. In the army, Bonaparte and the French were still regarded with mingled feelings of anger, contempt, and fear. Only recently, talking with one of Platov's Cossack officers, Rostov had argued that if Napoleon were taken prisoner he would be treated not as a sovereign, but as a criminal. Quite lately, happening to meet a wounded French colonel on the road, Rostov had maintained with heat that peace was impossible between a legitimate sovereign and the criminal Bonaparte. Rostov was therefore unpleasantly struck by the presence of French officers in Boris' lodging, dressed in uniforms he had been accustomed to see from quite a different point of view from the outposts of the flank. As soon as he noticed a French officer, who thrust his head out of the door, that warlike feeling of hostility which he always experienced at the sight of the enemy suddenly seized him. (2.2.19.11)

"And what the deuce makes us go to war with Bonaparte?" said Shinshin.

The colonel was a tall, stout, and sanguine German, obviously a seasoned soldier and a patriot. He took offense at Shinshin's words. [...] And with that impeccable official memory peculiar to him, he repeated the introductory words of the manifesto: "'. . . and the desire, which constitutes the sole and absolute aim of the sovereign, to establish peace in Europe on firm foundations, led to his present decision to move part of the army abroad and to make further efforts towards the achievement of that intention.' [...] Ve must fight to the last trop of plod," said the colonel, pounding the table, "und tie for our emperor, and then all vill be veil. And reason as little as possible." (1.1.16.2-9)

As in the mechanism of a clock, so also in the mechanism of military action, the movement once given is just as irrepressible until the final results, and just as indifferently motionless are the parts of the mechanism not yet involved in the action even a moment before movement is transmitted to them. Wheels whizz on their axles, cogs catch, fast spinning pulleys whirr, yet the neighboring wheel is as calm and immobile as though it was ready to stand for a hundred years in immobility; but a moment comes—the lever catches, and, obedient to its movement, the wheel creaks, turning, and merges into one movement with the whole, the result and purpose of which are incomprehensible to it. As in a clock the result of the complex movement of numberless wheels and pulleys is merely the slow and measured movement of the hands pointing to the time, so also the result of all the complex human movements of these hundred and sixty thousand Russians and French—all the passions, desires, regrets, humiliations, sufferings, bursts of pride, fear, rapture—was merely the loss of the battle of Austerlitz, the so called battle of the three emperors, that is, a slow movement of the world historical hand on the clock face of human history. (1.3.11.8-9)

The Bible legend tells us that the absence of labor – idleness – was a condition of the first man's blessedness before the Fall. Fallen man has retained a love of idleness, but the curse weighs on the race not only because we have to seek our bread in the sweat of our brows, but because our moral nature is such that we cannot be both idle and at ease. An inner voice tells us we are in the wrong if we are idle. If man could find a state in which he felt that though idle he was fulfilling his duty, he would have found one of the conditions of man's primitive blessedness. And such a state of obligatory and irreproachable idleness is the lot of a whole class – the military. The chief attraction of military service has consisted and will consist in this compulsory and irreproachable idleness. (2.4.1.1)