One case is the
double strategic front of the Tyrol and the Frioul for a French army
passing the Adige. On whichever side it may wish to direct its main
column, a detachment must be left on the other front sufficiently strong
to hold in check the enemy threatening to cut the line of
communications. The third example is the frontier of Spain, which
enables the Spaniards to establish a double front,--one covering the
road to Madrid, the other having Saragossa or Galicia as a base. To
whichever side the invading army turns, a detachment must be left on the
other proportioned in magnitude to the enemy's force in that direction.
All that can be said on this point is that it is advantageous to enlarge
as much as possible the field of operations of such detachments, and to
give them as much power of mobility as possible, in order to enable them
by opportune movements to strike important blows. A most remarkable
illustration of this truth was given by Napoleon in the campaign of
1797. Obliged as he was to leave a corps of fifteen thousand men in the
valley of the Adige to observe the Tyrol while he was operating toward
the Noric Alps, he preferred to draw this corps to his aid, at the risk
of losing temporarily his line of retreat, rather than leave the parts
of his army disconnected and exposed to defeat in detail.
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