The Franco-Prussian War: The German Conquest of France in 1870-1871. By Geoffrey Wawro. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003. 327 pages. $35.00. Reviewed by Dr. Eugenia C. Kiesling, Professor of History, US Military Academy.

For 40 years, no historian has dared to risk comparison with Michael Howard’s Franco-Prussian War: The German Invasion of France, 1870-1871 by publishing an English-language history of the Franco-Prussian War. Professor Geoffrey Wawro is not only brave but has succeeded in producing, if not a replacement for Howard, a worthy companion volume.

Even more than Howard’s book, this is straightforward military history, a study of armies and battles with little discussion of national policy, and with no concern for the economic or other domestic aspects of the war. As such, it is a useful work. The Franco-Prussian War was a military proving ground in an age full of uncertainties. French long-service professionals fought against Prussian conscripts, Chassepot rifles and Mitrailleuse machine guns against the Dreyse needle gun, Krupp’s new steel breech-loading six-pounder gun against the French army’s four-pounder bronze muzzle-loaders, an efficient general staff against a poor one. No one knew how these various contests would turn out, and Wawro offers an enthralling narrative of how battles were won and lost. As such, it ought to be of great interest to the professional soldier as well as the military historian.

In introducing the two armies, Wawro touches only briefly on the fairly well-understood subject of contemporary technological developments and their impact on military tactics. That decision reflects a reasonable economy of force, especially as the necessary points are clearly illustrated in the battle narratives. More problematic is the absence of discussion of the technology’s effects at the operational and strategic levels of war. For example, because Wawro says little about railroads, readers unfamiliar with the subject may fail to recognize the technological background to General Helmut von Moltke’s prediction for battles of encirclement.

One advantage of being the second person to write on a given war is there is no historiography to bother about. Wawro’s book is all the more readable for the absence of arguments with other historians. On the other hand, a historiographical discussion would have had the salutary effect of forcing Wawro to take more rigorous positions on certain points of controversy. In particular, Wawro does not situate himself vis-a-vis the triumphalist school of German military history, which sees the Prussian army of 1870 as a model of inexorable efficiency, the precursor of the Wehrmacht of the early years of World War II. If one believes this theory, Germans rolled over France in 1870 and 1940 (and almost in 1914) because their army was overwhelmingly superior in quality of soldiers, leadership, doctrine, organization, and use of technology. This school emphasizes the German General Staff system and an aggressive approach to war characterized by doctrines like auftragstaktik and operational art.

In the early pages, Wawro appears to belong in the triumphalist camp. His chapter on “The Armies in 1870″ compares the “sins of the French army” with a Prussian war-planning marked by “theoretical and technical innovations.” He invidiously compares French methods, orderly but slow and rigid, with auftragstaktik, purposeful energy behind the appearance of disorder. But the operation narrative refers to auftragstaktik and operational art too rarely to demonstrate the importance of these concepts to the German victory. For example, the claim that operational art “dictated” a particular action begs the question of defining operational art and explaining how a doctrine enforces its will on armies.

The gripping narrative tells a more plausible story. Once the war begins, we hear little of a perfectly organized general staff or the flexibility of auftragstaktik. Instead, Wawro describes how German units blundered into battles to be shredded by the efficient Chassepot. Thus, “aggressive subordinates, determined to be first in on the action, had piled up necessary casualties in every clash with the French thus far.” When the Prussians won, it was because well organized and handled artillery pulverized French units from beyond the effective range of French counter-battery fire. How a battle described by a near-contemporary as “an artillery battle par excellence” constituted a demonstration of operational art demands discussion.

If the narrative does not reinforce Wawro’s opening assertions about auftragstaktik and operational art, nor does it adequately prepare the reader for belated hints that Prussia’s victory over France was neither predictable with certainty nor inevitable. Only on page 187 do we realize that knowledgeable people expected a French victory in 1870. Thus, European surprise after Sedan, described on page 228, is itselfa surprise to the reader, as is Wawro’s later observation that “Prussia’s swift victory in 1870-71 came as something of a shock to Bismarck.” Wawro’s important conclusion that the war might have ended differently had France exploited the Chassepot’s defensive effectiveness with immediate counterattacks against shaken German formations ought to have been introduced at the beginning of the book. For what makes the Franco-Prussian War so interesting is that its outcome was anything but predictable. Rather than being a preordained victory for a Prussian steamroller, the war was a fascinating and uncertain contest between two rival military systems.

But is it difficult for the historian to resist the temptation to emphasize the flaws of the French army of 1870. The narrative naturally takes on a sardonic tone, thanks to the wealth of anecdotes like General Bourbaki’s complaint about his commander: “I spent the entire day in complete ignorance of Marshal Bazaine’s intentions, or of any ultimate objective.” If French soldiers describe their officers as “farcical, ridiculous,” so too might the modern historian. But Wawro does not wallow in French incompetence to the complete exclusion of problems on the other side, which included unfit reservists, headstrong and incompetent commanders, failures of communication, and, unsurprisingly in view of Bourbaki’s own ignorance, uncertainty about French plans.

This reviewer disagrees with several analytical claims. Machine guns are close support weapons, and it is commonplace to criticize the placement of the Mitrailleuse back with the artillery. It is not clear, then, why Wawro regrets that the gun’s 1,200m range kept it too close to the enemy for the safety of its crew. The battle of Beaune-le-Rolande did not so much reveal “the strength of Germany’s professionals and the weaknesses of France’s unseasoned reserves” as it demonstrated that Germany’s conscripts and reservists were now seasoned veterans while France lacked a reserve system to replace her vanished professional soldiers.

Thanks to Professor Wawro, there are now two delightfully readable, detailed, and clear accounts of the Franco-Prussian War. It is too bad that The Franco-Prussian War neither proves nor challenges conventional claims about the role of doctrine in the German victory, but it does provide a useful foundation for those eager to pursue this critical historical question.

Don’t Throw Howard’s Book Out Just Yet

For the past four decades, the most comprehensive English-language history of the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871 has been Professor Michael Howard’s book, first published in 1961. Geoffrey Wawro, the U.S. Naval War college professor who in 1996 wrote an interesting revisionist history of the 1866 Austro-Prussian War, has now written a book to compete with Howard’s classic. In a nutshell, Wawro’s book is quite good, but it complements rather than replaces Howard’s book.

Wawro’s assessment of the opposing military systems is rather biased in favor of the conscription-based German armies over the smaller French regular army. Wawro focuses on one problematic French regiment and uses it to categorize the entire French army as riddled with poor morale, incompetent leadership and lax discipline. Indeed, Wawro equates alcohol consumption in the French army with unsoldierly behavior – what about the famous alcoholic general named Grant who took Vicksburg seven years before? While Wawro frequently notes drunken German troops later in the campaign, somehow this did not represent German indiscipline. Wawro also makes a big point about the superiority of German pre-war planning, but this is questionable on two accounts. First, the French were hardly alone in lacking detailed contingency war plans in 1870 – few other nations had them either. Second, Wawro admits the German operational plan – to encircle both French armies on the frontier – failed (MacMahon’s army escaped to Chalons and while Bazaine’s army was encircled, it was due to French lethargy, not the German plan).

Wawro’s two main theses about the war are continuations of earlier themes from his book on the Austro-Prussian War. His first thesis – that incompetent French leadership was at the root of the defeat – equates General Bazaine’s fumbling behavior at Metz with Austrian General Benedek’s mistakes at Königgrätz. However, there are problems with this thesis. Bazaine had demonstrated real battlefield competence in previous wars, while Benedek was more of a paper-pusher. Bazaine’s conduct indicates that political calculations – rather than incompetence – were at the root of the general’s failure to act. Furthermore, Bazaine was a mere corps commander in 1870, not commander-in-chief like Benedek, meaning that the Austrian commander was in a much better position to ensure readiness for war and sound operational planning than Bazaine.

The author’s second thesis is that French defeat was attributable to tactical defects, namely that French superiority in the chassepot rifle was trumped by superior German artillery; these technical disparities made the French troops more defensive-minded while the Germans were more aggressive. It is unfortunate that Wawro does not delve deeper into the opposing infantry and artillery tactics. Both the German and French infantry used large numbers of skirmishers, but the Germans were more inclined to conduct reckless frontal attacks. Neither army had a doctrine for tactical withdrawals, which meant that retreats quickly turned into routs. As for the artillery, the German Krupp breech-loaders were certainly more advanced than the French artillery, but the range advantage was smaller than Wawro suggests only (150 – 750 meters further), giving the German artillerymen a 5-27% advantage in range and 0-60% advantage in rate of fire. German fuses were also better and the Germans pushed their artillery further forward, but none of this added up to a decisive advantage. Wawro fails to note that post-war analysis revealed that only 8% of all casualties were caused by artillery fire, which seriously undermines his tactical thesis.

French defeat was primarily due to the haphazard military reforms enacted by Napoleon III. While the emperor did push the chassepot and mitrailleuse, he allowed the legislature to veto funds for artillery modernization and he squandered millions on adventures like Mexico and his own personal embezzlements of public funds. Napoleon III also over-spent on his navy to match English strength, but this fleet was virtually useless against threats from Prussia; a smaller French navy would have provided the manpower for another French corps as well as funds for artillery modernization. The French logistic collapse – never mentioned by Wawro – was caused by lack of preparations for a mobile campaign, such as buying more horses. Once the French army moved away from its supply depots it quickly became an unfed and short of ammunition – is it any wonder that morale deteriorated? German logistics were equally close to collapse once they pushed deep into France, and this over-reliance on distant rail heads would come back to haunt Germany in future wars.

Throughout the narrative, I was suspicious that Wawro was concealing facts that indicated French success or German failure. According to Wawro, the French naval blockade of Germany’s coast accomplished nothing – he doesn’t mention that they captured 80 German merchantmen in the first month of the war. Wawro is reticent about German losses, such as failing to mention the 10,000 German casualties at Froeschwiller. Later, Wawro omits critical details about the French counterattack to relieve Belfort in January 1871; he asserts that the French “sat idly on the road ..[to] Belfort from 10-13 January.” In fact, Howard’s account details the French victory at Villersexel on 9 January that led to a 5-mile advance toward Belfort in this period; why does Wawro ignore one of the few French tactical victories?

The Franco-Prussian War can be viewed simplistically as a triumph of German aggressiveness and technical skill over French sloth – as Wawro does – or it could be viewed as an opportunistic event where one nation was better placed to exploit temporary advantages. The French army of 1870 was far better than the outcome of the war indicated and indeed, this was probably the best French army the Germans ever fought. In term of casualty ratios, the Germans inflicted 3.8 casualties for everyone of their own in the 1914 invasion of France, 2.5 to 1 in the 1940 campaign but only 0.7 to 1 in the 1870 invasion. Had the French army in 1866 obtained the 13 million francs it needed for artillery modernization, is there any doubt that the results of the Franco-Prussian war would have been much different – Bazaine or no Bazaine?

An Excellent Study of the First Modern War., June 5, 2004

Reviewer: W. M. Robbins

Geoffrey Wawro established himself as a preeminent military historian and author with his previous volumes, “The Austro-Prussian War” and “Warfare and Society in Europe, 1792-1914″. His latest work, “The Franco-Prussian War: The German Conquest of France in 1870-1871″ is yet another example of the brilliant research and presentation Mr. Wawro is known for.

The world watched in surprise as Prussia easily defeated Austria in the Austro Prussian War (1866), nearly annihilating the Austrian army at the Battle of Koniggratz. The new Prussian breech-loading rifle, the Dreyse Needle Gun, allowed the Prussian forces an overwhelming superiority in fire power over the slower muzzle-loading weapons of the Austrian army. In addition, Prussian “swarm” infantry tactics, which called for units advancing in supporting skirmish lines until they overlapped the enemy’s flanks, confused the Austrians. Lastly, the Prussians had completely revised their tactics regarding the use of artillery, allowing batteries to be quickly moved and concentrated anywhere on the field of battle, pulverizing enemy forces. Military strategists all over the world analyzed the conflict and tried to adapt their doctrine to the new style of waging war introduced by the Prussians.

The Franco-Prussian War forever changed the social, political and economic balance in Europe. The major European powers were stunned as the military might of France was devastated by a newly united Germany, and the seeds were sown for the constant political maneuvering and arms race that lasted until the start of the First World War.

France was largely caught unprepared when war came in mid-July 1870, even though war with Prussia had nearly occurred every year since 1866. Prussian leaders, King Wilhelm Hohenzollern and the Statesman Otto von Bismark, were motivated by a desire for revenge against France stemming from the Napoleonic Wars, the possibility of regaining Alsace and Lorraine, formerly German territory, and providing a national motive for uniting Prussia and the independent German States. The French sought to “keep Prussia in it’s place”, and maintain France’s position as the leading power in Europe.

The French defeat was owed as much to deficiencies on the part of the French themselves as it was to Prussian superiority. Emperor Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte III was corrupt, indecisive and unschooled in military matters. France’s generals had a penchant for political infighting and bitter rivalry, created in large part by the Emperor’s habit of passing over senior officers to promote his friends and supporters, subordinating the more experienced commanders to their juniors. France’s generals also were indoctrinated to believe that their strength lay in defense rather than attack, and French officers repeatedly passed up opportunities to attack and destroy smaller or weaker Prussian units, even when French forces were overwhelmingly superior.

Organizationally, the French had a larger professional army than Prussia, as well as a system of reserves. The French army, however, proved to be poorly disciplined and the reserve system was wholly inadequate, as were mobilization plans, railways, etc. The Prussian army, though smaller, was better educated and trained, and backed up by a vast, quickly mobilized reserve. The one bright spot for France was their superb infantry rifle, the Chassepot. This powerful breech-loading rifle had double the effective range of the Prussian Dreyse, allowing the French troops to cut Prussian infantry to pieces before they closed. Unfortunately for the French, the Prussians more than offset this advantage with their overwhelming artillery, blasting French units to pieces under a rain of high explosive shells.

Aside from the discussion of the actual fighting, Mr. Wawro treats all the facets of this brief but bloody struggle, from personal accounts of soldiers of both antagonists and the foreign observers and reporters of the conflict (which included US General Phillip Sheridan) to the Republican rebellion after the Prussian capture of Emperor Louis-Napoleon.

For those interested in military or European history this book is a must have!

An Excellent Study of the First Modern War

Geoffrey Wawro established himself as a preeminent military historian and author with his previous volumes, “The Austro-Prussian War” and “Warfare and Society in Europe, 1792-1914″. His latest work, “The Franco-Prussian War: The German Conquest of France in 1870-1871″ is yet another example of the brilliant research and presentation Mr. Wawro is known for.

The world watched in surprise as Prussia easily defeated Austria in the Austro Prussian War (1866), nearly annihilating the Austrian army at the Battle of Koniggratz. The new Prussian breech-loading rifle, the Dreyse Needle Gun, allowed the Prussian forces an overwhelming superiority in fire power over the slower muzzle-loading weapons of the Austrian army. In addition, Prussian “swarm” infantry tactics, which called for units advancing in supporting skirmish lines until they overlapped the enemy’s flanks, confused the Austrians. Lastly, the Prussians had completely revised their tactics regarding the use of artillery, allowing batteries to be quickly moved and concentrated anywhere on the field of battle, pulverizing enemy forces. Military strategists all over the world analyzed the conflict and tried to adapt their doctrine to the new style of waging war introduced by the Prussians.

The Franco-Prussian War forever changed the social, political and economic balance in Europe. The major European powers were stunned as the military might of France was devastated by a newly united Germany, and the seeds were sown for the constant political maneuvering and arms race that lasted until the start of the First World War.

France was largely caught unprepared when war came in mid-July 1870, even though war with Prussia had nearly occurred every year since 1866. Prussian leaders, King Wilhelm Hohenzollern and the Statesman Otto von Bismark, were motivated by a desire for revenge against France stemming from the Napoleonic Wars, the possibility of regaining Alsace and Lorraine, formerly German territory, and providing a national motive for uniting Prussia and the independent German States. The French sought to “keep Prussia in it’s place”, and maintain France’s position as the leading power in Europe.

The French defeat was owed as much to deficiencies on the part of the French themselves as it was to Prussian superiority. Emperor Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte III was corrupt, indecisive and unschooled in military matters. France’s generals had a penchant for political infighting and bitter rivalry, created in large part by the Emperor’s habit of passing over senior officers to promote his friends and supporters, subordinating the more experienced commanders to their juniors. France’s generals also were indoctrinated to believe that their strength lay in defense rather than attack, and French officers repeatedly passed up opportunities to attack and destroy smaller or weaker Prussian units, even when French forces were overwhelmingly superior.

Organizationally, the French had a larger professional army than Prussia, as well as a system of reserves. The French army, however, proved to be poorly disciplined and the reserve system was wholly inadequate, as were mobilization plans, railways, etc. The Prussian army, though smaller, was better educated and trained, and backed up by a vast, quickly mobilized reserve. The one bright spot for France was their superb infantry rifle, the Chassepot. This powerful breech-loading rifle had double the effective range of the Prussian Dreyse, allowing the French troops to cut Prussian infantry to pieces before they closed. Unfortunately for the French, the Prussians more than offset this advantage with their overwhelming artillery, blasting French units to pieces under a rain of high explosive shells.

Aside from the discussion of the actual fighting, Mr. Wawro treats all the facets of this brief but bloody struggle, from personal accounts of soldiers of both antagonists and the foreign observers and reporters of the conflict (which included US General Phillip Sheridan) to the Republican rebellion after the Prussian capture of Emperor Louis-Napoleon.

For those interested in military or European history this book is a must have!