Figure 11.1. Clausewitz at Age Fifty.
Wilhelm Wach, 1830. Courtesy www.clausewitz.com.
I think the course of my life will rise once more, a culminating point shall come…
Clausewitz may not have been satisfied with the effects of the 1815 campaign on his career, but his performance as the 3rd Corps’s chief of staff during the campaign satisfied General Thielmann. “He fills his post with distinction,” Thielmann wrote on the Napoleonic-era equivalent of a modern “fitness report,” adding that Clausewitz was “a man of just as much intellectual as moral value and on the general staff is fully in his element.” Deep into the autumn of 1815 Clausewitz went to serve as General Gneisenau’s chief of staff—a posting that pleased him immensely—and he and Marie, reunited after their long separation, set up in Coblenz, where some of their close acquaintances in the army also landed. In the expanded and reorganized postwar Prussia, Gneisenau commanded the Rhine military district, one of seven in the realm. Clausewitz was a full colonel at the relatively young age of thirty-five, and in August 1816 the government credited to him as time in service the period he wore Russian green.1
Clausewitz performed a variety of normal staff duties such as planning and training, but also took up political tasks, traveling, for example, in January 1816 to advise Prussian officials conducting border negotiations with the Dutch. His time with Gneisenau proved short, however. A combination of Gneisenau’s petulance and exhaustion, Prussian bureaucratic confusion, and the mistaken belief that the general’s past and continued desire for reform betrayed revolutionary tendencies (a broad-stroke brush of a charge that simultaneously colored Clausewitz and others of a reformist bent), led to Gneisenau’s July 13, 1816, departure and his replacement by General Albrecht Georg von Hake. This upset Clausewitz and Marie, both of whom enjoyed close relationships with Gneisenau and his wife.2
Under Hake’s tenure Clausewitz considered himself no better than “a trained poodle,” and Marie branded the general as a pedant, and in 1817 Clausewitz told Gneisenau that in Coblenz he and Marie “led a quiet but somewhat insipid life.” Hake was very much cut from the pre-reform school of Prussian officers who valued mastery of military minutiae over more substantive activities, and thus not in the camp of the reformers. Arguably, however, one of Hake’s biggest sins in the eyes of the Clausewitzes was that he was simply not Gneisenau. Nevertheless, Hake was not without intelligence, as well as an ability to assess those under his command, something made clear by the fitness report he wrote on Clausewitz in 1816. “He expresses himself little,” Hake wrote. “I consider him to be a good person. He has a great sense of truth and justice, is generous, full of a sense of honor, perhaps vain, hence, he likes to assert his views. However, he possesses also no negligible amount of military knowledge and was beneficial as a teacher of young officers. His mind especially seeks after ideas.” Hake also noted that although Clausewitz’s manner was sometimes “a bit rigid, he expects, nevertheless, to be treated with tact. If this is shown to him, then it is easy to get along with him. I have up until now only had cause to be satisfied with him and consider him to be a good general staff officer.”3
When the administrative director of the Prussian War College in Berlin died in September 1817, Gneisenau put forward Clausewitz as the replacement. Clausewitz, however, preferred an appointment as inspector of the Landwehr because this would allow him to protect it against its reactionary enemies. The king’s unwarranted fears that Clausewitz might possess sympathies that leaned too far toward republicanism slowed the standard investigation into the candidate’s moral and political character. Many of the Prussian elite still viewed any desire for political, military, or social reform as possible stalking horses for republican government, and those promoting the ideas as bald-faced revolutionaries of the French mode.4
Despite his hesitations, on May 9, 1818, the king appointed Clausewitz director of the War College, a change for which he was grateful to both the minister of war and the king. After a short time as commandant of Aachen (Aix la Chapelle), supervising the Congress of the various powers that began there on September 30, Clausewitz returned to where he had taught under Scharnhorst. With the appointment came a promotion to Generalmajor (the equivalent to a modern American brigadier general), made official on September 19; this would be his final rank. He and Marie moved to Berlin shortly before Christmas 1818.5
The course for War College students had by now been expanded to three years. Clausewitz immediately set about evaluating the curriculum, concluding that the coursework too closely resembled that of a civilian university and thus did not meet the army’s needs. Three months later he had readied a reform proposal.6
Clausewitz realized that students attending a university had been prepared to do so; those coming to the War College had not. He also observed that the university student paid his own tuition and wanted to acquire the skills for a profession; because of this he studied hard. But the military student already had a career and the government was bearing the cost of his education. Because of this the instruction at the War College needed not only to be more rigorous, but also more practical. Clausewitz wanted to narrow the number and variety of classes, decrease the focus on mathematics, and change the manner of instruction away from lectures to classes in which students were forced to react to ideas and concepts, to discuss, think, and function on a practical level useful to the army.7
Clausewitz’s post made him merely the chief administrator, however; it did not give him the authority to alter the curriculum. And the climate for reform was not conducive. On March 23, 1819, a member of a radical student group murdered a playwright known for his conservative politics. The assassination sparked a reactionary fever in Prussia, one eventually leading to the dismissal of Clausewitz’s political patron and ally, Boyen, from his post as minister of war. Reaction, not reform, became the rule.8
Whereas the Clausewitz of 1812 would have persevered and challenged the authorities, the Clausewitz of 1819 simply shrugged and walked away. Whether this was from exhaustion, complacency, or perhaps simply the realization that fighting against the entrenched, closed-mindedness of the Prussian bureaucracy was ultimately futile—or some combination—isn’t clear. Only the catastrophe of 1806 had made any change possible. Now, Prussia saw no profit in reform. When changes in the curriculum eventually occurred, in 1826, many along the lines Clausewitz had proposed six years earlier, he stayed out of the process.9
In any event, there were other compensations. Clausewitz received a number of decorations in the years after Waterloo. On October 2, 1815, he had been awarded the Iron Cross, 2nd Class. The Prussian crown also gave him the Order of the Red Eagle, 3rd Class—a fairly standard decoration—in 1822, and the more prestigious 2nd Class stamp of the same award six years later. Also in 1822, the Russians named him a Knight of the Order of St. Anne, 2nd Class, backdating the award to the summer of 1813. The Russians had also previously awarded him—in December 1816—the Order of St. George, 4th Class, for bravery. Because of these distinctions, as well as, undoubtedly, the distinguished service of his two older brothers in the Prussian army—both ended their careers as general officers—the Clausewitz claim to nobility was confirmed in 1827.10
Clausewitz also made a concerted effort to enter the diplomatic service. On May 12, 1819, Gneisenau put forward Clausewitz’s name for the position of ambassador to London. Clausewitz had taken a trip to London the year before, possibly laying the groundwork for this effort. For a time it looked as though this would succeed, but a long, drawn-out, multinational affair ensued. The debate over the future of the Landwehr—which the reformers lost—did not help Clausewitz’s cause. Some of the resistance to Clausewitz on the British side came from the Duke of Cumberland (a son of King George III and the future king of Hanover), who saw Clausewitz as a radical. Sir George Henry Rose, the British ambassador to Berlin, supported the duke. Clausewitz’s critics viewed him as having too much sympathy for the forces of democracy and he was suspected (wrongly) of being a member of a secret reform-era subversive group. When he became aware of the difficulties surrounding his appointment, Clausewitz made a verbal offer to withdraw, but it wasn’t accepted. Nonetheless, all of this conspired to kill Clausewitz’s appointment. Clausewitz’s friend, Prussian foreign minister Christian Günther von Bernstorff, also put forward Clausewitz’s name as ambassador to Bavaria, but the king refused to endorse the appointment.11
Many of the health problems he had suffered for years continued to afflict him. In 1818 one associate wrote: “Clausewitz, one of the most excellent, brightest, and most honest men in the army—drags around a cheerful and courageous spirit in a still gouty body.” On June 3, 1822, he suffered a temporary paralysis of his right arm as the result of something similar to a stroke. In 1817, 1825, and 1826 he went on extended leave (including at least one two-month period) to take the waters at Wiesbaden, Marienbad, as well as Ems. The following year he became so ill he thought death imminent.12
Moreover, as he had throughout his career, Clausewitz battled melancholy in addition to his poor health. On a May 1821 trip to Potsdam, frustrations with his position, as well as Prussia’s political atmosphere, mixed with the uneasy memories of his father depositing him into the arms of the Prussian army, cast him into a particularly morbid spirit of mind. “How many decisive moments have I experienced with you,” he wrote Marie, “how many difficult days and worrying nights have I lived and stayed awake through! And of it all I have hardly even any faded memories! Now, it is going slowly and gently downhill, and the grave, which may still be very far away, therefore, seems closer to me because nothing seems to separate me from it. That, however, does not want to enter my head; I think the course of my life will rise once more, a culminating point shall come, and even if it were only so that you could say ‘a beautiful death honours the whole life,’ in short, I have not worked enough to be able to rest, and I do not feel tired enough to go to sleep.”13
Clausewitz’s literary output in the decade and a half after 1815 can only be viewed as astounding. His job made this possible. He lived on the War College campus, and his duties proved not particularly demanding. He could easily handle the necessary administrative tasks early in the morning, freeing the rest of his day for other pursuits. He worked on his manuscripts in Marie’s drawing room in their apartment. A contemporary noted that Marie assisted him closely. The college’s 15,000-volume library undoubtedly proved infinitely useful.14
One can divide Clausewitz’s works after 1815 into four rough—often overlapping—groups: professional, political, historical, and On War itself. The professional includes the aforementioned reevaluation of the War College’s curriculum. In that class we could also lump an essay he wrote on Scharnhorst, one that he intended to publish until Gneisenau convinced him to wait. His Scharnhorst study broke with the practices of the day in that it examined his mentor’s character. “He hated men who served only for money, kept his distance from men who sought distinction and honors above all, and scorned those who without higher ambition simply followed routine.” Such an approach fit the portrait of an artist or intellectual; Clausewitz’s innovation was applying it to a soldier. His admiration for Scharnhorst and his mentor’s accomplishments are clear in the text. While still in Coblenz, Clausewitz also completed military studies in relation to his job, such as a plan for the defense of the Rhineland, as well as an evaluation of a proposed territorial swap to solidify the fragmented Prussian domains.15
Among his professional writings are his responses to two training exercises assigned to Major von Roeder of the General Staff. Roeder had served with Clausewitz in the 3rd Corps during the Waterloo campaign and wanted his superior’s opinion. When he received Roeder’s note, Clausewitz had just come to his conclusions about the necessity of revising On War (which he began writing in 1816) to further develop his concept that all wars were fought either for regime change or something less, as well as his theory on the ways politics permeated war. Clausewitz told Roeder that the problem with evaluating their proposed plans for a defensive war against Austria and Saxony was that there was no political context. Similarly, in February 1815, when mentioning a campaign plan that Gneisenau sent him (one now lost), Clausewitz said he didn’t like to “break his head on such work, because without any solid data” one would simply be acting on assumptions and get lost in “boring musings.”16
By 1827 he had solidified his reasons for viewing matters this way. “War is not an independent phenomenon,” he wrote Roeder, “but the continuation of politics by different means. Consequently, the main lines of every major strategic plan are largely political in nature, and their political character increases the more the plan encompasses the entire war and the entire state.” Because of this, Clausewitz believed “there can be no question of a purely military evaluation of a great strategic issue, nor of a purely military scheme to solve it.” This letter has his clearest expression of what would become the core of his intellectual approach in On War.17
His political writings included a trio of works defending the Landwehr, which, given that they deal with the army, are also professional. Clausewitz and the other reformers struggled to preserve the Landwehr, as we’ve seen, which came under attack on military and political fronts. He insisted the organization strengthened Prussia’s defenses as well as the connections between the crown and its subjects, going so far as to recommend arming the populace. He also made the impolitic suggestion that Prussia consider moving to a government built along British parliamentary lines. The king ignored the pleas of the reformers and placed the Landwehr under the army’s control in December 1819.18 These papers also include a short 1818 study on the organization of a German army drawn from the states of the German Federation, the post-Napoleonic-era replacement for the Holy Roman Empire.19
Also among the political works is a piece known as “Agitation,” which Clausewitz penned sometime between 1820 and 1823, for reasons unknown. In the piece Clausewitz backpedaled from his support for a Prussian parliamentary government, and denounced the more radical student agitators then stirring Prussia’s political landscape. When considering why and when this piece was written, one clue can be found in the work’s sweeping study of the political evolution of Europe, where Clausewitz writes on the demise of the feudal knight: “Since the noble knew no other means of supporting himself except by the sword, the moment when there was nothing more to be gained by it was the true culminating point of his existence.”20
Clausewitz’s historical works are by far his most numerous. He always had a sense of history and an awareness of epoch-marking moments. For example, he asked for permission to join the Prussian parade through Paris in 1815 “because last year I missed the similar fun and would not like to do without the sight of such a remarkable age and historical period as it culminates in this last act.” Clausewitz’s historical work is also differentiated from others by its immersive, exhaustive quality. He examined perhaps 130 past battles, giving him a foundation for development and testing of his theoretical ideas.21 In Campaign of 1814 (probably completed after 1819) we get a sense of his use of history. He begins the analysis section with some theory, then poses some questions and analyzes the historical facts based upon these questions. Theory is only useful “to educate the practical person and develop his judgment rather than to be of direct assistance in the course of his business.” In On War he writes that “the primary purpose of any theory is to clarify concepts and ideas that have become confused and entangled.”22 Observations on Prussia in Her Great Catastrophe, written between 1823 and 1825, is a historical examination of his homeland’s disastrous 1806 war with France. His criticism of Prussia and its leaders made it too hot politically to include in his collected works and it languished in the Prussian archives until 1888. In July 1825 he also wrote a smaller piece that discusses aspects of the 1806 campaign, particularly the battles of Jena and Auerstedt.23 Although the bitter tone of his younger years faded somewhat as he aged, the work is still a biting critique of the Prussian state and lacks the objectivity of his other historical works. He had intended it to be a larger study but never completed it. He also asserts in this text the primacy of political policy that he develops in On War, writing “we are convinced that Prussia’s desperate position in 1806 was due entirely to her own poor policies. Even the most effective policies might not have prevented her collapse, but defeat would have been accompanied with more honor, respect, and sympathy.”24
In 1814 he had begun his study of the 1812 campaign. He probably intended two versions, a campaign account and a personal memoir, but combined them into one manuscript during 1823–1825. Here he lays the groundwork for some of the concepts he would develop in On War, such as friction, the culminating point, and the center of gravity, which emerges in his assessment of Napoleon’s strategic and operational approach for his invasion of Russia. “To defeat the enemy’s army, to destroy it, to occupy his capital, to drive the government to the farthest corner of the country, and then in the chaos that followed to win the peace—that until now had been the operational plan of all of [Napoleon’s] wars. In Russia he had the vastness of the country against him and the disadvantage of two widely separate capitals. These circumstances would diminish the psychological effects of his victories.” Clausewitz also offers some advice on how the soldier should prepare for war: “The man who means to move in such a medium as the element of war, should bring with him nothing from books but the general education of his understanding.” To bring “ideas cut and dried,” rather than “derived from the impulse of the moment,” Clausewitz believed, was folly, as the events of war would only “dash his structure to the ground before it is finished.” Such a man could never be a leader, nor would he inspire confidence in others.25
Clausewitz composed his study of the 1815 campaign sometime between July 1827 and the spring of 1830. The manuscript was probably never intended for publication and he believed readers would have no interest in it. Yet some point out—correctly—that Clausewitz’s history of 1815 may have been his most sophisticated in its connection to his theory. None of Clausewitz’s other historical studies utilize so many tools that later appear in On War, including the center of gravity, military genius, rational calculation, chance, and luck, as well as Clausewitz’s approach of combining history, theory, and critical analysis to objectively evaluate the combatants and their decisions.26
Also in the early 1820s, Clausewitz examined Frederick the Great’s wars.27 In 1826, or perhaps after, he composed a short commentary on the War of Spanish Succession after reading a recently published set of letters.28 Between 1827 and 1830, he wrote studies of the 1796 campaign in Italy and the 1799 campaign in Italy and Switzerland, as well as a brief examination of John III Sobiesky’s wars with the Turks, and probably his study of Prussia’s Duke of Brunswick-led 1787 war in Holland, though the date of this work is disputed.29 His other short historical pieces include a study of the uprising in the Vendée in 1793 and an examination of the Russo-Turkish War of 1736–1739.30 That, roughly, is a round-up of Clausewitz’s professional, political, and historical works.
And then comes the work that combines elements of all he had written before—On War. So many factors influenced its creation, some of which we have already touched upon: extensive military experience; his study of history; and his reading of the works of Machiavelli, Bülow, Jomini, and many others. If any single event exerted the greatest influence, it was the French Revolution and the harnessing of the population to war.31
As we have seen, Clausewitz acquired some of his method of analysis from the philosophy of Immanuel Kant in 1804 or 1805 via the Berlin lectures of Johann Gottfried Kiesewetter. The emphasis on comparative inquiry rooted Clausewitz’s thought in the preceding historical, theoretical, and philosophical works, but he also delved into art and literature, borrowing ideas and concepts from these fields. Many find in Clausewitz’s approach Hegel’s dialectic—the use of thesis-antithesis-synthesis—and even terms taken from the famous philosopher, while others see his methodology as more reflective of the Greek philosophers due to his use of opposites. Another source of inspiration was undoubtedly Scharnhorst, who, Marie wrote, put Clausewitz on the path to On War. Clausewitz credited Scharnhorst for giving him the intellectual confidence he needed.32
Scharnhorst himself was influenced by the writing of the Welsh military historian and theorist Henry Lloyd (1718?–1783), who stressed practical training and development of the mind, and also utilized the concept of “genius” in his work. Another source was George Heinrich von Berenhorst, a veteran of Frederick the Great’s army, who published Reflections on the Art of War beginning in 1796. Berenhorst discussed the psychological forces involved in war, as well as genius and chance. Bülow, Jomini, and Lloyd all touched on the use of war as a state political tool. Clausewitz was familiar with Montesquieu’s The Spirit of Laws, partially due to Scharnhorst, and Montesquieu’s examination of the motivations of a nation’s people may have influenced his thinking.33
As mentioned earlier, Clausewitz took up the writing of On War at Coblenz in 1816, but his work on it intensified when he assumed his post at the War College in 1818. He labored over the manuscript for the next dozen years. In the spring of 1830 Marie wrote, “He arranged his papers, sealed and labeled the individual packages, and sadly bade farewell to an activity that had come to mean so much to him.” They remained untouched until his death.34
Clausewitz began his magnum opus with the intent of writing a small text, but—as he put it—his tendency to “develop and systematize” led him to expand it. “It was my ambition,” Clausewitz noted, “to write a book that would not be forgotten after two or three years, and that possibly might be picked up more than once by those who are interested in the subject.” Existing military theory was “unscientific,” and he intended to build his work “on the secure foundation either of experience or the nature of war as such.” Nonetheless, he had no illusions that he had written the final word on the subject, and adds a note of modesty: “Perhaps a greater mind will soon appear to replace these individual nuggets with a single whole, cast of solid metal free from all impurities.”35
In a note of July 10, 1827—one generally published with On War—Clausewitz writes that he intended to revise it in light of his idea that wars are either fought for regime change or something less. He had by that point composed no fewer than six books and planned to write eight—the “individual nuggets” had grown exponentially since 1816. “I regard the first six books,” he wrote in the note, “which are already in a clean copy, merely as a rather formless mass that must be thoroughly reworked.” He planned to next revise Book 7 in light of the aforementioned, as well as Book 8, which was little more than a rough draft and also needed to be subjected to his new ideas. His desire for revision is confirmed in another note, traditionally dated to 1830, in which Clausewitz writes, “The manuscript on the conduct of major operations that will be found after my death can, in its present state, be regarded as nothing but a collection of materials from which a theory of war was to have been distilled.” He further adds: “The first chapter of Book One alone I regard as finished.”36
Thus arises the question as to how complete On War was when Clausewitz died. Some believe that at the time of Clausewitz’s death, the tome still had a long way to go. Others, historian Jon Sumida being among the idea’s most recent proponents, view the text as more complete. This argument partly hinges on the accuracy of the date of Clausewitz’s 1830 note, which some contend was written before his July 1827 missive. Earlier dating, it is argued, implies Clausewitz had time to make the changes he insists he intended, and to believe otherwise would be to assert the near-stagnation of Clausewitz’s work between 1827 and 1830.37 In reality, we simply don’t know how complete On War truly is, and this is a question that cannot be definitively answered because we know that Clausewitz never finished the book.
Clausewitz’s 1827 note also forecast one of the problems On War would encounter: “If an early death should terminate my work,” wrote Clausewitz, “what I have written so far would, of course only deserve to be called a shapeless mass of ideas. Being liable to endless misinterpretation it would be the target of much half-baked criticism, for in matters of this kind everyone feels he is justified in writing and publishing the first thing that comes into his head when he picks up a pen, and thinks his own ideas as axiomatic as the fact that two and two make four.” Despite his reservation, Clausewitz still believed the manuscript made significant contributions to military theory. Even in their incomplete state, he wrote, in the first six books the reader “may even find they contain the basic ideas that might bring about a revolution in the theory of war.”38
Clausewitz proved right on both counts (though the latter took a while), and largely has himself to blame for the first. Much of the misreading and criticism of Clausewitz’s text has to do with his putting forward the concept of “absolute war.”39 Clausewitz writes that “war can be thought of in two different ways—its absolute form or one of the variant forms that it actually takes,” meaning that war has an “absolute,” “pure,” or theoretical state, as opposed to war in reality, which is fought either for the overthrow of the enemy government or something less than this. “In the absolute form of war, where everything results from necessary causes and one action rapidly affects another, there is, if we may use the phrase, no intervening neutral void.” Or, in other words, in “absolute war,” nothing inhibits the struggle. But in reality, many things do.40
Clausewitz clouds the picture further by using the term “total war” (ganz Krieg) as a synonym for “absolute war” (absoluter Krieg), and he does not use “total war” in the modern sense where it generally conveys the scale of the conflict (the American Civil War or the First World War—with much debate—usually being deemed the first examples): “This conception would be ineluctable even if war were total war, the pure element of enmity unleashed.” The equality of “absolute” and “total war” is further demonstrated by the discussion in the rest of this chapter and is an example of Clausewitz’s tendency to use different terms for the same concept—something that Peter Paret has noted is not unusual in Clausewitz’s writings. Some authors argue that the concept of “absolute war” derives in at least some manner from Kant, who established the idea of “pure reason,” and from this derived a “practical reason” fit for the everyday. Others, such as Michael Handel, suggest the influence of Sir Isaac Newton and his discussion of a “frictionless world.”41
In On War, Clausewitz presents his theory of absolute war while emphasizing the need to keep the political nature of all aspects of war “in mind when studying actual practice.” He continues, “We will then find that war does not advance relentlessly toward the absolute, as theory would demand. Being incomplete and self-contradictory, it cannot follow its own laws, but has to be treated as a part of some other whole; the name of which is policy.”42
Clausewitz then makes his own position difficult by contradicting himself (not unsurprising in an unfinished work). On the one hand, “absolute war” is a theoretical concept, and on the other it is something that Clausewitz said he had himself observed. “After the short prelude of the French Revolution, Bonaparte brought it [war] swiftly and ruthlessly to that point...Surely it is both natural and inescapable that this phenomenon should cause us to turn again to the pure concept of war with all its rigorous implications.” He continues in this vein, arguing that “we must...develop our concept of war as it ought to be fought, not on the basis of its pure definition,” while leaving “room for every sort of extraneous matter.” “We must allow for natural inertia, for all the friction of its parts, for all the inconsistency, imprecision, and timidity of man; and finally we must face the fact that war and its forms result from ideas, emotions, and conditions prevailing at the time—and to be quite honest we must admit that this was the case even when war assumed its absolute state under Bonaparte.” Two pages later he writes that “absolute war has never in fact been achieved.” “Absolute war” was a point of reference, not a reality.43
In 1827 Clausewitz embarked upon a considerable revision of On War.44 There is voluminous literature dedicated to interpreting his ideas in On War and no arguments will be settled here. Those who make use of Clausewitz’s work are typically the least interested in these matters, and perhaps for good reason. The primary students of Clausewitz’s On War are serving military officers exposed to it during some segment of their education, and usually for no more than one or two weeks. Those among them who are truly interested in Clausewitz’s theories often want to know how Clausewitz says one should fight a war, or, more specifically, what Clausewitz tells us about how to win a war. In fact, Clausewitz teaches us that though his work will not tell them how to win a generic war (which Clausewitz would say doesn’t exist), it does do something perhaps more important: teach them how to think about waging war.
Significantly, Clausewitz’s work reminds such soldiers just what they were getting themselves into: “War is an act of force to compel our enemy to do our will.” He calls it a “duel on a larger scale” and notes that “kind-hearted people might of course think there was some ingenious way to disarm or defeat an enemy without too much bloodshed, and might imagine this is the true goal of the art of war. Pleasant as it sounds, it is a fallacy.”45 Clausewitz had stood on too many battlefields and seen too many of his friends killed and wounded to have any delusions about what was involved.
If war’s outcome cannot be controlled, its purpose can be guided. To Clausewitz, the establishment of the political objective is of supreme importance. “When whole communities go to war—whole peoples, and especially civilized peoples—the reason always lies in some political situation, and the occasion is always due to some political object. War, therefore, is an act of policy.” The goal being sought by the combatant drives what they are willing to do to get it, and for how long. When the “value of the object” has exceeded what one is willing to pay, “the object must be renounced and peace must follow.” But one must also remember that the political objective can change, being driven by events and their effects. Where Clausewitz stands apart from other theorists is not the fact that he identifies war as a political instrument, but in insisting that political goals affect every level of military activity.” “The political object is the goal,” Clausewitz writes; “war is the means of reaching it, and means can never be considered in isolation from their purpose.”46
From the aforementioned Clausewitz points us to the next step: consideration of the means required to achieve the political objective. But how does one determine this? Clausewitz recommends doing what in today’s defense parlance would be part of an assessment. First, consider each side’s political aim; then evaluate the strength of the enemy and compare the character and abilities of its government and people against one’s own; and finally, examine the political inclinations of other states and the effect of the struggle upon them. Clausewitz is keenly aware of the challenge faced by those saddled with the task of determining the resources to be mobilized for war: “To assess these things in all their ramifications and diversity,” he writes, “is plainly a colossal task.”47
Paramount to the assembly of a proper assessment, Clausewitz believes, is to gain an understanding of the nature of the war being fought. This, in his mind, is the most important task of the political and military leaders, and “the first of all strategic questions.” While Jomini provides a laundry list of types of wars (“Wars of Expediency” and “Wars of Intervention,” for example), Clausewitz boils war down to the two types mentioned herein, evoked most fully in his July 10, 1827, note: “War can be of two kinds, in the sense that either the objective is to overthrow the enemy to render him politically helpless or militarily impotent, thus forcing him to sign whatever peace we please; or merely to occupy some of his frontier-districts so that we can annex them or use them for bargaining at the peace negotiations.” Later, he breaks these down further, arguing that there are two types of limited wars, an “offensive war with a limited aim” and a “defensive war.”48
Given Clausewitz’s core belief in the political nature of war, we might again ask how it connects to “absolute war.” As noted earlier, some say Clausewitz argues that war should be waged so. Actually, however, it is all but impossible for this to happen. War cannot reach this absolute (though it dearly wants to) because of various factors acting upon it to restrain the forces unleashed by the conflict. Key among these—again—is politics itself. Clausewitz writes that “we also want to make it clear that war in itself does not suspend political intercourse or change it into something entirely different.” Political direction places limits on the war, be these geographical, related to resources and manpower, or any number of other factors. Human nature—or moral forces—are also counted among these chains. Clausewitz writes that “since the moral elements are among the most important in war,” they “constitute the spirit that permeates war as a whole, and at an early stage they establish a close affinity with the will that moves and leads the whole mass of force.” The difficulty with such forces, Clausewitz notes, is that they “will not yield to academic wisdom. They cannot be classified or counted. They have to be seen or felt.” Such “Principal Moral Elements” include “the skill of the commander, the experience and courage of the troops, and their patriotic spirit.”49
War may be driven by the logic of internal politics, but it is susceptible to contingencies, external factors of which the greatest is perhaps chance. “No other human activity is so continuously or universally bound up with chance” as war—an unpredictable experience that “most closely resembles a game of cards.” And through chance, he notes, “guesswork and luck come to play a great part in war.” Uncertainty, incomplete information, circumstances—all these influence how the war is fought. These are all part of war’s “human factor.” For this reason, “a sensitive and discriminating judgment is called for; a skilled intelligence to scent out the truth.”50
Indeed, “intelligence” of a different sort is a significant factor in Clausewitz’s discussion of uncertainty. “By “intelligence,” he means “every sort of information about the enemy and his country—the basis, in short, of our own plans and operations.” But such intelligence is not easy to come by. Clausewitz advises skepticism here, arguably cynicism. Most of the information those fighting wars receive is, he insists, “unreliable and transient,” making war “a flimsy structure that can easily collapse and bury us in ruins.” “Many intelligence reports in war are contradictory; even more are false, and most are uncertain...and the effect is to multiply lies and inaccuracies.” The “general unreliability of all information” thus adds to the uncertainty constantly present in war. “All action takes place, so to speak, in a kind of twilight, which like fog or moonlight, often tends to make things seem grotesque and larger than they really are.”51
Such views have produced the accusation that Clausewitz did not value intelligence. As noted earlier, it would be presumptuous to draw a straight line from Clausewitz’s experience at the battle of Sehestedt in 1814—when all of his unit’s information incorrectly said the Danes had taken a different route—to his doubts here, but considering Clausewitz’s background as a staff officer handling the material coming in, it is probably safe to say that his Sehestedt experience was not his only such contact with an intelligence failure. While such experiences undoubtedly colored his view of tactical intelligence during wartime, it is obvious from other parts of the text that Clausewitz values information on the enemy and his intentions. He is insistent upon calculating whether or not one has available the military means for achieving their political ends. How can one deduce this other than by gathering intelligence—or information—on the enemy? In 1804, in his unpublished Strategie, Clausewitz wrote: “Good intelligence is indispensable, in order to know the enemy disposition in general.”52
How is a soldier (or the reader of On War) to make sense of the crucial importance of intelligence as well as its potential unreliability? Clausewitz offers advice in two places. First, he suggests one should be “guided by the laws of probability.” Second, he writes, one has to be either naturally talented or willing to gamble. “Whatever is hidden from full view in this feeble light has to be guessed at by talent, or simply left to chance. So once again for lack of objective knowledge one has to trust to talent or to luck.”53
Along with “chance” and “intelligence,” another factor that makes absolute war an impossibility is “friction,” which has come up earlier. Friction is “the force that makes the apparently easy so difficult.” In other words, friction is essentially any difficulty that can arise. Clausewitz insists that it cannot “be reduced to a few points,” and that it “brings about effects that cannot be measured, just because they are largely due to chance.” The weather provides an example: fog can prevent an enemy from being seen, the effects of which then ripple over the combatants. Fear is also a form of friction. When someone is trying to kill you, it can affect the efficient performance of the task at hand.54
What can overcome all of the problems of friction? To Clausewitz there is only one thing: “combat experience.” “If one has never experienced war,” he writes, “one cannot understand in what the difficulties constantly mentioned really consist, nor why a commander should need any brilliance and exceptional ability. Everything looks simple.” And indeed, he cautions, “Everything in war is very simple, but the simplest thing is difficult.”55
Also important in his enumeration of external forces is interaction with the enemy. To Clausewitz, war was an interactive process, and fighting something alive, organic. This is one of the contentions distinguishing his thought from many other military theorists. He points out that the enemy will not be static; they will react. This reaction will then cause a counteraction. Rather than being an “exercise of the will directed at inanimate matter,” the will in war is directed at “an animate object that reacts.” The results of this can also sometimes push the combatants to extremes.56 How does one deal with these forces? Clausewitz emphasizes good staff work, experience, and, as we shall see, genius.
Another tool of assessment that Clausewitz offers is his “paradoxical” or “wondrous trinity” (eine wunderliche Dreifaltigkeit). There is much argument over translations of the passage in which this “trinity” arises, as well as what Clausewitz actually means by it, and even the name itself. Christopher Bassford has constructed an effective composite depiction, one based upon the various English translations of the original text and discussions with scholars. It reads so: “War is thus more than a mere chameleon, because it changes its nature to some extent in each concrete case. It is also, however, when it is regarded as a whole and in relation to the tendencies that dominate within it, a fascinating trinity—composed of: (1) primordial violence, hatred, enmity, which are to be regarded as a blind natural force; (2) the play of chance and probability, within which the creative spirit is free to roam; and (3) its element of subordination, as an instrument of policy, which makes it subject to pure reason.”57
Every war is based upon the interaction of these three forces, which generally manifest in a specific way. Passion arises from the people, the general and his troops address the challenge of chance, and the government decides the political aims. Clausewitz doesn’t believe that the waging of a war requires the balancing of these forces, as some insist. What he has done is develop a theoretical approach that maintains “a balance between these three tendencies, like an object suspended between three magnets.” In other words, his work will show their relationships.58
As always with Clausewitz, however, there are exceptions to his analytical method (“there is an exception to every rule,” he emphasizes in another place): the elements do not always behave as they should. For example, governments can go to war for passionate reasons, or a people behave rationally instead of with passion. This is what makes Clausewitz’s “trinity” a “paradox.” The stress in Clausewitz’s work here is on the forces themselves, not where they are more likely to manifest.59
After one assesses the resources necessary for war, how should one prosecute it? How do we go about achieving our political end? Clausewitz has a single answer: combat. There is no other way. To Clausewitz, the conduct of war is made up of both planning and fighting, though “if fighting consisted of a single act, no further subdivision would be needed.” Critically, one must keep in mind the following: “No one starts a war—or rather, no one in his senses ought to—without first being clear in his mind what he intends to achieve by that war and how he intends to conduct it.” Clausewitz defines these two concepts as political purpose and operational objective. Together, they provide the “governing principle” that sets the course of the war and decides what means and exertions are demanded, “down to the smallest operational detail.”60
Politicians—those acting on behalf of the polity—define the objective, which in turn determines the required means, indicating to the military leadership whether they must fight a defensive or an offensive war. This leads us to another traditional point of controversy: Clausewitz’s insistence that defense was superior to offense. Defense “consists of two different elements—the decision and the period of waiting.” The object of defense, Clausewitz writes, is preservation. “It is easier to hold ground than take it. It follows that defense is easier than attack, assuming both sides have equal means. Just what is it that makes preservation and protection so much easier? It is the fact that time which is allowed to pass unused, accumulates to the credit of the defender. He reaps where he did not sow.” Letting pass an opportunity to “attack—whether from bad judgment, fear, or indolence—accrues to the defenders’ benefit.”61
Though passive by definition, defense must still have an active purpose, “both in strategy and in tactics.” Clausewitz insisted “that within the limits of his strength a defender must always seek to change over to the attack as soon as he has gained the benefit of the defense.” Defense is not permanent: “If defense is the stronger form of war, yet has a negative object, it follows that it should be used only so long as weakness compels, and be abandoned as soon as we are strong enough to pursue a positive object.”62
Clausewitz’s conclusion here is certainly based upon much study and analysis, but did his abundant combat experience also influence this conclusion? In 1812, for example, Clausewitz participated in an extensive defensive campaign that then switched to the offensive after the strength of Napoleon’s army was spent and the Russians could gain nothing else from the defensive. Clausewitz also explored this concept in his study of the 1812 campaign, noting that “whoever investigates the subject will say to himself that the offensive form is the weaker, and the defensive the stronger, in war; but the results of the first, when successful, are positive, therefore the greater and more decisive; of the later only negative, by which the equilibrium is restored, and one may be advocated as well as the other.”63
Whether on the defense or offense, one must decide where to direct the effort against the enemy (or where the enemy might direct theirs against us). To determine this, Clausewitz offers one of his most famous concepts in On War, and one alluded to a number of times: the center of gravity (Schwerpunkt). “One must keep the dominant characteristics of both belligerents in mind. Out of these characteristics a certain center of gravity develops, the hub of all power and movement, on which everything depends. That is the point against which all our energies should be directed,” he writes. The key, therefore, is determining what an enemy’s center of gravity is. It is often the army, but this is not true in every case. For small dependent states, it is generally their ally’s army. In alliances, the center of gravity is found in “the community of interests,” and in popular revolts it will be found in public opinion and the temperament of the leadership. In states subject to “domestic strife,” Clausewitz notes, “the center of gravity is generally the capital.” When this center is determined, Clausewitz writes, it is “the point on which your efforts must converge.” As always, however, Clausewitz offers an exception: “The principle of aiming everything at the enemy’s center of gravity admits of only one exception, that is, when secondary operations look exceptionally rewarding. But we repeat that only decisive superiority can justify diverting strength without risking too much in the principal theater.” The difficulty, of course, lies in identifying these various centers and their relative importance. Clausewitz brands this “a major act of strategic judgment.”64
One point of contention around Clausewitz’s concept of the “center of gravity” is whether or not he means it to apply to what today we term the strategic level or the operational (i.e., campaign) level of war. This in turn raises the larger question of what, exactly, Clausewitz meant by “strategy” (Strategie). As we’ve seen, Clausewitz separated the levels of conflict into the political, strategic, and tactical. This is clear from nearly all of his writings, and from his continuing efforts throughout his life to clarify what they meant. Today, we insert the operational level between the strategic and the tactical and this most closely corresponds to the execution of a campaign. As we have discussed, Clausewitz’s definition of strategy (and Jomini’s as well) encompasses our strategic and operational levels of war, something that no doubt feeds some of the confusion surrounding the text. Clausewitz’s mention of public opinion and leaders implies the strategic realm. His other centers can also be strategic in nature. It is undoubtedly applicable to both.65
Generally, however, in On War, Clausewitz defines tactics (Taktik) and strategy (Strategie) in relation to each other: “tactics teaches the use of armed forces in the engagement; strategy, the use of engagements for the object of the war.” “Tactics,” he said, “are chiefly based on fire power.” Clausewitz believes that strategy is harder than tactics because you have more time to act and thus more time to doubt. Also, in tactics you can see what is going on, in strategy you have to guess. “The best strategy,” Clausewitz argues,” is always to be very strong; first in general, and then at the decisive point. Apart from the effort needed to create military strength, which does not always emanate from the general, there is no higher and simpler law of strategy than that of keeping one’s forces concentrated. No force, for example, should ever be detached from the main body unless the need is definite and urgent.” He also writes that “strategy is the use of the engagement for the purpose of the war. The strategist must therefore define an aim for the entire operational side of the war that will be in accordance with its purpose. In other words, he will draft the plan of the war...shape the individual campaigns and, within these, decide on the individual engagements.”66
In any case, both strategy and operations are tied to the “center of gravity” that comes up in Book 8, a volume entitled “War Plans,” which provides guidance on how to defeat the enemy. As always, Clausewitz begins with the political, and also addresses matters that today we would classify as strategic, but the bulk of the book is concerned with what we would today deem “operational” matters. After one has defined the enemy’s center of gravity, Clausewitz tells us how to proceed: “The first principle is that the ultimate substance of enemy strength must be traced back to the fewest possible sources, and ideally to one alone.” From here, “the attack on these sources must be compressed into the fewest possible actions—again, ideally, into one. Finally, all minor actions must be subordinated as much as possible. In short the first principle is: act with the utmost concentration.” After concentration, Clausewitz suggests the second most important principle is speed. “No halt or detour must be permitted without good cause,” he writes. In both cases, “the grand objective of all military action is to overthrow the enemy—which means destroying his armed forces...destruction of the enemy is what always matters most.”67
When on the offensive (perhaps trying to destroy that center of gravity), Clausewitz argues for constant pressure upon the enemy: “If the enemy is thrown off balance, he must not be given time to recover. Blow after blow must be aimed in the same direction: the victor, in other words, must strike with all his strength and not just against a fraction of the enemy’s. Not by taking things the easy way—using superior strength to filch some province, preferring the security of this minor conquest to great success” (some label this “The Principle of Continuity”). Although Clausewitz emphasizes the need to strike decisively and with all of one’s strength, he is also aware that it is not always possible. Interruptions—“necessary evils”—he terms them, will occur, but they need to be minimized at all costs.68
When fighting a war, Clausewitz writes, one must also be sure to keep one’s forces concentrated. Operationally, he saw the most important factor as “the possession of strength at the really vital point.” Having strength at this “decisive point” is contingent on an army’s strength and the skill of its employment. “The first rule, therefore, should be: put the largest possible army into the field. This may sound a platitude, but in reality it is not.” Not only must the largest possible force be employed, but all available forces should be utilized simultaneously. “This application will be so much the more complete the more everything is compressed into one act and into one moment.” And of course, as is so often the case in Clausewitz’s theory, obeying the “rules” does not mean one will succeed: “Superior numbers, far from contributing everything, or even a substantial part, to victory, may actually be contributing very little, depending upon the circumstances.”69
Another approach that Clausewitz offers for fighting the enemy is what he calls “The People in Arms,” the first time this type of analysis appears in military literature. It is also the closest that Clausewitz comes to writing about the modern conception of guerrilla warfare. It is obviously influenced by his pre-1812 plans for how Prussia could resist Napoleon, as well as his study of the revolts in Spain, the Tyrol, and the Vendée. To Clausewitz, “The People in Arms” was “a general insurrection as simply another means of war,” and when used intelligently it offered “some superiority over those who disdain its use.” Clausewitz’s theory is set apart from what is so often voiced as the modern, conventional vision of guerrilla war in its view of an uprising of the people as part of a larger war plan, rather than as a primary means of resistance. Those doing the fighting, “militia and bands of armed civilians,” Clausewitz wrote, “cannot and should not be employed against the main enemy force—or indeed against any sizeable enemy force. They are not supposed to pulverize the core but to nibble at the shell and around the edges. They are meant to operate in areas just outside the theater of war—where the invader will not appear in strength—in order to deny him these areas altogether.”70 Clausewitz as a theorist is sometimes accused of being irrelevant to discussions of guerrilla and irregular forms of warfare. This section—as well as his extensive lectures on “Little War”—argue otherwise.
For Clausewitz, the general with the misfortune of having to weigh all of these factors under the eyes of his political masters, while, incidentally, leading an army or perhaps running an entire war, should ideally possess extraordinary aptitude for this task. Clausewitz titles his chapter devoted to the preferred type of leader, “On Military Genius” (Der kriegerische Genius). Some argue that this would be better translated as “The Genius for War,” and it appears this way in older English-language translations. Regardless, Clausewitz’s section on military genius should be read not just for his exegesis of genius, but also for his examination of personality types, one written before the advent of modern psychological methods. Here again, Clausewitz possibly took some of his inspiration for this discussion from Kant, who noted that “Genius is a talent for producing that for which no definite rule can be given,” a sentiment similarly expressed in some of Clausewitz’s remarks. For example, he notes that genius “rises above all rules,” and later writes that “what genius does is the best rule, and theory can do no better than show how and why this should be the case.”71
To Clausewitz, war was the realm of chance, violence, chaos, “the realm of physical exertion and suffering.” Operating at a high level of command in such an environment demanded certain skills. “If the mind is to emerge unscathed from this relentless struggle with the unforeseen,” he wrote, “two qualities are indispensable: first, an intellect that, even in the darkest hour, retains some glimmerings of the inner light which leads to truth; and second, the courage to follow this faint light wherever it may lead. The first of these qualities is described by the French term, coup d’oeil; the second is determination.” Coup d’oeil (which Clausewitz readily admits he is not the first to use, and can be translated as “glance”) “merely refers to the quick recognition of a truth that the mind would ordinarily miss or would perceive only after long study and reflection.” It is this ability to grasp things simply, “to identify the whole business of war completely with himself,” that Clausewitz sees as the soul of good command. “Only if the mind works in this comprehensive fashion can it achieve the freedom it needs to dominate events and not be dominated by them.”72
The successful military commander has other characteristics as well. One is courage, both in regard to facing physical danger, as well as the moral courage needed to make decisions and assume responsibility for them. Clausewitz also lists additional desired attributes for his military genius: ambition, “presence of mind,” “strength of mind,” energy, self-control, an understanding of terrain, imagination, and others.73
Even with a military genius in charge, there is, of course, no assurance of success. War is the most complicated of human activities. All we can do is balance its elements. “We would emphasize the essential and general; leave scope for the individual and accidental; but remove everything arbitrary, unsubstantiated, trivial, far-fetched, or supersubtle. If we have accomplished that we regard our task as fulfilled.”74
When the general is fighting the war, particularly when they are commanding an offensive, one of the things they must keep in mind is what Clausewitz terms “the Culminating Point of the Attack.” One author argues that “the pre-history of the concept of culmination” originates in astrology and astronomy and is fed by Machiavelli’s writings, particularly his views on victory. Whatever the case, Clausewitz warns that when on the offensive one must be very clear about the objective sought, the strength available, and the all-important actions of the enemy. He believes that the majority of strategic attacks do not end the war, but “only lead up to the point where their remaining strength is just enough to maintain a defense and wait for peace. Beyond that point the scale turns and the reaction follows with a force that is usually much stronger than that of the original attack.” Clausewitz also explains that since the attacker is trying to seize enemy land, he will continue to press until he no longer has the supremacy to do so. But herein lies a danger: this desire for territory can drive an attacker past his goal. “What matters therefore is to detect the culminating point [Kulminationspunkt] with discriminative judgment.”75
But one must also be able to tell how far this has taken them on the road to achieving their political objective. To aide our thinking on this, he offers a related concept: the Culminating Point of Victory. “The end is either to bring the enemy to his knees or at least to deprive him of some of his territory—the point in that case being not to improve the current military position but to improve one’s general prospects in the war and in the peace negotiations.” In working “to destroy the enemy completely,” he notes, it is possible that “every step gained may weaken one’s superiority.” Because of this risk, “one must know the point to which it can be carried in order not to overshoot the target; otherwise instead of gaining new advantages, one will disgrace oneself.” It is extremely difficult to deduce this turning point, however, requiring a commander to guess the effects of his operations upon the enemy, which creates a new set of problems. Clausewitz notes that for this reason, “the great majority of generals will prefer to stop well short of their objective rather than risk approaching it too closely,” and those who are courageous and enterprising “will often overshoot it and so fail to attain their purpose.”76
At some point, of course, the war must come to an end, and when it does, only one thing is of supreme importance: “final victory. Until then, nothing is decided, nothing won, and nothing lost.” Clausewitz reiterates this point: “Victory alone is not everything—but is it not, after all, what really counts?” Clausewitz does not mean, however, that a peace settlement is always war’s true final act. “The defeated state often considers the outcome merely a transitory evil, for which a remedy may still be found in political conditions at some later date.” Knowledge of this means that individuals sometimes will not push as hard as they should.77 Like wars themselves, discussion of On War, and just what the text means, will undoubtedly never end.
As 1829 reached its end, Clausewitz’s long dormant military ambition reawakened. He wanted to make Generalleutnant, and believing his path blocked to becoming chief of the general staff (which carried this rank), he concluded that he had to take a different path. On December 27, Clausewitz petitioned the king for an active command. Frederick William agreed and sent Clausewitz to the artillery, which had three brigade commands. The intercession of Prince August, who led the Prussian artillery, enabled Clausewitz’s appointment. To familiarize himself with his new duties (something Clausewitz found a bit demeaning for a man of 50 who had been a general for 12 years), he was temporarily attached to Berlin’s 1st Artillery Inspection on March 9, 1830 (while keeping his War College job), and then given command of the 2nd Artillery Inspection in Breslau on August 19, 1830. His time there was short. In December he was ordered back to Berlin to become chief of staff to Gneisenau, a post he officially assumed on March 6, 1831.78
As we have seen, 1830 was a year of revolution in Europe. Early in autumn of that year Prussia’s Rhineland provinces beheld scenes of both urban and rural riot and uprising. These disturbances, and the Warsaw revolt of the Poles against the Russians, sparked fear in Berlin that Prussia’s own subject Poles might become a problem. The situation in Poland concerned Clausewitz deeply because he saw in Polish independence an existential threat to Prussia and other German states. In 1831 he wrote three pieces—at least they are the only ones known to survive—dealing with the issue of Poland in relation to Prussian security. In “Europe since the Polish Partition,” Clausewitz essentially denounced support of Polish independence as moral posturing, arguing that Poland was no better or worse off than had been the other nations absorbed throughout human history. Prussian and Austrian security could not afford an independent Poland. It would cost them too much in population and strategic position, and would weaken them vis-à-vis Poland’s natural ally—France.79
Clausewitz also wrote “On the Basic Question of Germany’s Existence.” Here he comments on the revolutions in Belgium, Italy, and Poland—especially Poland—asserting that what matters most is the preservation of German (not merely Prussian) independence. The independence of Poland was the worst evil because of the traditional antagonism between Prussia and the Poles (he mentions the fact that East Prussia was once a Polish vassal), and, again, the more dangerous fact that Poland was a natural ally of France.80
Clausewitz tried unsuccessfully to publish this in the Augsburg, Bavaria, newspaper, Allgemeine Zeitung; it remained unpublished until 1878. Also related to the Polish revolt was a letter Clausewitz published anonymously in July 1831, first in the Zeitung des Grossherzogtums Posen, and then in other newspapers. Here Clausewitz defended his nation against Polish criticism of Prussia selling supplies to the Russian forces fighting in Poland. King Frederick William dispatched a note praising it, which both pleased and surprised Clausewitz. It was undoubtedly the king’s only endorsement of anything Clausewitz ever wrote.81 His fear of a future war between France and Prussia, one undoubtedly fed by the July 1830 revolution in France that brought Louis-Philippe to power, drove him to considering various alternatives to such an event.82
In March 1831 Clausewitz followed Gneisenau to Posen (now Poznań, Poland) as chief of staff for the army of observation Prussia had assembled. Before they left he had taken the time to study the Polish campaigns of 1793 and 1794. Though he enjoyed Gneisenau’s company, he became increasingly exasperated with an apparent lack of decision in the Prussian leadership and his old melancholy returned. His letters to Marie sometimes turn to talk of his death. In Posen, there was little work for Clausewitz and his colleagues. General Carl von Grolman, the chief of the General Staff and Clausewitz’s old friend, wrote to his wife in March 1831 that the only thing agreeable in his journey to the area was that he has seen Clausewitz and Gneisenau, but what the three of them mostly did was to wait and drink tea. Grolman also noted that the weather was so bad and the roads such a disaster that they couldn’t move anyway and so resting was good.83Clausewitz did though keep a very close watch on military events in Poland (and in other parts of Europe). Generally, he had little complimentary to say about Russia’s operations, which were commanded by his old superior Diebitsch. Clausewitz’s opinion of Diebitsch had soured before the war because of what he judged as Diebitsch’s poor performance in the Russo-Turkish War of 1828–29. Major Heinrich von Brandt worked almost daily with Clausewitz while they observed the Russians and Poles. He noted Clausewitz’s uncomfortableness with the troops, but praised Clausewitz’s other skills. Brandt was particularly taken by Clausewitz’s powers of observation when examining the movements and operations of the warring forces, and his ability to forecast the point when their marches would produce a decision point. Brandt thought it unfortunate that Clausewitz never had the chance to prove himself in a position of high command and professed a firm conviction that as a strategist Clausewitz would have been “extraordinary.” But Brandt also had the equally strong feeling that Clausewitz lacked the personality traits necessary to command and lead men in battle.84
By the summer, however, things had changed. By May the cholera epidemic became a concern and Clausewitz began making preparations to deal with the disease. In June Diebitsch, the commander of the Russian forces in Poland, died from the malady. This upset Clausewitz because he considered him a good man, but he also remarked to Marie—somewhat coldly—that he did not pity Diebitsch because he believed the general’s reputation gone and that he was walking on the edge of disgrace because of his conduct of the war in Poland. Reputation still ranked high in Clausewitz’s mind. By July the cholera had jumped the frontier into Prussia and killed the first soldier in Clausewitz’s command. On August 22 it struck Gneisenau. His old friend and mentor died the next day. The loss dealt him a particularly heavy blow.85
In October 1831, even though the war in Poland was winding down, Berlin dispatched a replacement for Gneisenau, Karl Friedrich von dem Knesebeck. Clausewitz, who had been the de facto army chief, found this offensive. His over-sensitivity got the better of him and he was unjustifiably angry about what was a perfectly normal Prussian army response. Clausewitz and Knesebeck, though, came to work well together.86
The Russians soon finished crushing the Poles and by November 7 Clausewitz was happily back in Breslau with Marie and corresponding with his old superior, Prince August. On November 16 the cholera struck him. Caroline von Rochow, a friend of both Clausewitz and Marie, noted that Clausewitz got up that morning fine, gave an artillery lecture from 9:00 to 11:00, then began feeling unwell. Marie insisted he go to bed while she sent for the doctor. By noon Clausewitz displayed the symptoms of cholera, which at first the doctor’s treatment seemed to be addressing. But later he was wracked by convulsions. The disease moved with deadly rapidity, and, at nine o’clock in the evening, Clausewitz died, possibly from a heart attack brought on by the disease.87
Caroline noted how heavy the blow fell upon Marie. “His poor wife loses just about everything with him because she has never for a moment lost the feelings she had for him as a bride.” Marie wrote of his death: “It is a great comfort to me that at least his final moments were calm and painless, and yet the expression and tone with which he expelled his last sigh were heartrending; it was as though he pushed life away like a heavy burden. Soon afterwards his features became calm and peaceful; an hour later, when I saw him for the last time, they again expressed the deepest pain.”88
Marie felt the anguish of her husband—the man with whom she had been “profoundly happy” for twenty-one years—having never achieved the glory he longed for, or the honors she felt he deserved, despite his remarkable life. “Life for him had consisted of an almost unbroken chain of effort, sorrow, and vexation. Certainly, on the whole he had achieved much more than he could have hoped for at the outset; he felt this deeply and acknowledged it with a grateful heart. But he never did scale the highest peak, and every pleasure that he experienced contained a flaw that clouded his enjoyment.” What her husband had enjoyed was the friendship of “the most noble men of his time,” and while he never received the honors he deserved, those friendships were perhaps more valuable. “And how did he not suffer with and for his friends!”89
Because of the cholera epidemic Clausewitz was interred with no ceremony in the military cemetery in Breslau. This also meant no one was allowed to be at the burial, though Marie’s brother greased the palms of the gravediggers to get in. King Frederick William sent a letter remarking that his passing “is as unexpected as it is painful. The army has suffered a loss which will be difficult to remedy, which greatly saddens me.” Clausewitz’s remains were reinterred in his birthplace of Burg in 1971. A monument marks the grave.90
Marie soon took up the task of publishing Clausewitz’s works, most importantly On War. Clausewitz had not, as we’ve seen, intended it to see print in his lifetime. “When I would try to dissuade him from this decision,” Marie wrote, “he often responded, half-jokingly, but perhaps also with a presentiment of this early death: ‘You shall publish it.’ ” Marie did, and despite her half-protestation otherwise, was the “true editor” of the text. Indeed, no one else was better qualified to take the job. She had worked closely with Clausewitz as he wrote it; no one had greater familiarity with his ideas or intentions. She had help assembling the text from her brother, the Prussian general Friedrich Wilhelm von Brühl, as well as Major Franz August O’Etzel, an instructor at the War College, who also saw to the maps.91
On War appeared as the first three volumes of his works (1832–1834). These eventually ran to ten volumes, the last appearing in 1837, a year after Marie’s death. Brühl helped publish a new edition from 1853–1857 that corrected some errors in the first. We will never know exactly what changes he made (if any) from the now-lost original text and the first edition of On War. Brühl, however, did make alterations of his own to the first edition, such as placing the military commander-in-chief in the cabinet in Book 8.92 Incomplete, unfinished, sprawling, sometimes contradictory, and often as frustrating as it is endlessly rewarding, On War nonetheless assured Clausewitz of a form of the immortality that he had sought. Its incisive methodology, fed by a drive to clarify and define, both unshackled from dogmatism while grounded in experience and history, are just some of the qualities that make it the greatest monument to military thinking yet constructed.