ABSTRACT
On one occasion Karl Marx wrote to Engels that he would await instructions from "the War Office in Manchester". He was referring to Engels's reputation as an expert on military affairs. Engels was one of the few civilians in the middle of the nineteenth century who became an acknowledged master of the theory of warfare and an authority on the technique of armed insurrection. Between 1850 and 1870 he established for himself a reputation as a military critic and his friends called him "General". In his later years he was actually consulted on military matters by Major Wachs of the General Staff in Berlin. Engels's articles on military affairs appeared in newspapers and journals in the United States, England. and Germany.l
After his death Engels's military writings were, to some extent, neglected, though they appear to have influenced Lenin's thinking concerning revolutionary warfare. In 1923 Engels's articles on the Franco-Prussian war were reprinted. Then Engels's achievements as a military critic were discussed in the Soviet encyclopaedia. In 1958-64 a selection of Engels's military writings was published by the East German Ministry of Defence, while in 1961 a new edition of his essays on the English volunteer movement was published.
