ABSTRACT
In the Army Exercise of 1913, Sir John French theoretically commanded four infantry divisions and a cavalry division, but a mere 47,000 men participated, with the battalions averaging 300 mm apiece, and the field batteries appeared at half strength with teams for three guns and three wagons. The proper use of cover, of infantry advancing in rushes, coordinated in turn with creeping barrages of artillery: these were the tactics of truly modern war, first evolved by Buller in Natal. At the Army Exercise of 1913, Commandant de Thomasson noted that the infantry “makes wonderful use of the ground, advances as a rule by short rushes and always at the double, and almost invariably fires from a lying down position”. A revision of the pre-war drill books accompanied the rearmament and the changes in infantry training, Modifications in tactics had occurred during the South African War and their value in countering the increased fire effect of contemporary weapons merited assessment.
