Von Clausewitz: Similarities And Differences
Carl Philipp Gottfried von Clausewitz was a Prussian soldier who later became a major military thinker of the 19th century. Antoine-Henri Jomini was a Swiss man that joined the French revolution and even joining Russia and would become the most popular thinker of his time. Both Jomini and Clausewitz share many similarities more than their differences yet they both do focus on two different camps of ideas, the importance of strategy and chaos in war.
One of Jomini’s main points of interest in war is the importance of lines of operation, which is essentially the direction of army in land from its headquarter to a military target, in respect to the enemy. In this way, what he would concede to be the challenge of war is,”… establish them in reference …show more content…
Jomini when describing the principles of war he makes the argument that “To throw by strategic movement the mass of an army, successively, upon the decisive point of a theater of war…” (Jomini, pg70). Clausewitz makes it clear that war is serious and therefore a country cannot limit their war effort saying, “He who uses his forces ruthlessly, shrinking from no amount of bloodshed must gain an advantage if his adversary does not do the same,” (Clausewitz pg 265). Both of these men learned many of ideas of military success came from the Napoleonic wars. The French under Napoleon’s regime shows the way in which a population that practices total war principles, an army in mass and ruthless no prisoners policy, would be able to defeat any army that does not also practice this same mentality. Napoleon incorporated both the ideas of strategic movement with those of principles of ruthless military campaign.
The way in which Clausewitz and Jomini essentially maintain the same principles of war but only differ in what they consider significant such as the idea of movements of armies, the significance of politics and total war principles. Jomini throughout his art of war has shown the importance of planning and strategic movement yet Clausewitz recognizes the significance of other factors of war that are hard to quantify, such as the fog of war, the politics involved in war and the need to be barbarous in
One of Jomini’s main points of interest in war is the importance of lines of operation, which is essentially the direction of army in land from its headquarter to a military target, in respect to the enemy. In this way, what he would concede to be the challenge of war is,”… establish them in reference …show more content…
Jomini when describing the principles of war he makes the argument that “To throw by strategic movement the mass of an army, successively, upon the decisive point of a theater of war…” (Jomini, pg70). Clausewitz makes it clear that war is serious and therefore a country cannot limit their war effort saying, “He who uses his forces ruthlessly, shrinking from no amount of bloodshed must gain an advantage if his adversary does not do the same,” (Clausewitz pg 265). Both of these men learned many of ideas of military success came from the Napoleonic wars. The French under Napoleon’s regime shows the way in which a population that practices total war principles, an army in mass and ruthless no prisoners policy, would be able to defeat any army that does not also practice this same mentality. Napoleon incorporated both the ideas of strategic movement with those of principles of ruthless military campaign.
The way in which Clausewitz and Jomini essentially maintain the same principles of war but only differ in what they consider significant such as the idea of movements of armies, the significance of politics and total war principles. Jomini throughout his art of war has shown the importance of planning and strategic movement yet Clausewitz recognizes the significance of other factors of war that are hard to quantify, such as the fog of war, the politics involved in war and the need to be barbarous in