MANEUVER - A DISCUSSION

Reviewer's Comment:
This table is a list of articles, essays, books and definitions about the concept of maneuver and the developing discussions about the nature of maneuver in comparison and contract with other concepts.

Attrition:
Attrition warfare is a military strategy consisting of belligerent attempts to win a war by wearing down the enemy to the point of collapse through continuous losses in personnel and materiel. The word attrition comes from the Latin root atterere to rub against, similar to the "grinding down" of the opponent's forces in attrition warfare. The German term actually is better translated as 'exhaustion'.

The contrasting strategy to 'attrition' is 'annihilation' both are means employed to achive political ends. Neither actually requires achievement of complete military attrition or annihilation. The goal, end, sought is the result that the opponent's WILL to continue has resulted in his surrender or willingness to negociate.

Annihilation:
A war of annihilation (German: Vernichtungskrieg) or war of extermination (destruction) is a type of war in which the goal is the complete annihilation of a state, a people or an ethnic minority through genocide or through the destruction of their livelihood. The goal can be outward-directed or inward, against elements of one's own population. The goal is not like other types of warfare, the recognition of limited political goals, such as recognition of a legal status (such as in a war of independence), control of disputed territory (as in war of aggression or defensive war), or the total military defeat of an enemy state.

Annihilation is a military strategy in which an attacking army seeks to entirely destroy the military capacity of the opposing army. This strategy can be executed in a single planned pivotal battle, called a "battle of annihilation". A successful battle of annihilation is accomplished through the use of tactical surprise, application of overwhelming force at a key point, or other tactics performed immediately before or during the battle. The end goal of a battle of annihilation is to cause the leaders of the opposing army to sue for peace due to the complete annihilation of its army and thus inability to further engage in offensive or defensive military action. It is not necessary to kill or capture all, or even most, of an opposing army's forces to annihilate it in the sense used here. Rather, the destruction of the enemy army as a cohesive military force able to offer further meaningful military offense or defense, even if temporarily, is the objective.

Firepower:
Firepower is the military capability to direct force at an enemy. (It is not to be confused with the concept of rate of fire, which describes the cycling of the firing mechanism in a weapon system.) Firepower involves the whole range of potential weapons. The concept is generally taught as one of the three key principles of modern warfare wherein the enemy forces are destroyed or have their will to fight negated by sufficient and preferably overwhelming use of force as a result of combat operations. Through the ages firepower has come to mean offensive power applied from a distance, thus involving ranged weapons as opposed to one-on-one close quarters combat. Firepower is thus something employed to keep enemy forces at a range where they can be defeated in detail or sapped of the will to continue. In the field of naval artillery, the weight of a broadside was long used as a figure of merit of a warship's firepower.

Shock tactics:
This is accomplished by direct contact, bayonet or sword fighting, or direct contact by cavalry lances or swords as opposed to slings or bows and arrows.

Position warfare:
This strategy is generally employed when the defense is stronger that offense and employs fortifications. It an also result from features of terrain and logistic capabilities. It can be the result of the political ends sought being acquisition of a limited territory or surrender of the opponent when his capital is threatened. Position warfare was the typical strategy of 18th century warfare of which Frederick the Great was a master. It was replaced by the maneuver warfare adopted by Napoleon.

Ralph Peters, In Praise of Attrition

Richard Maltz, Comment on Peters' essay on Attrition

J. Boone Bartholomees Jr., The Issue of Attrition

J. Boone Bartholomees Jr., The Issue of Attrition

Crawley, Major Skip, review of -Maneuver Warfare: An Anthology. Edited by Richard D. Hooker. New York, NY: Press, 1933. ISBN: 978-0891415183,409 pp.

Decision Theory:
Decision theory (or the theory of choice not to be confused with choice theory) is the study of an agent's choices.
Decision theory can be broken into two branches: normative decision theory, which analyzes the outcomes of decisions or determines the optimal decisions given constraints and assumptions, and descriptive decision theory, which analyzes how agents actually make the decisions they do. Decision theory is closely related to the field of game theory and is an interdisciplinary topic, studied by economists, statisticians, data scientists, psychologists, biologists, political and other social scientists, philosophers and computer scientists. Empirical applications of this rich theory are usually done with the help of statistical and econometric methods.

Hughes, MG. B. P.,Firepower: Weapons Effectiveness on the Battlefield, 1630 -1850, Sarpedon, N.Y., 1997, index. bibliography, tbles, illustrations

Jomini, Baron de, Art of War, Capt. G. H. Mendell, and Lieut., W. P Craighall, trans. and eds., Wilder Pubs. Radford VA. 2008, 296 pgs., paperback. -There are other editions.

Antoine Henri Jomini Baron, biography in Encyclopedia Com.

Antoine Henri Jomini Baron, biography in Wikipedia.com.

Antoine Henri Jomini - The Art of War, Condensed Version ed. Brig Gen J. D. Hittle,

Karl von Clausewitz, On War,

Hanz Delbruck, History of the Art of War, and many other books and essays. The 'delbrucklist' includes many commentators on Delbruck's work.

Count Alfred Von Schlieffen, Cannae

Capt L. A. Robinson, Intelligence & Maneuver Warfare

World Atlas, What is Maneuver?

Fourth Generation Warfare

Marinus, Zweikampf Dynamic - Maneuverist No 2

Marinus, Maneuverist NO 3

Matthew J. Schultz, The Operational Warfare Revolution: How Operational Art Can Prepare the Marine Corps for an Era of Great Power Competition

Major Sean Barrett, Mike Augier & Col, Michael D. Wyly, Remaneuverizing the Marine Corps

Two Maneuverists, What the Marines Believe About War and Warfare

Major J. D. Burke, Maneuver Warfare and MAGTF

Capt. Daniel R. Graizier & William S. Lind Maneuver warfare 2015

William Lind, Defining Maneuver Warfare

William Lind Biography

Arthur Bloom, William Lind's Way of War

Jim Lacy, The Continuing Irrelevance of William Lind

Arthur Bloom, William Lind's Way Of War

John Boyd, Wikipedia bio