Calendar: 1927-1928 Page 493

νηι ON THE USES OF THE STUDY OF WAR there are some to-day who would have us believe that the progress of science as applied to war has by creating an entirely new set of conditions destroyed the value of past experience That is point to which will return while in the meantime declaring that my faith in military history as the foundation of military study remains unshaken and military history is but special branch of the general study It has technique of its own There are few more difficult tasks than to unravel the true story of battle have indicated that there are many dicta about war which experience has shown to be either entirely misleading or to be no longer applicable But it is certainly as true as it ever was that What the soldier said is not evidence Lawyers tell us that it is commonplace that there will be material discrepancies between the accounts of half dozen honest eye-witnesses of the same event How much truer must that be of witnesses engaged in the storm and stress of battle To get at truth it is necessary to know the influences which are likely to affect the mind of commander how to measure the numbers and efficiency of the troops which military documents are valuable and which are not and the circumstances which affect their value These processes which have but briefly summarised have to be applied to both sides For think it is true to say that we never get the complete truth from one side only Yet we have long accepted as historical fact the accounts of the wars of the Greeks and Persians and of the Romans and the Carthagenians for which the materials have come to us almost entirely from one side cannot but think that there is some revision of history needed there The fact is that too often sailor and soldier historians have lacked the technique of the civilian historian and the civilian historian the technique of the sailor and soldier The apparatus for research and historical study which university possesses can be of great value to the military world the expert assist- ance of the professional in war to the student of history We have here in London both great university and great military centre though the mass of the metropolis tends to conceal both from the view of the citizen London is the only place in this island indeed in our Empire where both exist on such scale and much good may be done by bringing both together My first course of public lectures is designed to help to that end In this sphere too-the sphere of the conduct of war-there is in its more general and less technical aspects much which concerns the citizen We have imagine most of us realised that our methods of conducting the Great War were far from perfect We had to change them drastically during the course of the war and ideal arrangements are seldom reached in the stress and strain of strife We are now endeavouring to improve upon our organisation of government for war The improvements are likely to be satisfactory and complete or unsatisfactory and incomplete just so far as there is or is not an intelligent public interest in them For the statesmen who are the masters of the sailors soldiers and airmen are influenced and react