site logo

Miscellaneous Information

Categories: OFFICERS' RESERVE CORPS
Military Handbooks: The Plattsburg Manual

For convenience, military information is considered under two heads,

namely (1) that collected in time of peace by the body of army experts

in Washington called the General Staff; and (2) that obtained by troops

in the field after war has begun. The former relates to general

conditions such as the geography, resources, and military strength of

the various nations, information necessary to enable the General Staff

to ac
intelligently in the event of war. The latter relates to more

local and detailed conditions out on the firing line.



For a general to act intelligently he must possess information of the

position, strength, dispositions, intentions, etc., of his opponent.

This may be obtained from a number of sources--adjoining troops,

inhabitants, newspapers, letters, telegraph files, prisoners, deserters,

spies, maps, but mostly from information-gathering groups, called

reconnoitering patrols. When the available maps do not show all the

military features of the country, officers and soldiers must go on ahead

and make maps that do.



More

;