Napoleonic and independance wars

Napoleonic and Independence wars, are the wars that took place in the periods between 1770 and 1820 approximately. These wars are sometime considered a direct product of the philosophical current at the time: The enlightenment.

The wars in this period include, the United States of America independence wars from the British Empire. the French revolution, the seven years war between the colonies possessed by the richest families in Europe (the Hohenzollern, the Hasburg and the Bourbon), the post-revolution wars or Napoleonic wars, and the independence of the american colonies of the kingdoms of Spain and Portugal.

These wars have an interesting quality that differentiate them from all the previous armed conflicts. Mainly the standardization of the military units: infantry, cavalry and artillery; And the subsequent modification of combat techniques. Its worth noticing that the geographical extension of the wars was increasing and becoming a new powerful and decisive factor to account for. An clear example being Napoleon's invasion to Russia in 1812.

The ever increasing need for bigger and better trained armies, led to the creation of drafted citizen soldiers, and the implementation of cheap small arms into the infantry, clearly shaping the political order at the time; The big number of soldiers that composed the army, led to the creation, and later standardization, of army divisions and corps; Which facilitated communication, organization of the big massive armies that took part in the wars.

A representative army, not only from the historical point of view, but also from the point of view interesting to us, is Napoleon's army; More specifically, the army that he used in his campaign against Russia.

The campaign against Russia took place on 1812. Napoleon's army was one of the biggest and better trained armies in the world. Napoleon had an impressive military career as commander, and had an impressive 16-year long interval of undefeated battles. His army consisted of 370000 infantry units, 80000 cavalry units and 1400 artillery units; However impressive the number were (and still are under today's standards) the army was only half french; The other half was a unstable mixture of defeated Germans, Italians, Spaniards and Portuguese troops. Ont he other hand of the conflict was Russia with three major armies which together the were able to gather 180000 Infantry units, 40000 cavalry units and 800 artillery units.

Napoleon himself took charge of the logistics of the invasion. He was aware of the possible risk his campaign will undergo as they marched into the vast Russian territories. He knew the enemies would run towards the interior of the country, we knew they would do their best to left nothing for the Napoleonic troop to use, they would burn their own cities and crops just to make Napoleon's army starve and demoralize; In response to this, Napoleon decided to took with them all the necessary food and garments they would use during the invasion; He designed the supply routes, which included over 10000 wagon pulled by oxen. The wagon were build without any specifications other than carry as much food as possible, and the oxen were planned to be part of the menu once the provisions of the wagon have been used. All this minor details were taken into account by the great commander.

The Russian army was aware of the difficulties the French would have to undergo if the war was to be prolonged for too long. They were well aware of the demoralizing effect of their retreats, the vastness of the Russian territories, and most significant of all, the crudeness of the Russian winter.

Napoleon, as great commander as he was, left Paris hoping to obtain a victory in 4 weeks or less. He was confident the Russians would surrender without resistance once his army had crossed the Polish borders. He was wrong; Indeed, 4 weeks later, Napoleon had change his war strategy and his army was now marching towards Moscow. The army had been reduced by 150000 units at a rate of about 3000 units a day due to malnutrition, exhaustion, and infections.

By September that year Napoleon's army had reach Moscow. They took it without any resistance (since the Russian army, and Russian inhabitants left the city with all their belongings when they saw the french army coming) and had 2/3 of the city burned down. At this moment the remaining soldiers had their bag filled with some extra clothes, some food and many treasures , mostly gold relics and golden objects gained over the course of the war. It was customary among the soldiers to lighten their bags, by leaving behind the extra clothes that seemed unnecessary in September. At the en of September, the remaining 120000 soldiers started their march back to Paris.

Napoleon had calculated that winter would come until him, and his army had reach Poland, but that year, an abnormally cold winter, came abnormally soon. It is estimated that less than 25000 soldiers came back to Paris after the campaign.

This is a short abstract of Napoleon's campaign of invading Russia in 1812. But it is enough for us to realize the important role of materials in this context. We see, one more time the urge to find the optimum combinations of weight and strength, flexibility and toughness, between specialized components and multifunctional components. And all this in mass production, and for the least possible price.

A few examples that illustrate how decisive could have turned the right pick of materials include, the material from which the wagons were build. A wagon build out of fast burning wood could have help resists the inclement crude Russian winter. Oak wood is, in recent times, the best possible wood; It burns the longest, hottest, and basically the most efficient BTU available. Oak wood is not the strongest wood, but Napoleon's army didn't really need that.

The typical decision among soldier of sacrificing spare clothes to gain space where to put their treasures might have been alleviated by better clothing. It is true that in the 1800's there were no GoreTex membranes, Polartec insulation, or waterproof material like there are today, but many useful clothing was intentionally left aside because of its visual appearance. It was very important to fight in the army uniform and wear the nation's (or royal family's) colours in the uniform. A thick cloak, although ugly, might have offered better insulation during cold seasons, a dry place to sleep, it could be worn opened, thus offering good ventilation, or simply get detached in hot days.

Another example, this time of something that actually happened, as opposed to something that could have happened, is the material of which the cannons were made. During the seven years war, Napoleon's army had perfected their metallurgy, and the cuspid of this development was the implementation of the Gribeauval guns. The Gribeauval guns where a series of artillery units that in average weighted 2/3ths of the enemies cannons, thus allowing Napoleons army to advance faster and break the line formations more effectively (One of Napoleon's main war strategies.) As a comparison, the British 12-pounder cannons weighted around 6500 pound including the carriage and the limber; The Gribeauval 12-pounder only weighted 4367 pounds.

The technology used to create these weapons lied on the reduction of the manufacturing tolerance of the cannons. To achieve this, instead of pouring molten iron or bronze around a clay cylinder (and later removing the cylinder), these guns casted the entire solid volume, and later drilled the whole inside the iron or bronze core. This had numerous advantages, for example, in early cannons, the amount of power required to make a cannon ball flight a certain distance was bigger since most of the power was dissipated through the imperfections of the inside cylinder. The increased amount of powder made the mechanical loads present in the cannon very big, and this needed the implementation of external metal rings around the cannon tube to absorb the shock of the explosion. With the advent of the new method, the amount of powder required was smaller (since the imperfections in the inner cylinder were also smaller) and the loads the cannon tube had to withstand were totally absorbed by the cannon alone. This allowed the metallurgist to spare the extra metallic rings ,thus lightening the whole piece, and reducing the amount of material needed to produce every cannon.

The french army had the best artillery in Europe, this led Napoleon to create the French empire as we know it today, and some of its glory can be traced back to the understanding of new materials and new, smarter, ways of using them in our favor.

World Wars

Increasingly in the past two centuries, radically new science‐based technologies—inventions providing new power sources and means of transportation and communication, for example, have had a transformative effect on society, and on warfare. But despite widespread popular belief in technology as a determinative agent of change, indeed as part of the culture of modernity, a debate continues over the inevitability of the social consequences of particular major inventions. While some see technology as a virtually autonomous agent of change, others contextualize it in larger socio‐cultural processes. The latter emphasize that material innovation is initiated and developed, or not developed by human beings with particular abilities and resources (the gun was largely banned from feudal Japan, for example, for more than two centuries; see Noel Perrin, Giving up the Gun: Japan's Reversion to the Sword, 1543–1879, 1979). Despite the power of a technological development once it has begun, the beginning and end of every such sequence, as Robert L. O'Connell (Of Arms and Men, 1989) has said, is a point when human choice can and does exert itself.

World war I

World war I happened between 1914 - 1918. The weapons used in this war can be divided into individual use and group use. 

For individual use, The main weapon used by British soldiers in the trenches was the bolt-action rifle. 15 rounds could be fired in a minute and a person 1,400 metres away could be killed.

Machine guns needed 4-6 men to work them and had to be on a flat surface. They had the fire-power of 100 guns.

Large field guns had a long range and could deliver devastating blows to the enemy but needed up to 12 men to work them. They fired shellswhich exploded on impact.

For massive killing:

1. Gas. The German army were the first to use chlorine gas at the battle of Ypres in 1915. Chlorine gas causes a burning sensation in the throat and chest pains. Death is painful - you suffocate! The problem with chlorine gas is that the weather must be right. If the wind is in the wrong direction it could end up killing your own troops rather than the enemy.

Mustard gas was the most deadly weapon used. It was fired into the trenches in shells. It is colourless and takes 12 hours to take effect. Effects include: blistering skin, vomiting, sore eyes, internal and external bleeding. Death can take up to 5 weeks.

For group use:

1. Zeppelin. The Zeppelin, also known as blimp, was an airship that was used during the early part of the war in bombing raids by the Germans. They carried machine guns and bombs. However, they were abandoned because they were easy to shoot out of the sky.

2. Tank. Tanks were used for the first time in the First World War at the Battle of the Somme. They were developed to cope with the conditions on theWestern Front. The first tank was called 'Little Willie' and needed a crew of 3. Its maximum speed was 3mph and it could not cross trenches.

The more modern tank was not developed until just before the end of the war. It could carry 10 men, had a revolving turret and could reach 4mph.

3. Planes were also used for the first time. At first they were used to deliver bombs and for spying work but became fighter aircraft armed with machine guns, bombs and some times cannons. Fights between two planes in the sky became known as 'dogfights'

4. Torpedoes were used by submarines. The Germans used torpedoes to blow up ships carrying supplies from America to Britain.

The Germans torpedoed the passenger liner Lusitania on May 1st 1915 which sank with a loss of 1,195 lives. Americans were outraged and joined the war in 1917 on the side of the allies.

World war II

World War 2 required a massive outpouring of manufacturing capabilities, giving rise to one of the world's largest industrial producers in the United States of America. The war, and its global reach, challenged many-a-nation to rise up and fight the fascist incursion brought about by Adolph Hitler and Benito Mussolini in Europe and North Africa and the empirical reach of Japan in the Pacific. With its roots planted firmly in the First World War, it was not surprising to see the fusion of man and machine to the extent that was witnessed in the Second World War. It was a war of defined heroes and villains, tyranny and democracy, meekness and strength. In the end, it would be a war of wars, setting the stage for the conflicts now witnessed throughout the 21st Century - most notable in the Middle East. Below you will find a listing of aircraft, infantry weapons, tanks, artillery, grenades and naval vessels used throughout World War 2 by the major players and world powers.

From the main list of weapons we can see that with the  growth of weapon"effects", the materials and the manufacture also needed to be improved.

For personal use, the goal is to be more flexible and deadly. This required the weight of the weapon could not be too heavy for a soldier to carry. On the other hand, too light could cause the accuracy issue. So this dilemma required new materials and new technology.

For group use, the goal was to kill as many as possible. So the weapon required accuracy less  than individual use but more powerful.

Ancient

Weapons are meant to kill or harm living things. Historically speaking, the development of human civilization followed the pace of the evolution of weapons, which stands for the highest level of the current technology.


Stone age.

At ancient times, materials that human being could access to were far limited, which were only ones came directly from nature, like wood, stone, bones, etc. As a half man-made thing, weapons in that time was only used to hunt in order to survive. Wars were only between human being and nature.

The main principle of how to choose weapon material is basically considering the strength and hardness of a material. With these properties people could get work done more efficient.
And also there were tools of combinations of different materials, which was mainly decided by the combinations of good properties of different materials. Take a spear for example, the long wood part was chosen because of the low density, which enabled people to hold for a long time without loosing the attacking distance, while the sharp part was stone. With big hardness, the stone part had the capability to kill animals fast.


Bronze and iron age.

With the development of productive forces, there were enough food for everyone to survive and even some left. As the left things got accumulated, selfish was firstly came up and this led to the fights between man and man, which was "true war" or the war we now defined.

In order to win the war, mankind were forced to invent more powerful weapons. But the renovation of weapons need great society source support, which means the richer a society was, the more advanced weapons they probably own. Of course there were exceptions. Like China in Qing dynastic.

So on this level, the relationship between weapons and the level of society was some how promote each other.

Copper was first smelted around 3,300 B.C., followed quickly by the development of bronze. Iron tools first started to appear in the Near East in the 12th Century B.C., although iron remained relatively expensive for centuries and was often used concurrently with bronze tools. However, first bronze and then iron and steel were major leaps forward in weapon-making, producing arms that were heavier, more durable and kept a sharper edge longer. In addition to these materials improving the killing power of all previous weapons, the era also saw the domestication of the horse. That opened the doors to both cavalry and chariots. Chariots fell out of favor by the 4th Century B.C.; but cavalry would remain important for more than a millennia after that. The ancient world also saw the development of siege weapons that used cables, animal sinew and counterweights to store mechanical power for use in things like trebuchets, catapults, and ballistas. This was also an era that saw a primitive form of napalm, the famous "Greek Fire," come into being.

Greek and Roman

The historical period considered here is mostly represented by the Classical era of the Greek civilization. An era of great influence on human history as it enriched every aspect of human culture. The classical period is commonly accepted to be the 200 year period between the 5^th and the 4^th centuries BC.

The Roman contribution is mainly represented by the 500 years-long period of the Roman Empire, historically placed between 27BC to 476 AD. During this period the Roman Legions tripled their territories going from 2.7 million km², to an outstanding 6.5million km².

This success can be tracked back to two main revolutionary concepts; The first being the military war tactics, in which discipline and obedience are key factors to maintain the front lines unbroken, and the second, and more relevant to us, the superiority of their war equipment.

As we can see from the pictures, the roman legionaries, greatly resembles the Greek hoplites. This can be explained by understanding that the Greek classical period had a tremendous influence over the roman empire. Influencing every aspect of their culture, from architecture to religion, from politics to war tactics.

The typical roman legionary can be considered to have some defensive and some offensive equipment. In the defensive we can include an extensive armor that effectively covered its vulnerable points. This armor consisted of a shield, a helmet and a body armor, all of which were thicker and covered more body parts than those of their enemies, which were mostly dressed with nothing other than clothing and defended with shields. The improved thickness of their armor was decisive in the prolonged engagement that battles often implied. The defensive equipment was usually made out of bronze, iron  and later steel. The use of each of these new materials were major leaps forward in the military superiority of the soldiers since stronger materials protected them better, lighter materials allowed them to be faster and more agile, cheap materials allowed the armies to grow bigger and so on. Usually, the lowest ranges didn't have the means or the privileges to wear a armor, instead they were protected by leather which acted as a thicker and more resistant skin (specially against the thrusting of swords), and wooden shields, perhaps reinforced with natural fibers (taking advantage of the anisotropicity of these materials) or even metallic parts.

On the offensive side, the legions had swords and spears mainly, they also were provided with chariots and some forms of cavalry. The swords themselves were generally made out of bronze or copper; Bronze is rarely encounter naturally and its very likely to have been produced by smelting of naturally occurring ores. Spears played an important role in battle, being for example a decisive war instrument in the Macedonian troops. The long spears, or Sarissa,  when used together with the phalanx formation proved to be the winning strategy responsible for the undefeated campaigns of Alexander the Great. Although the materials were common among trained enemy troops, the techniques used by the Romans resulted in higher lethality in combat. An example of this is the military training focused on thrusting of the sword rather than the slash which was only possible due to the use of materials that could stay sharpen for longer periods of time.

The differences between a roman legion and a well trained enemy troop didn't always lie on the materials they used, but rather on the ways they used these materials, or the processing the materials undergo. In the case of savages, this difference might have been decisive since savages probably didn't have access to the forging facilities and specialized blacksmiths the Roman Empire had, putting them from the beginning in the losing side. Another example might be the use of exotic alloys that offered dramatic mechanical improvements at the cost of being toxic to the soldiers, like for example the use of arsenical bronzes.

We can conclude that military superiority during the classical period can be tracked back to the discovery of superior materials, superior forging techniques, and use of these products accordingly to the military task expected.

Medieval

Early knights wore chainmail. It was a form of armor made of many small rings locked together. The rings were usually made of iron and was very heavy (around 23kg) . It easily rusted and was hard to clean. It protected the wearer from cuts but not much else.

Knights also whore metal helmets and shielding on their arms and legs.

Later on knights began wearing armor made up of solid metal plates that protected the wearer's body and bent at the joints. This armor weighed about the same as chain mail but was usually polished or painted in order to prevent the metal from rusting.

Even horse wear armor. It was called barding and covered the horse's head, neck, body and chest.

Ancient

 Weapons, as man-made things, with the purpose of killing or harming living things, were used in the war. Weapons are of great significance because mankind wanted to win the war unharmed, which means one side must kill the other quickly and deadly. As the only tool man could use, the level of weapons decides the live or death, mostly.

At ancient times, materials that human being could access to were far limited, which were only ones came directly from nature, like wood, stone, bones, etc. As a half man-made thing, weapons in that time was only used to hunt in order to survive. Wars were only between human being and nature. Weapons, as the major tools for human being to survive, were developed in order to get more efficiency.

With the development of productive forces, there were enough food for everyone to survive and even some left. As the left things got accumulated, selfish was firstly came up and this led to the fights between man and man, which was "true war" or the war we now defined.

In order to win the war, mankind were forced to invent more powerful weapons. But the renovation of weapons need great society source support, which means the richer a society was, the more advanced weapons they probably own. Of course there were exceptions. Like China in Qing dynastic.

So on this level, the relationship between weapons and the level of society was some how promote each other.

Description

Finally, we have narrow our search down;
We will be describing how the equipment of all the different types of soldiers has evolve as a consequence of the discovery of new materials, or the modification in the methods used to obtain them.

We have divided the progress in 8 different groups. These are:

-Ancient: Includes tribal warriors from ancient Mesopotamia, ancient china, and all the pre-colombian mayor cultures i.e. Inca, Maya and Aztec.

-Greek and Roman: Includes the warriors from ancient Greece and Rome. Probably the most representative warriors are the greek hoplites and the roman legionaries.

-Medieval: Includes the fully armored medieval knights. The horses, even though they represent an important part of the war machinery, have been left aside for simplicity.

 -Independance and Napoleonic: Includes the warriors that were involved in independance wars in the americas, as well as in the napoleonic wars in europe.

-WWI: Typical American and Birtish troops (leaving aside tanks, war vehicles, planes, ships, etc..) during the first world war.

-WWII: Typical German  troops during the second world war, leaving aside any other war machinery.

-Vietnam: American troops during the vietnam war.

-Irak and Afganistan: American troops today.