Von Clausewitz's theory of war. “On War” - the main work of the great general

The wide interest of our public in the theoretical works of Clausewitz explains the publication of this, the second edition of his main work “On War”.

“For me it was a matter of ambition,” says Clausewitz about this work of his, “to write a book that would not be forgotten in 2-3 years, that those interested in the matter could pick up more than once.”

This hope of Clausewitz was fully realized: his book has been alive for more than a century, giving the author a well-deserved reputation as a profound military theorist and philosopher of war.

Clausewitz was a contemporary of the great bourgeois revolution. The Jacobin dictatorship shattered the feudal serf system in France. The new army created by the revolution victoriously defended its country from the onslaught of reactionary Europe and bravely cleared the way for a new social system with its weapons. “The French revolutionary troops drove out nobles, bishops and petty princes in droves... They cleared the ground, as if they were pioneers in virgin forests...” (Engels). Old class privileges were crumbling everywhere. Everywhere the breath of the revolutionary storm awakened the oppressed and ruined peasantry and the burghers eking out a miserable existence.

The political ideas of the French Revolution remained alien and hostile to the Prussian nobleman Clausewitz. In this respect he did not rise above the level of his class. Carl von Clausewitz is a monarchist. All of his practical military activities were spent in the service of European reaction. As a fourteen-year-old boy in 1793, Clausewitz took part in the Rhine Campaign after drinking away revolutionary France. In 1806 he took part in the war against Napoleon. In 1812, Clausewitz left the Prussian army and went into the service of Alexander I. He remained in Russian service until 1814, participating in the Battle of Borodino, as well as in operations on the Lower Elbe and in the Netherlands. In 1815, having returned to the Prussian troops, Clausewitz became a quartermaster general of the corps in Blucher's army and participated in the battles of Ligny and Waterloo. After the July Revolution of 1830 in France, Clausewitz personally developed a plan for war against France. Clausewitz's political personality is also characterized by the fact that in 1810 the Prussian court chose him as a teacher for the heir to the throne, the crown prince. Clausewitz's monarchist beliefs were reflected in his main work, On War.

But being a determined enemy of the French Revolution, Clausewitz was able to understand the significance of the revolution in military affairs caused by the revolution.

Together with all the participants in the revolutionary and Napoleonic wars, Clausewitz experienced the brutal collapse of all the norms and provisions of the military art of the 17th and 18th centuries that were considered “unchangeable” and “eternal.” The mass armies of the revolution took to the battlefields against the mercenary, carefully trained armies of the reactionary coalitions. The new army of peasants, artisans and workers, inspired by the slogans of the revolution, found new ways of waging war, replacing the linear, strictly measured tactics, “oblique battle formations” of the mercenaries of Frederick II. The strategy of “armchair” wars, similar to skillful fencing, was replaced in the revolutionary wars by the “plebeian” strategy of completely defeating the enemy. And on the fields of Jena and Auerstedt, along with the Prussian army, all the old familiar ideas about the art of war perished.

It was clear that within the framework of “pure” military art, within the framework of operational-strategic “monograms” and formations, it was impossible to explain the reasons for the defeat of the proud Prussian army, nor to find ways to revive its military power. In the autumn of 1806, before the Battle of Jena, Scharngorst, observing the maneuvering of French troops, tried to imitate their military techniques and discard Friedrich's tactics, but the very structure of the Prussian army, of course, made these attempts unsuccessful.

The principles of the French Revolution won a brilliant victory in military affairs. Recognition of their triumph was the struggle of the leading military leaders of Prussia, among whom Clausewitz belonged, for military reform, for universal conscription - on the basis of the abolition of serfdom. After Jena, Clausewitz took a practical part in this transformation of the army, working together with Scharngorst in the War Ministry.

The dilapidated building of the German Empire crumbled to dust under the blows of the revolution. Napoleon reshuffled countless German states. Under the onslaught of a foreign conqueror, the old Prussian state irrevocably collapsed in the disaster of Jena.

Backward, semi-feudal Germany, represented by its young bourgeoisie, was awakening to a new life. But the German bourgeoisie was too weak to take the path that had previously been victoriously traversed by its French and English brethren. Germany during this period was only on the eve of the industrial revolution, which began in it only in the 40s of the 19th century. In Clausewitz's era, German capitalism developed on the basis of domestic industry. Machine technology was in its infancy. The backwardness of German capitalism, which grew up under the auspices of the landowner government, determined the weakness of the German bourgeoisie. She was incapable of a decisive struggle for a new social system. But the brutal military defeat of Prussia in 1806 clearly showed the need for bourgeois reforms. Submitting to the inexorable pressure of circumstances, even the Prussian landowners realized that only the peasantry freed from serfdom could revive the military power of Germany. It was clear that without some, at least visible, concessions it was impossible to rouse the Prussian peasant to fight Napoleon. In addition, the Junkers feared that the liberation of the peasantry could come from outside, from the victorious French, or from below, from the peasant revolution, as a result of new defeats. The bitter experience gained from a series of shameful defeats led to the bourgeois reforms of Stein-Hardenberg (the beginning of the liberation of peasants and a new urban structure) and the military reforms of Scharngorst (the transition to short terms of military service and universal conscription).

The social upsurge after the disaster at Jena swept across Germany. From the Berlin pulpit, Fichte addressed fiery speeches to the German nation. Heinrich Kleist in his poems called for a fight against foreign conquerors. But the ardent patriotism of the German bourgeoisie, which raised the banner of German unification, ultimately went to the service of reaction. The struggle of the bourgeoisie for national liberation and national unity was exploited by the Junkers and contributed to the restoration of the old order. The twenty-year era of revolutionary wars ended with the victory of reactionary Europe. The German bourgeoisie could not extract anything from the fruits of this victory. Economic weakness did not allow her to take the revolutionary path and pushed her towards reconciliation with the ruling feudal classes.

The impotence and opportunism of the German bourgeoisie found their clear expression in German classical philosophy. The bourgeoisie, which practically did not set itself the task of fighting the existing system, lived in a world of abstract thought. German idealistic philosophy was a pale reflection of the French Revolution, transferred to the realm of ideas.

Clausewitz's doctrine of war was created under the undoubted influence of classical German idealism.

Brought up on Kant, Montesquieu and Machiavelli, who after Jena listened to the philosophical lectures of the Kantian Kiesewetter, Carl Clausewitz worked on his main work “On War” in the years (1818 - 1830) when Hegel reigned supreme over the minds of Germany. The immediate philosophical origins of Clausewitz's teachings lead to Hegel: from Hegel - Clausewitz's idealism, from Hegel his dialectical method.

Clausewitz's teaching on war reflected the main features of the ideology of the early period of capitalism.

Clausewitz is first and foremost a philosopher. “I am now reading, among other things, Clausewitz’s On War,” writes Engels in 1858, “a peculiar way of philosophizing, but in essence very good.”

©Rimis Publishing House, edition, design, 2009

All rights reserved. No part of the electronic version of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, including posting on the Internet or corporate networks, for private or public use without the written permission of the copyright owner.

We express our sincere gratitude to the Rachinsky family and personally to Natalia Andreevna Rachinskaya for agreeing to publish the translation, as well as for their assistance in preparing the book for publication. We express our gratitude to Zoya Gennadievna Lisichkina, assistant director of the Abramtsevo Estate Museum, as well as the great-grandson of Savva Ivanovich Mamontov, Sergei Nikolaevich Chernyshev, for their help in working on the book.

Biography of K. Clausewitz

Carl von Clausewitz (1780–1831)

Carl von Clausewitz (German) Carl Philipp Gottlieb von Clausewitz, born June 1, 1780 in a place called Burg near Magdeburg, in the family of an official) is a famous military writer who revolutionized the theory of war with his writings. In 1792 he was enlisted in the Prussian army as a cadet, and in 1793 he took part in the war with France. In 1801 g. entered the military school in Berlin.

After graduating from college, I took part in a campaign 1806 g., was appointed adjutant to Prince Augustus of Prussia and, together with him, was captured. In 1808, G. von Scharnhorst, head of the War Ministry and chairman of the army reorganization committee, drew attention to him and appointed Clausewitz head of his chancellery. Clausewitz actively participated in preparations for the reorganization of the army and soon established close friendly relations with A. Gneisenau, the future Field Marshal. In 1810–1812 gg. taught strategy and tactics at the Officer Military School, of which he became head 1818 d. Later he listened to philosophy in Berlin from Professor Kiesewetter (Kantian school), traces of whose dialectical techniques are noticeable in the theoretical works of Clausewitz.

He was one of the authors of a document that put forward the idea of war in alliance with Russia against Napoleon. When in 1812 King Frederick William III, having concluded an alliance with France, sent military contingents to participate in Napoleon’s Russian campaign, Clausewitz left Prussia and enlisted in the Russian army, where he rose from a liaison officer to the chief of staff of the corps. By this time, his note on the danger of an alliance with France, which first appeared in Pertz’s “Leben Gneisenaus”, dates back.

At first, Clausewitz was assigned to the service of Karl Pfuel, then transferred to the rearguard of Count Palen, with whom he participated in the battle near Vitebsk. Then he served in Uvarov’s corps, and during the Battle of Borodino he took part in a raid on the French flank. After this, he was transferred to Riga to the Marquis Paulucci, from where he asked to join Wittgenstein’s 1st Corps. When York entered into negotiations with the Russians, Diebitsch entrusted them to Clausewitz, who contributed to the conclusion of the Taurogen Convention. Being a direct participant in many events of the war, he left memoirs that are a valuable source for researchers.

He then prepared a plan for the formation of the East Prussian Landwehr, based on Scharnhorst's idea. In 1813 he was chief of staff in the Valmoden corps; during the truce, at the insistence of Gneisenau, he wrote “bbersicht des Feldzugs von 1813 bis zum Waffenstillstande.”

In April 1814 he returned to serve in the Prussian army with the rank of colonel. In 1815 he was appointed chief of staff of the 3rd Army Corps. Took part in the Hundred Days Campaign. Fought at Ligny and Wavre. At Wavre, the 3rd Corps was able to attract Grouchy's corps to itself and thereby contributed to Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo. For his differences against Napoleon, Emperor Alexander I on January 23, 1817, awarded Clausewitz the Order of St. George, 4th degree (3304 according to the cavalry list of Grigorovich-Stepanov).

In the 19th century There was a widespread legend about Clausewitz's extraordinary leadership abilities. According to this narrative, Clausewitz strongly disagreed with the position of the Prussian troops at Jena and drew on the board for Prince Albert and Scharnhorst how Napoleon's army should be defeated. After the battle, the board went to Napoleon as a trophy. Looking at the drawing, Napoleon allegedly frowned and said: “What a blessing that I didn’t have the chance to fight this terrible man. I would no doubt be crushed!” This legend has no official confirmation. However, in the first half of the 20th century. The Kaiser and Nazi leadership did their best to popularize this historical legend.

In 1818 he was promoted to major general. In 1830, Clausewitz was director of the General Military School. In 1831, when Prussian troops advanced to the Polish border during the Polish uprising, he was appointed chief of staff under Field Marshal Gneisenau.

The strategic principles he formulated, necessary to achieve victory, were successfully applied by Prussia in the wars with Austria in 1866 and with France in 1870 and formed the basis for the theory and practice of preparing and conducting military operations of many other states. Clausewitz's main work is “On War” (1832).

The distinctive features of Clausewitz's military-historical works are clarity of presentation, an apt critical assessment of military events, and, according to his views on war (“war is the continuation of politics by other means”), he assigns a special place to the political element and seeks to find out to what extent the fate of armies depends on the strengths and weaknesses of the commanders, whom Clausewitz characterizes with his characteristic brilliance and talent.

“On War” is a fundamental work by a classic of military art. Clausewitz did a lot to develop the theory of military art and its components - strategy and tactics; opposed the “eternal principles” of military art, considering the phenomena of war in development. At the same time, he denied the existence of patterns in the development of military affairs, arguing that war is an area of chance, an area of the unreliable. For the first time in military science, Clausewitz clearly formulated some principles for conducting battles, campaigns and wars in general. This is the full tension of all forces, the concentration of the greatest possible forces in the direction of the main attack, the energetic use of achieved successes, as well as surprise, speed and decisiveness of actions. Clausewitz's significant contribution to military theory is also the disclosure of the role of moral factors in achieving victory. Clausewitz considered the main moral factors to be the talent of the commander, the military valor of the army and the spirit of the people who formed it. Clausewitz's works, published posthumously, constituted a whole stage in the development of military thought.

The following sources were used in writing this article:

Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron;

From the preface to the first edition by Maria von Clausewitz

The work which these lines must precede occupied almost exclusively the attention of my dearly beloved husband during the last twelve years of my life; alas, I and the fatherland lost him too early. It was my husband’s cherished dream to finish this work, but he did not intend to publish his work during his lifetime; when I tried to persuade him to do this, he often half-jokingly, or perhaps anticipating his premature death, answered me: “You must publish it.”

I could not help but become familiar with the work that occupied my beloved husband in every detail. Thus, no one can tell better than me about the zeal and love with which my husband devoted himself to work, about the hopes that he placed in it, about the circumstances surrounding the birth of work, and, finally, about the time when it was created. My husband's richly gifted spirit felt from early youth the need for light and truth. No matter how versatile he was educated, his thoughts were directed primarily towards military sciences, which are so necessary for the good of the state: here was his calling. Scharngorst was the first to show him the right path, and his appointment 1810 a teacher at a military school and an invitation to give an initial military education to the Crown Prince served as a new impetus to direct his efforts and aspirations precisely to this subject and to express in writing the thoughts that had matured in him and had already received strict definiteness. The work with which he completed his teaching course to the Crown Prince in 1812 already contains the embryo of future works. But it was only in 1816 in Koblenz that he began scientific work again, using the experience acquired during four years of war. At first he wrote down his thoughts in the form of short, loosely connected notes. The undated note below appears to date from this time:

“The provisions written here touch upon, in my opinion, the main principles that constitute what is called strategy. I see them only as materials, but I have progressed so far in my work that I am ready to begin merging them into one whole.

These materials arose without any preconceived plan. At first I intended, without thinking of any system or strict sequence, to write down in short, precise and concise statements those of the most important points on this subject, regarding which I had arrived at a definite conclusion. At the same time, I vaguely imagined the form in which Montesquieu processed his material. I believed that such concise and richly assessed chapters, which I initially intended to call only grains, were sufficient to interest educated, thinking people both in the possibility of further development of the conclusions and in their immediate content; At the same time, I pictured a thinking reader who was already familiar with the subject. However, my nature has always attracted me to systematization and logical development of thought; in the end, in this case too, she prevailed. For some time I managed to force myself from the notes that I made on individual issues, so that they became completely clear and definite for myself, to extract only the most important conclusions and, thus, compress my thoughts to a small volume; However, subsequently the specific turn of my mind finally prevailed: I began to develop, if possible, all my thoughts, and at the same time, naturally, I imagined a reader who was not yet familiar with the subject.

My final task was to work through everything again from the beginning, to give a more detailed motivation to the previously written articles, to reduce the analysis contained in the later composed sections to a specific result and, thus, to create a harmonious whole of one small volume out of everything. At the same time, however, I wanted to avoid everything that is ordinary, self-evident, repeated a hundred times and generally accepted, because for me it was a matter of ambition to write a book that would not be forgotten in 2-3 years, that those interested in the matter could pick up without just one time."

In Koblenz, where he had a lot to do with his work, he could only devote a few hours in fits and starts to his private work, and only in 1818, after being appointed to the post of director of a military school in Berlin, did he have enough free time to push the boundaries of his work, enriching it with the history of recent wars. This leisure time reconciled him with his new position, which in other respects did not fully satisfy him, since, according to the organizational chart of the military school, the scientific work of the latter was not under the authority of the director, but was directed by a special educational commission. Although he was very far from any petty vanity, from any restless egoistic ambition, he felt the need to be truly useful and not leave unused the abilities with which he was gifted. In practical life he did not occupy a position in which this need could be satisfied, and he had little hope that he would ever be able to occupy such a position; therefore, all his aspirations were directed towards the scientific field, and the purpose of life became the benefit that he hoped to bring with his book. If, despite this, he became more and more determined that the work should be published only after his death, then this serves as the best proof that his noble desire to achieve the largest and most lasting results possible with his work was not mixed with the slightest vanity, thirst for praise and recognition from contemporaries, not a shadow of any selfish motives.

Thus he continued to work diligently until the spring of 1830, when he was appointed to serve in the artillery. His activity took a completely different direction and reached such intensity that at first he had to abandon all literary work. He put his papers in order, sealed them in separate bags, provided them with appropriate inscriptions and sadly said goodbye to his beloved work. In August of the same year, he was transferred to Breslavl, where he received a second artillery inspection; but already in December he was transferred to Berlin to the post of chief of staff under Count von Gneisenau (for the time while the field marshal was commander-in-chief). In March 1831 he accompanied his respected superior to Poznan. In November, after the painful death of the latter, he returned to Breslavl. Here, some consolation for him was the hope of starting his work and, perhaps, finishing it during the winter. However, on November 7 he arrived in Breslavl, and on the 16th he was no longer there, and the packages he personally sealed were opened only after his death.

This posthumous creation is now being published in the form in which he left it, without adding or subtracting even one word.

June 30, 1832

Clausewitz's explanations

I look at the first six parts, which have already been completely rewritten, only as a rather shapeless mass for now, which certainly needs to be reworked again. With this revision, the duality of the method of warfare will be more sharply outlined, with greater attention given to it. In this way, all ideas will acquire a clearer meaning, a definite direction and will come closer to practical application. The duality of the method of warfare is expressed in the following. The purpose of the war may be the crushing of the enemy, that is, his political destruction or deprivation of the opportunity to resist, forcing him to sign any peace, or the purpose of the war may be some conquests at the borders of his state in order to keep them behind him or to use them as a useful guarantee at the conclusion of peace. Of course, there will also be transitional forms between these two types of war, but the deep natural difference between the two indicated aspirations must clearly appear everywhere, and their incompatible aspects must be separated from one another.

In addition to this factual difference between types of wars, it is necessary to establish precisely and definitely the almost equally necessary point of view that war is nothing more than a continuation of state policy by other means. If this point of view is strictly followed everywhere, it will bring greater unity to the consideration of the issue and will help to understand everything more easily. Although this point of view will be reflected mainly in the 8th part of this work, it should nevertheless be developed in detail already in the 1st part and taken into account when reworking the first six parts. Thanks to such processing, the first six parts will be freed from unnecessary ballast, many gaps will be filled and smoothed, some common places will be molded into specific thoughts and take on a complete form.

The 7th part “Offensive”, for which separate chapters have already been sketched, should be considered as a reflection, a reflex of the 6th part. It should be developed in accordance with the above basic point of view and not only will not require new rework, but can serve as a model for the development of the first six parts.

For the 8th part, “The War Plan,” which treats the organization of the war as a whole, several chapters have already been sketched out, which, however, cannot even be considered as well-developed material; this is just an attempt to work into its mass, in order to recognize only in the process of the work itself what the matter is. I consider this task resolved, and, having completed the 7th part, I intend to begin developing the 8th, in which both of the above points of view should clearly come forward; they must simplify and thereby spiritualize my entire system of beliefs. I hope that with this book I will be able to smooth out some of the wrinkles that have formed in the brains of strategists and statesmen; at least she will find out exactly what we are talking about and what should be taken into account when waging war.

When I manage, by developing the 8th part, to establish complete clarity in my thoughts and determine the main outlines of the war, then it will no longer be difficult for me to reflect this spirit and these outlines of the war in the first six parts. Therefore, I will begin reworking the first six parts only after finishing the 8th.

If premature death interrupts this work of mine, then everything written here can rightly be called a formless mass of ideas; if subjected to misinterpretation, they can serve as material for the slander of many immature critics. In such cases, everyone imagines that the thoughts that come into his head as soon as he takes up the pen are good enough to be expressed and even published, and they seem to him as undeniable as two plus two makes four. But if such a critic had taken the trouble, like me, to reflect on this subject for many years, constantly comparing his train of thought with the history of wars, he would have shown great caution in his remarks.

And yet, despite the unfinished nature of my work, I believe that the reader, free from prejudice, thirsting for truth and genuine conviction, will find in the first six parts the fruit of many years of reflection and diligent study of the war and, perhaps, will assimilate those basic thoughts from which a whole revolution may arise in the generally accepted theory.

Berlin, July 10, 1827

In addition to this explanation, between the papers of the deceased was the following unfinished passage, apparently written much later:

“The manuscript on the conduct of the great war, which will be found after my death, in its present form should be assessed only as a collection of individual parts from which the theory of the great war was to be built. I am not yet satisfied with most of my work, and the 6th part can only be considered as experience; I would like to completely rework it and find a different direction for it.

However, I consider the main lines in the depiction of the war that dominate this material to be correct; they are the result of comprehensive reflection with a constant bias towards the practice of life, with constant consideration of what experience and communication with outstanding military figures have taught me.

The 7th part was supposed to conclude the offensive, but so far these are only cursory sketches. The 8th part was supposed to contain a war plan; I intended to include in it a special analysis of the political side of the war, as well as consider it from the point of view of humanity.

I consider the first chapter of the 1st part to be the only completed one. In relation to the entire essay as a whole, it is an indicator of the direction that I intended to follow.

The theory of a great war, or so-called strategy, presents extreme difficulties, and it can be said with good reason that few people have a clear idea about its individual details, that is, brought to the understanding of the dependence arising from the causal connection existing between them. Most people follow the instructions only of intuition and act more or less successfully, depending on the degree of genius inherent in them.

All great commanders acted this way; That was part of their greatness and genius, that they had the tact to always hit the target. This will always be the case in the field of practical activity; for her, intuition is completely sufficient. However, when the question is not about individual action, but about persuading others at a meeting, then clarity of presentation and the ability to grasp the internal connection of the phenomena under consideration are necessary. But since people are little developed in this regard, most meetings boil down to groundless bickering, and they end either with everyone remaining to their own opinion, or with an agreement according to which some give in to others and stop on a middle path, which essentially has no values.

Therefore, clear ideas in these matters are not useless; In addition, the human mind is generally characterized by a desire for clarity and the establishment of the necessary causal connection.

The great difficulties presented by such a philosophical observation of the art of war, and the numerous unsuccessful attempts to create it, lead many to assert that such a theory is impossible, since we are talking about subjects that are not covered by any permanent law. We would agree with this opinion and would abandon any attempt to create any theory if a number of propositions were not established with complete clarity and without any difficulty, for example: that defense is a stronger form of war, but pursuing only a negative goal, offensive same – a weaker form that has a positive goal; that major successes make smaller ones dependent and that therefore strategic influences can be reduced to certain main blows; that a demonstration is a weaker use of force than an actual offensive, and therefore is permissible only under special conditions; that victory lies not simply in capturing the battlefield, but in the physical and moral destruction of the enemy’s armed forces, achieved for the most part only by pursuit after a won battle, that success is greatest in the direction in which victory is won, and therefore the transfer from one line and from one direction to another can only be regarded as a necessary evil; that a detour can only be justified by superiority over the enemy in general or by the superiority of our lines of communication or routes of retreat over the enemy’s; that flank positions are determined by the same ratio, that each offensive weakens itself as it moves forward.”

German military theorist, strategist and historian.

"The future Prussian general K. Clausewitz He served in the army from the age of 12 and received his first officer rank at the age of 15. After the defeat of Prussia Napoleon In the war of 1806-1807, Clausewitz took part in military reform in his country and taught tactics and strategy at the Officers' Military School in Berlin.
He advocated an alliance between Prussia and Russia, and when the French emperor forced the Prussian king to help him prepare a campaign against Russia, Clausewitz went to serve in the Russian army. He took part in the battles of Ostrovno and Smolensk, and then in the famous Battle of Borodino.
In 1813, Clausewitz became the chief of staff of one of the Russian armies, and in 1814 he transferred to the Russian-Prussian Silesian army, commanded by Field Marshal General G. Blücher.
After Waterloo, Clausewitz returned to teaching at a military school, devoting, however, the main part of his time to studying the history and theory of military affairs.
He considered himself a philosopher. An ardent supporter of Hegelian philosophy, Clausewitz wanted, using the dialectical method, to link together the main categories of military science, to understand the nature, causes and essence of war. Many of his definitions were later included in almost all military encyclopedias.
The most famous definition is Clausewitz war as “the continuation of state policy by other means.”
This definition justified the subordination of military leaders to political leadership. The Polish uprising of 1830-1831 forced Clausewitz to leave his office as a scientist and head the headquarters of the Prussian army on the Polish border.
Here the 50-year-old general suddenly fell ill and died of cholera.
Clausewitz did not publish all of his works: he did not consider many of them completed. After his death, Clausewitz’s wife, Maria von Clausewitz, prepared and published in ten volumes the bulk of her husband’s theoretical and historical works, including his famous book “On War.”
While working on it, Clausewitz told his friends that he wanted to write a book that would be read in a few years. He could hardly have imagined that his books would still be read 150 years later.
Clausewitz's main works have been translated into dozens of languages and are included in the lists of required reading in almost all military academies in the world. Of course, Clausewitz studied primarily the wars of the 18th century and the Napoleonic wars. His views were greatly influenced by the experience of the Patriotic War of 1812 and the military campaigns of 1813-1815.
But his thoughts and analysis turned out to be so profound that it would be difficult to continue the study of the history and theory of military art without relying on the thoughts and conclusions of Clausewitz.”

Roy Medvedev, Zhores Medvedev, Unknown Stalin, M., “Time”, 2007, p. 201.

Main work Carla von Clausewitz: About War / Vom Kriege was published in 1833. Their work was based on analysis from above 130 campaigns and wars from 1566 to 1815.

Carl von Clausewitz drew the line between scientist and commander: “...war requires outstanding mental strength from its adherents. War is an area of uncertainty, three quarters of what action in war is based on lies in the fog of the unknown, and, therefore, to reveal the truth, a subtle, flexible, insightful mind is required first of all [...] Our decisions are continually bombarded with new data, and our spirit must remain alert at all times. To successfully withstand this continuous struggle with the unexpected, you must have two properties: first, a mind capable of seeing through the flickering of its inner light into the thickening twilight and groping for the truth; secondly, the courage to follow this faint indicating glimmer.”

“War is an area of uncertainty,” believed Carl von Clausewitz- chance constantly interferes with military operations - only a fusion of intelligence, courage, initiative and energy is capable of solving the most difficult tasks facing a commander during military operations. An initiative born of courage alone is an initiative of chance; it is impossible to overcome chance without intelligence. Carl von Clausewitz explains: a theory for a military leader is “a fulcrum in the form of a set of principles and rules or even a system”, born of centuries-old military practice, its task is “to show how and why a genius acted.”

Carl von Clausewitz, On War in 2 volumes, Volume 1, M., “Terra Fantastica”, M.-SPb, 2002, p. 135, 147 and 139.

Moreover: “We want... to dispel the misconception that in war one can achieve outstanding success without mental abilities, through courage alone.”

Carl von Clausewitz, On War in 2 volumes, Volume 1, M., “Terra Fantastica”, M.-SPb, 2002, p.99.

Instructive methodological aspect: Carl von Clausewitz, studying wars, he emphasized that it is important to study precisely real action army, and not any exercise that supposedly followed by the military leader and his staff...

"Following Kant, he declared: artistic genius does not break rules, but works with them. Indeed, a great artist can rewrite the rules, but then they must change. Therefore, the dialogue between genius and rules remains unchanged. Clausewitz transferred these thoughts from the fine arts to the art of war. Napoleon was a genius who himself embodied the “spirit” of military art. The researcher’s task was to find rules that would reflect the consequences of his actions.”

Hugh Strachan, Carl von Clausewitz “On War”, M., “Ast”, 2010, p. 138.

Some quotes from this work have been widely distributed in the books of other authors writing about making strategic and tactical decisions in various fields of activity. An example of such a phrase:
“Tomorrow is in today, the future is created in the present; while you are madly hoping for the future, it is already coming out mutilated from your lazy hands. Time is yours, what it becomes depends on you."

Carl von Clausewitz is an outstanding Prussian writer, commander and military theorist. Von Clausewitz's work “On War” revolutionized the theory of war. His book is distinguished by its vividness, clarity of presentation, and sharp criticism of many military events. In his work, he devotes a large place to politics, its influence on the course of the war, the dependence of its outcome on the strength and weakness of individual politicians and commanders. It is not for nothing that his famous phrase “war is the continuation of politics by other, violent means” remains relevant to this day.

Biography of K. Clausewitz

Carl von Clausewitz (1780–1831)

The following sources were used in writing this article:

Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron;

Website – http://militera. lib. ru/science/clausewitz/;

Website - http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9A%D0%BB%D0%B0%D1%83%D0%B7%D0%B5%D0%B2%D0%B8%D1%86;

Website – http://www. afor. ru/authors. php? aut_id =491 ;

Website - http://www.peoples.ru/military/commander/carl_clausewitz/index1.html.

Biography of K. Clausewitz

Carl von Clausewitz (1780–1831)

After this, he was transferred to Riga to the Marquis Paulucci, from where he asked to join Wittgenstein’s 1st Corps. When York entered into negotiations with the Russians, Diebitsch entrusted them to Clausewitz, who contributed to the conclusion of the Taurogen Convention. Being a direct participant in many events of the war, he left memoirs that are a valuable source for researchers.

The following sources were used in writing this article:

Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron;

From the preface to the first edition by Maria von Clausewitz

The first showed him the right path, and his destination 1810 a teacher at a military school and an invitation to give an initial military education to the Crown Prince served as a new impetus to direct his efforts and aspirations precisely to this subject and to express in writing the thoughts that had matured in him and had already received strict definiteness. The work with which he completed his teaching course to the Crown Prince in 1812 already contains the embryo of future works. But it was only in 1816 in Koblenz that he began scientific work again, using the experience acquired during four years of war. At first he wrote down his thoughts in the form of short, loosely connected notes. The undated note below appears to date from this time:

I believed that such concise and richly assessed chapters, which I initially intended to call only grains, were sufficient to interest educated, thinking people both in the possibility of further development of the conclusions and in their immediate content; At the same time, I pictured a thinking reader who was already familiar with the subject. However, my nature has always attracted me to systematization and logical development of thought; in the end, in this case too, she prevailed. For some time I managed to force myself from the notes that I made on individual issues, so that they became completely clear and definite for myself, to extract only the most important conclusions and, thus, compress my thoughts to a small volume; However, subsequently the specific turn of my mind finally prevailed: I began to develop, if possible, all my thoughts, and at the same time, naturally, I imagined a reader who was not yet familiar with the subject.

This posthumous creation is now being published in the form in which he left it, without adding or subtracting even one word.

Clausewitz's explanations

In addition to this explanation, between the papers of the deceased was the following unfinished passage, apparently written much later:

I consider the first chapter of the 1st part to be the only completed one. In relation to the entire essay as a whole, it is an indicator of the direction that I intended to follow.

The theory of a great war, or so-called strategy, presents extreme difficulties, and it can be said with good reason that few people have a clear idea about its individual details, that is, brought to the understanding of the dependence arising from the causal connection existing between them. Most people follow only their intuition. 3
We translate the expression “tact of judgment” with the word “intuition,” which Clausewitz did not use. – Ed.

And they act more or less successfully, depending on the degree of their inherent genius.

Therefore, clear ideas in these matters are not useless; In addition, the human mind is generally characterized by a desire for clarity and the establishment of the necessary causal connection.