Strategy and Tactics: 1910-1939 American military strategy
during the first half of the 20th century was an outgrowth of
the Civil War campaigns of Generals Ulysses S. Grant and William
T. Sherman who brought superior force and resources to bear on
the enemy, wearing them down by attrition. It was termed by
historian Russell F. Weigley as a "strategy of annihilation,"
the purpose of which was to engage and exterminate the armies
and resources of the enemy. It meant massive losses of men and
material. (15) As World War I began in 1914, the debate that
raged in European military circles was whether advantage rested
with offensive or defensive stances. The Boer War and the Russo-
Japanese War, the first instances where the more accurate
magazine-fed, small-bore rifles, and machine guns had been
employed, had taught that even thinly held defensive positions
could turn back frontal assaults with deadly effect. But not all
military thinkers took that lesson to heart. Many clung to the
idea of the offensive. N.P. Mik