Friedrich Engels

Written January 31, 1859.

From the English.

The Paris *Constitutionnel* recently published a summary intended to prove that France, in the event of war, could send a force of 500,000 men across her frontiers. In his letter from Paris, which was reproduced yesterday in the *Courrier des Etats-Unis*, M. Gaillardet asserts that this summary and the figures on which it is based were handed to our Paris newspaper colleague by the Emperor himself, without the knowledge of his ministers. The first point of this summary states that, if all men on furlough are recalled and no more are furloughed, the French army will consist of 568,000 men on the coming 1st of April; that, if all the recruits of the year 1858 are called up, this total will be increased by 64,000 men; and that, in the event of a declaration of war, the government can count with absolute certainty on at least 50,000 enlistments of volunteers, either old soldiers whose term has expired, or young volunteers. This would give a total of 682,000 men, which, according to the imperial statistician, is divided as follows:

Infantry 390,978  
Cavalry 83,000  
Artillery 46,450  
Engineers 12,110  
Transport Corps 19,120  
Guard 29,942  
Miscellaneous Corps 49,000  
Total 621,600  

Obviously there is an error in this total. There remain 60,000 men which the imperial pen, in the haste of the moment, forgot to distribute. But let that pass. Let us assume that the figure of 682,000 men is correct. In the event of war, 100,000 men would remain behind in the depots, which at the same time form the garrisons in the interior, supported by the 25,000 gendarmes; for Algeria, 50,000 men would suffice. Deduct these 175,000 men from the above total, and 507,000 men remain. But His Majesty once again managed to lose 10,000 men, and deducts from 672,000 instead of 682,000 men, thus reducing the available field army to 497,000 men. According to our informant, therefore, an army of 500,000 can be made available by the 1st of June 1859 for a foreign war, without in any way altering the existing military organisation of France.

Now let us see how the French army is really composed. The existing organisation of an army sets a certain limit to its expansion; battalions, squadrons, and batteries cannot exceed a certain number of men, horses, and guns in each arm of the service without destroying the system and the tactical peculiarities of that arm. For example, the French battalions, each of eight companies, could never increase those companies to nearly double their normal strength of 118 combatants, without necessitating a complete upheaval in elementary and battalion drill; the French batteries would fare similarly if they increased the number of their guns from six to eight or twelve; in both cases, the companies and batteries would become extremely unwieldy, unless subdivided. Thus, the organisation of any army sets definite upper limits to its numerical strength, and if these limits are exceeded, new formations become necessary. Since, however, such new formations, once their establishment has reached a certain point, cannot escape public attention, and since, as the *Constitutionnel* writes, no new formations have so far been required, we can take the framework of the army as it existed at the end of the Russian war as the limit of the strength attainable at present.

The infantry battalion of the French line, with its complex organisation of six line and two elite companies, cannot well exceed the strength of 1,000 men. For 100 line regiments of three battalions each, this would give 300,000 men. We purposely include the third battalion, for although it figured only as a depot battalion up to the Russian war, it was then mobilised, and besides, three additional depot companies were formed per regiment, which undoubtedly still exist. These 300 depot companies will together amount to approximately 36,000 men. The 20 battalions of chasseurs à pied, who are intended more for fighting in detached companies than in close battalions, admit of a larger number of combatants; they each number approximately 1,300 men; this gives a total strength of 26,000 men, with hardly any depots required, as they receive many trained soldiers from other regiments. The Guard consists of two infantry divisions, and its regiments had only two battalions each until the peace with Russia, which agrees with the *Constitutionnel*, according to which its infantry consists of 18 battalions or 18,000 men. That is the whole French infantry, except the troops intended for service in Africa. These include nine battalions of Zouaves with 9,000 men, plus about 500 in the depot; three penal battalions (Zéphyrs) or 3,000 men; and nine battalions of Algerian (native) tirailleurs, who, when at their full strength, number 9,000 men. Thus the total strength of the French infantry can be stated as follows:

Line, including depots - 336,000 men in 300 battalions and 300 depot companies.  
Chasseurs - 26,000 men in 20 battalions.  
Guard - 18,000 men in 18 battalions.  
Zouaves - 9,500 men in 9 battalions.  
Zéphyrs - 3,000 men in 3 battalions.  
Native Algerians - 9,000 men in 9 battalions.  

Total: 401,500 men in 359 battalions and 300 depot companies.  
Of these, 36,500 belong to the depots; leaving 365,000 for active service at home and abroad.

The strength of the French cavalry was calculated in 1856 as follows:

12 regiments of heavy cavalry - 72 squadrons and 12 depot squadrons - 14,400 active soldiers and 1,800 men in depot.  
20 line regiments - 120 squadrons and 20 depot squadrons - 24,600 active soldiers and 3,820 men in depot.  
21 regiments of light cavalry - 126 squadrons and 21 depot squadrons - 27,100 active soldiers and 4,230 men in depot.  
4 African regiments - 16 squadrons and 4 depot squadrons - 3,000 active soldiers and 450 men in depot.  
3 native regiments - 12 squadrons - 3,600 active soldiers.  

Total: 346 active and 57 depot squadrons - 72,700 active soldiers and 10,300 men in depots.  
To this add the Guard: 30 active squadrons - 6,000 active soldiers.  
Grand total: 376 active, 57 depot squadrons - 78,700 active soldiers and 10,300 men in depots.

It must not be forgotten, however, that the native horses are to an extraordinary degree unfit for cavalry service, although great progress has been achieved in the improvement of horse-breeding in France since 1840. Only with much trouble and expense has it been possible in recent years to supply the cavalry for the most part with French horses — and that only after a fashion. This, however, applies only to the peace establishment, which can hardly exceed 50,000 horses, and despite the resources afforded by Algeria, many horses had to be bought abroad, of which not a few had previously been sold by the cavalry troops of other countries on account of their unfitness for service. At present, horses for the French cavalry are being bought in Germany, and the Austrian government has just prohibited the export of horses across its south-western frontier. With all these difficulties, it is not to be feared that the French cavalry will ever exceed the strength given above, or that it will ever distinguish itself in the field, with the exception of the small portion mounted on Algerian horses, unless by conquest it gains a larger share of good horses than it now possesses.

The artillery, including the Guard, may number about 50,000 men, with 207 field batteries or 1,242 guns. Of these, at least 5,000 men belong to the depots. The engineers will not exceed 9,000 or 10,000 men, but we will assume with the *Constitutionnel* that they are 12,000. The transport corps, workmanship companies, medical officers, etc., all non-combatants, amount to about 11,000 men on the war footing. The maximum number of soldiers which the French army, with its present organisation, is capable of receiving, is thus as follows:

| | Active soldiers | In depot | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Infantry | 365,000 | 36,500 | 401,500 |
| Cavalry | 78,700 | 10,300 | 89,000 |
| Artillery | 45,000 | 5,000 | 50,000 |
| Engineers | 12,000 | - | 12,000 |
| Non-combatants | - | 11,000 | 11,000 |
| Total | 500,700 | 61,800 | 563,500 |

This result agrees very well with the general recruiting measures of the French army. Every year, 100,000 young men are called up for military service, but hitherto in peacetime only 60,000 have actually been sent to their regiments, and as they had to serve for seven years, the army used not to exceed 400,000 to 420,000 men. Under Louis Philippe, the actual term of service seldom exceeded four to five years, so that at that time the effective strength used not to go beyond 300,000, the rest were on furlough. Since then, however, the framework of the army has been so much extended by the addition of another battalion to each infantry regiment, an additional squadron to each cavalry regiment, and the entire Guard corps, that it can accommodate about 600,000 men; and it is not probable that France, except in a war of national self-defence, will ever have more trained soldiers at once at its disposal.

If, therefore, we take the figures we have given above, and add to them the 49,000 gendarmes, municipal guards, and who knows what other miscellaneous corps, as the *Constitutionnel* does, to arrive at its total, the sum total agrees almost exactly with the figure which that paper gives as the probable strength on 1 April 1859. But now the differences begin. In the total calculated by us are depots, organised in 300 companies and 57 squadrons, which are scarcely sufficient for the elementary training and the organisation of the 46,800 infantry and cavalry soldiers included in them. Suppose these are suddenly withdrawn, to make room for new recruits and to fill in the regiments the places of the men whose term of service has expired, what number of recruits would these depots then have to train? The 100,000 men of the levy of 1859 and at least 20,000 untrained volunteers, altogether 120,000 men, i.e., 70,000 more than the depots can accommodate. There is therefore no doubt that, between the 1st of April and the 1st of June, the three depot companies of a

every infantry regiment would have to be raised to full battalion strength, and accordingly, for each cavalry regiment, two depot squadrons would have to be formed instead of one. If at present, when the whole army is performing mere garrison duty, the depots are simply transit stations for the recruit, from which he is sent as quickly as possible, either not at all or only half-trained, to his regiment to receive his training there, one must not forget that in the event of war, when the army is in active service, the depot must thoroughly equip and train the soldier, so that he enters his regiment as fit for war service. If the Constitutionnel therefore maintains that the French could increase their armed forces to 700,000 men without new formations, this diverges very considerably from the reality. The formation of 100 depot battalions out of the 300 depot companies, and of 57 additional depot squadrons, will necessitate the withdrawal of at least 2,000 officers and 10,000 non-commissioned officers from the ranks of the active army precisely at the moment when their services are most needed.

But even assuming that the 700,000 men are brought together – and we are far from asserting that France could not collect this number of young men on the outbreak of a war – how many of the 700,000 soldiers will then be fit for active service? No more than 580,000, and of these, according to the Constitutionnel, 50,000 have to defend Algeria. The number of gendarmes and the strength of the various corps for service in the interior we may not take as 25,000, but must adhere to the Constitutionnel’s original calculation, i.e. 49,000. There thus remains a remainder of 481,000 men. But our imperial contemporary must indeed possess a very strong faith in the stability of his dynasty if he imagines he can entrust its defence exclusively to 120,000 fresh recruits and 49,000 gendarmes and other military policemen. The depots will scarcely be in a position to provide the more important fortresses – not counting Paris and Lyon – with garrisons. Louis Napoleon would never entrust these two cities to the hands of fresh recruits; and although the Constitutionnel considers 40,000 men to be entirely sufficient to keep them in check, it is certain that 100,000 men will not be too many for this purpose. But supposing we subtract 100,000 men for the requirements of the large cities of the interior and for the royalist south of France, then the whole armed force that can be employed outside the frontiers is reduced to 381,000 men. Of these, at least 181,000 men would have to form an army of observation on the Belgian, German and Swiss frontier, and only 200,000 men would remain available for an attack on Italy. We are, however, of the opinion that 150,000 Austrians in their strong position on the Mincio and the Adige are at least equivalent to 300,000 French and Sardinians; and if it should come to war, they will perhaps soon be able to demonstrate it.