THOROUGH REVISION

Evening Post, Issue 19, 23 July 1934, Page 13

THOROUGH REVISION

BRITISH ARMY MANUALS

A thorough revision of the official training manuals of the Army is now in progress, says the "Daily Telegraph." "The War Office is also considering a scheme to simplify military instruction by producing the manuals in a graduated form. In this way they would be made easier for the younnofficer to digest. _J* The idea is that Field Service Regulations should be divided into two parts, one for the junior officer and the other for the goneral or potential general. The first would deal with what the junior officer needs to know about the conduct of operations, as it affects the small units which form the intarloekmg cogs of the machine.

The second would be full enough to scivico a", ,i guide to the man who commands a formation or an independent force of all arms.

Ilithcilo our military manuals have suffered liom being too comprehensive. Ihey tiy not only to treat almost every possibility, but to tover the whole scale of command—from the general's role downwards. The result has been that they are both too vague and too complex.

Anothor ill effect has been to'develop excessive concern with tactics to the neglect of strategy. Thero is practically nothing in any of ou. manuals on the iubject of strategy, which should takp first place in the mind of any senior officer in charge of an independent force.

At the same time the inina of the younger student has been overloaded with details of the tactics to bo employed by large formations. In studying the manuals it was difficult for him to tell which part applied to tho divisional commander and which to his own ranks.

_ Any seheuio which wiJl o-laiify and simplify such punted instruction is to be welcomed. Tho now "Training Regulations" presumably foreshadow tho Dew trend. For there :educed the overlapping that has. occuned in the pnst, while providing for moro concrete guirlamr as to ibo jiiactieal methods to be employed, " -