Agincourt and...Afstan? Update: And Winston
Talk about a NY Times reporter searching for spin:
Historians Reassess Battle of AgincourtUpdate: No doubt an inspiration for Winston, certainly not for Harper, Obama or Brown (via Spotlight on Military News and International Affairs):Some text:
...Agincourt’s status as perhaps the greatest victory against overwhelming odds in military history — and a keystone of the English self-image — has been called into doubt by a group of historians in Britain and France who have painstakingly combed an array of military and tax records from that time and now take a skeptical view of the figures handed down by medieval chroniclers...
...the most telling gauge of the respect being given to the new historians and their penchant for tearing down established wisdom is that it has now become almost routine for American commanders to call on them for advice on strategy and tactics in Afghanistan, Iraq and other present-day conflicts.
The most influential example is the “Counterinsurgency Field Manual” adopted in 2006 by the United States Army and Marines and smack in the middle of the debate over whether to increase troop levels in Afghanistan...
Whatever the magnitude of the victory, it would not last. The French populace gradually soured on the English occupation as the fighting continued and the civil war remained unresolved in the decades after Henry’s death in 1422, Mr. Schnerb said.
“They came into France saying, ‘You Frenchmen have civil war, and now our king is coming to give you peace,’ ” Mr. Schnerb said. “It was a failure.”
Unwilling to blame a failed counterinsurgency strategy [emphasis added, huh!?!], Shakespeare pinned the loss on poor Henry VI:
“Whose state so many had the managing, That they lost France and made his England bleed.”
...
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day...
posted by Mark, Ottawa at 2:49 p.m.
4 Comments:
Shakespeare left out entirely from his play the soldiers who really won the Battle of Agincourt: the English Archers. The French nobility in their heavy armor wallowed in the thick mud while the archers shot thousands of bodkin pointed arrows which punched through the French armor.
There's some fascinating military history concerning the English Longbow and the English Archers. There was a remarkable program on the Military Channel on cable recently, concerning the ten weapons that most changed the face of warfare. The English Longbow was on that list.
There was a most informative commentary from the English actor and historian Robert Hardy (best known for playing veterinarian Dr. Siegfried Farnon in the BBC TV series "All Creatures Great and Small"). Hardy commented that Winston Churchill, a distinguished historian, credited the English Longbow for not being exceeded in firepower and lethality until the advent of the rifled percussion musket firing minie bullets, most notably and bloodily in the American Civil War.
English Archers trained to fire accurately 6 or more arrows per minute at ranges up to 250 yards. When hundreds, or even thousands or archers in formation, volley fired armor-piercing arrows, the results were incredibly deadly, notably so at Agincourt.
By contrast, the smoothbore flintlock muskets (e.g. the English .60 cal. Brown Bess musket used by the British Army for much of the 18th century through the Napoleonic Wars) weren't accurate at ranges over 50 yards. Soldiers were lucky to fire two to three inaccurate rounds per minute.
The military impact of the longbow is unquestionable, but less well known is the social impact of weaponry.
English archers needed a lifetime of training, and by the time of Henry VIII archers were in steep decline because there was no longer a large pool of trained people to call on, and few were willing to take the time and effort to learn the art of archery (going to far more lucrative and rewarding jobs).
Muskets, crossbows, pikes and other types of weaponry discounted lifetimes of training, since they were militarily effective and peasants and townspeople could be quickly and easily trained to use them. These people could also be rapidly replaced, unlike a highly trained archer or knight.
We are seeing something like this again, as our highly skilled and trained professional armies take on opponents who use inexpensive technology like cellphones,the Internet and IED's, the 21rst century crossbows, muskets and pikes.
Being neither a military historian nor a military anything, other than supporter of our troops, what jumps out at me in your entry is the part you have bolded. I do have a love for the study of history and one thing I hold very dearly is the most basic principle which should underpin all historical research, namely judge the characters in the period that you are studying by the standards and knowledge that would have prevailed at the time. These two pseudo-historians have obviously violated that most fundamental requirement of good scholarship. Shamefully, this lapse in standards in all too common today in academia.
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