216 
MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS OF 
Strategical Considerations, 
The strategical considerations with reference to the choice of positions 
for manufactories of war material depend upon— 
1. The attitude of the nation—whether defensive or offensive, 
2. The position of the capital. 
3. The strategic points occupied by the army. 
Defensive ,—If a nation be standing upon the defensive, its arsenals 
should be fixed in some central situation in the interior of the country, 
so as to be as far as possible removed from the attacks of the enemy. 
The works covering such a central arsenal would form, as it were, a 
reduit for the remainder of the country. It would be in this direction 
that an army beaten in the first encounters upon the frontier would 
direct its retreat. It would form a rallying point for the reserves 
assembling from all parts of the country, and would become, as it were, 
a perennial source from which fresh armies would spring to meet the 
enemy, as long as the stronghold remained unreduced. Under cover of 
its fortifications a defeated army could be rallied and re-organised, 
while its ample stores would afford the- means of re-equipment for the 
field. Such a place of arms should, in the words of Colonel Hamley, 
contain sufficient material for a great army in artillery, fire¬ 
arms, provisions of all kinds, workshops, arsenals, hospitals; in fact, 
collecting all the raw material which naturally flows from the surrounding 
district into a great city, should be capable of converting it, by means 
of a large population of artisans and of extensive manufactories, into 
the material of war—of turning brass into cannon, iron into projectiles 
and rifles, wood into trains of wagons, wheat into biscuit, canvas into 
tents, &c.—so that an army might manoeuvre round such a place, either 
in its own or the enemy's country, secure of all the support which a 
near base can afford." 
Offensive .—For the offensive, such great arsenals and entrenched 
camps may be situated within easy reach of the frontier which divides 
the state from the theatre of war. Supposing everything to turn out 
well in the plan of an offensive campaign, such a situation no doubt 
becomes advantageous in the extreme. The invading army possesses a 
secure base at the smallest possible distance in its rear, and the time 
for the transport of supplies of all kinds to the front is reduced to a 
minimum. Victorious, the invading army is supplied in the safest and 
most expeditious manner; if compelled to retreat, the army falls back 
upon its place of arms, and manoeuvring around its entrenched camp, 
bars the passage of the frontier to the enemy. But then, what nation 
can always count upon being able to assume the offensive ? A nation 
which, having reckoned upon its own ability to always assume the offen¬ 
sive, finds itself suddenly, in its own turn, assailed, may find that the 
selection of such a situation for its manufactures of war materiel as we 
have above supposed is attended by the most fatal results. We have 
recently seen the evils of the concentration of a number of manufactures 
of war materiel and stores within reach of the enemy exemplified in 
the case of Metz. In July, 1870—a short time before the Franco- 
