Nature Of Warfare

• 1250-1500: Size of army

  • Small, average 10,000 men
• 1250-1500: Army composition

  • Infantry 66%
  • Cavalry 33%
• 1250-1500: Commanders

  • From upper nobility/relatives of the king
  • Chosen by social position not ability
• No permanent standing army (1250-1500)
• 1500-1700: Size of armies

  Continued small up until English Civil War (1640s), then got bigger
• 1500-1700: Composition of armies

  • Infantry (66%)
  • Cavalry (33%)
  • Artillery (cannons)
• 1500-1700: Commanders

  From upper nobility/relatives of the king, chosen by social position not ability
• No permanent standing army until 1660
• After 1660 there was an unofficial standing army
• Size

  Small compared to the rest of Europe
• Trend of slow growth of peacetime army size

  1. 1700: 30,000

  2. 1755: 47,000

  3. 1838: 88,000
• 1700-1850: Wartime army size

  Much larger e.g. 203,000 in 1760
• Army composition in 1700


  • Infantry: 75%
  • Cavalry: 20%
  • Artillery: 5%
• Army composition by 1850


  • Infantry: 80%
  • Cavalry: 15%
  • Artillery: 5%
• 1700-1850: Commanders

  • From gentry and nobility
  • Using the Purchase System
• 1700-1850: Army

  Full time standing army
• 1850-1900: Size of army

  • Showed rapid growth
  • Due to increasing British Empire
• 1850-1900: Size of army

  • 1849 = 115,000 troops
  • 1899 = 250,000 troops
• 1850-1900: Composition of army continued much the same even though cavalry was increasingly vulnerable to new weapons such as machine guns and rifles
• 1850-1900: Conservative army leaders were reluctant to reduce the proportion of cavalry troops
• Purchase System for officers


  Ended in 1871
• 1850-1900: Uniforms, training and accommodation for officers were expensive, so they were still mostly from the gentry
• Peacetime army


  Gradually got smaller from 1900, but massively increased during the First World War to 3.5 million men
• Army composition in 1914 (start of WW1)


  1. Infantry = 65%

  2. Cavalry = 10%

  3. Artillery = 20%

  4. Specialist troops = 5% (e.g. medics)
• Army size during Second World War

  3.3 million troops
• Peacetime army small after WW2 and trend of gradually getting smaller
• Importance of specialist units


  • Continued to increase
  • E.g. a new bomb disposal unit (Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD)) was formed in 1940 and was far bigger by the end of the war
  • Many of the bombs dropped on London in the Blitz didn't explode and men with specialist training were needed to make them safe
• Iraq War


  2003
• After WW2, the size of army continued trend of gradually getting smaller
• 2020 82,000 troops
• Present day army composition


  • Infantry = 25%
  • Cavalry ended in 1918, but their role of smashing through enemy front line fulfilled by tank units = 10%
  • Artillery 10%
  • Specialist troops = 55%
• Specialist troops


  • Engineers to build bridges and roads
  • Tend vehicles and equipment
  • Logistics
  • EOD units
  • Medical units
• Present Day: Reduction in % of artillery

  Tanks and aircraft share the role of bombarding the enemy
• Limited Warfare 1250-1850


  1. Chevauchees conducting short raids against an enemy area using armies of 2-3,000 troops to terrorise the local population, disrupt their daily life including farming and tax collection

  2. Siege warfare-surrounding castles and towns to either capture them or tie up their forces
• 1850-1900: Start of trend of increasing power of defence over attack
• Total warfare: Britain used all the powers at their disposal to defeat the enemy (WW1)
• War of attrition: the aim was to wear the enemy down until they ran out of weapons, resources, money or morale (WW1)
• WW2 strategy


  • Total warfare and attrition
  • Guerrilla tactics behind enemy lines
• Causes of asymmetric warfare


  • Cost of high technology weapons
  • Mutually Assured Destruction (powerful states only go to war with less powerful ones)
  • Guerrilla warfare
• Asymmetric warfare is due to cost and MAD principle