The 33 Strategies of War (50 page)

The ultimate evolution of strategy is toward more and more indirection. An opponent who cannot see where you are heading is at a severe disadvantage. The more angles you use--like a cue ball in billiards caroming off several sides of the table--the harder it will be for your opponents to defend themselves. Whenever possible, calculate your moves to produce this caroming effect. It is the perfect disguise for your aggression.

Authority: It is by turning the enemy, by attacking his flank, that battles are won.

--
Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821)

REVERSAL

In politics, occupying the flank by taking a similar position to the other side, co-opting its ideas for your own purposes, is a powerful ploy, one that President Clinton used to great effect in his triangulations with the Republicans. This gives the opponent nothing to strike at, no room to maneuver. But staying too long on the opponent's flank can bring a price: the public--the real soft flank for any politician--loses its sense of what the triangulator stands for, what sets him and his party apart from the other side. Over time this can prove dangerous; polarity (see chapter 1)--creating the appearance of sharp differences--is more effective in the long run. Beware of occupying the opponent's flank at the expense of exposing your own.

People will use any kind of gap in your defenses to attack you or revenge themselves on you. So offer no gaps. The secret is to envelop your opponents--create relentless pressure on them from all sides, dominate their attention, and close off their access to the outside world. Make your attacks unpredictable to create a vaporous feeling of vulnerability. Finally, as you sense their weakening resolve, crush their willpower by tightening the noose. The best encirclements are psychological--you have surrounded their minds.

THE HORNS OF THE BEAST

In December 1878 the British declared war on the Zulus, the warrior tribe of present-day South Africa. The rather flimsy pretext was border troubles between Zululand and the British state of Natal; the real aim was to destroy the Zulu army, the last remaining native force threatening British interests in the area, and to absorb Zulu territories into a British-run confederation of states. The British commander, Lieutenant General Lord Chelmsford, drafted a plan to invade Zululand with three columns, the central one aimed at the capital of Ulundi, the heart of the kingdom.

Legend has it that Shaka altered the nature of fighting in the region for ever, by inventing a heavy, broad-bladed spear designed to withstand the stresses of close-quarter combat. Perhaps he did: certainly both Zulu sources and the accounts of white travellers and officials in the nineteenth century credit him with this achievement.... His military innovations made an impact on Zulu folklore, if nothing else, for Shaka certainly developed fighting techniques to an unprecedented degree, and there is a wealth of stories concerning his prowess as a warrior: he may, indeed, have been one of the great military geniuses of his age. In place of the loose skirmishing tactics with light throwing spears, Shaka trained his warriors to advance rapidly in tight formations and engage hand-to-hand, battering the enemy with larger war-shields, then skewering their foes with the new spear as they were thrown off balance. If the results are anything to judge by, Shaka's capacity for conquest must have been dramatic. By 1824 the Zulus had eclipsed all their rivals, and had extended their influence over an area many times larger than their original homeland.

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Many Englishmen in Natal were thrilled at the prospect of war and at the potential benefits of taking over Zululand, but no one was as excited as forty-eight-year-old Colonel Anthony William Durnford. For years Durnford had bounced from one lonely British Empire outpost to another, finally ending up in Natal. In all his years of military service, Durnford had not once seen action. He yearned to prove his valor and worth as a soldier, but he was approaching the age when such youthful dreams could no longer be fulfilled. Now, suddenly, the impending war was sending the opportunity his way.

Eager to impress, Durnford volunteered to organize an elite force of native soldiers from Natal to fight alongside the British. His offer was accepted, but as the British invaded Zululand in early January 1879, he found himself cut out of the main action. Lord Chelmsford did not trust him, thinking his hunger for glory made him impetuous; also, for someone with no battle experience, he was old. So Durnford and his company were stationed at Rorke's Drift, in western Zululand, to help monitor the border areas with Natal. Dutifully but bitterly, Durnford followed his orders.

In the first days after the invasion, the British failed to locate the main Zulu army, only trickles of men here and there. They were growing frustrated. On January 21, Chelmsford took half of the central column, which was encamped at the foot of a mountain called Isandlwana, and led it east in search of the Zulus. Once he had found the enemy, he would bring the rest of his army forward--but the elusive Zulus might attack the camp while he was away, and the men at Rorke's Drift were the closest reserves. Needing to reinforce Isandlwana, he sent word to Durnford to bring his company there. As colonel, Durnford would now be the highest-ranking officer at the camp, but Chelmsford could not worry about Durnford's leadership qualities--the impending battle was the only thing on his mind.

Early on the morning of January 22, Durnford received the news he had been waiting for all his life. Barely able to contain his excitement, he lead his four hundred men east to Isandlwana, arriving at the camp at around 10:00
A.M
. Surveying the land, he understood why Chelmsford had put his main camp here: to the east and south were miles of rolling grassland--Zulus approaching from that direction would be seen well in advance. To the north was Isandlwana, and beyond it the plains of Nqutu. This side was a little less secure, but scouts had been placed at key points in the plains and at the mountain passes; attack from that direction would almost certainly be detected in time.

Shortly after his arrival, Durnford received a report that a seemingly large Zulu force had been spotted on the plains of Nqutu heading east, perhaps to attack Chelmsford's half of the central column from the rear. Chelmsford had left explicit orders to keep the 1,800 men at Isandlwana together. In case of attack, they had enough firepower to defeat the entire Zulu army--as long as they stayed concentrated and kept their lines in order. But to Durnford it was more important to find the main Zulu force. The British soldiers were beginning to grow edgy, not knowing where this vaporous enemy was. The Zulus had no cavalry, and many of them fought with spears; once their hiding place was uncovered, the rest would be easy--the superior weaponry and discipline of the British soldiers would prevail. Durnford thought Chelmsford was too cautious. As senior officer at the camp, he decided to disobey orders and lead his 400 men northeast, parallel to the plains of Nqutu, to find out what the Zulus were up to.

As Durnford marched out of the camp, a scout on the plains of Nqutu saw a few Zulus herding cattle some four miles away. He gave chase on his horse, but the Zulus disappeared into thin air. Riding to the point where they had vanished, he stopped his horse just in time: below him lay a wide, deep ravine, completely hidden from the surface of the plains, and crowded into the ravine, as far as he could see in both directions, were Zulu warriors in full war regalia, an eerie intensity in their eyes. They seemed to have been meditating on the imminent battle. For a second the horseman was too stunned to move, but as hundreds of spears were suddenly aimed at him, he turned and galloped away. The Zulus quickly rose and began clambering out of the ravine.

Soon the other scouts on the plains saw the same terrifying sight: a wide line of Zulus filling the horizon, some 20,000 men strong. Even from a distance, it was clear that they were moving in formation, each end of their line coming forward in a shape resembling horns. The scouts quickly brought word to the camp that the Zulus were coming. By the time Durnford received the news, he could look up to the ridge above him and see a line of Zulus streaming down the slope. He quickly formed his own men into lines to fight them off while retreating to the camp. The Zulus maneuvered with incredible precision. What Durnford could not see was that the men in the left tip of the horn were moving through the tall grass toward the rear of the camp, to link up with the other end of the horn and complete the encirclement.

The Zulus facing Durnford and his men seemed to grow out of the earth, emerging from behind boulders or from out of the grass in ever-greater numbers. A knot of five or six of them would suddenly charge, throwing spears or firing rifles, then disappear back into the grass. Whenever the British stopped to reload, the Zulus would advance ever closer, occasionally one reaching Durnford's lines and disemboweling a British soldier with the powerful Zulu spear, which made an unbearable sucking sound as it went in and out.

The careful use by the Zulus of cover during their advance was observed time and again by the British. Another anonymous survivor of Isandlwana noted that as the Zulus crested the Nyoni ridge and came within sight of camp, they "appeared almost to grow out of the earth. From rock and bush on the heights above started scores of men; some with rifles, others with shields and assegais." Lieutenant Edward Hutton of the 60th left a rather more complete description of the Zulu army deploying for the attack at Gingindlovu: "The dark masses of men, in open order and under admirable discipline, followed each other in quick succession, running at a steady pace through the long grass. Having moved steadily round so as exactly to face our front, the larger portion of the Zulus broke into three lines, in knots and groups of from five to ten men, and advanced towards us....
[
They
]
continued to advance, still at a run, until they were about 800 yards from us, when they began to open fire. In spite of the excitement of the moment we could not but admire the perfect manner in which these Zulus skirmished. A knot of five or six would rise and dart through the long grass, dodging from side to side with heads down, rifles and shields kept low and out of sight. They would then suddenly sink into the long grass, and nothing but puffs of curling smoke would show their whereabouts. Then they advance again...." The speed of this final advance was terrifying. When the British gave the order to cease firing and fall back at Isandlwana, the Zulus were pinned down some two or three hundred yards from the British position. Lieutenant Curling of the Artillery noted that in the time it took for his experienced men to limber his guns, the Zulus had rushed in so quickly that one gunner had actually been stabbed as he mounted the axle-tree seat. A Zulu veteran of the battle, uMhoti of the uKhandempemvu, thought the final charge so swift that "like a flame the whole Zulu force sprang to its feet and darted upon them."

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Durnford managed to get his men back into camp. The British were surrounded, but they closed ranks and fired away, killing scores of Zulus and keeping them at bay. It was like target practice: as Durnford had predicted, their superior weaponry was making the difference. He looked around; the fight had turned into a stalemate, and his soldiers were responding with relative confidence. Almost imperceptibly, though, Durnford noticed a slight slackening in their fire. Soldiers were running out of ammunition, and in the time it took them to open a new crate and reload, the Zulus would tighten the circle and a wave of fear would ripple through the men as here and there a soldier in the front lines would be impaled. The Zulus fought with an intensity the British had never seen; rushing forward as if bullets could not harm them, they seemed to be in a trance.

Suddenly, sensing the turning point in the battle, the Zulus began to rattle their spears against their shields and emit their war cry:
"Usuthu!"
It was a terrifying din. At the northern end of the camp, a group of British soldiers gave way--just a few, panicking at the sight and sound of the Zulus, now only a few yards distant, but the Zulus poured through the gap. As if on cue, those in the circle between the two horns rained spears on the British, killing many and making havoc of their lines. From out of nowhere, a reserve force rushed forward, fanning around the circle and doubling its squeezing power. Durnford tried to maintain order, but it was too late: in a matter of seconds, panic. Now it was every man for himself.

Durnford ran to the one gap in the encirclement and tried to keep it open so that his remaining men could retreat to Rorke's Drift. Minutes later he was impaled by a Zulu spear. Soon the battle at Isandlwana was over. A few hundred managed to escape through the gap that Durnford had died in securing; the rest, over fourteen hundred men, were killed.

After such a devastating defeat, the British forces quickly retreated out of Zululand. For the time being, the war was indeed over, but not as the British had expected.

Interpretation

A few months after the defeat at Isandlwana, the British mounted a larger invasion and finally defeated the Zulus. But the lesson of Isandlwana remains instructive, particularly considering the incredible discrepancy in technology.

The Zulu way of fighting had been perfected earlier in the nineteenth century by King Shaka Zulu, who by the 1820s had transformed what had been a relatively minor tribe into the region's greatest fighting force. Shaka invented the heavy, broad-bladed Zulu spear, the assegai, that was so devastating in battle. He imposed a rigorous discipline, training the Zulus to advance and encircle their enemies with machinelike precision. The circle was extremely important in Zulu culture--as a symbol of their national unity, a motif in their artwork, and their dominant pattern in warfare. The Zulus could not fight for extended periods, since their culture required lengthy cleansing rituals after the shedding of blood in battle. During these rituals they were completely vulnerable to attack--no Zulu could fight again, or even rejoin the tribe, until he had been cleansed. The immense Zulu army was also costly to maintain in the field. Once mobilized, then, the army not only had to defeat its enemies in battle, it had to annihilate every last one of them, eliminating the possibility of a counterattack during the vulnerable cleansing period and allowing a speedy demobilization. Encirclement was the Zulu method of obtaining this complete kind of victory.

Before any battle, the Zulus would scout the terrain for places to hide. As one looks out over the grasslands and plains of South Africa, they seem to offer wide visibility, but they often conceal ravines and gullies undetectable from any distance. Even up close, grasses and boulders provide excellent coverage. The Zulus would move quickly to their hiding places, their feet tough as leather from years of running over the grasslands. They would send out scouting parties as distractions to hide the movements of the main force.

Once they emerged from their hiding place and headed into battle, the Zulus would form what they called the "horns, chest, and loins." The chest was the central part of the line, which would hold and pin the enemy force. Meanwhile the horns to either side would encircle it, moving in to the sides and rear. Often the tip of one horn would stay hidden behind tall grass or boulders; when it emerged to complete the encirclement it would at the same time give the enemy a nasty psychological shock. The loins were a reserve force kept back to be thrown in for the coup de grace. These men often actually stood with their backs to the battle, so as not to grow overly excited and rush in before the right moment.