THE EVOLVING FRENCH ARMY

Guibert's career occurred near the end of a centuries-long period of debate and reform. As early as the medieval period, France began a lengthy shift from armored cavalry to missile infantry as its basic weapons system. This produced massive changes in military theory and practice, particularly as formations of missile infantry required a much more organized and standardized doctrine to operate.

By 1700 the transition was complete, as all French infantry were armed with muskets affixed with socket bayonets. The soldiers also were supported by artillery and cavalry, the latter's weaponry and organization much more standardized from past practice. These changes now allowed for the beginnings of institutional doctrine. A few theorists began to work on this, proposing to remove doctrine from the purview of individual officers and commanders and instead propagate a single system for the entire army.

The process of doctrinal development was greatly accelerated by the rise of Prussia. Frederick II's disciplined battalions proved indomitable during the War of Austrian Succession, 1740–48. While France and Prussia were allied in that conflict, many on the French side came away with a favorable view of their partners. Practitioners and theorists alike came to view Prussia, not France, as the leading military power after the war, touching off a wave of polemical debate and reform.

The rise of Prussia produced a two-fold response in France. Institutional doctrine developed at a much more rapid pace, with the first elements appearing by 1755 at the tactical level. This produced in turn an emphasis on rigid discipline and organization, much to the dismay of many within the Ministry of War. As a result, a doctrinal debate erupted, with various groups advocating their unique views and accusing the others of unpatriotic sentiments. More importantly, the rise of Prussia produced a new adversary for France. Confronting Prussia for the first time during the Seven Years War, France was humiliated. The combination of these two developments produced a time of great angst and reform in the French military, in which Guibert would be an active participant.

The origins of France's eighteenth-century army can be found in a long process touched off by the development of gunpowder weapons during the early fifteenth century. Beginning in the later phases of the Hundred Years War, 1337–1475, infantry gradually replaced shock cavalry, famously personified by the medieval knight. Affecting more than events on the battlefield, the development of firearms also considerably influenced both government and society. Taken together, this trend is known as the Military Revolution.

Relying on the system of vassal service, medieval armies required little organizational training. Knights trained extensively as warriors, but armies rarely, if ever, practiced tactics or operations. Battles largely consisted of individual combats fought with sword and spear, with knights confronted by their opposite numbers in the enemy army. Medieval soldiers provided most or all of their own equipment as a portion of the feudal obligations they owed their lord. This defrayed the cost of war from the state to the nobility, enabling relatively poor monarchs and lords to conduct campaigns that otherwise would have been cost prohibitive.

Missile weapons gradually brought an end to this system of warfare. As technology developed in the high medieval period, bows and crossbows followed by gunpowder weapons became relatively cheap compared to the armor systems of heavy cavalry. These weapons also required much less individual skill and training to use than the weapons system employed by medieval knights. Due to their ease of use, missile weapons could be wielded by peasants, a trend begun on a small scale by the English longbowmen of the Hundred Years War. As technology developed, firearms came to be the dominant missile weapon, particularly given the training required for use of the longbow. Many Europeans recognized the potential for a resulting power shift. This process originated in the mid-fifteenth century, particularly during the Hundred Years War and the subsequent French campaigns for hegemony on the Rhine. For the first time since the fall of Rome, large numbers of nonelites could be equipped and used in battle. According to John Lynn, this marked the transition from a medieval system to an "aggregate contract," whereby monarchs assembled quasi-feudal venal regiments or hired mercenaries to man their armies.

Arming commoners with firearms had a double effect on military establishments across Europe. In society it marked the beginning of a gradual change whereby commoners ultimately rejected feudal social and political systems. For militaries, the shift to firearm-wielding infantry necessitated the development of higher-order organization and tactics. Soldiers could no longer rely on personal martial prowess or superior equipment to best their foes. The extreme vulnerability of firearms-bearing soldiers to cavalry required large numbers of troops to work together in disciplined formations to remain safe and effective. This fact, along with the increasingly complex machinery used in firearms, required technical knowledge and training to operate under battle conditions as the period progressed. When combined, these factors necessitated an army composed of soldiers who could maneuver and fight as a unit rather than individuals. Consequently, early modern armies required organization to practice tactics.

But such developments rarely occurred immediately or even concurrently. The period between the adoption of gunpowder weapons and the appearance of infantry tactics and organization began in the late medieval period but took up to three centuries to take hold throughout most of Europe. Various states adopted intermediate steps between medieval and early modern tactics, most notably Spain. In the fifteenth and early sixteenth century, the Spanish mixed pikemen and gunmen in a dense, rectangular formation known as a tercio. Although these combined-arms formations enabled the Spanish to conquer much of their empire during this period, the tercio proved tactically inflexible. For protection from cavalry, the pikemen needed to remain near the gunmen, thus preventing rapid maneuver.

As a result of this evolutionary process, France produced an army based on infantry armed with gunpowder weapons and pikes by 1700. Other branches included mounted infantry (dragoons), shock cavalry (cuirassiers), and artillery. Cannon had developed alongside infantry firearms, particularly in the great age of sieges that occurred roughly between 1500 and 1740. Louis de Bourbon, prince de Condé, used artillery in battle as early as 1643, but the type of...