Antoine Henri Jomini Quotes
A state attacked by another which renews an old claim rarely yields it without a war: it prefers to defend its territory, as is always more honorable. But it may be advantageous to take the offensive, instead of awaiting the attack on the frontiers.
Jomini, Antoine Henri. The Art of War. Translated by G.H. Mendell and W.P. Craighill, J.B. Lippincott & Co., 1862, p. 16.
After the attack on Fort Sumter, the South Sent “diplomats” to negotiation with the Government. Unfortunately for all, the South really was not open to negotiations as they only had two predetermined positions they would agree to: The first was that the Government should guarantee the perpetual right of states to have slavery if they wished and that fugitive slaves would be returned by the non-slave states. The second was that the Union should recognize the Confederacy as an independent nation and have peaceful relations between the two. The first was impossible to deliver even if the Union would agree to continue slavery, there was no way that the Federal Government could enforce the return of fugitive slaves from many northern states where they were free the second they set foot in the state, and the Northern states demanded States Rights and not being forced to return Fugitive Slaves forcing the Southern States to oppose States Rights when it came to Fugitive Slaves while favoring it for slavery itself. The Federal government could not enforce the Dred Scott Decision under the pro-South Buchanan administration. And Lincoln and most of the Northern Politicians would not accept a complete dissolution of the Union. There are no other possibilities the South would accept and there was really nothing to negotiate.
He was arguing for a preemptive attack rather than wait to be attacked.
The meaning is that to be victorious in war one should not be inhibited from doing cruel and brutal things that war sometimes necessitates.
At the time France and Germany controlled different parts of the Ruhr Valley. Each believed that they should control it all and the other had no right to control any of it. This never did get settled and was one of the justifications Germany gave in WWII for invading the area. Haskins was one of only three assistants who were part of Woodrow Wilson’s team that negotiated the Treaty of Versailles ending WWI.
Antoine-Henri, Baron Jomini was a French-Swiss officer who served as a general in the French and later in the Russian service, and one of the most celebrated writers on the Napoleonic art of war. Jomini's ideas are a staple at military academies, the United States Military Academy at West Point being a prominent example; his theories were thought to have affected many officers who later served in the American Civil War. He may have coined the term logistics in his Summary of the Art of War (1838).
