|
Freiherr Wilhelm Leopold Colmar von der Goltz (12 August 1843 – 19 April 1916), also known as ''Goltz Pasha'', was a Prussian Field Marshal and military writer. ==Military career== Goltz was born in , East Prussia (later renamed Goltzhausen; now Ivanovka, in Polessky District, Kaliningrad Oblast),〔(Google Maps ) at maps.google.com〕 into an impoverished noble family. He grew up at the manor house of Fabiansfelde near Preußisch Eylau, which had been bought by his father in 1844.〔Horst Schulz, Der Kreis Pr. Eylau, Verden/Aller 1983〕 His father spent some nineteen years in the Prussian Army without rising above the rank of lieutenant, and his efforts at farming were similarly unfruitful, and he eventually succumbed to cholera while on a trip to Danzig (now Gdańsk) when Colmar was six years old.〔Hermann Teske (1957), 9-10〕 Goltz entered the Prussian infantry in 1861 as a second lieutenant with the 5th East Prussian Infantry Regiment Number 41, in Königsberg (now Kaliningrad).〔Hermann Teske (1957), 14〕 During 1864 he was on border duty at Thorn (Toruń), after which he entered the Berlin Military Academy, but was temporarily withdrawn in 1866 to serve in the Austro-Prussian War, in which he was wounded at Trautenau. In 1867 he joined the topographical section of the general staff, and at the beginning of the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71 was attached to the staff of Prince Frederick Charles, commanding general of the Prussian Second Army. He took part in the battles of Vionville and Gravelotte and in the siege of Metz. After its fall he served under Prince Friedrich Karl of Prussia in the campaign of the Loire, including the battles of Orleans and Le Mans. Goltz was appointed professor at the military school at Potsdam in 1871, promoted to captain, and placed in the historical section of the general staff. It was then that he wrote ''Die Operationen der II. Armee bis zur Capitulation von Metz'' (''The Operations of the Second Army until the surrender of Metz'') and ''Die Sieben Tage von Le Mans'' (''The Seven Days of Le Mans''), both published in 1873. In 1874 he was appointed first general staff officer (Ia) of the 6th Division, and while so employed wrote ''Die Operationen der II. Armee an der Loire'' (''The Operations of the Second Army on the Loire'') and ''Léon Gambetta und seine Armeen'' (''Léon Gambetta and his armies''), published in 1875 and 1877 respectively. The latter was translated into French the same year, and is considered by many historians to be his most original contribution to military literature. Goltz stressed how, despite the rapid initial victory against the Imperial French forces at Sedan, the new French Republic had been able to mobilise national will for a Volkskrieg ("War of the People") which dragged on for many more months (the Siege of Paris, the campaign on the Loire and the partisans behind German lines, the latter tying down 20% of German strength), the implication being that it was therefore unrealistic to expect a quick victory over France in any future war. Goltz, who wrote with open admiration about Léon Gambetta's efforts to raise new armies after September 1870 argued that the French "people's war" might had been successful had Gambetta been able to better train his new armies.〔Akmeșe, Handan Nezir ''The Birth of Modern Turkey The Ottoman Military and the March to World I'', London: I.B Tauris page 22〕 Goltz argued that henceforward a new age in war had began, that of the "nation in arms," where the state would seek to mobilize the entire nation and its resources for war, what today might be called total war.〔Akmeșe, Handan Nezir ''The Birth of Modern Turkey The Ottoman Military and the March to World I'', London: I.B Tauris page 22〕 The views expressed in the latter work were unpopular with the powers that be and led to Goltz's being sent back to regimental duty for a time, but it was not long before he returned to the military history section. In 1878 Goltz was appointed lecturer in military history at the military academy at Berlin, where he remained for five years and attained the rank of major. He published, in 1883, ''Roßbach und Jena'' (new and revised edition, ''Von Rossbach bis Jena und Auerstadt'', 1906) and ''Das Volk in Waffen'' (''The Nation in Arms''), both of which quickly became military classics. The latter also became the theoretical handbook of the Argentine Army, and in 1910 Goltz headed the German diplomatic mission to the Argentine Centennial. During his residence in Berlin, Goltz contributed many articles to the military journals. The ideas that Goltz had first introduced in ''Léon Gambetta und seine Armeen'' were further expanded in ''The Nation in Arms'', where he argued: "The days of Cabinet wars is over. It is no longer the weakness of a single man, at the head of affairs, of a dominant party that is decisive, but only the exhaustion of the belligerent nations."〔Akmeșe, Handan Nezir ''The Birth of Modern Turkey The Ottoman Military and the March to World I'', London: I.B Tauris page 22〕 As such, to win war in the future required that "the great civilized nations of the present bring their military organization to ever greater perfection."〔Akmeșe, Handan Nezir ''The Birth of Modern Turkey The Ottoman Military and the March to World I'', London: I.B Tauris page 22〕 To that end, Goltz that society needed to be militarized in peacetime on an unprecedented level, and what was required was "the full amalgamation of military and civilian life."〔Akmeșe, Handan Nezir ''The Birth of Modern Turkey The Ottoman Military and the March to World I'', London: I.B Tauris page 22〕 Goltz was a militarist, Social Darwinist and ultra-nationalist who believed war to be something necessary, desirable and inevitable.〔Akmeșe, Handan Nezir ''The Birth of Modern Turkey The Ottoman Military and the March to World I'', London: I.B Tauris page 22〕 In Goltz's Social Darwinist perspective, just as "survival of the fittest" prevailed in nature, the same principle applied to international relations with "strong" nations rightfully devouring "weak" nations.〔Akmeșe, Handan Nezir ''The Birth of Modern Turkey The Ottoman Military and the March to World I'', London: I.B Tauris page 22〕 Goltz who saw the carnage of war as the most beautiful thing in the world wrote: "It () is an expression of the energy and self-respect which a nation possesses.... Perpetual peace mean perpetual death!"〔Akmeșe, Handan Nezir ''The Birth of Modern Turkey The Ottoman Military and the March to World I'', London: I.B Tauris page 22〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Colmar Freiherr von der Goltz」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|