Derrótalos por partes: Estrategia de Divide y Vencerás

DEFEAT THEM IN DETAIL
THE DIVIDE-AND-CONQUER STRATEGY

When you look at your enemies, do not be
intimidated by their appearance. Instead look at the
parts that make up the whole. By separating the
parts, sowing dissension and division from within,
you can weaken and bring down even the most
formidable foe. In setting up your attack, work on
their minds to create internal conflict. Look for the
joints and links, the things that connect the people in
a group or connect one group to another. Division is
weakness, and the joints are the weakest part of any
structure. When you are facing troubles or enemies,
turn a large problem into small, eminently
defeatable parts.
Robert Greene

There were, however, many occasions when the
French were faced not by one but by two or a
whole series of enemy armies within supporting
distance of one another. Faced with such a
difficult situation, Napoleon often adopted a
second system of maneuver--the "strategy of
the central position." Very often under these
circumstances the French found themselves
operating at a numerical disadvantage against
the combined strength of their opponents, but
could procure superior numbers against any
one part of their adversaries' forces. It was this
second factor that the system was designed to
exploit to the full. "The art of generalship
consists in, when actually inferior in numbers to
the enemy (overall), being superior to him on
the battlefield." In brief, Napoleon set himself
the task of isolating one part of the enemy
armament, concentrating a stronger force to
ensure its defeat and if possible its destruction,
and then turning with his full strength to attack
the second enemy army; that is to say, instead
of a single decisive blow, he planned a series of
smaller blows against scattered adversaries
and set out to destroy them in detail. How could
this be done? Once again, the sequence of the
Napoleonic attack reveals the formula. First of
all the Emperor would accumulate as much
information about the forces facing him from
captured newspapers, deserters and most
especially from the indications brought in by his
probing cavalry patrols. From the data thus
provided, he would carefully plot the known
dispositions of his foes on the map, and then
select the place where their respective army
boundaries converged. This was the "hinge" or
"joint" of the enemy's strategic dispositions, and
as such was vulnerable to attack. This point
would be selected by Napoleon for his initial
blitzkrieg attack, carried out as often as not in
full strength. Shielded by the cavalry screen, the
French army would perform a crash
concentration and fall like a thunderbolt on the
handful of troops defending this central point.
Invariably this initial onslaught would be
successful. Immediately Napoleon had massed
his army at this newly captured point, he was
master of the "central position"--that is to say,
he had successfully interposed his
concentrated army between the forces of his
enemies who, ideally, would have staggered
back under the impact of the surprise blow in
such a way as to increase the distance between
their respective armies. This would inevitably
mean that the foe would have to operate on
"exterior lines" (i.e., have greater distances to
march from one flank to the other) while the
better-positioned French would have a shorter
distance to travel to reach either enemy.
THE CAMPAIGNS OF NAPOLEON, DAVID G.
CHANDLER, 1966