chief of staff was called to the assistance of the general in arranging his plans, to give information of them to subordinates in orders and instructions, to explain them and to supervise their execution both in their ensemble and in their minute details: his duties were, therefore, evidently connected with all the operations of a campaign.
To be a good chief of staff, it became in this way necessary that a man should be acquainted with all the various branches of the art of war. If the term logistics includes all this, the two works of the Archduke Charles, the voluminous treatises of Guibert, Laroche-Aymon, Bousmard, and Ternay, all taken together, would hardly give even an incomplete sketch of what logistics is; for it would be nothing more nor less than the science of applying all possible military knowledge.
It appears from what has been said that the old term logistics is insufficient to designate the duties of staff officers, and that the real duties of a corps of such officers, if an attempt be made to instruct them in a proper manner for their performance, should be accurately prescribed by special regulations in accordance with the general principles of the art. Governments should take the precaution to publish well-considered regulations, which should define all the duties of staff officers and should give clear and accurate instructions as to the best methods of performing these duties.
The Austrian staff formerly had such a code of regulations for their government; but it was somewhat behind the times, and was better adapted to the old methods of carrying on war than the present. This is the only work of the kind I have seen. There are, no doubt, others, both public and secret; but I have no knowledge of their existence. Several generals—as, for instance, Grimoard and Thiebaut—have prepared manuals for staff officers, and the new royal corps of France has issued several partial sets of instructions; but there is nowhere to be found a complete manual on the subject.