Nation's War Lesson Will Begin Aug. 10.

New York Times 100 years ago today, August 7, 1912:
Will Show What Would Happen if a Power from Europe Should Attempt Invasion.
NEW ENGLAND BATTLEFIELD
Campaign Will Have the Hardest Problems to Work Out of Any Manoeuvres Yet Submitted.
    STRATFORD, Conn.. Aug. 9.— The mimic warfare on land which will open in the southwest corner of New England on Aug. 10 between the armies of "Reds" and "Blues," with 10,000 men on each side, pre-supposes military events on a large scale. It will be known officially as the Connecticut Manoeuvre Campaign, and is planned for manoeuvres and field instruction of various arms of both the regular army and the volunteer militia.
    A number of organizations of regulars have already been ordered to take the field and militia of four of the New England States, together with portions of the National Guard of New York and New Jersey will be placed in active service for a ten-day period.
    The campaign will be the most extensive in aggregate of number involved and will have the hardest problems to work out of any heretofore held since the introduction of joint operations between the United States Army, and the National Guard under the general plan of making the latter the second line of National defense.
    Brigadier Gen. Tasker H. Bliss, commanding the Department of the East, United States Army, with headquarters at Governors Island, N. Y., will be commander of the Manoeuvre Campaign. He will have under him not only his own staff, but a large detail of army officers, estimated at over one hundred of all ranks, drawn from the various branches and departments. In addition the operations of the two armies will be observed by officers designated as umpires, of whom Gen. Bliss himself will be the chief, who will make reports of their observations as the movements of various bodies ot soldiers proceed.
    The campaign is brought about by a number of military occurrences theoretically grouped into a problem of major military tactics. The problem is described in this way:
    A war has been precipitated in the United States by a great European power which has defeated and blockaded the principal United States fleet at Hampton Roads. An invading army of the European "Reds" has landed at New Bedford, Mass., advanced on Boston, defeated a "Blue" army, and is pursuing it on its retreat toward Albany, N. Y., via Worcester and Springfield. Mass.
    Meanwhile, a division of the "Red" army has occupied Providence, R. I., moved westward unopposed, placing small garrisons in New London, Willimantic, Hartford and Middletown, but the main divisional body pressing on to New Haven, and driving back a "Blue" regiment from the latter city and later occupying with a detached force the city of Waterbury.
    In the meantime a second supporting "Red" Army of 100,000 men has been landed at New Bedford. The main objective of the whole "Red" Army of 200,000 men and its campaign is New York City. But the immediate scene of the manoeuvres is the minor strategy of the division of the "Reds" advanced to New Haven and Waterbury, two cities about thirty miles apart and occupying the region adjacent to and between each point which is cut by the Housatonic
and Naugatuck Rivers.
    The "Reds," however, have been unable in their quick advance to seize the region lying further northwest, the apex of which (under theoretical limitations of the operations) is at Danbury, which becomes a potential flanking point and which is held by the defending "Blues."
    The immediate strategy of the "Blue Army comprehends the withdrawal to New York City and Albany of the rolling stock of the New England railroads, and the organization near New York of a provisional "Blue" division rushed toward Danbury and Bridgeport. The official outlines of the manoeuvres show a kind of divisional campaign intended to protect New York from the quick and direct attack on that city by the advanced division of the "Reds" at New Haven, Waterbury, and the region between, as the base line of their future advance.
    Fronting this advance will be the various detachments of the "Blue" Army, reaching northward from Paradise Green in Stratford, the headquarters of Gen. Bliss, U.S.A., who will direct, by means of various methods of communication, field telegraphs and telephones, heliographs and other signaling devices, and aeroplanes, all the general movements on both sides.
    The "Red" Army of invasion will be commanded by Gen. Frederick A. Smith of the Central Army Division, while the defenders, or "Blues," will be under the direction of Gen. Edward J. McClernand of the Pacific Division. Concentration points are not as yet definitely known, but there will be field artillery at Danbury, cavalry at Bridgeport and Milford, and infantry scattered at the outset in camps extending from New Haven to the New York State line east from Poughkeepsie, and all along a line which would be established as a protective screen to the extensive Croton watershed of New
York City.
    The first concentration of forces on either side will be for a few hours only, and is intended simply to bring the various bodies into the sphere of operations. The moment regiments, troops, and batteries are at the point of their individual rendezvous the commanders will begin to shuffle them about to cover strategic points in accord with the plans laid down for the game.
    An illustration of the concentration is furnished by the orders to the First and Second Connecticut Infantry, which on Aug. 10 will be rushed from its home station to Seymour on the banks of the Housatonic River, there to make a base. The Housatonic River is the theoretical line to which the "Reds' " advance has come. There is at Seymour one of the main bridges over the river, Zoar Bridge, and the presumption is that the Connecticut forces will have as its object the seizure of this bridge, which is a means of direct highway communication with New York City. The Connecticut regiments will then make a camp and await reinforcements in the shape of a Maine regiment, which, then is coming by train. This point also places the brigade, which will be commanded by Col. Coles of the Plattsburg Barracks, in a position either to attempt or prevent a flanking movement on or from Danbury.
    The preliminary orders for the campaign do not specify exactly which commands will be assigned to either side, but the execution of orders to move from their home stations and take the field will quickly clear the matter, and by nightfall of the 10th the lines of the two armies will be well established. Danbury appears to be a point of strategic importance, and the anticipation is that the two days' battle which will follow the five days of instructions will be fought somewhere in that direction.
    The frontal line of the divisional and immediate campaign is about 25 miles long, with very nearly the same distance added for a line of movements from Zoar Bridge to Danbury. There lies a southern zone about twelve miles broad between Paradise Green and New Haven, directly between the "Blue" headquarters at the former place and the main body of the advancing "Reds" at New Haven, which seems to forecast an early engagement thereabouts, although for obvious reasons the actual movements and strategy of the contending forces is concealed.
    There will take part in the theatre of war about 2,500 regular troops, made up of the Fifth Infantry, the Tenth Cavalry, the Second Battalion of the Third Field Artillery, (less one battery,) Company B, First Batallion of Engineers; Field Company A, Signal Corps, and one section of the aviation service.
    The National Guard will be made up as follows:
    From New York, the Seventh, Twelfth, Sixty-ninth, and Seventy-first Infantry of the First Brigade; the Fourteenth, Twenty-third, and Forty-seventh Infantry of the Second Brigade, the First and Second Cavalry, the First and Second Battalions and Battery A of Field Artillery; the Twenty-second Regiment of Engineers; the First and Second Field Hospitals, and the First and Second Ambulance Companies.
   From New Jersey the First, Fourth and Fifth Infantry of the First Brigade, First and Second Troops of Cavalry, Batteries A and B, Field Artillery, Signal Corps Company, and First Field Hospital.
    From Massachusetts the Second and Sixth Infantry of the First Brigade, the Fifth and Ninth Infantry of the Second Brigade, First Company Signal Corps, First Field Hospital, First Ambulance Corps.
    The Connecticut forces will be the First and Second Infantry, First Separate Company, (colored,) First Company Signal Corps, Field Artillery, and Ambulance Company.
    Maine will send its Second Infantry, Vermont its First Infantry.
    Sanitary troops will accompany organizations to which they are attached. The volunteer forces will number about 16,000, about 8,000 of the latter coming, from New York State.
    Upon arrival at their detraining stations all organizations will be met by an "umpire instructor" who will give information and will designate as each day's operations are completed the over-night camp.
    The plan for the campaign provides for strict adherence to prearranged action by each unit, instead of more or less individual action by commanders of various bodies as was the case in the Battle of Boston fought a few years ago.