MILITARY INSTRUCTORS MANUAL

BY

CAPTAIN JAMES P. COLE, 59th INFANTRY

Instructor 3rd Battalion, 17th Provisional Training Regiment, Plattsburg, N.Y.

AND

MAJOR OLIVER SCHOONMAKER, 76th DIVISION

Assistant Instructor 3rd Battalion, 17th Provisional Training Regiment, Plattsburg, N.Y.

Acknowledgment.

To have prepared this book within the time allotted to it, without the assistance of Candidates Alcott Farrar Elwell and Lyle Milton Prouse would have been impossible, and grateful recognition is made of their services. Not only much of the manual labor, but the preparation of entire chapters, has been in their hands.

Candidates Charles Huntington Jacobs and Michael Francis Mcaleer have rendered very valuable assistance and we wish to thank the following candidates for the loan of materials used elsewhere, for typewriting and other work:

Introduction.

The officer of to-day has big problems to face at short notice. His training has necessarily been so intensive that he cannot absorb a large amount of it. He has little time to make out schedules or even to look over the hasty notes he may have made during his training period, yet he finds himself facing problems which force him to immediate action.

This book so condenses and systematizes general military instruction and the work done at Plattsburg so that it may be easily utilized in training other troops. No broad claim for originality is made except in the arrangement of all available material; the bibliography makes acknowledgment to all texts so utilized. Besides bringing helpful reminders to new officers regarding the elements of modern warfare, much of the material will be found of radical importance, as it is practically new and never before condensed. Since under the new army organization the platoon leader virtually has assumed the roll of a captain of a company, it is not enough for him to know simply his own part; he must be ready with all the information that his non-commissioned officers and men should know, and more important still, he must know how to teach them. Having little or no time to work over and digest for himself this mass of new material pouring in upon him, the officer may find in this book, material condensed and already arranged.

It is hoped that this work will serve to recall to many officers, valuable points of military training which would otherwise be lost, to them in the mass of notes never looked at since the day they were made. More than this, every reader will find help in planning his work, saving thereby precious hours already too full of necessary duties, and will find fresh material for progress in the game of war.

It is the purpose of this book to help men who are in the service of the United States, and through them to share in bringing victory.

Table of Contents.