They had their strengths, too: firearm ammo is small and light, bullets punch through armor well, and a thunderous volley of fire really shocks and awes.

There is a shred of truth embedded; which is that army training is more about stopping your soldiers from running away, than training them to attack or kill; and about getting people to work as a mutually-assisting unit rather than a collection of self-interested individuals. Once cohesion is achieved, only then do tactics become important.

Marching shoulder to shoulder etc is an unfake-able demonstration of unity and cohesion — only a disciplined army can do it. In face of this, an individual soldier must have confidence that he is also part of a solid group. But if he is not, and soldiers do not trust each other; then each individual soldier realizes that a rabble cannot fight a disciplined force; and the incentive is to save one’s own skin and be among the first to run-away before the inevitable rout begins.

People are killed in retreats because each is out for himself. By contrast, the army that provoked the retreat is usually still functioning as a cohesive unit.

At the last gun show I went to, I saw some very sweet modern air rifles in the near .50 cal range, sufficient for taking buffalo. Pretty nice, I’ve got to say.