Apache Tactics 1830-86 
Battles between Europeans and Native Americans in North America started with the first landfall and continued until the late 19th Century. Typically, the wars were limited in duration as the mass of European immigrants expanded into and pacified new areas. Tribes decimated by war and disease had few alternatives. In most parts of what is now the United States, peace followed settlement by not too many years.
The deserts of the West were another story. Vast distances and non-arable land meant that for many years more people transited the land than settled in it. What the land lacked in agricultural potential, it made up for with mineral wealth. That is what brought first the Spanish, then the Mexicans, and finally the Americans to the land of the Apache. Their range extended from Arizona to West Texas and from Southern Colorado to Northern Mexico.
The Apache may have remained in active conflict with European settlers longer than any other family of tribes. Coronado visited the area in 1540 and subsequent parties of Spaniards in that century reported raiding back and forth with the Apache. This continued after Mexican independence in 1821 and the eventual arrival of the Americans. It’s generally recognized that 1890 was the end of the Apache Wars, but there were certainly incidents past that time.
An Apache warrior was minimalist and efficient. Reflecting the harshness of their land, the Apaches had none of the splendid head dresses, painted tepees, or beaded parfletches of the Plains Tribes. Additionally, there was no cult of the horse; Apache saw horses as tools first and food when necessary. Even on foot, an Apache warrior could travel 70 miles per day in the harsh terrain they called home. Given their numbers, they were arguably the most effective guerrilla warriors in history. At the time of the Geronimo campaign, one-quarter of the U.S. Army (5000 men) were deployed looking for 50 Apache warriors.
Apache Tactics by Robert N. Watt is a thorough introduction to the strategies and tactics of the Apaches in the final stages of their wars. Although there are many scholarly books about the Apaches and their battles, few readers find the time to devote to an in-depth study. The virtue of this volume is the author’s distillation and categorizing of the various engagements, enriched by abundant maps, illustrations, and period pictures that lend a feel for the combatants.
Watt gives a good background of the Apaches and their milieu before getting to the meat of the book. One anecdote from 1876 is informative. In 1876 the Chiricahua reservation was to be closed and the tribe was divided on whether they should peacefully go to a new reservation, or leave in armed rebellion. Lacking agreement, it escalated to an armed battle and the “peace faction” literally shot down the more militant tribesmen. All members of the tribe had to be tough and capable of hard travel in austere conditions. Men were warriors and Apache boys were trained from an early age to fight and apprenticed in war as adolescents. Apache society was a meritocracy. Leaders were successful guerrilla fighters who exhibited and inspired toughness and patience. For that reason, many renowned Apache chiefs were in their 50s or older. Success was valued, but risk taking was not.
Categorizing Apache tactics and presenting each area as case studies, Watt first covers raids. A raid is simply a surprise attack against an immobile target. The attacker chooses the time, and the location is fixed. Apache raiding was largely to procure livestock and other booty. This was not warfare for the Apache. Raiding was to gain property and warfare was to take life. Studying their engagements show this clearly. Northern Mexico suffered more from Apache raiding than did the Americans. Inevitably, on both sides of the border, Apache raids caused pursuit and attempts at reprisal. In response, the Apaches would seek to evade or ambush their pursuers.
In an ambush, the attacker chooses the location, and the time is whenever the target enters the kill zone. It is in describing the ambush tactics of the Apache that this book excels. Watt breaks Apache ambushes into several categories. The planned ambush required real-time intelligence to establish patterns and find “exploitable weaknesses.” Many of these attacks were to capture livestock. Other categories of ambushes are: the killing ambush, seeking retribution against the enemy; ambush by decoy, using false trails/simulating panic/etc.; and ad hoc ambushes (or what Watt calls the Apache “roadside bomb”). These quick ambushes relied on Apache tradecraft to hide where there seemed to be no concealment and spring a deadly trap at close range. Often these would be set before or after a perceived danger area when the enemy was less alert. Watt makes the case that the Apaches understood psychological operations and used it to their advantage. In one instance an Apache war party was particularly brutal. This incensed responding miners and the Apaches goaded them on with distant gunfire. Thinking another attack was taking place; the miners ran pell-mell into an ambush and were killed.
Like all great guerrilla warriors Apaches avoided direct attacks and were famously risk adverse. Disparity of numbers and technology led to the inevitable failure of the Apache resistance, but students of guerrilla war can learn much from their efforts.
The author of Apache Tactics 1830-86, Robert N. Watt, is a lecturer at the University of Birmingham in the UK and this book is published by Osprey Publishing of Oxford, UK. They have a great list of books at OspreyPublishing.com. Apache Tactics was published in 2012 and is available through Amazon,com, BN.com, and other major Internet booksellers.
About The Reviewer: John Hawkwood (a pseudonym) is SurvivalBlog’s new Military Book Review Editor. He is a former U.S. Army Infantry officer who also served as a paramilitary officer with the CIA.