Saturday, March 5, 1 93 8
[There is n o text among Bataille 's manuscripts that bears the title announced by the program of the College for this date . However, there are a number of scat
tered pages inserted by Bataille in the file labeled "Sociological Studies" that seem to be contemporm}' with the activities of the College and that analyze the militmy phenomenon, its position within the social body as a whole, and the in
ner forces that make it function . Without claiming to have restored the text, I re
produce here only a montage of these pages.
In the preceding lecture ( "Power"), Bataille gave a general idea of what he had to say on these questions when he mentioned that ' 'militmy relations do not seem to imply the killing of a leader, undoubtedly because the movements of murderous repulsion are normally diverted against the enemy . "
Bataille 's analysis contrasts the army, on the one hand, to the rest of society, to its civilian economy (the opposition anny-factmy), and, on the other hand, to the religious realm (the opposition war-tragedy) . The first point can be related to Mauss 's condemnation of totalitarian regimes, the m ilitarization of eve1y area of social space , occupation of the whole by a part, a camp economy imposed on a civilian life . The second point would be set at the junction between Freud 's re
flections in Chapter 5 ofPsychologie collective et analyse du moi ( ' 'Deux Fmtles conventionnelles: l 'Eglise et l 'annee ") and Dumezil's works in which he dem
onstrated the double nature of the sovereign function, by turn simultaneously both religious and armed.
In the background, there is obviously the German army whose histoiJ' Benoist-Mechin had just related in four astounding volumes . In 1934, Emst
1 37
138 0 THE STRUCTURE AND FUNCTION OF THE ARMY
Jiinger 's Der Kampf als inneres Erlebnis (Le combat comme expenence interieure) (Combat as inner experience) was translated as La guerre notre mere
( War, o11r mother) . Caillois extracts long passages from this at the end of his book B ellone ou la pente de Ia guerre (Paris, 1963). On the other side of the Rhine wo11ld develop (according to the title of one of the fragmen ts reprod11ced here) a "mystical" conception of the army . It is the idea suggested by Dwnezil in a small book published in 1939, Mythes et dieux des Germains, later explicitly formulated in his Horace et les Curiaces ( 1 942): The militmy art of northern peo
ples "has remained on a more archaic, more mystical level . "
( O n two occasions, Paulhan was t o publish i n the NRF a note on Dumezil 's Mythes et dieux des Germains, which he signed each time with his pseudonym, Jean Guerin . The first note appeared in the September 1939 issue : "A fascinat
ing and amazingly topical study of the passage of an Indo-European-type sacer
dotal society to a magico-militmy society . Conceived in that manner, mythology revives sociology " [p. 527] . The second, right in the middle of the phony war, in February 1940: "Myth expresses an obsessive fear and makes it possible to sin
gle out 'certain psychological constants . ' Odin , 'the violently inspired, ' is leader of leaders . His chosen ones form 'a sort of magico-military society that is specifically Germanic . ' How is Odin to be disarmed? G. D . 's lucid and re
strained treatise is fascinating . " Drieu Ia Rochelle also would find in Dumezil ' s theses a grid through which events of the times fit into the order of th ings; see
"Etemelle Germanie, " Je suis partout [Jan uary 12, 1 940}, reprinted in Chronique politique [Paris, 1943], p. 2 1 3 . For his part, rather than reedit Mythes et dieux, Dumezil chose to rewrite it; consequently, in 1959 the book would become Les Dieux des Germains. This work, revised to the point of being a completely new book, is nonetheless presented in the illfroduction as the reedi
tion ofMythes et dieux 1 939, which it replaces . That does not prevent Dumezil from disowning h is theses of 1 939: The date and the haste that were too evident in its publication "are sufficient e::�planation, I hope, for the unevenness of an exposition outmoded as quickly as it was out of print. ' '
Forgetting that Munich had already taken place when this small volume ap
peared, Etiemble mused after the war on what might have happened if reading it had pre vented the democratic negotiators from being taken in by Odin/Hitler:
"Neither Daladier, nor Leger [the diplomatic name of Saillt-John Perse]. I sup
pose, read th is book in the plane taking them to Munich . Eve�ything was pre
dicted in it in black and white: Prague, Danzig, the lot" "Einstein , Dwnezil, "
Hygiene des lettres, val. 3 (Paris, 1950), p. 243} . )
The year 1 938 also saw the publication by de Gaulle of L a France e t son armee .
The following lines, which are related to the subject of the lecture, are taken from a review by Caillois of Maurice R . Davie 's work, La Guene dans les societes primitives (NRF, August 1 936) . War "eminently favors the
establish-THE STRUCTURE AND FUNCTION OF THE ARMY D 139
ment of autocracy, and, more generally, it m ultiplies the number of social im
peratives and their coercive force (for the sole and exclusively technical reason that discipline constitutes the 'principal force of annies') . It seems under these conditions that society 's tendency to increase its density (in the Durkheimian sense of the word) already constitutes a permanent and natural invitation to war, which reinforces the effective unity of the group by opposing it to enemies, and replaces its relaxed peacetime organization with a totalitarian structure. Then, at the same time, one understands that a society in which individualist tendencies can freely develop (a liberal democracy, for example) is less apt to make war and, especially, to set a high value on it than is a society of the type referred to as 'totalitarian , ' whose structure is adapted to war in advance, simultaneously by the framework it uses and by the psychology it provokes : identification with the leader, etc . " And the following: "Secret societies have a considerable influ
ence on the decisions concerning war as if the latter were there only in order to aggravate and justify a certain ideal of collective formation that finds in war it
self its most intense exaltation . . . ' '
All that to be connected with the notes Bataille wrote in 1941 (OC , vol. 5, p.
540) : " When I say that I have not liked war, I mean above all that I have never been sensitive to that sort of release, the pursuit of which war constitutes . The exhilaration and bursting pride it offers conquering regiments would have been denied me, even if the occasion presented itself, I think. For me, anything resem
bling these feelings (or having an affinity with them) is stifled the moment I am called on in person . I have discussed these things in order to understand them from the outside .
"How little I am attracted to war can easily be shown. Colltempormy live battle is less arresting for me than the more appalling trench wmfare . In war what is arresting for me is a means of agonized contemplation . For me that is still connected to a nostalgia for ecstatic states, yet this nostalgia today seems dubious and lugubrious to me: It never had, I must say, any active value . I never fought in any of the wars in which I might have been involved. ''}
The aggressive or defensive force of a society takes the name of "army" each time it is clem·ly distinguished from the whole. 1 There is only one word to designate the armies of populations that are civilized in diverse ways. And yet the militmy or
ganizations m·e very different from one another. The place they occupy in the so
ciety is variable as well. That is why it is difficult to generalize about them.
This difficulty does not hinder me to the extent that I do not want to discuss any real mmy. I shall speak of the army as I might speak of "father" or "1iot"
or any other human reality by describing the necessary connections the name evokes for me. What I shall express will, therefore, be no more than the mys
tique of the army that is inscribed within me as it is inscribed in the mind of the simplest of persons: a collection of beliefs and reactions that I hold in common
140 D THE STRUCTURE AND FUNCTION OF THE ARMY
with living men like myself. (These beliefs, these reactions, belong also to those who deny them since they deny them for having felt them).
I know that this reality to which I am bound (because the society on which I depend itself depends on the fate of its army) is the portion of the populatiqn that trains or is trained to fight.
Men fighting is not enough to make an army: It is necessary, first of all, for the bonds and reactions that are fmmed in drilling to have profoundly changed their hearts, minds, and bodies.
It seems to me that the difference between soldiers and other men is as striking as the changes seen in chemical reactions. When a body crystallizes, the mole
cules are newly organized, appearance and properties change. The same thing happens with recruits in the barracks. Doubtless it will be remarked that in the first instance the transformation is natural and in the second, artificial. But the distinction thus made depends entirely on the definition of "artificial. " If the transformation of recruits is not natural, it is only to the extent that man is op
posed to nature: that which is human is not for all that artificial. The painful transformation of the barracks is, moreover, one of the undertakings of men that least brings to mind a production imitated from nature.
Within society the army thus fmms before me a "constituted body," a world closed in on itself, different from the whole, different from other ''constituted bodies.'' It cannot be reduced to its function- which is war. It endless! y sets up poweiful bonds among a great many men whose behavior and nature are changed by them. And, this manner, it changes human nature. Because it does not sim
ply act on those whom it incorporates. It parades itself before others and offers itself for their admiration. It even claims to be the embodiment of their existence and their fate.
Society as a whole unites its members only by bonds that are comparatively loose. It gives them neither a job to fill nor a raison d'etre. It abandons them to their own particular destiny, whether it is good or bad. "Constituted bodies"
alone offer (or impose) tight bonds: They require that the men forming them join their fate to the fate of the "constituted body" ; this destiny becomes the raison d'etre for everyone, so much so that each one gets a job and must content himself with fulfilling it honorably in order to achieve it.
If the army were only in the business of attack or defense, in the same way a factory is in the business of producing, I would not insist on what it has engraved on my mind. A factory produces without binding workers to its fate, but the army does not send one to death for a bit of cash. The glory of the military and its code make the soldier be a part that cannot be disconnected: The glory of the army, the reward it most pursues, is everyone's common good, but, in compen
sation, the code does not permit anyone to escape discipline and danger. Like
wise, a factory does not try to pretend it is the utmost goal of existence; the army,
THE STRUCTURE AND FUNCTION OF THE ARMY D 14 1
on the contrary, making up a sort of intangible bloc unified in its movements, di
rects a constant challenge toward the rest of the men.
In the midst of other men given over to the pursuit of their private ends, it is the army that has glory, that rises above any specific or general utility. The a1my is not merely a means as are factmies or agriculture; it is glorious, and it teaches to live, suffer, and die in the pursuit of glory. It is sufficient unto itself and only in addition does it serve society. It is generally acknowledged that the army is there for the others and not the others for the army. The truth is that the army has the advantage of doing almost entirely without theory. To the extent that it makes a pretense, it borrows the language of the others and brags about its usefulness.
But when it obeys the stark impulses that make it strong, each man would have to consider himself content with contributing humbly to its glory.
The Army as a Totality with Its Own Autonomy
There are armies whose structures are very different from one another; further
more, the insertion and function of these armies within society vary according to the situation. A feudal army is utterly different from a national army and even more different from a professional army; and finally, an army of revolutionary partisans shows exceptional but temporary characteristics. Nonetheless, one can think of the army in a general manner, in the same way that one can think of a stalk in connection with plants regardless of any specific forms.
The army is that distinct part of society that fights or prepares itself, or trains in advance for fighting .
It is not a simple function, a simple organ of the community; it presents itself equally well as a totality sufficient to itself, a sort of being that is complete in itself, attached to the noncombatant population by connections that ar·e not even intangible. The fact that the army can exist by itself, moreover, is of only sec
ondary importance. It is still more remarkable that inside the community whose aggressive or defensive force it is, the army exists for itself; it constitutes a whole whose meaning is found in itself.
The army has an aesthetic all its own: It adorns itself with bright unifmms and is led by a band to show off its brilliance and give rhythm to movements like those of a virile and austere ballet corps. Its morality deviates from religious or philosophical morality both because of its superficial casualness and because of its violent physical and formalistic consequences. And although its technical op
eration makes use of all possible resources, it forms an isolated whole distin
guished by hasty performance, tumultuous speed, and, at the same time, pe
remptory negation of anything that might curb it. The lucidity and speed of decision that it requires and realizes in battle in the end confer on the mentality it represents an intellectual value sufficiently undeniable to have often served as a model for other activities. The army has then the capacity to stir human groups
142 D THE STRUCTURE AND FUNCTION OF THE ARMY
into a movement where all of life and all the aspirations of the individuals com
posing it are brought into play. Nevertheless, all this diverse wealth of the army is still only the condition for its human autonomy. Totality of existence comes for the army only at the moment in which it links to its destiny the life of each of those whom it unites into a single aggressive body and a single soul. In order to fiimly fix a correct and formal realization of this common fervor, the army groups its soldiers around a sacred emblem in the same way that a church clusters the houses that form a village around it. Most often this emblem is an object, col
ors, or a flag; it can also be a person (such as the noble maiden accompanying the nomads of Arabia into battle on a richly adorned camel). A leader can also have played the pari of emblem regardless of his action as one who leads. These em
blematic leaders and persons, these ensigns and flags are treated as the analogue of a soul by the body possessing them: It is better to die than have it taken away by the enemies. And conversely, it is easy to die for this conquering soul so ea
ger for conquests.
The Rudimentary Character of Sacred Elements in the Army
The attraction of anned men around a vital center is similar to the city's attrac
tion to its sacred places (even more than the attraction of the village around its church). It is through this striking adherence of life to what unites it that the army by itself can be considered similar to human communities as a whole and re
garded as a whole itself. It is true that an army is usually included within a so
ciety and is only the army of that society, but this insertion is always to a certain extent that of' 'a State within a State.'' More precisely, the connection of society and its army could be compared to an almost absolutely consistent connection, in which a small strong male would be joined with a large weak female2: Male and female each would possess a whole animal life, with the reservation that being habituated to each other takes away their capacity to live alone. However, human reality is not so simple: in one of its most familiar forms it could correspond to the predominance of the female who would possess the male and could show his presence at will, by borrowing his external appearance (giving an expression, a face to the society of [ ],3 in fact, is one of the most consistent functions of the army).
Sacrifice as Expression of the Intimate Harmony of Death and Life
It is easy to see the intensity of excitement produced at the point at which the mortal game of violent destruction and creation is played out.4 However, when one casts the light of consciousness on whatever is strangest in human existence,
THE STRUCTURE AND FUNCTION OF THE ARMY 0 143
what appears is not some simple fact but a remarkable complexity. The hesitant and uneven gravitation that we see takes place not around a single center but around several, and the nuclei fmmed in these various centers do not simply co
exist; often they are opposed to each other. Between the "men whose death is military" and the "men whose death is religious" or sacrificial, there are doubt
less many connections, but what directs them is still divergent and conflicts are still possible. This is so because the military literally buries death in the vainglo
rious rumble of battles, whereas the priest reels around death in fascination, re
maining in tragic turmoil until he has raised from it an image that is bloody but at the same time completely radiant and such that a sacred silence is required in its presence. For the man who fights, meeting death is simply a chance encounter, whereas it is the fate of the sacrificer who must each time divert it onto the vic
tim. The soldier contents himself with saying: ' 'There is death. You are to brave it without giving it a thought. You are to laugh at it. " The man of sacrifice gives
tim. The soldier contents himself with saying: ' 'There is death. You are to brave it without giving it a thought. You are to laugh at it. " The man of sacrifice gives