Rigorous drilling gave Egyptian soldiers an edge in battle through trained recognition of signals.

Evidence

If ever the Egyptian army could be said to have been superior to its Ottoman adversary, it was in situations like this when it was not the courage, honor or high morale that came to the rescue, but the constant drilling and repetitious training that induced the soldiers to recognize in the midst of the hubbub and clamor of the battle the familiar sight of a banner or the decipherable sound of a trumpet that signified something meaningful to them. These signals, banners and command shouts seemed to give the illusion of order in such tense moments. During the taxing hours of battle soldiers had no choice but to obey commands, not only because not obeying them brought with it the likelihood of punishment but also because disregarding them seemed to bring death closer still. The soldier stood to benefit personally from obeying orders during the decisive hours of battle since these orders gave at least a semblance of order and organization. — Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed Ali, his…, 1105

Categorization

Category: Causal Relationships

• XREF: Directly answers the reader’s question about Egyptian army performance versus the Ottoman adversary; connects to later discussion of drill and training effectiveness.

Related

• Egyptian soldiers obeyed battle commands because drill made signals meaningful amid chaos (similarity 0.94)
• The Egyptian army’s edge over the Ottomans came from drilled discipline, not courage. (similarity 0.87)
• Eleven years of drilling produced the Egyptian army’s synchronized infantry tactics (similarity 0.85)
• Egyptian drill deliberately trained soldiers to obey commands without reflection (similarity 0.84)
• Egyptian infantry replaced individual valor with drill-based unitary action (similarity 0.84)
• Egyptian drill built complex maneuvers from tiny standardized unit movements (similarity 0.82)
• Egyptian drill manuals reduced soldiers to interchangeable functioning cogs. (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptian educators modeled schooling explicitly on military drilling to build national power. (similarity 0.80)
• Ibrahim Pasha ordered soldiers to obey without reasoning for themselves (similarity 0.79)
• Training manuals reduced the Egyptian soldier to a machinelike interchangeable component. (similarity 0.79)
• Egyptian battle orders demanded soldiers’ literal obedience and forbade independent thought (similarity 0.78)
• Egyptian army discipline shifted from brutal force to abstract internalized controls (similarity 0.78)