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Originally Posted by ericthered
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But they were not the primary weapons. Napoleonic Cavalry used the lance and the saber as their primary weapons. the pistols fired one or two shots, and the cavalry faced off against superior numbers in most cases.
And any tool can be used wrong. And as stated, cavalry was used to great and decisive effect all over the eastern front of WWI. This wasn't just dragoon style fighting. It was charges. Not it every case, but it happened a lot. The weapon that stopped the charge as a tactic in WWI was the machine gun. And the machine gun requires excellent logistics. ...
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Sorry the too above are linked.
Even by the early C19th cavalry charging against infantry in all but the most favorable situations was a bad idea, so its not really a case that cavalry were regularly and successfully charging home against riflemen 100 years later unless there was machine gun in play.
Have you got cites of these successful charges happening a lot? As opposed to cavalry being used a lot because they are good mobile force for fighting in the more open eastern front context. But actually most of the time they fought like mobile infantry.
EDIT: sorry just to say I'm not claiming it never happened, and if it happened it happened more often in the east, just that I don't think it happened as much as you imply.