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Period of Achievement of the Siege. 
According to General Wiebe the artillery combat is the most difficult part of 
the siege—whoever is victorious is certain to gain a complete victory. If the 
combat has terminated in favour of the besiegers, their artillery will have nothing 
more to fear from the guns of the defenders, and will be able to apply itself 
seriously to the work of demolition, which has already been begun during the 
artillery combat. The infantry and pioneers will naturally have taken advantage 
of the artillery success to make a trench of some extent opposite the principal 
position of the defenders, which should now be used to make an advance upon 
the body of the place. If necessary it should be extended to the flanks, and if 
the defenders are still in possession of any points from which they may interfere 
with these ulterior operations, they must be driven from them. All obstacles must 
be removed which may prevent the infantry from taking up the position which 
will serve as a point of departure for the attack by sap, and which will cover at 
the same time the batteries directed against the body of the place. 
This infantry position is really nothing but a first parallel, and it would be 
simpler to call things by their right names, but the General does not like to make 
use of so obsolete a term, which recalls the time when the engineer department 
played the principal part in a siege. This is no longer the-case, as the attack by 
sap will not be necessary in the case of the detached forts, and only under certain 
conditions in the case of the body of the place. The artillery combat is now the 
principal operation of the siege, the rest being only accessory. This seems to be 
General Wiebe’s real opinion, as, although he devotes some lines to a description 
of the conduct of the defence during the last days of the siege, it is done in such 
a laconic manner that the author does not seem to have any great confidence in 
the efficacy of the means which he recommends. 
Before concluding this examination of General Wiebe’s theories, it is necessary 
to retrace our steps in order to discuss some of his statements which are 
especially noteworthy—and, first, with regard to the division into periods, this is 
undoubtedly convenient for the study of the operations, but it has the disadvan¬ 
tage of being somewhat arbitrary and of giving an inexact idea of the combat. 
Is General Wiebe sure that the attack and defence of a fortress will really pass 
through all these different phases, and are not the distinctions which he makes 
between batteries of “ preparation,” of “ execution,” &c., and between the 
different kinds of reserves, of a very complicated nature P All the methods of 
attack hitherto recommended by foreign military authors are much simpler than 
his, and in that respect are certainly superior, as, in the operations of war, 
simplicity is one of the conditions of success. 
One of the tactical principles upon which General Wiebe most frequently 
insists is that it is necessary to act quickly and by surprise. This principle is 
excellent in itself, but would it not sometimes be difficult to follow ? We think 
that the General would have done well to have indicated the means by which he 
proposes to overcome the obstacles met with in a real siege. It must be assumed 
that the fortress, under the conditions here considered, will be powerfully armed, 
and the besiegers will require a considerable park of siege guns, and it is a pity 
that the General does not give any information on the point, so as to be able to 
estimate the efforts required on either side. General Brialmont considers that 
the besiegers will require to bring up to the first artillery position at least 700 
guns, howitzers, and mortars. If this be so, the deployment of such an artillery 
would entail great labour, and it would have been useful to show how the 
elements of rapidity and surprise could be made compatible with such an under¬ 
taking. 
The last and at the same time most important observation concerns the method 
of attack chosen. Everything rests upon the idea that the artillery alone is 
capable of reducing the line of detached forts, whose resistance will be easily 
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