LAND AND WATEE 
October 17, 1914 
to-day. It is wLcther the garrison remained too long 
within tlic walls of Antwerp, and whether, therefore, 
the small di-aits of the Allies sent in to counsel and 
aid such prolonged resistance were justified in ^their 
an-ival and m that prolongation. There is no doubt 
of the object: the object was to see whether the 
German forces m front of Antwerp could not bo held 
until the Allies had done the trick further south and 
had pierced into the German lines east of Lille. At 
any rate Antwerp fell before that success was 
achieved (for it is not even yet achieved), and the 
delay therefore proved not an advantage but a hiirt. 
Instead of the garrison getting av/ay in good condition, 
for u.se in the Meld, when the first breach had been 
made in the fortifications, only a portion got away ; 
another smaller portion— but over 20,000 men— are 
prisoners of wai- ; not, indeed, in the hands of the 
enemy, but interned in Holland. These include a 
certain number of Englishmen. It is evident that every 
hour's delay, as the Gennans advanced northward 
towaixls the city, nan-owed the belt between the German 
lines and the Dutch frontier. For Antv/erp lies 
squeezed up along that frontier. And along that belt 
the retreat had to be conducted. That belt was 
naiTOwed so much Avhen Antwerp fell that part of the 
evacuating garrison, including 2,000 British, would 
not or could not risk the defile and took refuge in 
Holland. 
But the second point is not of academic interest, 
but is still of poignant and practical interest, and that 
second point concerns the immediate value of this 
act to the Gei-mans. This is threefold. 
(c) What number of troops has the fall of 
Antwei"p released for the use of the 
enemy. 
{b) Of what quality are these troops, 
(c) In what dii'ection will they probably be 
used. 
(a) As to the numbers actually released by tlie 
fall of Antwerp. 
We have first of all the two guesses and the 
biassed statement. 
The biassed statement talks of 200,000 men. 
Now we may dismiss that immediately. The care- 
fully organised Prussian system of influencing oi^inion 
includes fantastic stories spread through Copenhagen 
and Rome, as weU as the reasonable stuff from 
Amsterdam and the really sober and accurate officiid 
communiques. This German talk of 200,000 men 
released by the fall of Antwei-p belongs to the first 
and worst category. The two guesses are the French 
estimate of 60,000, and a local estimate (on the 
sources of which I need not dwell) of 45,000. 
I conceive the French estimate to be the nearest 
to the tmth. More than 45,000, of whatever kind 
of troops, the Gennans must have had in the face of 
the resistance they had to meet upon the Nethc, 
and of the probable (though, as it turned out, not the 
actual) task before them in the occupation of a city 
which, with its suburbs, counts nearer three-quarters 
of a million than half-a-million in numbers. But 
since we may be absolutely certain that in an action 
where their artillery was sure to succeed and under 
such active menace to their communications through 
Bortbem France, the Germans would not wixste a 
single man before Antwerp, we need not put the 
numbers at over 00,000. 
Nor ai-e all those 00,000 released. A certain 
number — not large — will be requu-ed to police 
Antwerp itself and to occupy the neighbourhood. A 
much larger number are accounted for by the neces.sity 
of facing the line of troops parallel with the sea-coast, 
Belcian, English, and French., from north and south cf 
Ostend onwards. Say that 40,000 men are released 
from directly in front of Antwerp arul }'ou have 
probably an exaggerated statement. Moreover, the 
same act releases for the field a much larger number 
of Belgian troops, who can give and have given a 
very good account of themselves against an equal 
number of the German reserves. 
We may sum up and say that the direct result, 
the full amount of extra troops free for German work 
from before Antv/erp, is not the significant point in 
the matter. Call it a division and not two divisions 
and you will not be far out. W/iat is far more 
important is the effect of the fall of Antwerp ^ in 
rdeasiiig vim now used aloi)(j the communications 
leticecn JJeije and the French frontier, and the tiininf/ 
of the fall of Antwerp for the arrival in France of nc:a 
German troops. 
So long as tlic Belgian Army lay within Antwerp 
it potentially threatened the main line of German 
communications through Belgium. Readers of tliesc 
columns will remember the raid upon the railway 
between Louvain and Brussels some three or four 
weeks ago. Now the getting rid of this threat 
means (1) tbe release of men kept, on account of the 
threat, on the main line, Liege— Namur — Hirson ; 
(2) the power of moving forward into France new 
troops. 
Let us take these points in order. What release 
of men wiU be effected from the main line through 
Belgium by the withdi-awal of the Antwerp menace ? 
Nothing very great. 
Ox two things, one. Either this astonishing new 
Prussian doctrine (that murder and fire are tolerable 
to the Em-opean conscience for the purpose of securing 
communications through hostile country) has been 
successful, or it has not. Either the railway lino 
from Liege to Hirson wanted its regular complement 
of men a mile (and a di\ision could have held it 
anyhovv), or it did not. /// cither case the fall cf 
Antioerp onli/ releases the force that was previously 
masking Antwerp. It does not release any consider- 
able force kept upon the main line of communications 
to the south. There is no more mere ten-or than before. 
But here comes in the second point. The 
Germans quite ceiiainly attacked Antwerp at this 
late moment in order to be free to move through 
Belgium on to tlie Allied fiank new troops which, 
till this moment, they had not ready. What arc those 
troops ? 
It is certain that Germany is about to bring 
through Belgium against the Allies in France very 
considerable new forces. Of what they will consist 
we can only guess. They cannot come in great force 
until there has been some decision in the east ; they 
■may be the better trained of the new conscripts ; they 
may be yet further bodies tentatively and perilously 
withdrawn from the left and the centre of the long 
German line in France. But though the bringing of 
those forces upon the Hank of the Allied lino, that is 
upon the Franco -Belgian frontier at Lille, and to the 
west thereof, is the most probable event of the near 
futiu-e, and though the fall of Antwerp will facilitate 
the movement, I do not sec a\ hence the enemy can very 
seriously increase his value (not his numbers) in this 
field. The German Government has undoubtedly 
called up all its boys and old men. Unlike the French, 
it will keep no reserves, but stakes all on now. Equally 
undoubtedly it is noAV ready to put into the field in 
France sojne new ti-aincd and probably mixed force : 
it would not attack Antwerp till that was ready. Eat 
of wliat value v.ill that force be ? 
8* 
