LAND AND WATER 
October 31, 1914 
shore of the Straits, would incliue the judgment of 
Englishmen and their political directors to keep 
great bodies at home and thus to check the supply of 
reuiforcements from Britain to France. That supply 
Avould be interfered with, or would cease. The naval 
aid afforded by Britain to France would also be 
impaired. 
2. It is believed by no inconsiderable body of 
German critics, that an invasion of this country could 
be arranged from the coast of Flanders and Pouthieu 
(that is from the ports of Dunkirk and Calais, and so 
round the heights of Grisnez Cape to Boulogne) in a 
fashion more direct and secure than from further 
north. The arguments in favour of this theory must 
be summarised in a separate category of their own as 
follows : — 
(a) Heavy artillery could command the major 
part of the width of the Straits of Dover, 
perhaps three-quarters. Once let it be 
known that shells could be accurately 
dropped at a given range (and the range of 
a ship in fine weather can be found from 
secui-e positions on land to a few yards) over 
the most part of the Straits, and the traffic 
through them, the communications between 
the North Sea and the Channel, the main 
traffic from the world to the Port of London 
would be half strangled. 
(b) Under protection of such heavy artillery 
mines could be laid, and this mine-field, 
with passages thi'ough it known only to the 
enemy, would approacli very near to the 
shores of this island. The mine-field could 
be pushed forward under cover of any 
difficult weather or of darkness. Once it 
was laid the last dash to be made over 
the very few miles beyond what could be 
mined would perhaps be negligible. 
(c) The element of distance is exceedingly 
important in connection with transports. 
Whether you are going to be a day at sea 
or an hour may make in the tonnage required 
by you a difference of doubling or halving it. 
So much tonnage which will take horses and 
guns and men for a sea journey of a day 
or two would take certainly twice as many 
men and horses and guns and perhaps 
three times as many for a journey of only 
an hour or two. Therefore, to secure the 
short passage is to double or treble yonr 
capacity to carry. 
(</) The short passage once secured could be (it 
is argued, not proved), at least intermit- 
tently maintained for the further passage 
over to England of supply. An ex- 
pedition which had foiight off and partially 
crippled an opposing fleet through the wide 
northern part of the North Sea would still 
have to take with it all its munitions and aU 
its provisions for a raid. But one which 
had secured the passage of the narrow seas 
at their narrowest point might depend upon 
at least intermittent replenishment from the 
further shore. The invading force would not 
be burdened with the necessity of having 
to bring with it the supply for many weeks. 
{e) That guardianship of the (German shore by a 
British blockading fleet which is possible 
in the Bight of Heligoland (where the 
re-entrant angle of the coast confines an 
enemy and gives to ^the blockader the 
shortest segment to watch outside the gulf) 
is, in the case of the nan-ow seas, reversed. 
Here the bend is the other way ; it goes 
outward. Outside the Bight of Heligoland 
the British sailors watch the mouth of a 
purse. On the bulging and shallow lines of 
the shore from the Scheldt to Boulogne 
they would be like men dodging round 
outside an enclosure : a park wall. To 
watch what was going on all the way from 
Boulogne to the Scheldt would, like any 
other similar task, be a task heavy in 
proportion to the thickness of the weather 
or the darkness of the night, but it would 
also be a task dividing the existing British 
naval force ; weakening it in the north. 
Upon this truth de^jends the last and 
perhaps the most important point. 
{f) The possession of the Straits of Dover on 
the French side would give the enemy the 
choice of dcparttire. 
It is an elementaiy point in all strategics that 
if you are about to take the offensive, your prime 
factor towards success is a doubt in the mind of the 
enemy as to the point from which you wiU attack. 
Now, so long as the transports lined up in the Ems 
Eiver, and their convoy in the shape of German 
ships both in that river and in and beyond the Kiel 
Canal and in the harbours adjacent thereto, repre- 
sented the certain, known, and only opportunity for a 
raid upon this country, this " choice of departure " 
did not exist for the Germans nor has this doubt dwelt 
in the mind of our commanders. 
The sole point of departure was known. The 
great disturbing factor which is imperative for 
the strategist to introduce into his opponent's mind, 
perplexity as to the next move, was absent. But 
let it be conjectural from which of several possible 
points (the Scheldt, the ports of Flanders, Calais) the 
attack may come, and from which of two distinct 
fields (the Bight of Heligoland and the shore of the 
Netherlands) the attack may come, and that all- 
important element of douht has at last been presented 
to Great Britain by the Germans just as it was pre- 
sented by them to the French before they hurled 
themselves on to the Sambre. I think that this con- 
sideration weighed as heavily as any other with those 
German rulers who determined upon the Calais march. 
But now let us briefly consider what there is to 
be said against that march as a strategical proposition, 
(a) In the fii'st place, the command of the Straits 
by heavy artillery is not complete. If the 
Straits were 10 miles instead of 20 across, 
it would be a very different matter. But 
it so happens that at this juncture of the 
world's affairs the erosion of the centuries 
has produced a gap of 20 miles between 
Britain and the Continent, while the pro- 
gress of artillery has produced an effective 
range of much less than 20 miles. 
(i) Next, let it be noted that there is not sufficient 
transport on the French and Netherland 
shores for a raid. They may have enough 
in Antwerp — but I doubt it. They have 
not a tenth enough, even if all the shipping 
were left undamaged in Calais and Dunkirk ; 
and they cannot get transports down from 
the German ports to these new ports should 
they occupy them : whether the Calais 
march should succeed or not I shall discus? 
later. 
Anyhow this lack of transport would seem to me 
to settle the matter, and to determine what I have 
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