August 
1914 
LAND AND WATEE 
TLe careiul student of foreign affairs •will rememLer liow, 
fifteen years ago, in a famous trial at Renues, there came out 
unexpei.todly tlie fact that the French General Staff intended 
to idopt tlio offensive in Alsace. 
Now oa this Friday, August 7th, the small advance 
guard of the French — a brigade, to be accurate — with some 
cavalry and certain supports of artillery took, just before sunset, 
the town of Altkirch. Upon the next day, Saturday, August 8th, 
this little force, or at least the mounted portion of it, 
rod* on into Mulhcus». 
The effect of this raid (for it was no more) was to rouse 
the Alsatian people to the conception of their deliverance. It 
was (as so many things will be in this war) political rather than 
strategic ; but, as we shall see in a moment, it was not done 
haphazard j there was strategy behind it. 
On the next day, Sunday, August 9th, the Fourteenth Army 
Corps of the Germans, composed of the men of Baden, advanced 
against this dai-ing French Brigade and against the division of 
which they formed a part and drove them out of Mulhouse 
again, but did not proceed so far as to recover Alkirch. 
From that moment, let it be noted, the French troops had 
established themselves in the Southern extremity of the Alsatian 
Plain — that is, in the beginnings of a flanking movement 
against the extreme German left. They had done this (Plan C) 
upon the extreme Southern end of the 300-mile sti-atcgie front. 
They were to do more. 
By Monday, August the 10th, the next day, it is time to 
turn to the other extremity of the long line of operations 
and to consider how the German Commanders proposed to treat 
the unexpected situation created on the Belgian Plains by the 
check they had received from the resistance of the forts at 
Li^ge. 
Tt is now quite clear what they did. They could not, as 
they had originally intended, push forward great masses of men 
across the plains north of the Meuse. They did not yet 
command the railways by which alone they could supply those 
masses ; but what they could at least do was to push forward 
rivalry with emergency rations and with orders to live as best 
tiiey could upon the country. To send forward a cloud of 
ciwalry thus was not a useless or merely theatrical operation ; 
it protected the slower advance of the infantry, which could ba 
made cither when the LiSge forts fell or whenever, more slowly, 
s'lpplics could ba pushed up by road over pontoon bridges 
thrown over the Meuse, down river and up river, out of roach 
of the LiSge forts. This ill-provided but mobile body of 
cavalry, with a little artillery, machine guns, and a few support- 
ing infantry, did as m Plan D. 
It was oa Monday, August 10th, along the line A-B in 
(he Flan D. By Wednesday, August 12th it was along 
the Hue C-D, and was checked in a hot action in front 
of Haelea by the Belgians. Before the end of the week, 
tliat is, before Sunday, the 16th, it was already along the line 
E-P and menacing Brussels. Meanwhile, quite a large body of 
cavalry with considerable infantry supports had tried oa Satur- 
day to pass the Meuse at Dinant, and had failed before tba 
French artillery defence at that point. 
Sj far we heard nothing in this country of what was 
going on behind this successful Cavalry advance of the Germans, 
and we could not judge how much, if at all, the big masses of 
I lie Army were backing it up. Monday, the 17th, and Tues- 
day, the I8th, this screen of Cavalry pressed no further forward ; 
apparently, therefore, it was wiiting for the mass of troojjs 
which it was designed to shelter to come up — but that hypo- 
thesis I will discuss a little later. We leave the advanced 
Gorman Cavalry with their few Infantry supports and their 
horse artillery and machine guns on this advance line upon 
Tuesday hst, the 18th, and return to the southern extremity 
where the offensive was the other way and the French were 
proposing to push in the German left. 
We have seen that on Sunday, August 9th, the French 
advance guard had been driven out of Mulhouse. But that 
week-end the French were making good their positions upon the 
crest and in the passes of the Vosges Mountains. Although we 
heard little about it in this country it was clear that, now their 
mobilisation was complete, the French in considerable force — 
perhaps altogether three Army Corj)s — meant to push against 
the German left in Alsace and to try and roll it up. They knew 
then, what wo know now, that Germany had no equal forces to 
oppose to this push. 
1 he fighting to secure the Passes of the Vosges (Saalcs, 
Sle. Marie, Bonhomme) went on for five days ; the Passes were 
£e:urcd and the Valleys leading down on to the Alsatian Plain 
were held in force. It was the second step toivards the turning 
of the German left, of which the reconnaissance upon Altkirch 
and Mulhouse before mobilisation was completed had been the 
fiiSt. 
All the German commanders could do against superior 
forces in this Alsatian field of war they did. They could not 
stop the superior numbers of the French from pouring over the 
mountains on to the Plain of the Bhine; but they ordered the 
considerable number of their troops which are round and in 
Metz to check the French advance by threatening its rear and 
by acting on the western side of the Vosges Mountains in the 
open Lorraine country. 
Already upon Tuesday, August 11th, the Gcnnans conducted 
a raid into France, about one day's march in extent, along the 
arrow maiked (1) in the Plan "C," and the next day, and 
the day after that, another raid along the arrow marked (2). The 
first of these blows was directed towards Spincourt, the others 
towards La Garde and Blamont. If this German effort had 
boea maintained and pushed further forward it is evident that 
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the Fi-cnch positions in the Vosges Mountains would have been 
untenable. They would have been threatened from the rear 
and would have had to retire out of Alsace. But the Gorman 
effort could not be maintained. Both these raids were beaten 
back by the superior French forces in this region, and by 
Sunday, the 16th, the French securely lield the frontier round 
Avricourt and thus protected the rear of their columns pushing 
over the Vosges. 
Oa the next day, Monday, the 17th, the French had filled 
and completely held all the mountain valleys which lead down 
from the crests of the Vosges on to the Alsatian Plain. Upon 
Tuesday, the 13th, they achieved a stroka^of capital importance. 
They got astraddle of the main railway line uniting Metz and 
Strassburg by occupying the town and region of Saarbourg, 
and their general situation on this part of the front was as in 
Plan F. 
It was now clear that a very strong French offensive upon 
the extreme left of the field of operations — that is, against the 
weak South of the German line — was seriously intended by the 
French. They were strongly posted just between the two gixat 
fortresses of Strasbui^ and Metz. They held, at Saarbourg, the 
main railway junction of that line. They threatened to 
advance further north immediately, and to threaten all the 
southern communications of the Gorman army. It was almost 
equally clear upon co-ordinating all the news relating to that 
Tuesday evening, the 18th, that at the other extremity of the 
field, upon the German right in the Belgian Plain, a serious, 
though belated offensive, was contemplated against the Franco- 
Belgian left. 
(By this time the whole of the English Allied Force had 
been landed, and was presumably arrived at its allotted post). 
If we pause to sum up the situation as it was revealed to be 
upon Tuesday night and Wednesday morning of this week in 
the telegrams which reached London upon the Wednesday 
evening, it runs as follows : — 
The strategicivl front of the Germans upon which the whole 
of the operations had begun, and upon which at any tncmeut 
9* 
