LAND AND WATER 
December 12, 1914. 
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easily be broken by the increasing pressure of a 
successful enemy. On this account there always 
comes a moment when a great town of this sort 
behind a defending line must be abandoned as that 
line falls back. And to abandon it too late is to 
invite disaster. For the defending line as it gets 
curved more and more round upon the solid block of 
building is more and more exposed to a converging 
fire, and its own fire becomes more and more diver- 
gent, while the retirement through a large town is 
a slow and crowded movement. The streets are 
defiles, and in the suburbs the country on each side 
of the road is encumbered by a thousand obstacles, 
even before you reach the continuous built area. 
Therefore the Russians deliberately aban- 
doned Lodz, and they have presumably straight- 
ened out their line behind the town. 
Now let us estimate the military value of the 
whole affair. As I hope I have sufficiently pointed 
out above, the main business of the Germans js to 
make the great Russian force which threatens 
Cracow, and, therefore, the industrial region of 
Silesia, relax its pressure and send drafts to the 
north. In pursuance of this object the German 
commanders, as we know, made this bold stroke in 
the north, failed in its first phase, only just avoided 
disaster, then received heavy reinforcements from 
the western field to the number of close on a 
quarter of a million, and with these rein- 
forcements fought, as it were, a new battle; 
the battle of the present week, which may 
m general terms be called the battle of Lodz. 
In this new battle the Germans have achieved 
very appreciable, and, in their own eyes, conspicu- 
ous success. They have reoccupied this large town 
of Lodz : they have pressed back the Northern Rus- 
sian Army. How far they have thus been suc- 
cessful the accompanying very rough plan will 
suggest. When this second battle began, after 
the German reinforcements arrived, the Russian 
line ran roughly as the dotted line does. After 
four days' i\ghtmg against these reinforcements 
the Russian line ran as the line of crosses does. 
Now apparently it runs as the full line does. 
In lOther words, the Russians have given 
ground, especially upon their left wing, and in 
giving ground they have had to abandon Lodz. 
This abandonment of Lodz may, as I have said, be 
both exaggerated and underestimated. Let me 
try to put it justly. 
Politically the matter is of the greatest con- 
sequence. Lodz is already half a German town, 
for the German-speaking Jews in it and the Ger- 
mans in it are in sympathy with the invader. It 
is the chief industrial centre of all Poland. Much 
more important in the moral values of such a cam- 
paign as this, Lodz is reoccupied after having been 
abandoned. It represents a return, and a success- 
ful return, of German power, strongly impressing 
local opinion. 
Strategically, however, the thing is much 
less important. The occupation of Lodz does in- 
deed give the enemy the possession of a point where 
a number of communications meet, as will be appa- 
rent from the accompanying sketch (VII. ). The 
town is the centre of five or six great roads, and 
there is a system of double-line railways (with one 
single-line railway running from south-east) which 
Lodz commands. But apart from that minor de- 
tail, the occupation of Lodz is not of great strate- 
gical importance. 
Sufficient reasons have been given above to 
show that the general object of the Germans, that 
of relieving pressure in the south, was to be at- 
tained by turning the Russian Army on its right 
along the Vistula and occupying Warsaw: the 
nodal point for all comrau'ications of the Northern 
Russian Army. But though the most violent 
German efforts have been made against Russia's 
right wing, along the Vistula, they have not suc- 
ceeded. Warsaw is not approached. The Ger- 
mans have only pu.shed that v.'ing back as far a^i 
Ilov. The German success, as the sketch 
shows, is on the Russian left wing. It is that wing 
which has been most pushed back, because with 
devastated roads and railways behind it, it was 
farthest from its base of supply. The Vistula will 
feed the Russian lines amply at their right extreme 
with reinforcements and with ammunition. But 
the left extreme, dependent upon road traffic under 
abominable conditions (a thaw has just set in all 
over Central Poland), has undoubtedly had to give 
way from lack of supply — especially artillery 
supply — for the moment. 
Well, thus to push back the Russian left wing, 
though a success, is not a success of any decisive 
kind. It is a score : it is not a win. Until or 
unless the Russian right wing is-pushed back and 
the point Warsaw is in the hands of the enemy, 
the original Northern Army is still perfectly 
secure. 
Has there been any withdrawal of men from 
the south to help it ? 
The only evidence of anything of the kind is 
an enemy telegram announcing the reports of cer- 
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