December 12. 1914, 
LAND AND WATER 
TRANSPORT, ROADS, AND MINES IN 
THE COMING SIEGE WARFARE. 
By COL. F. N. MAUDE, C.B. (late R.E.). 
I AM afraid there are still some weary weeks — possibly 
mouths — of trench and siege warfare before us, 
though not necessarily in Belgium, and these will entail 
on all ranks an amount of spade work far beyond what 
they expected when they first joined. 
Much of it, too, will not be in the front line under 
fire, where, as I Iiave pointed out, men will put their whole 
hearts into the w&rk, but on lines of communications and road 
repair, where the overwhelming need is not so clearly 
apparent. 
Now, the whole art of getting work out of your men, if 
you are an officer, or of doing it yourself, if a private, is to 
bo saturated with a sense of its importance, and to under- 
stand why certain measures are adopted. 
Road making or maintenance, though based on very simple 
ideas, is by no means so obvious a business as the uninitiated 
is apt to suppose, and the amateur is far more likely to go 
■wrong than to go right by trying short cuts of his own in- 
stead of following out conscientiously his instructions. 
On this point I speak with some experience, as I have seen 
roads almost irretrievably ruined by well-meant expedients, 
and thousands upon thousands of pounds, not to speak of time, 
wasted on alignments and drainage, which never had a hope 
of success. 
I should like to see a number of lecturers, chosen from 
practical engineering contractors, accustomed to moving heavy 
weights in lialf-fiuislied docks, canals, and similar under- 
takings, chosen to go round and lecture to the brigades of the 
New Armies. They would be doing a great public service, 
and having such a thorough practical knowledge of their busi- 
ness, they could not fail to carry conviction. The subject is 
of pressing interest just now, because the demands made on 
the road, and the needs of the new forms of transport — petrol- 
driven lorries, for example — are quite different to those of 
former days, when you could generally get along somehow, and 
speed and certainty of keeping time with deliveries was not 
the first essence of the contract. 
I have been led to choose this subject this week because I 
already see indications of a coming split between controlling 
authorities. In the old days of horse transport roads were 
essentially under the control of the Royal Engineers, who knew 
just as much about what horses and waggons required as any- 
body else; and the people who drove and controlled the wag- 
gons knew all about roads. 
Nowadays we have a new department of mechanical trans- 
port, who certainly know all about their own machines, but 
have no practical knowledge of the limitations under which 
the road maintainer has to work. We have, in fact, the same 
conflicting interests to reconoile as in the case of the never- 
ending strife between the locomotive superintendent and the 
engineer in charge of the roadway in every railway company; 
and, from want of experience, we have no authorised co- 
ordinating head to reconcile the coming difhoulties, which are 
bound to arise because our motors of all kinds are an ex- 
pedient adapted to war requirements, and not a design to 
deal with war requirements, and there is all the difference in 
the world between tlie two. 
The transport man sayg to the engineer : " You make 
roads to carry ray vehicles, '^' and the engineer replies: " Such 
roads cannot be made in the time; you must design vehicles 
to travel on my roads." 
Some few years ago, when I was asked to design a trans- 
port train for the use of tho army of the new Chinese Republic, 
in districts where no real roads exist and mud more or less 
bottomless wa.s about tlie nearest approach to firm ground that 
existed, I had to make many investigations into traction prob- 
lems, and tried my hand on several inventions myself; but 
tho other day I almost tumbled over a complete and workable 
solution of all thoBc difficulties, whicli has caused me to aban- 
don all my own ideas and reverently salute tlie inventor. 
For reasons connected with our patent laws, T am not at 
liberty to describe the wliole design. But I arr* convinced tliat 
if he had only been ready some five years sooner, so that wo 
oould have commanded some 1,000 or more of his maohinee, 
we could liavc eliminated praotically all the road and trans- 
port difficulties to whicli I have called attention and intro- 
duced an entirely new era in siege warfare, wliich might 
have made a difference of months in the' time we shall probably 
require for the reduction of the trenches in Belgium and tha 
sieges of the Rhine fortresses. 
Provided with this appliance, our heaviest siege artillery 
could be manoeuvred over the country we have to travorsa 
almost as freely as ships over the sea ; and not only would 
this power enable us to bring a whole mass of guns, unex- 
pectedly and simultaneously, into action, but the dangen 
and difficulties of approach, owing to the land mines we may 
expect to encounter, could be overcome by the adaptation of 
expedients already well known and practised at sea. We 
could even use tliem for crushing down and rolling over wire 
entanglements, the most formidable of all the obstructions wa 
have to overcome, and I can only hope that the difficulties 
the inventor is bound to encounter may be smoothed away so 
speedily that his idea may be given a practical test before tha 
war is over. 
To make quite clear what the gain to us would really 
amount to, I would ask the reader to try to calculate the 
chanoes of a particular ship, or " land ship " of this type, if 
I may be allowed to coin a new word, striking a particular 
mine in traversing an area of given dimensions. Clearly if tha 
area is large the odds are immensely against such a collision ; 
but if the passage of the ship or land ship is confined to a narrow 
channel, such as a road, on which the defender can concentrate 
all liis resources, the chances can be raised to an absolute cer- 
tainty against the ship. People habitually talk of " sowing 
mines," whether on land or sea, as if the supply was inex- 
haustible, and the cost negligible. In reality, the cost (s high 
and the supply limited, and to secure a roadstead on a five- 
mile radius, or to render untenable all the possible gun stations 
within a five-mile circle of a besieged city, is absolutely be- 
yond the financial means of any country. 
But in war it rarely pays to spend money on " off 
chances." If the end in view cannot be obtained with reason- 
able certainty on a small expenditure, then one does not 
spend the money at all, but concentrates it upon some more 
certainly profitable purpose. 
A DIARY OF THE WAR 
DAY BY DAY. 
TUESDAY. DECEMBER 1st. 
In Belgium the German infantry endeavoured, without 
success, to come out of their trenches south of Bixschoote. 
Between Bethune and Lens we carried the ch&teau and 
park of Vermelles by assault after a somewhat hot encounter. 
In the Argonne we advanced appreciably in the woods of 
La Grurie. 
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 2ad. 
In Belgium tliere was a violent bombardment of Lampcr- 
nisse, west of Dixmude. 
In the Argonne the enemy blew up, by means of mines, the 
north-western spur of the forest of La Grurie. 
In Alsace our troops carried Aspach-le-Haut and Aspach- 
le-Bas, south-east of Thann. 
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 3rd. 
In Belgium there was a somewhat lively cannonade upon 
Nieuport and to the south of Ypres. 
From the Lys to the Somme there was a violent bombard- 
ment from Aix-Noulette to tho west of Lens. 
In the Argonne several attacks by tho enemy were re- 
pulsed, and we made slight progress. 
FRIDAY. DECEMBER 4th. 
No notable incident has occurred on the front as a whole. 
On our right wing we advanced in the direction of, and 
near, Altkirch. 
Information was received that on December 2 we made 
991 prisoners in tho Northern region alone. 
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 5th. 
To the north of Lys wo made appreciable progress. Our 
infantry, attacking at daybreak, carried with a single charga 
two lines of trenches. The gain was 500 metres. 
J3» 
