Jaimarf 2, 1915. 
LAND AN^D WATER' 
RSAW 
Kterniewjce 
IS »o TS 
It will be remembered that the Germans, when 
they failed in the first phase of the second battle for 
Warsaw rather more than a fortnight ago, made an 
attempt in a rather half-hearted manner to threaten 
the town in an altogether novel direction from East 
Prussia, advanced with perhaps fifty or sixty 
thousand men along the railway through Mlawa to 
about the point A B, where they were checked and 
driven back over the frontier. The Russians who 
inflicted this check towards the north are said to 
have been reinforced and to have occupied in some 
strength the district which lies between the Mlawa 
railway, the Vistula, and the frontier, having come 
■down m number upon the point of Dobrzyn and the 
banks of the river just below, opposite the town of 
Woclawek. As I have said, all this movement is 
obscure. We know nothing of the numbers in 
which the thing is being done, we have no official 
news upon it — nothing but private correspondence ; 
and it is obvious that anything save a very large 
force here would be in danger fi-ora the German 
armies in East Prussia. Stul, if there is a large 
force operating here to the north, if those slowly 
equipped and slowly ai'riving Russian reserves with 
which the Russian front is constantly being fed 
liave been largely directed along the right bank of 
the Vistula, then their presence below Plock and in 
all this Government of Plock which lies between the 
Mlawa railway and the river would, fi:om the banks 
of the Vistula, seriously threaten the main German 
communications : that is, if the forces upon the Vis- 
tula were accompanied by heavy artillery and could 
hope to cross under the cover of its fire. The only 
line of communication for the German armies in 
front of Warsaw, which now stand along the line 
■C D and have been held up there by the Russians in 
the fighting of the last week, is the railway which 
goes i'rom Lowicz to Thorn in Prussia, and that 
railway is vulnerable from the Vistula for some 
miles above and below Woclawek, where it ap- 
proaches the stream. I only give the rumour 
for what it is worth. The chances seem to 
be heavily against anything coming of such a 
movement. It may very well be no more than a 
cavalry raid. It is very much too far away fi-om 
the main field of fighting, and much too greatly in 
danger on its own flank from East Prussia above 
(the Germans have already moved a large force to 
Mlawa, which they have reoccupied) ; but if any- 
thing comes of it, its origins in this unconfirmed 
message are worth watching. 
II.— THE BATTLE FOR CRACOW^. 
The conditions of the battle for Cracow in the 
south differ fundamentally from those for the 
possession of Warsaw in the north. It is not only 
that the roles are reversed, and that while it is the 
German object to seize Warsaw, it is the Russian 
object to seize, or at least to invest or mask, 
Cracow ; it is also that the nature of the fighting, 
the ground, and, we may now add, the results, are 
so different from what has taken place along the 
Bzura and the Rawka, 150 miles away. In fiont of 
Warsaw the Russians have checked and thi'own 
back the German offensive. In front of Cracow the 
Austrian movements (stiffened perhaps by an 
addition of German troops) having pushed the 
Russians back an average of 50 miles from that 
fortress, which is the gate of Silesia, are now 
suffering from a return of the Russian offensive, 
which return has for several days in succession 
continued to advance. 
As we saw above, the southern end of the 
Russian line ran down the Lotsosina, to where that 
tributary joins the Nida, then down the Nida to its 
mouth, where it falls into the Vistula. Beyond the 
Vistula it followed roughly the course of the Lower 
Donajez, up to the confluence of its tributary, the 
Biala, and then ran up that tributary past Tarnow, 
through Tuschow, and so across the hilLs to Opilny, 
to Jaslo, to Krosno, and thence southwards it 
reposed upon the mountains. This line, it will be 
seen, though pushed well back from Cracow, still 
kept astraddle of the great main railway of Galicia, 
R R, which is essential to the life of any army 
operating in that province. There are other side rail- 
ways, some of which I have indicated on Plan IX., 
which help to supply the Russian army, or at least 
to take the pressure off" the main line. But it is the 
possession of that main line which is life or death to 
either combatant ; particularly to the Russians, 
because along it fi-om the eastward they obtain all 
their provisions in a naked land, where the grip of 
winter is now far more severe than it is round 
Warsaw to the north. 
It is further evident that this Russian line as 
it was drawn up at the end of the retirement not 
quite a fortnight ago, was designed to cover 
Przemysl, as 1 have said. In order to uncover 
Przemysl and relieve it from its investment by the 
Russians, and in order to compel the Russians to 
fall back until they were parallel with the railway 
R R and at last perhaps should be forced to cross 
it to their certain disaster, the Austro-German 
forces were concerned not only to push along the 
northern foot of the Carpathian Mountains, follow- 
ing up the Russian retirement, but also to capture 
the passes, and so threaten the Russian line in the 
rear. 
Apparently by the calling up of men from 
Servia (and paying the price in the disaster suffered 
there) the Austrians found sufficient men just to 
force the passes. They occupied first the Dukla 
Pass, then, in much smaller numbers, the crest of 
the Lupkow, and were, in stiU smaller numbers, stiU 
fighting ten days ago for the Uszoc Pass. It was 
just at that moment that the Russian counter- 
offensive began ; and these Russian movements 
always mean, as we know from the past, the coming 
up of the newly equipped bodies, for it cannot be 
too often repeated, if we are to understand this war, 
that while Russia's advantage is numbers Russia's 
disadvantage (especially since Turkey came in) is 
slowness of equipment and supply. 
The new Russian offensive, then, first took the 
form of tlu'owiiig the Austrians from the left bank 
of the Nida, which they had occupied, to the right 
bank. The fighting took place especially in the 
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