LAND A N D .W ATE R. 
February 27, 1915. 
only losses in guns would be the cases %vliicl) do 
o^cm in a rapidlv-pressed advance oi guns dis- 
aWei b? the cn'en.y-s^ fire. In transport l.ard^y any 
loss, but in men a very heavy one. ^ ou do not 
Se a quautity of defiles between maj-s^'es a.id m 
such weather against even a greatly inlenor 
enerny (Russians\-ere inferior by perhaps one to 
t nee without losing a great niany men m t e 
m-oceis. And that is particular y tnjc when one 
s u'ing raw troops newly levied They nuis be 
used in^fairly close formation to be kept toge er 
and their success depends upon '"ff • ^^^ f.^" 
not ]>e far wrong if wc put down the loss of the 
wliolo operations at 10 per cent., or something 
larger for tlie attacking bodies and the smallei 
retreating liodies. It is probab e or cei-tai 
that the German offensive had niore than 
forty odd thousand men hit during those 
nine days. But, on the other hand, it 
must be remembered that these losses are not 
—as in tlie Russian ease-absolute. All the cas^-s 
of slightly wounded recover, and, among Uie 
pursuers, ire returned ultimatelv to the fighting 
line, whereas most of even the slightly wounded m 
a force retiring with such precipitation as did the 
Russian fall into the enemy's hands as prisoners 
and are lost for good. Of unwounded prisoners, 
the enemy's losses must have been msigniiicant. 
The Russian account puts them at 1,000. 
Such would seem to te the sunimaiy ot com- 
parative losses on both sides; and the statement 
leads me to a further comment upon the present 
condition of the German official communiques. 
We have alreadv seen in the earlier com- 
ments published some months ago m these 
columns what was for long the character oi 
the German official communique. It was 
accurate, open, and, as far as detail would 
allow, terse. We have further seen that when the 
hope of a speedy and decisive victory was lost the 
German official communique changed somewhat la 
tone It }:»egan to include, side by side with the old 
type of information, manifest, though rare and 
not commonly important, calculated inaccuracies, 
sometimes deliberate, and in our eyes fantastic, 
falsehoods. I say " in our eyes " because it was 
evident that these falsehoods were not intended lor 
our consumption and may liave been wise enougli 
for the purpose for which they were designed. 
With the communique upon these movements 
in East Prussia, and against the Nicraen and the 
"N'arew, we seem to have reached a third phase, in 
\vhich tlie document for the first time deals m 
phrases at once vague and capable of grave inis- 
interpretation as well as needlessly boastful. 
This is no particular accusation of the enemy. 
Official documents of this sort in war have been 
far the commonest throughout military histoiy, 
and particularly on the losing side. But they make 
a remarkable contrast with what we have hitherto 
Ijeen led to expect from the German General Staft, 
and they point to some disarray in the domestic 
opinion'which they are designed to affect. 
Thus, there is a deliberate confusion between 
the figures applying to the late sei)arate and suc- 
cessful movement clearing tlie Russians out of 
East Prussia and the "winter battle,' which 
obviously is used as a term for the whole mass ot 
the operations since October. 
Further, for the former, which is capable ot 
fairly close analysis by students of war, we are 
given credible figures, less than a dozen batteries 
and losses of some 40.000, whereas for tlie whole 
business of many months— in which analysis is 
impossible because all details are lacking— we are 
Kiven fantastic figures. Again, we are told tliat 
"the 10th Army Corps may be regarded as 
having ceased to^exist." That is rhetorical non- 
sense.' The 10th Army has lost, at a guess, 12 per 
cent., ccrtainlv not 20 per cent, of its strength as 
to three-quarters of its composition. The remain- 
inf^ quarter has indeed been so severely dealt with 
as^to have lost the existence as a separate corps, 
while of tlie total artillery of the 10th Army a tew 
hea\-\' pieces, and more than 10 but less than a 
dozen batteries have also been lost, out oi the 
seventy or eighty which accompany the whole 
force. , . . 
Remark, again, that the series of com- 
muniques, wiicn thev are all taken together, do not 
read consecutively. We are first told that the 
enemy must have" lo-st such and such a number, 
we arc next told that he has positively lost a lesser 
number, and there are other discrepancies of the 
same sort. 
All these are not very important points, hut 
thev arc worth noting, just as the demeanour of a 
witness in a law court is worth noting, lor the 
German conimuniqu<:'S are one of our very lew 
sources of evidence upon the campaign while it is 
in progress. 
THE CARPATHIAN FRONT. 
Upon the Carpathian front there is no news 
save that, now a week old, of the occupation ot 
Czernowitz. It is a pity. It means that the enemy 
has thrust his wedge in tetween a possible 
Rumanian intervention and the Russian armies in 
Galicia. It means also the occupation of that rail- 
wav centre which the capital of Bukovina is, and 
the importance of which I pointed out last time. 
It means all that, no more, but unfortunately no 
less. It does not mean, as certain of the enemy s 
iiapers have suggested, that the Russian position in 
Galicia is threatened. The left flank of the Rus- 
sian armies in Galicia can be maintained, m spite 
of the occupation of Bukovina. Moreover, the 
communications of the enemy's force in Bukovina 
are very difiicult. They go over passes deep m 
snow, aiid the railway docs not yet serve them. As 
a strategic move it seems far less than what is 
happening in the north against the Warsaw rail- 
wav. but as a political move it has the importance 
which I have described. It would begin to have 
strategic importance if Stanislaus were occupied, 
for tliat would give raihvay communication across 
the mountains. 
THE WESTERN FIELD. 
In the Western field of war there has not been 
this week, any more than the last, a movement of 
sufficient importance to justify a careful analysis 
or to oecupv the space of these columns. But such 
operations "as have taken place, in spite of the 
iuimobility imposed upon both combatants by tho 
weather, have this two-fold interest : First, that 
tliev show the pressure upon the German line to be, 
if anything, increasing, and, secondly, that in one 
])oint there seems to be some indication of a new 
formation ha\ing reached the field. The slight 
advances made before Lomba^rtzyde— a matter of a 
few vards— the larger push forward in the Cham-' 
pagiie di::trict over a front of two or three miles, 
the slight success just cast of Varennes and south- 
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