March 6, 1915. LAIND AND JVIATER.. 
THE WAR BY LAND. 
By HILAIRE BELLOC. 
HOTB,— Till ArticU has beca tnbmlttti to the Prtsi Bnreia, which doei not object to the pubUcaOM u ummtU, ui ttkei u 
respoasibllUy tor the correctnegs ol the ilatementi. 
U accordaac* with the requlreminlii of t!is Pre«» Burtan, the positions ot troops oa Plans illustratla* tUi ArUcto «mst •«!/ U 
regarded as spproximate, and ao deSnlta (trenfth at any polot is iadicatel. 
"^HE forcing of the Dardanelles is by very 
much the most important event strategic- 
ally which v/e have seen in this war since 
the battle of the Marne. It is evident 
operations in which there is most movemonf and 
chance for a decision, but that upon which tha 
future of the campaign for tho moment mosti 
obviously turns. 
that if this operation be successful we have begun It presents the same strategical interest which 
to solve, lon^before the end of the winter, the main it has presented since the beginning of February, 
problem of Kussian equipment and munitioning, when the triple action was engaged of holding tha 
and at the same time released foodstuffs of which Russians in front of Warsaw and of attempting 
to push them back upon either flank. But in using 
our market is in need. At the same time we have 
released the Balkans from their hesitation, we 
have left Austria without an object towards the 
Bouth-east, we have cut off all supply available for 
modern war to the Turkish forces in Asia. 
Politically the event is of even greater 
magnitude. 
The whole of this week, however, these opera- 
tions have been naval in character, and do not 
come within the scope of these comments. 
Upon the western front there has been too 
little movement to make any commentary worth 
while, and so far as that field is concerned I shall 
deal this week only with its most important aspect 
at the moment, which is the call for ammunition. 
Of movements upon any general scale we have no 
this phrase it is necessary to modify one conclusion 
to which a certain amount of public criticism has 
come, presumably in error. Men speak as though 
the action along the whole eastern front from 
the Baltic to tlie Roumanian border was ono 
united conception, an effort to push in tho 
two flanks of the Russian army so as to 
compel the centre to abandon the line of 
the Vistula and the all-important bridge- 
head for the same, which is politically the 
capital of Poland — Warsaw. It is a false judof- 
ment. The enemy's effort on the left wing of tha 
Russians in the south is not a strategical effort 
balancing what he is doing upon the right win» 
of the Russians in the north. It has a different 
examples except upon the eastern field, and with motive, and it is proceeding in a different fashion, 
this therefore, I shaU begin my comments thi« As has been pointed out more than once ia 
.week. 
THE EASTERN FRONT. 
BALTIC 
Kovno 
a 
The AusttV'OermAtt 
tine Last Monda.iif 
March lec 
TheBuk^vtni^ 
pointed 
these columns, the effort in the south is probably, 
political : though political only, of course, in tha 
sense of a political action affecting later strategy, 
the enemy is pushed into the Bukovina in order, 
as we have seen, to intercept any potential com- 
bination between the Roumanian forces and tlie 
Russian forces in Galicia. But the hope by this 
effort to turn the Russian effort in Galicia and to 
attack it seriously in flank is not probable, for 
reasons which I hope to show later in this article. 
But in the north, by far the most important 
field, what he set out to do was undoubtedly to 
isolate Warsaw, and in this attempt we still tavQ 
to follow the main point of interest this week. 
THE ATTEMPT TO FORCE THE NIEMEN 
AND THE NAREW. 
Przasnysz. 
The eastern front continues to be what it has 
been for the last two months^, not pnl^ that field of 
