LAND AND .WATER. 
March 6, 1015. 
1 musF, al the risk erf wearying the reader^ 
repeat ^he elements of the position in order to 
Se clea? what has Uiken place in the past week. 
Wa^aw is the mecting-pkce of the railwap 
*ncf nf the Vistula. Of these lines, the eouthein 
Tnes marked 2 3 and 4 upon the sketch, esi>ecially 
^ and 4 lead to Warsaw from the more nnportant 
L'rs But the northern one, marked 1 leads to the 
c^';i?al of Petrograd. connects tl^e °o^f-\",^^';j!;f, 
uDon the East Prussian frontier ^Mth the main 
K near Warsaw, and if cut would isolate 
iWai'aw in some degree, and would check in some 
S^asure its flow of reinforcements; but, most m- 
^rtant of all, would lead in a few days to the 
Jutting of the remaining railways For there is 
no nat°aral line and no fortified line that would 
save Railways 2 and 3, and ultimately 4, if once 
this sheaf of railways were entered by the enemy. 
fiho rivers are not transverse, and there are no 
works north of the Brest-I vangorod line. _ 
We know that the enemy has done everything 
lo take Warsaw by direct attack along the front 
A— B and has failed. We know further that since 
February 7 he has changed his plan, and whue 
only holding along A— B, has determined to strike 
for the railways behind Warsaw from the province 
of East Prussia; that is, along the arrows C.O.U 
Lastly, we know that there lies between this attack 
from C.C.C. and the sheaf of railways the fortined 
line represented by the Rivers Narew and Niemen, 
elong which are stretched the strongholds from 
Kovno in the north to Neogeorgiesvk m the south, 
passing by way of Grodno, Osowiecs, Ostrolenka, 
Let me also repeat the main point of the whole 
jlhesis, since it is that upon whicL current opinion 
in this country has been, to some extent, confused. 
Unless the Germans pierce this fortified line, and, 
lacing pierced it, carry on, they have been defeated 
in their general plan, and would have been stronger 
/or not having undertaken it. If, on the contrary, 
they pierce this line and carry on till they reach 
the railways, they have succeeded in their plan. 
It is exceedingly important to grasp this per- 
fectly simple point, not because we are noting the 
scores in a game, but because wo are watching a 
military action upon which our own fate to some 
extent depends. 
Unless the German Headquarters had a plan 
of this kind, it had no plan at all — and that is not 
to be believed. Merely to clear the enemy out of 
East Prussia is not a military object, because it 
promises nothing for the future of the war. But 
to isolate, and ultimately occupy, Warsaw pro- 
mises everything; for, holding tnat nodal point, 
you prevent further offensive action by the Rus- 
sians for a long time to come, and you are free to 
bring many of your forces now in the East back 
westward, as also to use in the West your last new 
formations when they reach the field. 
But it is in the West that the only final deci- 
sion of this war can be achieved. Therefore do 
the Germans particularly intend to take Warsaw; 
end to take Warsaw on the lines of the present 
effort means to pierce successfully and con- 
tinuously through the defending line of the 
Kienien and the Narew until they reach and cut 
the sheaf of railways. To do that would be to take 
[Warsaw in reverse. To fail to do it means that 
they have lost this movement again and that they 
have wasted energy for nothing. 
Let us keep that quite clear. Their local 
success in enveloping one Corps a fortnight ago 
does not affect the greater ^^^J^; ^'^e «i^^ ^^'jf^ 
in this field win or lose as a whole, and an oliensue 
^h ch faTfs in its purpose is not something which 
cancels out in war : it is a minus quantity. An 
offcSive which fails leaves the attack weaker than 
'^ ^''wfth dl this postulated as a foundation for 
our iudgment. let us see how the struggle now 
stands in front of this Niemen-Narew line. The 
Sue is by no means yet decided, but the news of 
the past week is, upon the whole, favourable. 
Three main points of attack marked the 
objectives of the German advance. 
MI 
aw 
Kovno 
N.G corbies vk 
Warsaw 
(1) A point a little above Grodno and outside 
the fortifications of that stronghold. 
(2) An attack upon Osowiecs, and an attempt 
to pierce through and strike at the line beyond. 
(3) Of particular importance, an attack upon 
the sector between the Mlawa railway and the 
town of Ostrolenka. This last is the most perilous 
and the most vital of the three movements, because 
the nearer to Warsaw the enemy gets on the rail- 
ways, the more powerful is his effect. 
I will take these three issues in reverse order 
to their present value in the campaign. 
(1) The Attack vpon Grodno. This attack 
alone of the three has, up to the present date, suc- 
ceeded in piercing the line, but it has not pierced 
it in great numbers, and it has not pierced it 
thoroughly at all. We should even have the right 
to regard" it as a diversion in the general plan 
were it not that there has been used upon this 
sector the best of the ten Array Corps which the 
Germans have concentrated for their great effort 
from the north. It is the same body as that which 
had proved the deciding factor in the enveloping 
of the Russian 20th Array Corps the other day. 
It is the German 21st Corps, in garrison during 
peace time upon the French frontier, and cori-e- 
sponding somewhat to the French 20th and 6th 
Corps. 
But though a body of such excellence has been 
used right up here on the left of the general effort, 
we must not conclude that that point was tliere- 
fore regarded as of special importance by the 
enemy. We must rather decide that when the con- 
centration was effected three weeks ago the 20th 
Corps was put where it was in order to act where 
the hardest work had to be done in forcing the 
defiles between the lakes. That was apparently 
the task assigned to it. And this being so, it could 
not but appear when the Prussian frontier was 
crossed in the region of Suwalki and Augustowo, 
even though that region were not after the first 
operations the chief theatre of the .struggle. 
At any rate, the attack upon the Niemen by 
2* 
