Maicli 20, 1915. 
LAND AND S: ATE R. 
THE WAR BY LAND. 
By HILAIRE BELLOG. 
NOTE.— This Article has been submitted io the Press Bureau, which does not object to the publicatioo ai censored, and (akei a* 
respauslbllity lor the correctness ol tile staieuients. 
In accordance witit the requirements of the Press Bureau, the positions of troops on Plans iliustratin;; this Article must only bt 
rci^arded as appraiiiaiate, and no deBaite strength at any point is indicated. 
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I 
THE TWO ACTIONS OF LA BASSEE AND 
PERTHES IN CHAMPAGNE. 
THERE has been fought in the last few 
days by the British and Indian forces 
north of La Bassee, against the Bavarians 
and a remnant of the Prussian Guard, 
an action which is highly significant of the ends 
to which all trench warfare in the west is designed. 
Let us try and see what happened. 
At the beginning of last week, Monday and 
Tuesday, the 8th and 9th, the heavy French 
fighting one hundred miles to the south of the 
British positions in Champagne had come to its 
climax and had achieved its purpose. It is im- 
portant to cast one's eye to that distant point, 
because, as will be seen in the sequel, what the 
British did near La Bassee was closely co- 
ordinated with the French effort in Champagne, 
and the two together exactly illustrate the now 
successful plan of attrition to which so many 
months of effort have been directed. 
This heary French action in the Champagne 
district had drawn down to the German front 
reinforcing troops from all along the line, but in 
particular east of that country in front of Lille, 
DCtween Ypres and La Bassee itself, which is 
where the German line faced the British Expedi- 
tionary force. 
During those same days of Monday and 
Tuesday, upon the left of the British line — that 
is, in the neighbourhood of Ypres and somewhat 
to the south of that neighbourhood near Armen- 
tiferes — pressure had been exercised upon the 
enemy of a little more than normal kind, and, in 
the words of the description upon which all this 
is based, a definite mastery over the enemy in this 
section had been obtained. He had, it may be 
presumed, been led to expect further movement 
here — let us say, between Ypres and Armentieres. 
and on the night of the Tuesday a small body of 
the enemy made a counter-move upon St. Eloi, just 
outside Ypres, which was repelled. 
But with the morning of Wednesday, the 
10th, it was apparent that the plan designed by 
the British command was of a different character 
from what the enemy expected, and that as a great 
effort was about to be made, not upon the left and 
left centre between Armentiferes and Ypres, but 
upon the extreme right in the neighbourhood of 
and to the north of La Bassee, where for some 
time past tlie enemy's pressure upon the allied 
line (which here joins its two contingents, the 
French and British) has been particularly strong. 
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