September 18, 1915. 
LAND AND .WATER. 
everything), are not susceptible of rapid demoli- 
ticm. All save some half-dozen of its bridges can 
b© quite quickly reconstructed. In a word, the 
capture of a modern railway line, especially in 
such a countrj' as what was, of old, Lithuania, and 
under the political system of the modern Russian 
Empire, where railways are so few, is, in spite of 
all the destruction that can be effected by retiring 
troops, of capital importance. 
Why is the possession of this line — Riga to 
Lembei-g — of such value to the enemy, both posi- 
tive and negative? 
Positively it is of value because it furnishes 
him with the chief, and almost the only, oppor- 
tunity he will have for moving troops and muni- 
tions from one fart of his front to the other, from 
north to south, when he shall propose or if he 
shall begin the invasion of Russia proper. To 
liave such an advantage is obviously a thing of 
capital importance in modern war. The reasons 
that a railway is essential to modern armies need 
not be repeated, and it is equally true that upon 
such an immensely extended front in territory so 
vague, and in front of an enemy whose munitions 
and equipment have passed their lowest point and 
are growing, the power of rapidly reinforcing any 
threatened sector is essential. Had no such line 
been traced and surveyed, no such embankments 
made, no such viaducts thrust out to the river 
crossings as those discovered upon the line from 
Riga to Lemberg, it would be absolutely necessary 
for the Austro- Germans to construct some such 
line if they desired to prosecute a successful 
advance eastward. In a word, the possession of 
this railway is a necessary part of the enemy's 
ability either to advance further into Russia with 
the winter or even to stand on the defensive. 
Negatively, the occupation of the line will 
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similarly disadvantage our ally. Onc« i£ i« tii 
enemy hands, the Russian armies necessarily fall 
into separate sections for the very plain reasons 
set forth in these columns last week. The supply, 
of the forces in the field would then depend upon 
three great divergent lines of railway correspond- 
ing respectively to Petrograd, Moscow, and 
Kiev (with which latter town may be coupled 
Odessa). The lateral communications from north 
to south, once this main Riga to Lemberg com- 
munication is lost, are both ill-connected to main- 
tain a united front and also stretch that front 
beyond tenable limits as a continuous line, as ia 
apparent from the accompanying Sketch II., re- 
produced from last week's issue. 
If the enemy can obtain, as a whole, this 
artery of communication Riga-Dvinsk-Vilna- 
Luminieck-Rovno-Lemberg, he will still possess 
the power of going forward, grievously and in- 
creasingly hampered as this has been during the 
last four weeks. Supposing him to have acquired 
communication by sea to Riga (a task the diffi- 
culty of which I shall not attempt to judge, but 
leave to others who better understand such opera- 
tions), then, remembering how excellent a rail- 
way system concentrates from all Austria upott 
Lemberg, we may iustly regard this line as a sort 
of pipe fed at both ends and amply munitioning 
and reinforcing all the armies fighting in front 
of it and to the east. 
The full possession (not merely reaching here 
and there) of the line Riga-Lemberg is, then, the 
immediate objective of the enemy. 
Next let us recapitulate the fa(.>tors of the 
enemy's advantage which are now common pro- 
perty and on which all military opinion in Europe 
is agreed. 
The Austro- Germans have upon this front 
a very large superiority in the munitionment of 
their artillery, and especially of their heavy 
pieces. That is the first point. They can produce 
such munitionment at a rate far higher than the 
Russians. Next they have in equipment — whick 
means, for practical purposes, rifles — a similar 
superiority. In small-arm ammunition, supposing 
the rifles to be present, both parties are equa3 
enough. In machine guns the enemy hae 
an enormous superiority over the Russians, 
even greater than his superiority in heavy 
artillery. And this last form of superiority 
ia due to two things. First, his own far superior 
power of production in machinery; secondly, the 
fact that a retiring force must always lose great 
numbers of machine guns as well as rifles in the 
rearguard actions which defend trenches to the 
last moment. Of personal superiority in the type 
of troops used there ia no trace. Upon the coa- 
trary, it would seem that the Austro-Germans 
have less good fortune when there is a corps-a- 
corps, and that most of the Russian successes in 
the prolonged rearguard actions that have been 
fought have depended upon a personal superiority 
of the Russian over the Austro- German soldier 
Under these circumstances, it is clear what 
the nature of the enemy's advance has been. 
He can always at certain determined but 
restricted points and at certain intervals of time 
compel a Russian retirement by the concentration 
there of his heavy artillery, and by the checking 
of the local Russian counter-offensive with a vast 
numerical superiority in machine guns. I say 
" restricted " points and " at certain intervals^ of^ 
time " because, as we shall see, you can only bring 
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