I. A X D A x I") ^^■ A T E R 
November i- , 1915- 
artillery was badlv licndiGapped, the roads eeased 
am'me replaced bv traeks, save tor one or two 
ma n iWhways. The winter weather further 
ml Sicapped ransport and the mountams gave 
every advantage to a mobile mfantry over an 
mvader tied to a heavN" siege tram. But it was also 
pointed cut that this crucial pomt of the campaign 
would take its character entirely irom tnc condition 
of Serbian supplv, and it is now abundantly proved 
that that . upply has been exhausted m the northern 
hghting. , , 
Tn.t when the country began to be in favour 
and the weather also, ju^t when a well-:-upp hed 
host could have u^ed its infantry to the greatest 
effect the Serbian retreat, instead of making a 
pause" was accelerated on every side, and that 
phenomenon, I repeat, cannot be ascribed to any- 
thing but the exhaustion of supply. 
Now this fact once established, we gather 
from it an important lesson with regard to the 
future of the campaign. The rate at which the allied 
forces can be landed and munitioned from the single 
base of Salonica is strictly hmited. Lven if the 
Western ])owers were prepared to put in a quarter 
of a million men they would not have that force 
deployed and ready for action in less than six weeks, 
and the supply of it by two single-line railways m 
ccuntry with not half a dozen main roads, would 
be a very grave problem. 
But nipposing this hiaximmn to be there 
established. It has against it ultimately a force 
of double the size. If the Austro-Germans have 
kept their units in this adventure up to their full 
complement, then with the Bulgarian forces added, 
they would be double the extreme number which 
the Allies could put against them. The enemy 
woukl be holding mountain country with full 
opportunities for munitionment behind him, and 
it would be impossible lor the AUics in the south 
alone, under inch conditions, to achieve anything 
at all. 
But if wc add to the position of the Allies in 
the south, other new forces with the two extra 
factors of position and of numbers, it is a very 
different problem. If the AUies, working up from 
and based upon Salonica, find, acting in concert 
with them, an ItaUan, or a Roumanian, or a 
Russian, or even a Serbian force, not only have 
they the added 1 umbers, but they have those 
numbers acting upon a flank of their enemy. 
Of these hypothetical reinforcements one only 
is actually in the field— the Serbian. That force 
is believed to be in numbers not far short of 
200,000 men, or at any rate, with the Montenegrins 
still over 150,000. 
There is.no certitude in the matter. We have 
contemporary Serbian declaration of losses, 
piece or two lent by the Allies, and possibly a few 
fortress gims dra^^ged from their original emplace- 
ments, but in general one may say that the Austro- 
German bombardment could be met by nothing 
to count o\er in. 
We have here only a repetition of what is to 
bo seen all over the Eastern \w\(\ of war. It is the 
point which most sharj:)l\- differentiates the eastern 
from the western theatres. As compared with 
their foes on the East the Central Powers can pro- 
duce heavy pieces in vastly greater amount and the 
ammunition for them. It is true, not only of 
Serbia, but of Russia, and not only of Russia, but 
of Roumania and Bulgaria, not only of Bulgaria, 
but of Turkey, not only of Furkey but of (ireece. 
And this inequality is carried on to every depart- 
ment in which modern industry counts. In petrol 
vehicles and machineiy of all kinds, in the making 
of rifles, in the supply even of small arms ammuni- 
tion, the Central Powers have, and necessarily 
retain, a vast superiority o\'er the younger world to 
the east of them. On the West, where they 
meet an old civihsation superior to their own, the 
Central Powers ha\e no such advantage. They 
possess, indeed, far more workshops and a greater 
supph' of coal and of iron, but they have no such 
power of rapid concentration and of meeting a 
new situation as have the older and more civjlised 
nations against whom they are pitted. And these 
civilisations, further, through the excellence and 
numerical superiority of the British fleet, have 
command of the sea. In the West, therefore, 
their heavy gun work is dominated by that of the 
French, British and Italians. 
Now the Serbians, being thus subjected to a 
greater superiority in heavy artillery upon the 
part of the enem\-, nevertheless maintained them- 
selves in the north for something like three weeks. 
That is, till pretty well the end of the month of 
October. If any one will be at the pains of nuark- 
ing upon a large map the various positions 
occupied by the Germans and Austrians in the 
three weeks following their first shots across the 
Danube, he will appreciate not only the truth of 
this statement, but its informing character. 
The Serbian army, mainly massed along this 
northern frontier, was able, during all that time, 
in the face of such immensely superior artillery, to 
keep up a desperate resistance and to check the 
advance of the enem\\ 
Why was this ? 
It was because the Serbian army was still 
provided with ample munitionment for its task. 
Of that there can be no doubt. Had there 
been any husbanding of munitionment the effort 
could not have been undertaken. But note what 
follow^ed. After this initial period, during which 
the Austro-Germans had been subjected to mur- 
derous punishment and had probably lost for tlic and the enemy claims are obvicuily exaggerated, 
moment something like one-third of their effectives, but a trained force still in being and still organ- 
the enemy's advance in the north had been so ised, of, let us say, more than six divisions, and 
slow as to attract the attention of oxcxy military perhaps eight, or even ten, is apparently present 
student in Europe and to provoke both excuses in the mountains, and has preserved in its retreat 
and grumbling in B r in. Just when the edge of the greater part of its artillery as well. It is falling 
the outer highlands was reached the Serbian beck westward. The mass of it is less than a hun- 
no 
retreat becomes rapid. The Austro-German as 
well as the Bulgarian advance proceeds by regular 
days' marches and the tale of losses on the enemy's 
side begins to fall, and that of captures from the 
Serbians to rise. 
It was insisted upon in these columns that the 
test of the Austro-(jerman effort would be m.adc 
when the highlands were teached. There the heavy 
dred miles from the Adriatic. It is not an effective 
force upon whose co-operation we can count, 
beccu'^e it lacks supply, and the very first chance of 
prolonging to our advantage (we cannot now hope 
for a long time to turn it to cu- advantage) the 
position in the Balkans, lies in munitioning and 
supplying that army. If that can be done, and 
if the fire can be kept alight, even on the extreme 
12 
