March in, 1916. 
LAND AND WA T E R 
:t in deliberately 
-. and in continuing 
offensive ? 
jDiething personal. 
the actual town 
The German Object 
What then, is the enemy's ohjc 
risking at such a moment this heavy lu;^ 
it week after week in this great winter 
The Press has represented it as s 
The dynasty hacl promised to enter 
Verdun and must keep its word. 
There may be something of that motive in the con- 
tinuation of the action, but it is certainly not the chief 
motive. The conception which seems to underly the 
enemy's continued assault is rather something like this : 
'' The French deliberately cover with a minimum 
number. It is their known tactical method. They 
showed it locally in the beginning of this action. They 
showed it again in the advanced positions west of the Meuse, 
on the Goose Crest the other day, and even on the main 
])ositions which thev have been defending for now more 
than a fortnight ; they are still using a much smaller 
number of men than we should use under similar circum- 
stances. The advantages and disadvantages of this 
method are well-known." When it succeeds you spare men 
and use them later as a mass of manoeuvre. But if it 
fails there is a bad smash. We have failed so far to 
provoke that smash, but if we go on perhaps we shall 
provoke it before the end. We may find a thin place m 
the crescent, or there mav be a local break-down and the 
effect of that would be to give us great masses of prisoners 
and, if not a decision, at least a local triumph of the 
utmost value to our moral position at home and abroad. 
There will be a corresponding loss of that position to the 
enemy." 
this is as much as to say that the enemy no longer 
hopes to break the French front, but that he does still 
liope — at a verv heavy cost— to achieve a striking local 
success upon a" large scale. He no longer hopes to do 
what he did on the Dunajetz, but he does hope to do 
what he did in the second advance to the Niemen, when 
he defeated the Russian tenth army— allowing, of course, 
for the difference between an action upon lines and action 
of movement. Supposing, for instance, he at last drove 
right through some point of the French quadrant east 
of the Meuse he would at once; take in reverse all its line 
upon the north of the breaking point. Or suppose he 
mastered on the west of the Meuse all the advanced lines 
one after the other, got to the Charny ridge and mastered 
that, he would presumably destroy, in a military sense, 
a great part of the French forces remaining east of the 
Meuse. . . 
Such then, are his main motives in continuing, 
though the political motive may have its value for him. 
The fact that the chances against him are very heavy 
does not render such motives less possible; places 
might be cited where the chances against the Allies 
were very heavy and were ultimately too much for them, 
and yet in which the allied effort .was long continued. 
13ut there is another motive which we ought to 
consider. 
Of all enemy statistics obtainable by the Intelligence 
Department of a General Staff, the most difficult to obtain 
are the statistics of production. We do not accurately 
know the enemy's rate of production in munitionment. 
He does not know ours. But he does know that the 
three western Allies produce each for its own army, 
and he knows that the French were very heavily handi- 
capped by the occupation of their principal industrial 
region. He further knows that all his own industrial area 
including northern France, Belgium and the industrial 
part of Poland can be used as one unit, and its surplus 
production of shell concentrated on any one point. 
Therefore, he argues, he can be sure of a local superiority 
in heavy munitionment at least, wherever he chooses to 
concentrate for one great offensive as he has at Verdun. 
He may not only hope that this superiority in munition- 
ment (as he believes it is) will give him a dominating 
power in heavv guns to which, if he continues his effort 
the French will no longer be able to reply ; but he will 
also argue that bv thus depleting the French accumulation 
of shell, he is rendering a later French offensive impossible, 
or at any rate greatly postponing it. This, I believe to be 
a second motive inclining him to continue his effort. 
There is in aU this business of Verdun a certain 
rather subtle point well worth noting. It is the effect 
of time upon the operations. 
I do not refer to the effect time has upon the losses 
of men, for it is evident that the mere prolongation of 
an offensive is no guarantee of excessive loss upon the 
attacking side. You may lose in one type of offensive as 
many men in a day as you would lose in three weeks of 
deliberately restricted effort, True, the German action 
in front of Verdun is not at all of this latter kind. It is 
not a series of slight attacks carefully limited to a few 
losses : It is a case of intermittent attacks never separated 
by more than forty-eight hours, delivered in extraordin- 
ary numbers for the front concerned, and each exceedingly 
expensive. 
The factor of time, therefore, has indeed had in 
these Verdun attacks a very powerful effect in increasing 
their cost. 
The EflFect of Time. 
But it is not to this effect which I would draw atten- 
tion but to the absolute effect of time in such work as 
this. 
The enemy in attacking the Verdun salient desired, 
if possible, to break the French front and to pour through. 
Though he should fail in this he yet might well 
succeed in cutting off some very considerable body of his 
opponents. And, as the object of all war is to disarm 
your opponent in a greater measure than yourself, such a 
success, though partial, would have been of great value. 
A third object, as we all know, was the impression 
of neutral and civilian opinion by the use of the name 
" Verdun." Verdun, according to this legend repeated 
over and over again in the German Press, and in German 
messages to neutrals, was a great " fortress." Military 
terminology for centuries past had accustomed men to 
the idea of a " fortress " which you " besiege " and which 
at last " capitulates " (that is, surrenders on terms) or 
is " stormed." In either case the fortress " falls " and an 
artificial obstacle hitherto barring advance is removed 
and the advance can proceed. 
The military value of the area of Verdun to-day 
corresponded to such a description about as much as the 
word " Savoy " as applied to John of Gaunt's Palace 
applies to the modern conditions of the Strand. There 
are some things in common, size, a numerous habitation, 
weklth, etc. In the same way it is true to say that 
Verdun was a centre of communications because it was 
a great town, etc. Being the central point of a salient, 
it had great stores of supplies. It had been a fortress 
SORTES SHAKESPEARIAN.^, 
By SIR SIDNEY LEE. 
Tis 
COL. CHURCHILL'S ORATORY 
matter how it 
it make noise 
tio 
e in tune, so 
enough. 
AS YOU LIKE IT. IV., 
8-9. 
PORTUGAL DEFIES GERMANY. 
Men shut their doors against a settijig sun. 
TIMON OF ATHENS. I., ii., 139. 
OUR STRATEGY 
' Tis better that the 
So shall he waste his 
soldiers. 
Doing himself offence. 
IN FRANCE. 
enemy seek ns : 
means, weary his 
JULIUS C^SAR, IV., iii.. 197199. 
