May i8, 1916 
LAND & WATER 
of her 1917 class into the field. She is the only Power 
whirli has warned and, I believe, already examined, 
her IQ18 class — that is the lads who will be 20 years of 
age in the course of 1918, who and are consequently either 
just imder or just over 18 years of age at the present 
moment 
The German Empire comes next in its exhaustion of 
men. It has called up into the field pretty well the whole 
of its igi6 class. It has called up and is training and has 
already, I believe, put into the field portions of its 1917 
class. There certainly exists secret information upon the 
status of the iqi8 class in the derman Empire at this 
moment, but I have not seen that information. I am 
dependent only upon published telegrams which seem to 
show that the 1918 class has been warned, and perhaps, 
in the case of special services, examined, but at any rate, 
the 1918 class in Germany is not so far advanced towards 
service as is the corresponding class in the Austro-Hun- 
garian Empire. 
Lastly, we have the French Republic in the following 
situation : — 
The 1916 class was called up many months ago, and has 
been in training ever since. The Germans even claim 
that certain members of it have been discovered among 
their prisoners before Verdun. I was specially told, 
upon the other hand not many weeks ago, that none of 
this class (save a few original volunteers) had as yet 
been put under fire. But, no matter which of these 
versions be true, it is of no great consequence. The 
French have certainly not yet put into line many of 
their 1916 class. The Germans have put into fine nearly 
all of theirs. They have called up for training, now four 
months ago, their 1917 class. So have the Germans. 
Neither party has put'j this class into the field yet in 
any appreciable numDcrs. The French have certainly 
put none of it at all. If the Germans have begun to put 
theirs in, it has been only on a very small scale so far. 
German Tactics and Exhaustion 
VVc must of course remember further in this contrast 
that the French period of training is very much longer 
than the German. It is more than twice as long. 
If it be asked why the German Empire should be some- 
what — though but slightly —more exhausted than the 
French Republic, the answer would seem to be that 
frequently given in these columns : that the German 
Empire has been fighting upon two fronts, that it is ruled 
by a tactical tradition of close formation (from which it 
sometimes attempts to depart but to which it invariably 
returns), and thit it has also since the Aisne been con- 
demned to a perpetual offensive against entrenched 
enemies. The two great offensive actions of the French, 
that in the Artois a year ago and that in the Champagne 
last September, you can set in the history of the campaign 
against at least five such expensive German efforts — 
of which Verdun is the last and greatest by far. It is 
only in the natural order, and precisely what was to be 
expected, that the German service should show a slightly 
greater loss in proportion to its numbers than the French. 
But we must be careful to remember that this difference is ' 
only slight. 
Such is the general situation as to numbers upon the 
continent, so far as these numbers regard the fully 
mobilised great nations. We can represent the thing 
clearly, but exceedingly roughly, by saying that where 
Austro-Hungary has probably lost in 21 months 10 men 
out of a given unit, Germany has lost, say, 9, and France 
about 8, while the man-power of Austro-Hungary and 
Germany is to that of France alone as almost exactly 
3 to I. 
It would be mere waste of space to refute once more the 
ineptitudes and worse which have been spread upon the 
situation in the press of this country, especially during the 
last few months. 
Many of my correspondents again point out to me the 
wearisome iteration of the official German lists, which 
as we all know, are about six weeks belated and about 
19 per cent, below the truth in dead alone. It is really 
not worth while going over that well-worn field again. 
Germany does not work miracles. Her losses in the war 
are proportionate to the effort she has made and are 
naturally upon much the same scale as those of her Allies 
and her opponents. The real losses of the enemy, as of 
any other belligerent power, are at this time known to 
within so small a margin of error that there is very little 
room left for discussion. If any new jact can be produced 
worthy of our consideration and slightly modifying the 
conclusion universally reached upon this matter by every 
competent observer in every bureau of every war office 
and of every staff, it should receive due consideration. 
But mere vague assertion without a shred of evidence 
is not worth wasting powder and shot upon in any serious 
examination of our problems. 
So much then for the first group or category of " fully 
mobilised powers." 
The second group of powers includes Italy, Great Britain, 
Russia and Turkey. It is the group of those Powers 
which have not yet, for various reasons, a\'ailed themselves 
of their fiill man power for the purpose of this campaign. 
I mean, have not put it yet into action. Lest this phrase 
should falsify my argument I will pause to consider the 
different ways in which these Powers, which still have such 
large reserves of men, are affected. 
The Turkish Empire ought upon paper to produce very 
much larger forces than those it has actually produced. 
Some have therefore argued that these forces still stand 
in reserve. They do not. 
Possible Reserve3 
The Turkish Empire is very loosely held together. It 
contains a mass of population that can hardly be used for 
war (for political reasons), and other masses that are very 
bad material indeed for an army, and other masses again 
which simply cannot be enrolled at all for geographical 
reasons — cannot be got at. It has great difficulty in 
providing itself with arms, and still greater difficulty in 
providing itself with munitions. What maximum fi\lly 
equipped force the Turkish Empire can keep in the field 
we do not exactly know — byt we know that the forces 
already mobilised cannot be appreciably increased. We 
have received the maximum effort of this foe, and it is 
already declining. 
The causes that make Britain, Italy and Russia sever- 
ally possessed of large hitherto unused reserves of men are 
quite distinct in each case. 
Great Britain has raised, so far as the mere enrolling of 
men is concerned, the training of them, and their potential 
use in the war, a very great number indeed. She has made 
an effort everywhere comparable to, and in some cases 
surpassing, the effort of the continental powers. At the 
beginning of the war the generally accepted rule among 
soldiers was that the mobilisation of one-tenth of one's 
population represented a maximum effort. The strain 
of the war has slightly raised that standard and, though 
the extra men squeezed in have for the most part been 
absorbed in auxiliary services, yet the 10 per cent, has risen 
in the case of Germany and of France to something more 
like 12 per cent., and some say to even a trifle over 12 per 
cent. It has been exactly the same thing in this country, 
with the difference that this country has produced virtu- 
ally the whole of its enormous effort by voluntary and not 
by conscript means — as amazing a political success as has 
ever been achieved by a free nation in the history of the 
world. 
When one says, therefore, that Britain stands in the 
category of the not-yet-fully-mobilised nations, what one 
means is not that she has failed to reach her practical 
maximum* of man-power in enrolment — for she has reached 
that maximum, and perhaps even passed it. One means 
that the forces actually put forward in the field and the 
losses hitherto sustained are not in proportion to that 
man-power. Roughly speaking, the man-power of these 
islands stands to that of the German Empire as more than 
5 to 7, but less than 5 to 8. But the total permanent 
losses in the British forces from all causes whatsoever are 
not 5ths or gths of the corresponding German losses. They 
are more like a fourth or a fifth. And that is why Great 
Britain possesses vast reserves of men either behind her 
front, or lying in reservoirs, as it were, such as Egypt, or 
in camps and depots or under training here at home. 
The position of Italy, again, is different. 
Italy is fighting very intensely (and with a cumulative 
effect upon the enemy) upon a narrow front, or rather 
• I mean by a " practical " niaximuni the highest number that can 
be actually used as soldiers without impairing the nation and the 
army's necessary supply: as distinguished from a "theoretic" 
maximum, which may of course, be as high as j"ou liUe — up to the 
actual limits of population- 
