August 10, 1916 
LAND & WATER 
•was in the hands of the Austro-Germans and the Bul- 
garian and Montenegrin as well. 
But meanwhile the Allies had very wisely undertaken 
the occupation of the Port of Salonika. They had even 
advanced from this base with a small force up the Vardar 
Valley so long as there appeared any chance at all of the 
remnants of the Serbian army effecting a junction with 
them. But that army had delayed too long in the north 
in the vain hope to liold impossible positions ; it had been 
■compelled to retreat westward across the mountains, 
and though more than half of it was saved to light side 
by side with the Allies in the ensuing year, it lost all its 
artillerj' and all the territory it had desired to save, and 
the small Anglo-French force which had pushed up into 
the mountains fell back again upon Salonika. 
Though it had thus effected nothing to change the 
local military situation, the phase " very wisely " which 1 
have used in connection with the decision to occupy 
Salonika, has already been justified. 
In the first place, had not the Allies occupied Salonika 
it would directly or indirectly have been made without 
a doubt a naval base for the service of the enemy, and 
it is the only port on the European side' of the .4igean 
■capable of serving as such a base. 
Next, the presence of an increasing force at Salonika 
had upon any plans the Germans might have had of 
action towards the East the same effect which a man 
behind a door with a loaded gun has upon those who 
would pass that door. It did not prevent Germany from 
munitioning the Turks and adventuring certain forces 
Eastward in alliance with the Turkish Armies, but it 
prevented any large effort towards the East by the 
enemy, which could not be undertaken until this threat 
upon the flank of its communications should be i educed. 
In the third place, as the garrison of Salonika grew 
to formidable dimensions, it immobilised and counter- 
poised the whole of the Bulgarian forces. 
To these three points we might add a fourth, political 
•one ; the occupation of Salonika effectively restrained the 
Prussian sympathies of the Court at Athens. 
Meanwhile, the enemy's occupation of Serbia and the 
opportunities of Bulgaria upon his side had a political 
■effect among the Allies proportionate to the weakness 
or absence of a proper censorship. This led, for some time 
at least, to a dangerous military result : The locking up 
of forces in Egypt, who were therefore of no service, 
and the attempt to effect a pohtical coup in the Tigris 
Valley and against Bagdad with grossly insufficient forces. 
GALLIPOLI 
It was clear to all considered judgment long before 
this date that the attempt to force the Turkish lines in 
the Gallipoli Peninsula would be impossible unless there 
could be brought against them the same weight of metal as 
permitted the carrying of trenches in any other field of 
this new trench warfare. The Turkish hnes defending 
the Narrows of the Dardanelles could not be forced unless 
the 7,000 yards of their trace were subjected to a bom 
bardment at least as heavy as that which carried the first 
two lines before Loos. Even a head of shell and the 
presence of heavy pieces as numerous as that which had 
been at work i n Champagne and before Loos in September 
would only doubtfully have carried the Turkish lines. 
It was clear, therefore, that the operation must either 
he treated as the main British operation of the war for 
the moment, provided with the corresponding number of 
heavy guns and an immense reserve of munitionment, or 
abandoned. Unfortunately neither, of these alternatives 
was faced. The expedition was starved of artillery 
and its success rendered impossible, but the authorities 
hesitated to withdraw, partly from fear of the great 
losses that might attend such an operation, partly from 
fear of the result upon Oriental opinion ; partly from 
inertia. It was not until the ninth of January 
that the operation of withdrawal was effected. But when 
it was, it was carried out with the most complete and 
indeed amazing success, almost without casualties, and 
in the briefest possible time. A portion of the forces 
hitherto locked up in that expensive and insufficiently 
supported experiment against the Straits were diverted 
to Salonika ; others to the Western front ; others to 
Egypt, the security of which was still not sufiiciently 
■established, unfortunately, in the opinion of this country. 
But the Great War as a whole is only concerned with 
the failure of the Dardanelles as a subsidiary enterprise. 
What was really towards throughout the lull of the late 
winter, and was to mark the whole campaign for 
ever and to decide its final phase, was the great German 
attack upon Verdun. 
We have just seen what the combined scheme of the 
enemy was ; how it included political action in the East 
"and coupled with it the design of attempting what must 
of its nature be the last effort (there would be no effectives 
sufficient for a second blow) to obtain a decision against 
the French in the West ; to obtain it before the continued 
growth of the British forces should render them over- 
whelming and before Russia should be re-armed. The 
German Empire, leaving to the Austrians the task of 
holding the Italians and the Southern Russian front 
(where only a small admixture of German troops was 
lent to the Austro-Hungarians), keeping upon the 
Northern Russian front under Hindenburg the strict 
minimum necessary to hold it through the conditions of 
winter and the spring thaw, when a bare total of two 
men to the yard was thought sufficient, began fo concen- 
trate all its strength for this last possible decision. If it 
should fail, which was not thought possible, the war was 
certainly lost. All was done to make it succeed. 
VERDUN 
The point chosen for the attack was the sharp salient 
formed by the French trenches round the town of Verdun. 
The time fixed was the latter part of February. Difficult 
as the task would be under the weather conditions of that 
season it was believed necessary to act so early because the 
re-armament of the Russians, though proceeding faster 
than the Germans imagined, would begin to be formidable 
when the Russian Ports of the north were free from ice ; 
the growth of British armament was apparent and, most 
important of all, the enemy's one asset, his superior 
power of munitionment, especially for heavy pieces, was 
gradually disappearing. 
We have seen that corps were specially called back to 
the interior of Germany for reposing, training and even 
feeding calculated towards the end in view. Light railways 
were built upon every side. Heavy artillery was con- 
centrated to the number of over one thousand pieces — all 
that could be spared — and slowly massed in the woods by 
Spincourt, and an immense head of shell accumulated 
during the four winter months. The unfit were thor- 
oughly combed out and every possible man taken to 
swell the German effectives. Class 1916 after some four 
months training were sent forward to the local depots 
behind the front with the object of throwing it into the 
fighting the moment the losses should become serious. 
Class 1917 began to be called out (in the month of De- 
cember). On the 19th of February, 1916, the first shots 
of the intensive bombardment against the Verdun secto. 
were fired, and on Monday the 21st of February the great 
German offensive was launched. 
The point upon which it was delivered was as well- 
chosen tactically as it proved strategically to be ill- 
chosen. The French forces in front of Verdun held lines 
turning a sharp angle, almost a right angle ; that is, in 
the shape of an L. Cutting across those lines was the 
Valley of the River Meuse, suffering from winter floods 
and impassable over stretches varying from half a mile 
to a mile in width. If in this new offensive the foot of 
the " L " could be broken in, there would surely follow 
a local disaster. The troops beyond the flooded Meuse 
would be crushed back upon that obstacle with not 
sufficient means for withdrawal beyond it. They would 
fall en masse into the hands of the victor, who pressing 
forward thence, would have before him a congested Hue 
fallen into chaos and disarray with the imperfect and 
crowded retirement of those defeated beyond the river. 
What caused the enemy's plans to miscarry was partly 
the very thin covering line which the French tactic uses, 
partly the extremely rapid concentration which the 
French effected to meet the new. blow. For the rest the 
German effort proceeded upon the lines laid out for it. 
The head of shell accumulated was so enormous that the 
first intensive bombardment could be succeeded by others 
and yet others continuously for a period of many months, 
and though there would be lengthening intervals between 
each deluge of shell, wave upon wave of effort could be 
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