12 
LAND & WATER 
October 12, 1916 
The Opposing Strategies 
By Colonel Feyler 
A S a lesson In strategy, the present situation is 
/% particularly interesting. We find opposed to 
/ % one another two methods of operation which 
A. .^.have been evident in all past campaigns — that is, 
the strategy of envelopment on the wings and the so- 
•called " Strategy of interior lines." 
The strategy of envelopment was constantly attempted 
by Moltke. in the two great campaigns which he led in 
1866 in Bohemia, and in 1870 in France. This strategy 
was successful at Sadowa, where three German armies 
converged around the Austrians under Benedeck. It was 
unsuccessful on the Saar at the beginning of 1870. owing 
to the resistance of MacMahon at Frf)cschwiller 
and the too great haste of Steinmetz at Forbach. It 
was successful, however, at Saint-Privat owing to 
tlic passivity of Bazaine, and above all at Sedan, 
which has become a classic example of the strategy of 
envelopment. 
At the beginning of the present war the Germans 
resumed this strategy on the Western Front, and subse- 
quently in 1915, with the aid of the Austro-Hungarians, 
in Poland. On both occasions the manoeuvre failed. 
In 1914 the Germans just escaped being enveloped them- 
selves on the Ourcq ; in 1915 the Russians arrived back 
on the line Riga-Dvinsk-Pinsk-Rovno, after escaping 
from the envelopment with which they had been 
threatened near Warsaw. 
The strategy of interior lines was repeatedly used by 
Napoleon I. The most interesting and audacious ex- 
ample was that of 1815, where the Emperor led his armies 
to the point of junction between Blucher and Welhngton, 
separated them brusquely, defeated Blucher at Ligny 
and then turned against Wellington, who had taken up a 
position on the plateau of Mont St. Jean. 
The present campaign of 1916 places these two 
strategies in the limelight once more. The Allies are 
attacking in an endeavour to envelop, whilst the Germans 
and Austrians are defending themselves on interior lines. 
Enveloping MancEuvre 
The result of the A.llied strategy can be called " The 
Battle of Europe," for never has so enormous a front 
been seen. It not merely surrounds the whole of Central 
Europe from the North Sea to the Baltic, but embraces 
on the south-east the whole circumference of the Ottoman 
Empire in Asia. If we measure this front, including the 
few zones of interruption, we lind that it extends from 
5,500 to 6,200 miles, or nearly a quarter of the circum- 
ference of the globe. 
On this huge front we can distinguish five separate 
spheres of action. 
(i) The English, Belgians, and French are opposed to 
a part of the German forces on a line in the West. Taking 
into consideration its irregularities this line stretches 
for about 420-500 miles from the mouth of the Yser to 
the Swiss frontier in the Jura. It shows two principal 
centres of activity, the Somme and Verdun. 
(2) The Battle of the Alps between the Italians and 
the Austro-Hungarians. This front is separated from 
the Western Front by the neutral territory of Switzer- 
land from the Jura Mountains to the Stelvia Pass, a 
distance of from 150-180 miles. At the present moment 
it shows a quiet zone in the Alps and a very active sector 
on the lower Isonzo. 
(3) South-east of the Battle of the Alps the Adriatic 
coast constitutes a front (jf naval surveillance and an 
interruption in the land front from the Isonzo to Durazzo 
of roughly 450 miles. Durazzo can roughly be con- 
sidered as tlie left wing of the Balkan battle which 
stretches almost to the Turko-Bulgarian frontier, an 
extension of about 360 miles. As a matter of fact, all 
the Allies, except the Belgian, are here face to face with 
the Bulgars and Turks who seem to have been somewhat 
left in the lurch by the Germans and Austrians, which 
seems to foreshadow on this front a circumstance greatly 
advantageous to the Allies. At the Turco-Bulgarian 
frontier the European battle front loses its regularity, 
and we come into the zone of an Anglo-Russian-Arabic 
struggle against the Turks. 
(4) The Turkish front describes an immense pocket 
formed by the coast of Asia Minor and Syria, Suez Canal, 
Central Arabia, the Eastern boundary of Mesopotamia, 
the western frontier of the high Annenian plateau and 
the Black Sea. On this circumference of 3,000-3,500 
miles, there are five centres of operations. On the wings 
activity is naval, consisting of zones of surveillance in the 
Mediterranean, the Suez Canal, and the Black Sea ; 
between these two is the zone of the Arab rebellion 
against the Turks, the Turkish counter-offensive against 
the British in Mesopotamia and the Russians in Persia, 
and the Russian offensive on the edge of the Armenian 
plateau. 
(5) We now arrive at the fifth great sphere of action, 
the struggle between Russians and Austro-Germans 
which constitutes the right wing of the enveloping 
strategy, just as the battle in France constitutes the left 
wing. This front stretches from the Danube to the Gulf 
of Riga on a front of nearly a thousand miles, and consists 
of three centres of action, one of these being sub-divided 
into two episodes. On the south we have the front of 
Russians and Roumanians against Bulgars and Austrians 
followed by the Galician and Volhynian fronts where 
Russians are opposed to Austrians and Germans and the 
northern front, at present undergoing a period of observa- 
tion only, where Russians are face to face almost entirely 
with Germans. 
These are the five spheres of action which constitute 
at the present moment the Battle of Europe, and the 
object of which is to envelop the Austro-German block. 
Manoeuvre of Interior Lines 
The example of Napoleon quoted above shows us the 
classical method of dealing with an attack converging 
from various directions. The defenders group the 
strongest possible armj' in a central position whence it 
can be directed either towards whichever attacking army 
becomes most threatening or to the point where the 
attackers seem weakest, and where a counter-attack 
might break the encircling line. The Imperial General 
Staff have used this strategy on more than one occasion. 
For instance, when at the end of August 1914 they 
renounced the completion of their attack in France in 
order to send troops to Poland, and again in 1915 when 
they failed to complete their operations against Russia 
in order to strike a heavy blow in the Balkans against 
Serbia. 
F"or the success of such a manoeuvre two conditions 
are necessary, namely, a concentration of reserve in a 
central position, and good lines of communication, per- 
mitting of the transport of these reserves to any point 
on the front as rapidly as possible. This rapidity is, of 
course, to a certain extent, assured by the very fact of 
the lines being " interior," and therefore shorter, whereas 
those of the adversary are extended round the circum- 
ference of the sphere of operations. 
We had a very good example of this earlier in the 
war. When the Central Powers assumed the defensive 
on the western front in order to take up their offensive 
in Poland and Galicia, the Allies would have liked to 
send round assistance to the Russians. Unfortunately, 
the attack on the Dardanelles had failed ; but even had 
it succeeded the transport of men and guns from Paris 
to Warsaw, for example, would have hacl to travel round 
via Marseilles, Constantinople and Odessa, that is to say 
about 2,500 miles, to say nothing of various tranship- 
ments from steamer to rail, and vice-versa. The Germans, 
on the other hand, disposed of nine parallel lines of rail- 
way across the surface of this circle, and were thus able 
to effect their transport over a distance of no more than 
600 to 630 miles We can realise, therefore, the advantage 
accruing to a manoeuvre on interior lines, so long as there 
are available sufficient rapidly-transportable reserves. 
There is, however, yet another condition necessary to 
success— namely, that the attack should not come from 
