January 4, 1917 
LAND & WATER 
Verdun was an offerfsive undertaken in view of an 
o])poncnt's relatively increasing strength and in the hope 
of forestalling a threatening future. The Somme was an 
offensive undertaken in view of the opponent's decreasing 
strength and with a view to initiating further and stronger 
offensive action in promising future : 
Wc must grasp that contrast before we can understand 
the rest at all. It conditions the whole war of 1916 in 
the West and produces all the other contrasts between 
the two battles which wc shall note later. 
Conditions of the Verdun Offensive 
Consider the state of the war when the Verdun offensive 
was begun and compare it with the state of the war when 
the Somme offensive was begun. 
The Verdun offensive was begun as soon as possible 
after the strategic failure of the Austro-German advance 
through Poland. 
Although that failure was followed by the accession 
of Bulgaria, which ])ermitted Serbia to be overrun, and 
which gave" through communication between the .\ustro- 
(ierman factories and the armies of their Turkish Ally, 
yet its main note was a check — the enemy had gone to 
a great expense for a certain object and had failed to 
obtain it. The five great successive attempts to envelop 
a Russian army had each ended in disappointment. 
The Austro-German line had been drawn eastward to 
cracking point. The enemy dared advance it no further. 
In the terse and most accurate phrase which Lord 
Kitchener used at that moment, he had " shot his bolt." 
What was he to do ? His advantage hitherto had been 
superiority in numbers everywhere, and in munitionment 
■ — -but in the latter an overwhelming superiority upon the 
East. His advantage in numbers was rapidly dis- 
appearing w ith the growth of the British army and with his 
own prodigal expenditure of men in the purs\iit of a 
decision which always escaped him. He would pass to 
a v'ery marked inferiority when the Russian reserve of 
man-power could be equipped, while his superiority in 
munitionment was still more threatened by the final 
establishment of plant in Britain. The British pro- 
duction for the munitionment, both, of Britain and her 
Allies, was already, early in 1916 — by the summer it 
would be formidable — rising. The enemy had only one 
card to play, and that was to seek a decision' in the West. 
He had, for that matter, proclaimed it openly in America 
where he had told his public through Bernhardi that 
from " his successes in the East," he was about to " come 
back westward and over-run F"rance." 
If we ehminate the very foolish rhetoric of such phrases 
they still mean obviously a determination to break the 
Western front, while some superiority for such an off en- / 
sive still remained, and a belief that it could be done. 
Even if we had not the enemy's repeated open pro- 
nouncements in the matter, what he did is glaring proof 
of what he meant to do. 
The divisions with which the first blow was to be de- 
li\ered were withdrawn from the line for special training 
the moment the Polish campaign was at an end. His 
new recruits of the 1916 class were pushed through their 
drills with the greatest, rapidity. The emplacement of 
the heavy guns began in the West immediately after 
the failure in the East was clear ; and despite the very 
great difficvilties of beginning an action upon so early a 
date, the bombardment opened upon the sector of Verdun 
in the third week of February. 
The whole thing speaks, as loudly as it can, of the 
necessity of obtaining a decision before the -summer of 
i()i6. And why ? Because if no decision were obtained 
bv then the increase in the number of the Allies in the 
\Vcstern field and the still more rapid increase (in geo- 
metrical progression*) of the Allied munitionment in the 
West would render the certain issue of the war fatal to the 
(Central Powers. 
Contrast of the Somme 
If such were-tfic conditions under which the Verdun . 
• " Ceomctrical Progression " because your plant once laid down — 
suljjcct to limitations in man-power- hcl])s you to niaUc further plant, , 
and the product therefore increases in geometrical progression, like 
Ihe breeding of stock. So would tlie enemy's munitionment increase 
Imt lor his liigher limitations in certain necessary materials and in 
man-power compared with the .\Uies. 
ofl'ensive was designed and undertaken, contrast the 
conditions under which the Somme offensive was designed 
and undertaken. 
First : Verdun had already eaten up upon that one 
sector alone and in five months alone, and for the German 
army alone, more than Germany can replace by new 
recruitment upon all her fronts during a whole year. 
In the second place, the Trentino offensive had failed 
and had failed at the cost of further vtry heavy Austrian 
losses upon the comparatively neglected Isonzo front. 
In the third place — and it was much the most im- 
portant thing of all— Brussiloff on the 4th of June had 
broken the Austrian front in the East, was sweeping up 
prisoners at such a rate that in a few weeks they reached 
nearly 400,000, and was eliminating the equivalent of at 
least forty Austro-Hungarian divisions. Germany had 
to fill the gap by the sudden depletion of her reserve pi 
man-power ; the reshuffling of units to create new and 
smaller divisions, and the maintenance of a most ex- 
pensive, slowly stiffening retreat. 
It was with the military situation in such a posture that 
the bombardment on the Somme opened in the last days 
of June. It opened with the British power of munition- 
ment still rising very rapidly and destined to rise more 
rapidly still ; and the offensive was delivered with forces 
which had behind them a very great reserve of man-power. 
Even upon the French side, "though the French were the 
more exhausted of the two Allies, Class 1917 had not 
yet appeared, while upon the German side the Somme 
drew into its vortex jroni the very first day the recruits of 
this class; and long before the operation was overall the 
available lads of 191 7 were either upon the active front 
or in the field depots. They had been drained from the 
main depots and Class 1918 had taken their place there 
Contrast in Rate of Loss 
The second point of contrast is conformable to this 
first and is what we should have expected to follow from 
the first. It will be found expressed, when the history 
of the war is written, in the curves of comparative losses 
which cannot be published to-day. 
At Verdun the French defensive grew stronger and 
stronger as the operations proceeded. The comparative 
losses upon the French side declined as the operation 
proceeded, and this was largely because the enemy's 
artillery was (1) more and more embarrassed in its 
efficacy by the rising power of the French in the air upon 
this sector ; (2) More and more equally met by the new 
French gun production and concentration. 
On the Somme it was just the other way. The AUied 
artillery, with the co-operation of the Allied superiority 
in the air, \vas master from the very beginning of the 
operation. The losses of the offensive grew on the 
average less and less in proportion to results as the 
operations proceeded. The losses of the defensive- grew 
greater and greater. The two curves (of the German 
loss and Allied loss) probably crossed somewhere towards 
the end of August. The distance between them was 
rapidly increasing and nothing prevented its increase to 
the point of completely demoralising the cnefny but the 
advent of winter and climatic conditions interrupting 
offensive power. In most of the later operations the losses 
of the offence, even upon the line of contact, were less 
than those of the defence ; while the losses behind the 
line through the efficacy of artillery was far greater 
upon the enemy's side than upon ours. 
One may estimate the thing, if one will, by the symptom 
— for it is" hardly a criterion — of prisoners. 
Roughly speaking, at Verdun in five months the enemy 
was taking one prisoner from the Allies (including 
colonial troops) for every ten casualties he received, 
and as the operations proceeded the cost in casualties per 
prisoner rose. 
Roughly speaking, upon the Somme. the Allies took 
prisoners in a much higher ratio to their casualties, and 
as the operations proceeded the cost in casualties for 
each prisoner fell very rapidly indeed. 
One may put the contrast between the Somme and 
Verdtm in the form of tactical experience. 
""■'The German attack at Verdun began with one tactical 
fticthod, which was pursued with slight modifications to 
the end, and as it proceeded gradually lost in value. 
The Allied offensive on the Somme perfected a new 
