LAND & WATER 
Augusr 9, 1917 
Cjje Wlar 
Opening of the Flanders Battle 
By Hilaire Belloc 
IN order to understand events of the past week in front 
of Ypres, we must clearly seize the change which has come 
over the nature both of offence and defence since the 
piolonged actions upon the Somme. • 
The Allies in the West are greatly the superior of the 
enemy in numbers and in jrower of munitionment. Short of 
some further and still greater change in the affairs of Russia 
they will remain superior. It is the object of the Allies 
now, as it has been for more than a year past, 
not to stand up against pressure expected or un- 
expected in any sector but, exercising that pressure 
themselves upon any sector they choose at will, to con- 
tinue it, cither unbrokenly upon that sector or first upon 
one sector and then upon another, until the enemy's power 
of resistance shall be broken. 
The great Somme offensive had the effect of very seriously 
weakening the enemy upon the West. He was only just 
able to recruit in time to prevent a complete break, and 
even as it was, though he was saved' by the weather, he was 
compelled to his first partial retirement before the next 
fighting season opened. Roughly speaking, the method of 
attack during the Somme and the method of defence were 
these : the offensive carried on an almost continuous bom- 
bardment and forced first one line and then another of the 
defensi\e in increasingly deepening and broadening crescents. 
The blows followed each other at considerable intervals, and 
each was heavily expensive in men. 
The defensive held each line successively in great strength 
and incurred a somewhat larger expense ia men in the 
process. 
During the winter interval the relative superiority of the 
Allies in munitionment and guns increased, and this year a > 
new. plan developed upon both sides, a plan the character of 
which was clear after the close of, the first spring offensive 
in front of Arras and in Champagne. 
Tills plan was to fix limited objectives, the occupation of 
which would involve a comparatively short advance ; to break 
the elaborately organised enemy front completely o\er a given 
stretch of the hne, by prolonged and accurate bombardment ; 
to occupy this limited belt immediately, and then to prepare 
the next blow upon such defences as the enemy should have 
organised behind. Such blows, each strictly limited, but fol- 
lowing each other fairly rapidly, would by their limitation be 
far less expensive in men ; would compel the enemy to highly 
expensive counter-attacks, and should, in general, make his 
inferior forces lose at a much greater rate than the superior 
forces pressing him. The culmination of such repeated blows 
would ultimately leave liim in a situation where he could not 
maintain his line. 
To meet this plan imposed upon him by the superiority of 
his opponent the enemy proposed tliis system of defence : 
To hold his elaborate front organisation as thinly as possible, 
to preserve by the saving thus effected considerable reserves 
upon a second line, say, on the average 2,000 yards behind 
the first, or more ; to admit thus the impossibility 
of holding his elaborately organised front line under the first 
attack, but to attempt its recapture by strong and necessarily 
expensive counter-attacks while the assault was still in con- 
fusion after its first success. 
All the fighting for the Aisnc Ridge has shown these char- 
acteristics and they will appear without doubt during this 
great battle of Flanders which has just begun. 
It is clear that the success of the offensive will depend 
upon the rapidity with which it can organise each successive 
blow, and upon its ability to compel the enemy to lose men in 
a far heavier proportion than do his assailants. 
It is ecpially clear that the success of the defensive will 
depend upon its power of retarding such blows and of inflict- 
ing loss upon the assailants during counter-attacks beyond 
those assailants' calculations. The longer the period between 
attacks the better the opportunity of the defensive to organise 
new lines, and if the old first line can be recaptured by the 
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