LAINU * WATKR 
iJecember b, igij 
The Battle of Canibrai 
Ry Hilaire Belloc 
THE enemy is making for the recovery ol a firm lino 
in front of Canibrai such an «-ffort as lie lias not madf 
in the West sinci- Verdun, and as hv has never Vet 
made in the winter at all. That is the only f^reat 
matter of the war at this moment. To it may be added at 
any hour news of that main bombardment upon tlic Piave 
front, which has Ix^'U so long expected and so long delayed, 
and in the absence of which nothing can W jiredicatcd of the 
Italian situation — for it will be the test of the Piave line, and 
what has happened there liitherto on that line is no siifticient 
inde.x of what mav coin<-. But at the moment of writing the 
battli- for Cambrai must occupy all our attention. 
Quite a short time ago the successful surprise effected bv 
the Third .Army would Iia\e compellwi a modification of the 
whole German line. Though then; was no complete rupture 
ol the defensive sj'stcm, though Cambrai itself was not reached 
and though a considerable ixjwer of reaction was shown 
before the end of the second day. yet Gent>ra1 Kyng's ad\ance, 
the jirofound wedge wliich he pushed into the centre of the 
enem\'s .s\-stcm, his turning of the Oueant-Drocourt line, 
Hud on top of tliis tlie occupation of Bourlon Hill, meant the 
elimination for the moment of Caml)rai as a nodal point of 
communications. The main railway- running north to Lille 
could not be used, and if tiie '^alient were ln-ld the heavy 
])ieces soon to come up would rbnder not only the main 
railway l)ut every road and line of metals converging upon 
Cambrai unuseabie in tlie neighbourluxid of the town, and 
therefore missing their connections. 
I say that under such circumstances tbc-'enem\-, were he 
still in the position whicli he was in before the International 
Anarchists in Russsia lietraj-cd the Allied cause, would have 
been conipelTcd to fall back. He would have had to go back 
to what is roughly the frontier line of \'alenciennes, and we 
should now be watching the problems .set him in att(>muting 
to retire witiiout rupture. His only alternativp to such a policy, 
once the nodal point of the Cambrai region was domin.ited 
by British fire, was to attempt to dri\e the British hiick and 
to make them lose the vantage tliey had attained. But to 
do that with no serious opjiortunities for surprise, and on 
ground wiiere conditions of partially open fighting had been 
restore<l meant the sacrifice of very large mm-ibers of men. 
Those large numbers of men a few montiis ago' he could not 
iiavc afforded. To-da}' he can. To-day it is worth his. while to 
pay a liigh i)rice on the chance of recovering the salient or, at 
any rate, flattening it sufficiently to restore Cambrai to some- 
thing of its old \'alue as a centre of communication. He has 
gone in for tiie alternative policy quite, thoroughly, and has 
poured in as gnat masses of men as the front can possibly hold, 
and is continuing to pour them in. 
The diary of tlio battle up to tiie moment of writing it some- 
what as follows : 
On Tuesday, .\o\-ein!)er 27th, tlie strong J)ut still local 
counter-attacks of the enemy were continuing, and were 
directed upon tlie lieight of Bourlon Wood. They were not 
of a force, which could shaki' the British hold' upon tin 
height or even u])on its neighbourhood. There was ex'en 
a certain British advance on that day near Fontaine and the 
capture of 500 enemy prisoners. And tlie two villages, Bour- 
lon and I'^ontaine, seem to have clianged hands twice in a 
day of c'onfused fighting. 
On Wednesday last, November 28lh, there was an interrup- 
tion or lull in the enemy's movements, and the main part of 
the fighting was confined to an artillery duel, while on the ne.\t 
day, Thursday, this state of affairs continued. 
At that moment, the night of Thursday', November 29th 
one may fix the end of the second i)hasc of the Battle of 
Canibrai. The first phase had been the two davs of successful 
advance, followed by the capture of Bourlon Hill, a story 
