LAND &■ WATER 
October 3, 1918 
the west wei" faced by the French Fourth Army under 
Gouraud ; the twenty to the east by the first American 
Army under Liggett. 
Observe wliat happened. From the first launching of 
the infantry at dawn of last Thursday, the 26th, after an 
ample preliminary bombardment, it was clear that the^ 
ftiffest of the resistance would be in front of Gouraud ; and 
that the weakest would be in front of the Americans, because, 
as I have pointed out, the parts of the line nearest to the 
central concentration could be reinforced quicker than those 
further off beyond Argonne. The French, therefore, made 
an advance which at first did no more than cover the deep 
outpost defences, almost denuded of guns, which composed 
what the Germans call "the fore-field" of the new method 
of defence, but the Americans went right through, taking 
a crescent of country, the deepest stretch of which was no 
less than seven miles, and going to the neighbourhood of 
Brieulles. 
Put yourself in the position of the German Command on 
the night between Thursday and Friday. Here is the huge 
great bow stretching across and into Northern France from 
the sea to the Moselle, with its apex upon the pivot St. Gobain 
and Laon. A violent attack has just taken place upon the 
left or south-eastern tip of this bend ; and that attack, if it 
progresses, especially at its extreme end along the Meuse, 
will threaten in a very few miles more to reach, let us say, the 
town of Dun ; and if it reaches the town of Dun, very grave 
consequences will follow. Why will very grave consequences 
follow if it reaches, I do not say the precise geographical 
point of Dun, but if it pushes down the Meuse sufficiently to 
occupy the region of that town ? Because in such circum- 
stances the German line on the far side of the river would 
be in an impossible position. It would be thrusting outwards 
in a local salient most dangerous for the defensive. It would 
have to be retired. But if you retire the line appreciably on 
the east side of the Meuse, north-east of Verdun, you put your 
vital lateral communication — the railway through Longuyon — 
in peril. I have explained in previous articles, how the 
Ardennes forest compels the Germans in France and Belgium 
to depend upon two separate sheaves of communications : 
one through Lorraine, and Luxemburg, the other through 
Belgium. I have further explained how the lateral com- 
munication which connects these two sheaves of communica- 
tions is the railway passing in front of the Ardennes countrj-, 
and uniting Metz with Mezieres, and on, up, with Valen- 
ciennes and Lille. Longuyon is the junction where the last 
of the southern communications comes in — the line through 
Luxemburg — and if either Longuyon Station or its neigh- 
bourhood gets under close fire, the German armies in the 
West are virtually divided into two groups, which cannot 
mutually support each other. The enemy, therefore, rightly 
thought it absolutely vital to prevent a further advance 
down the left or west bank of the Meuse. He brought all 
tlue men he possibly could down there to stop any further 
American a'dvance,'and he also strengthened to the best of 
his ability, though with less anxiety, the less important 
front west of Argonne, where Gouraud and the Fourth French 
.'\miy had rather the task of holding than of forcing back : 
rather the duty of preventing the enemy from getting men 
away from this part than the duty of pressing it as though 
it were a main sector. 
The enemy, then, is occupied all that Friday, the 27th, 
in preventing the bad situation which has developed between 
the Argonne and the Meuse from getting worse ; because if 
it gets appreciably worse, his line beyond the Meuse will 
have to go back, and every mile it goes back is an increasing 
threat to the whole of the armies he has in the West. 
Now, the very meaning of this great series of actions is 
that the Allies now being possessed not only of the initiative, 
but of a growing superiority in number, the enemy, whenever 
he reinforces- one sector which has been put in peril, must 
do so to the grave disadvantage of another. He has no 
general reserve left. Though he is quite right in cohceiving 
that the American advance between the Argonne and Meuse 
was an absolutely desperate peril which must be warded off 
at all costs, yet it was a" grave anxiety to him whence he 
should borrow men in order to stop the American advance. 
He must have borrowed them from those dense formations 
in his centre. Therefore, it is that on the second day 
— Friday, the 27th — you get the second great and sudden 
blow delivered by the British against the junction of Cambrai. 
The importance of Cambrai has been insisted upon too 
often in these columns to need repetition. It is a junction 
of roads and railways upon which the existing German line 
between the Scarpe and Oise depends. As we know, there is 
a water defence which it was hoped would be invulnerable 
JO M 'AfUes so 
