LAND ^ WATER 
November 7, 1918 
will from selected I'^ua to selected lines. They arc not like a 
man making his way down the precipitous face of a mountain, 
carefully choosing one foothold after another, picking out 
the best and finnest as he slowlj' descends. They are in the 
position of a man holding on to a precipitous edge on such a 
mountain, scrambling with his feet to catch hold of anything 
he can, and every time he slips down a little further, scram- 
bling involuntarily, and desperately relying on whatever 
chance foothold he finds. 
The situation has arrived which was foreseen from the 
very beginning of the counter-offensive, and which has been 
insisted upon over and over again not only here, but, I think, 
in everv other criticism or serious studies upon the campaign. 
It is a situation in which the enemy cannot retreat at will 
because his numbers are now too depleted, and because the 
pressure upon him is too great. He stands where he can and 
how he can, desperately holding on, while he attempts to 
save what he can of his material and to preserve his 
civilian population from the impression of complete disaster. 
To appreciate the truth of this, let us look at the present 
line and see what its elements are. 
He has a water defence from the Dutch frontier to Auden- 
arde, a point reached by the French this week. He could 
if he liked continue this water defence all the way down to 
Valenciennes, but the situation is such that no ordinary 
retirement of the sort has been or could be attempted. The 
enemy found, in front of the water-liiie, that he must, to 
prevent that water-line being turned, hold as long as possible 
Valenciennes. Why has he lost Valenciennes ? Because he 
cannot hold permainently anywhere against the determined 
attack of forces now greatly his superiors in numbers, in 
material, and in moral. 
We saw last week, with the aid of a little map, how the 
defence of Valenciennes depended upon three small parallel 
streams — the Selle, the Ecaillon, and the Rhondelle — and 
how these, like three ditches, covered the gap between the 
obstacle of the Scheldt Canal and the obstacle of the Mormal 
Forest. Well, the enemy tried hard to stand on each one of 
these water-lines successively, and he lost them one after the 
other. Having lost them he lost Valenciennes, having lost 
Valenciennes he will lose the Forest of Mormal. We shall 
turn it. Having turned the Forest of Mormal he will have 
— supposing he continues his resistance — to fall back on 
Hirson : and so forth. 
VITAL COMMUNICATIONS 
Again, his present desperate defence depends, for all the 
centre of it, as was pointed out here many weeks ago, and 
as has been repeated since in most other newspapers, upon 
the lateral communications formed by the great railway 
Metz and Luxemburg, Longuyon junction, Mezieres. To cut 
this railway is to imperil the supply of all the German 
troops in front of it, and the nearer to Longuyon you cut it, 
obviously the greater your effect. 
Hence the operation undertaken by the French and Ameri- 
cans last Friday, and carried out throughout Saturday and 
Sunday. The French on the sector of Vouziers supported 
the American attack on the sector of Buzancy. The Ameri- 
can attack on the sector of the Buzancy had for its object 
the reaching of a point from which the great railway would 
be under close range fire. The critical point which, if it be 
carried, endangers the whole German position here can best 
be studied by looking at the small sketch map III., where 
I have put the matter in some'detail. As the line originally 
Tiumel 
■Monfanecly" 
Srouennes 
stood, the French were fighting in front of Vouziers on the 
left and right of the town. Then the line went down, in a 
sort of pocket holding the last woods of the Argonne, and 
was carried on by the Americans beyond the woods to the 
Meuse, and, roughly, the line reached Brieulles. The advance 
effected by the French and Americans carries the line right 
bej'ond the woods to the north, and brings it on its extreme 
right a little nearer the critical railway, but has not yet 
(dispitches of Monday morning) carried the vital position 
opposite the little town of Dun. This position I have 
marked with an "X" on the map. Back of it at.Villers, 
the point at which they were lying nearest the railway upon 
Sunday night, seems to have been at a range of 18,000 
yards. That is not enough forward. It means that the 
iieavics when they come up will not be nearer than a 
range of 22,000 yards at the nearest, and this does not 
put the railway out of action. It is unfortunate that the 
very nearest point of the railway at Brouennes is dominated 
by a tunnel ; but, anyhow, fire at closer range upon the 
outlet to the tunnel and upon the road, as well as the railway, 
would cut this good line of communication. Therefore it 
is that the enemy is putting all his strength in the defence of 
this corner. 
Meanwhile, we must remember that the slowness of the 
advance here, and the way in which the pivot in front of 
Dun is being maintained, means a heav}' drain upon the 
enemy's reserves. He does not effect a resistance of that 
kind save at a tremendous expense in his dwindling asset of 
man-power ; and it would be a great error to judge his 
general position in Flanders and Northern France by his 
power to maintain himself at this vital sector. If he cannot 
hold out there, he cannot hold out anywhere — that is obvious. 
But, what is more, even if he holds out there, he does so at 
the expense of a necessary retirement elsewhere, and, worsi? 
than a retirement, of the weakening of the lines in critical 
sectors to a weakness which sooner or later will mean a 
crack, y^ 
As I pointed out a couple of weeks ago, there is a theoretical 
line on which if he had been able to get there with all his units 
more or less simultaneously, and if he had time or power to 
prepare the opening part of it, he might again attempt to 
stand for a few weeks longer. It is the line of the Lower 
Scheldt and the Dendre till that stream becomes quite 
insignificant south-west of Brussels. Thence he would have 
to hold open country, either going south to Namur or directly 
south to Mezieres. Then southward he would have the 
water-line of the Meuse. 
But this theoretical line has the greatest disadvantages. 
Its lateral railway (Namur-Luxemburg) is separated from 
the front by very difficult country and the deep ravine of 
the Semois, and though the position is easy to defend in its 
centre, it is very weak in his right centre across the plain. 
It would mean, at least, as many men as the present line 
needs, and be harder to hold. However, he would link, as 
we have repeatedly said, the two sections of the German 
army, north and south of the Ardennes, and they would be 
able to support each other with difficulty by a single railway 
line. 
There is, lastly, the shorter line covering Liege-Luxem- 
burg-Thionville, and Metz. That line looks the best upon 
a small scale map because it is obviously the shortest. As I 
said two weeks ago, he will not adopt it of his own free will. 
It brings his enemy to the gates of his country. It puts the 
western towns of the Germans into continuous and daily 
peril of repeated bombardment from the air. As for the line 
of the Rhine which lies behind, 1 make bold to sav that 
under present circumstances it is no line at all. 
I know how strong a statement, this sounds, but it is true. 
If the enemy cannot hold on the lines we have just discussed, 
he certainly cannot hold on the far more extended line of the 
river, with its perpetual curves forming re-entrants, and its 
very much more extended trajectory and the panic-stricken 
population behind it. 
Summarily, the situation is that the enemy will hold in 
all probability alwaj's as far to the west as he can, will hardly 
have any opportunity to pick up any continuous line in the 
future (though, as in the present situation, some such line is 
the foundation of his position), and that he will be defeated 
or will surrender upon posts which he happened to be holding 
against the pressure of the Allies, and which he finds he can 
no longer hold. 
He cannot psrm'anently retain any line. He has grown too 
weak. 
P.S. — Since writing the above later dispatches tell us that 
the Americans are as far down the Meuse as Halles. They 
hold the Dun position, and the railwa}- is now under fire at a 
range not completely putting it out of action, but certainly 
compelling a German retirement. 
