Ordeal by Battle

by Frederick Scott Oliver

When people proceeded to seek for answers to these questions, as many did during the year 1912, they speedily discovered that, in considerations of this sort, the governing factor is numbers—the numbers of the opposing forces available at the outbreak of war and in the period immediately following. The tremendous power of national spirit must needs be left out of such calculations as a thing immeasurable, imponderable, and uncertain. It was also unsafe to assume that the courage, intelligence, efficiency, armament, transport, equipment, supplies, and leadership of the German and Austrian armies would be in any degree inferior to those of the Triple Entente. Certain things had to be allowed for in a rough and ready way;[[2]] but the main enquiry was forced to concern itself with numerical strength.

There was not room for much disagreement upon the broad facts of the military situation, among soldiers and civilians who, from 1911 onwards, gave themselves to the study of this subject at the available sources of information; and their estimates have been confirmed, in the main, by what has happened since war began. The Intelligence departments of London, Paris, and Petrograd—with much ampler means of knowledge at their disposal—can have arrived at no other conclusions. What the English War Office knew, the Committee of Imperial Defence likewise knew; and the leading members of the Cabinet, if not the whole Government, must be presumed to have been equally well informed.

It was assumed in these calculations, that in case of tension between the Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance, the latter would not be able—in the first instance at all events—to bring its full strength into the struggle. For unless Germany and Austria managed their diplomacy before the outbreak of hostilities with incomparable skill, it seemed improbable that the Italian people would consent to engage in a costly, and perhaps ruinous, war—a war against France, with whom they had no quarrel; against England, towards whom they had long cherished feelings of friendship; on behalf of the Habsburg Empire, which they still regarded—and not altogether unreasonably—with suspicion and enmity.

NEUTRALITY OF ITALY

But although the neutrality of Italy might be regarded as a likelihood at the opening of the war, it could not be reckoned on with any certainty as a permanent condition. For as no one can forecast the course of a campaign, so no one can feel secure that the unexpected may not happen at any moment. The consequences of a defeat in this quarter or in that, may offer too great temptations to the cupidity of onlookers; while diplomacy, though it may have bungled in the beginning, is sure to have many opportunities of recovering its influence as the situation develops. Consequently, unless and until Italy actually joined in the struggle on the side of the Triple Entente, a considerable section of the French army would, in common prudence, have to be left on guard upon the Savoy frontier.

In a war brought on by the aggressive designs of Germany, the only nations whose participation could be reckoned on with certainty—and this only supposing that Britain stood firmly by the policy upon which her Government had embarked—were Russia, France, and ourselves on the one side, Germany and Austria-Hungary on the other.

It would certainly be necessary for Germany, as well as Austria, to provide troops for coast defences, and also for the frontiers of neutral countries, which might have the temptation, in certain circumstances, to deneutralise themselves at an inconvenient moment, if they were left unwatched. On the north and west were Denmark, Holland, and Belgium, each of which had a small field army, besides garrison and fortress troops which might be turned to more active account upon an emergency. On the south and east were Montenegro, Servia, and Roumania, whose military resources were on a considerable scale, and whose neutrality was not a thing altogether to be counted on, even before the Balkan war[[3]] had lowered the prestige of Turkey. In addition there was Italy, who although a pledged ally in a defensive war was not likely, for that reason, to consider herself bound to neutrality, benevolent or otherwise, if in her judgment, the particular contingencies which called for her support had not arisen at the outset.

SUPERIORITY OF GERMAN NUMBERS

After taking such precautions as seemed prudent under these heads, Germany would then be obliged to detach for service, in co-operation with the Austrians in Poland, and along the whole eastern border, a sufficient number of army corps to secure substantial superiority over the maximum forces which Russia, hampered by an inadequate railway system and various military considerations,[[4]] could be expected to bring into the field and maintain there during the first few months of the war.

It was reckoned[[5]] after taking all these things into account, that Germany would have available, for the invasion of France, an army consisting of some ninety divisions—roughly, rather more than a million and three-quarters of men—and that she could maintain this force at its full strength—repairing the wastage of war out of her ample reserves—for a period of at least six months. It was assumed that the Kaiser, relying upon the much slower mobilisation of Russia, would undoubtedly decide to use the whole of this huge force in the west, in the hope that before pressure could begin to make itself felt in the east, France would either have been crushed, as she was in 1870, or so much mangled that it would be possible to send reinforcements of an overwhelming character to make victory secure in Poland.