Seven Days of War East and West
Fighting of the Second Week in May on French and Russian Fronts.
[By a Military Expert of THE NEW YORK TIMES.]
The sinking of the Lusitania has, for the week ended May 15, so completely absorbed the attention of the press and the interest of the public that the military operations themselves have not received the notice that otherwise would have been awarded them. The sinking of this ship, with the delicate diplomatic situation between Germany and the United States which the act brought about, is not a military or naval operation as such, and comments on it have no place in this column. At the same time there is an indirect effect of the drowning of hundreds of British citizens which will have a very direct bearing on Britain's military strength and policy.
The British public is notably hard to stir, are slow to act, and almost always underrate their adversary. In almost every war, from 1775 down to and including the South African war, England, with a self-assurance that could only be based on ignorance of true conditions, has started with only a small force, and it has been only when this force has been defeated and used up that the realization of the true needs of the situation has dawned. Then, and then only, has recruiting been possible at a pace commensurate with the necessity.
In the Boer war, for example, every one in England, official and civilian, believed that 30,000 men would be more than enough to defeat the South African burghers. Yet ten times 30,000 British soldiers were operating in the Transvaal and Orange Free State before the war ended.
In the present conflict Lord Kitchener himself admits that there are many times the number of British soldiers in France than was thought would be necessary when war was declared. And even up to May 6 the British public was not thoroughly aroused. Many of the peasants in the back counties hardly believed the war was a reality. Recruiting was slow, there was but little enthusiasm, and Lord Haldane's thinly veiled hint that a draft might soon become necessary was almost unnoticed.
But the sinking of the Lusitania has brought the war home to England as nothing else has or could have done, and all England is aflame with a bitterness against Germany which is already increasing the flow of recruits and cannot but add to the fighting efficiency of the men now at the front. The effect will be far-reaching throughout the British Empire, and will do much to solve the problem which faced the organizers of Great Britain's forces of how to get sufficient volunteers to swell the volume of the French expeditionary force and to replace the casualties.
To turn to the direct military operations in the various theatres of war, no week since last Fall has witnessed more important activities or offensive movements conducted on such a scale. On both western and eastern fronts truly momentous actions involving great numbers of men have been under way, and though not yet concluded, have advanced so far as to give a reasonable basis for estimating the results.