Had the fighting round Rheims and the fighting north of the Aisne no result? Were these combats, vast as they were, merely drawn combats? By no means. North of the Aisne the British gained the eastern end of the ridge; round Rheims the French won all the eastern side of the theatre of hills, with the exception of Nogent l'Abbesse, and also the eastern side of the transverse gap. Those results were both decisive and important.

They were decisive and important because they achieved strategical purposes vital to the Allied campaign. Let us try to make that clear.

When after the defeat on the Marne the Germans took up their new line from the north of the Aisne to the Argonne, their utmost energy and resource were put forth to send into the fighting line from Germany fresh reserve formations which would give their forces not only a numerical but a military superiority.

But the effect and value of those fresh masses clearly depended on their being employed at the decisive points. Where were those decisive points?

The decisive points were first the extreme left of the Allied line, where it turned round from the north of the Aisne to the Oise, and secondly Verdun and along the eastern frontier.

Consider the effect had the Germans been able promptly to throw decisively superior forces against the Allies at those points. They would have turned both flanks of the Allied line, they would have forced a general retreat, and they would have been able once more to resume the offensive, but this time probably with the fortified frontier in their hands.

There can be no doubt that, broadly, that was their intention; and it was plainly seen by General Joffre to be their intention, because eastward from Rheims to the Argonne in their fortified line across the highlands the Germans remained from first to last upon the defensive.

This, however, was the situation the Germans had to meet: between the Aisne and the Oise a new and powerful French army under the command of General de Castlenau; on the Aisne and round Rheims, a tremendous and sustained onset by the 6th French, the British, and the 5th French army; between Rheims and the Argonne, an offensive which pushed them successively out of Suippes, and Souain, and therefore off the great cross-roads; in the Argonne, an offensive which forced them back from St. Menehould and beyond Varennes, and closed the defiles; round Verdun, and in the Woeuvre, an onset which threatened to cut communications with Metz.

Now the effect of these operations was, among other things, to restrict the German means of movement and supply; and it was a consequence of that restriction that even though there might be two or more millions of men then ready in Germany to be sent forward, there were neither roads nor railways enough to send them forward save after delay, nor roads or railways enough to keep them supplied when they had been sent.

With the means at their disposal—those means were still great, though not great enough—the German Government had to choose between various alternatives. As to the choice they made, later events leave no doubt. They sent forward troops enough to defend their flank between the Aisne and the Oise—it was all at the moment they could do; and they employed the best and heaviest of their masses of reserves partly to resist the British attack, but mainly to resist the 5th French army. At this time they had to let the position in the Argonne, round Verdun, and on the eastern frontier go; that is to say, they had there to remain for the time being on the defensive.

The fighting north of the Aisne and round Rheims therefore crippled their operations at what were, in truth, the decisive points—the Allied flanks; and that was unavoidable, because unless the centre of their line remained secure, operations on the flanks would be impracticable.

But these operations in the centre used up their best troops.

Conversely, of course, the same operations left General Joffre the more free both to pursue his envelopment of the Germans on their flank northwards from the Aisne towards the Belgian frontier, and to go on with his seizures of positions round Verdun and on the eastern frontier, seizures which pressed upon and embarrassed the German communications, and consequently limited the total strength they could put into the field.

It will be seen, therefore, that the fighting north of the Aisne and round Rheims was important and was decisive.

The fact must not be lost sight of that the aim of the Germans was at this time, if they could, to re-seize the initiative. Again the fact ought to be kept in mind that the aim of the Allied strategy was not to drive the German armies from France, but both to prevent them from getting out of France and to destroy them as a military force. If we know the governing motive on each side, we hold the key to the strategy adopted. Here the governing motive of neither was a secret.

To show the effect of governing motive, let us in the first instance follow the course of German strategy. We shall find that from the middle of September, during the succeeding nine weeks—that is, until about November 20—they made six great efforts, any one of which, had it succeeded, would once more have given them the initiative in this western campaign. The first was the effort to break the Allied line at Rheims.

Foiled in their outflanking scheme by the inherent difficulties of the situation, but not less by the powerful Allied attack north of the Aisne and round Rheims, there can be no question that the German Headquarters Staff decided that their best, most direct, and most decisive stroke would be a counter-offensive made against Rheims with their utmost force, and as the situation stood at the end of September, there can be no question that they were right.

Had the effort succeeded both parts of the Allies' line must have been forced into retreat and their communications severed. This success must have changed the entire aspect of the western operations. For the Allies it would have been a disaster of the first magnitude. If in this effort the Germans sacrificed their best troops, it affords only another illustration of the statement that they do not make such sacrifices without what they consider good cause.

But the effort failed, and the German Headquarters Staff, at any rate, must have realised that the failure and the cost of it had imperilled the whole position of their armies in France. Matters of this kind have not to be judged only by ground lost or won. The success or failure to achieve objectives is the true test.

Meanwhile heavy forces of the Allies had been massed against the German right flank. The next effort of the Germans consequently was to push back those forces. They met the outflanking movement in the way such movements can best be met—by trying to outflank the outflankers.

At this time the Allied forces on the flank extended from near Noyon on the Oise northward to the Somme. The Germans promptly pushed westward in force north of the Somme and across the outside edge of the Allied line to the town of Albert and the heights commanding it.

With notable promptitude, however, the Allied line was extended across the Somme to the north, and by the west of Arras, and the German movement was held. Gradually, after days of obstinate fighting, the enemy were battled out of Albert and then out of Arras; and the Allied outflanking line was stretched up to Bethune and La BassÉe.

Night and day, day and night, by railway, by motor-omnibus, on motor-cars,[33] French troops during three whole weeks were rushed up from the south and west of France. This movement towards the fighting line had begun with the pursuit after the Battle of the Marne. It never ceased. First the army of General de Castlenau appeared on the front. Next came the army of General de Maudhuy. Territorials and marines from the fleet were hurried into the service; divisions of cavalry spaced out the line, and defended communications. In Germany as in France no effort was spared. The issue was momentous. During these first weeks of October the German Government put forth its supreme effort to stem and to turn the adverse tide of war. Hitherto they had found their measures baffled. Two new and powerful French armies had fastened on to the flank of their position. Their own forces had come up just too late. The peril was menacing and it was growing. They redoubled their energies.

Their decision was another supreme effort to outflank the outflankers. With fresh masses of Reservists, sent westward at all possible speed, they pushed behind a heavy screen of cavalry across the Aa and across the Lys at Estaires and threatened the rear of the French troops holding Bethune.

It is probably not realised that this was strategically the most important offensive movement the Germans had made in the western theatre of war since their advance upon Paris.

Yet that undoubtedly was the fact. Had the movement succeeded it must not only have given them control of the north-east coast of France as far probably as Havre, but it must have rolled up the Allied line as far as Noyon. The whole original scheme of turning the Allies' left flank would have been within realisation.

The movement did not succeed. It was met by a counter-move probably as unexpected by the Germans as it was bold. The counter-move was the transfer of the British army from the Aisne.

Recognising the decisive character of these operations, General Joffre had entrusted the control of affairs on this part of the front to General Foch, not only one of the ablest among the able soldiers whom this war has shown the French Army to possess, but one of the most brilliant authorities on the science of modern military tactics. As he had met the situation magnificently at Sezanne, so now he met it with equal resource under circumstances hardly less critical.

There were now three French armies on the German flank, and they fought as they were led with a skill equal to their valour. Yet the necessity remained for a great counter-stroke. In view of that necessity the idea occurred to Sir John French to transfer the British army, a proposal to which General Joffre at once agreed.

It is beyond the scope of this volume to enter into details of the new great battle which, beginning with the arrival of the British troops, culminated in the heroic defence of Ypres. Justice could not be done to that great and memorable feat of arms in a brief summary.

Suffice it to say that here, on the great coalfield of northern France, in a labyrinth of railway sidings and canals, villages and lanes, pit heaps, and factories, the British troops, helped by the French cavalry, after furious fighting, drove back the Germans from the Aa and the Lys and took up a line continuing the outflanking positions from La BassÉe to Ypres in Belgium.

A third effort of the Germans to outflank the outflanking line was directed across the Yser. This was the last attempt of the kind that could be made. Its success was consequently vital, and its failure equally disastrous. Again it illustrates the fact that the Germans sacrifice neither money nor lives without good cause. The fighting on the Yser was as deadly for the enemy as the fighting round Rheims.

Coincidently, however, with these movements were others of a different kind. The official communiquÉs, covering the two kinds of movements as the evidences of them appeared day by day, have naturally led to a certain amount of mystification—not intentional, but inevitable from the brevity and caution of these statements and the fact that they cover separately only the operations of a few hours.

The movements of a different kind were those designed at one point or another to drive a wedge or salient into the Allied front.

In the operations on the German flank between the Aisne and the Belgian coast there have been two main efforts of that character. The first was the attempt to split the Allied front at Roye and at Arras, and to break up the line between those places; the second was the effort on an even larger scale, and pursued with still greater determination, to split the front at La BassÉe and at Ypres, and to break up the line intervening.

It is no mere accident that this latter attempt followed immediately on the failure to cross the Yser. The attempt arose out of the necessity of the situation.

On the Upper Meuse, by another great effort, the Germans had driven a wedge into the French fortified frontier at St. Mihiel, and that wedge appeared to some the prelude of a mysterious scheme. In fact, the intention and the effect of it was to hold off the French advance along the frontier of Lorraine and across the Vosges. Again it is the case of a desperate man clinging to a railing.

We have, therefore, three great efforts to break the Allied front by their wedge tactics, and three to outflank the Allied outflanking development. None of these efforts succeeded.

What was the consequence? The consequence was that the German armies in France and Belgium could neither advance nor retreat. They could not advance because they are not strong enough. They could not retreat, because retreat would mean their destruction.

The retreat of any army—and most of all the retreat of a huge mass army—is not a simple matter. On the contrary, it is a most difficult and complex operation in the most favourable circumstances. Here, however, was not one mass army, but a line of mass armies, occupying a front forming a right angle, and opposed on each arm of that right angle by forces which had proved stronger than they. So situated, they could only retreat with any chance of safety by falling directly back; but either arm of the angle if it fell directly back must obstruct the retreat of the other; and if they fell directly back each at the same time, their movements must become exactly like those of the blades of a pair of scissors as they are being closed. A retreat under such conditions is a military impossibility.

Not a few fantastic motives have been attributed to the Germans, more particularly as regards the terrible struggle in West Flanders, but the plain truth of the matter is that here stated.

Now if we turn to the strategy of the Allies, bearing their governing motive in mind, we shall find that it rested primarily on the attack launched against the German positions north of the Aisne and round Rheims.

That attack wrecked the German scheme for resuming the offensive, and was the most effective means of assuring that end. It is impossible indeed not to recognise that the feat which reduced a force like the German armies to immobility is a masterpiece of strategy wholly without parallel in the annals of war. Whether we look at the breadth and boldness of its conception, at the patience and command of organisation with which it was carried out, at the grasp it displayed of the real conditions governing the operations of modern mass armies, or at the clear purpose and unswerving resolution with which it was followed, the plan equally calls forth surprise and admiration.

From the military standpoint, victory or defeat is the answer to the question: Which side has accomplished the purpose it had in view?

The German purpose of re-seizing the initiative was not accomplished. The German scheme of turning either one or both flanks of the Allied line was not accomplished. That is military failure.

From the beginning of October, when the struggle round Rheims was at its height, the feature of the campaign broadly was that the weight of the fighting passed progressively from the centre of the fighting front to the wings—to West Flanders on the one side, and to the Argonne and the Upper Meuse on the other. Progressively the Allied forces were placed where it was intended they should be placed. They accomplished the purpose which it was intended they should accomplish—that of keeping the main military strength of Germany helpless while they wasted that strength. That is military success.

To sum up. The Germans entered France with a force of more than a million and a half of men. The like of such a military expedition the world till then had never seen. The plan of it had been studied and worked out in detail for years. On the preparations for it had been bestowed a colossal labour. It appeared certain of success. It was defeated by an exercise of military skill and resource which, however regarded, must stand as one of the greatest records of mastery in the art of war.