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'I  The innucnce of armament, pure an d simple, upon the course of a war is popularly but erroneously imagined to be decisive; and if it could operate anywhere conspicu- ously it would be no in the course ct the present conflict. In point of fact, in all wars It has usually been the case that one side has been markedly inferior to the other in the quality of its weapons; but that side, fcpougn handicapped sometimes very se- verely, has LzetL .by no means invariably worsted. Success in war depends upon a ( combination of qualities and endowments, of which perhaps the most important is a superiority m leadership. Under certain circumstances that can effecMlie most aston- ishing feats; in the American Civil War. for example, "Stonewall" Jackson, with 16,000 men, by dint of sheer brilliance and audacity i of strategy, by hard marching but little, fighting, twisted around his little finger a Federal army of ten times that strength, and changed the course of a whole campaign. Yet the same war afforded perhaps as good i an example as we seek of the fuilur? in the long run of exceptionally talented general- ship to prevail against sound if not con- spicuously brilliant leadership on the other, allied to tenacity of will and a great prepon- derance of resources. Lee was crushed eventually by the "big battalions." In the eighteenth century and in the ..Napoleonic Wars it might be said that dis- parities of armament had little to do with the fortunes of wars, even within the limited sphere for which an important influence can be claimcd for them. For centuries there was little development in firearms; and the most revolutionary changes began in the' • generation after the close of the Napoleonic struggles. A Prussian in- j vented a needle-gun, which was secretly accumulated in large numbers; but the riots which broke out in Berlin in 1849, and were the nearest approach to a revolution that Prussia has witnessed, compelled their pre- mature use, and disclosed to the world the possession by Prussia of a new engine of war. In the war against the Danes in 1864 and against Austria in 1866 the Prussian needle-gun was superior by far to the Danish and Austrian weapons; but in 1870 the Prussians had no mitrailleuses' (a crude form of machine gun), their needle-gun was to- I tally outranged by thw French chassepot' in reach and in rapidity of fire, and the Ger- mans had as a counteracting advantage only a distinct superiority in the quality of their •'Knrpp breech-iaading rifled field artillery, pitted against the French bronze smooth- bore muzzle-loaders. Zola in the "Downfall" has described once for all the ^tragedy of a battery of artillery, outranged, and then finally destroyed, by the superior enemy guns whom it is impotent to snipe. — Again, in the Russo-Turkish War, the | Turkish Martini was far better than the Russian rifle; and the Russian artillery was compelled by the long range of the Turkish small arm to keep a distance from the Turk- j ?. ish lines that prevented by it any elective ? co-operation for the Russian infantry attacks on the Turkish trenches. Hence the repeat- ed sanguinary Russian failures to storm Plevna. In the American Civil War the i Confederate arms were much inferior to Uiose of the Federals, who could buy the toefct.that-Europe cbuld send them; but that: did not prevent numerous and great if inde- owiVe Confederate victories. In the Spanish- AltieriCaA War the Spaniard- in the South African War the Boers, and In the Russo- Japawese War the Russians (in regard to their field aVtillery) all had marke-' advan- tages over their opponent's; thfe Spaniards he- better wne, the Boers, t,N better i field gun, the Russians the bettier field at-til- I klry yet each in'tU'rh WJ'defeat&l In the classic times of the Macedonian phalanx, t&e Roman legion and the Greek hoplites, the u66 of the sword, javelin, spear or arrow exerted a great influence upon formations d tactics, tout not upon the fate of cam- jpalgns. In this war it infcy be' said, to dehl with the Western com batants, that the French had the best field gui-i and the British th« fofcfct rite; thfc trwiftAns had. the j in numbers of machine-guns and in heavy artillery, at the outset. The Germans from tnfe first, it will be seen, enjoyed a superior- ity in just those weapons which are best euited to position warfare, of trench and re- doubt the British and Frenoh excelled in the "weapons suited to the quick-changing phases and rapid and long movements of fighting in the open. What great successes, 45f a marked importance upon the rourse of war, caii be claimed for a superiority in armament in this conflict? One could sav there are two cages, which are incontestable i  d?moMtrate; the triumph of W2^ ie < J»?CTH? f»■ n 17-nh howitzers bvet t?e l?el 'giall <orti-?es in 1914, Md the Ground .GW311 rrierity in weapons "er the ;,f; in 1915. ,i f'î1 1M4 the German big gunR demolished ? ?a fw da..?g defèncs t?t had ?h&tter<? Mtta?try attacks preceded only by {? ?rtit- ?''y?pa?twn from guns of Ieer caibl' ■ Itry 96 rap?id collapse of the obstacles which ?tMdthe enemy's m&in line of cOmmuMicft- '1íiÓl to irance rendered 1 pomible that tr?- mendous Onrush from which thme Vear3 later  Belgium have not recovered. Tie Geapm?n ?p?ontv in 1915 over t? Ra8.?s and t?o SerbfMM need not be hi sisted upon. Here, ? ?ywhe?, is a case in whch Results of ? f"t ?P?Ttance can be ? dain?d ?r ?penoTity in weapons; for m the other attributes of armies, leadership the :tnett of the mn, and nugg, the Germans in no sense hold a decisive superior- ity over the Russians. a«ain ?? ? Alhes in Jg 1916 and aga.in in 1917 the .ABies ':in JW? had upon thj" e whole the prepon- ,J «er*/ uoe over the », ? not perhaps M teach m quakty, at least ,a quantity, hut it a preponderance msu?cient to secure the gam  feJl ?. ««man  in ?'-A"?? o,r ^e Br?Im?t £ 6its of ,BelJüm in 1914, a? aU round i eupenonty .u .,rms over the «nfwtunate  h, jc?. To the Allied ?big guns CW.i smt?? defe? wTht- ch ,?mut<.d their c?cacy, .n« the Sr? mus' all round inferiority, tho?eh mani- fest cle.?y in 1916 and 1917 rIlaPH more clearly upon the 8omme in 1916 thM in the Miowtttg y?r—wa? not nearly so great ac in the Partallel. Indeed, t tatter 11 hardlv be lkd a pan, lie) at all, snvo in so far as there ',vttt;¡ unquestionablv upon nthe (n side, as with the Russians, all inferiority of importance to the Allies in all the mechanisin of war. The famous report i of Sixt von Arhitn beaTs that out. The1 Germans in the Winter 011916-1917 set tJlem- Selves to remedy that shortage, and by "Imta.ining from offensives prodigal in thci- di,maiids,tip)ii arfcillety and amxnunitija and the quietude of the Russian front, Lhev were enabled make this yert- g ¡'.rtter showing than they did upon the .Som^e. The German defence is, it is true, no more successful in the West in 1917 than it was in 1916, in frustrating the attainment- the Franco-British forces of limited local objectives; but at any rate all that we have read makes upon us the impression that t' ? < ,Ge.rmaii.q werf- not so badly handicappei, as last year. In the old contetnptibJes of the first seven divisions 'who I-ouot at Mons, it may be feaid that thev ivei-e provided, .-o far td; thtey "\VMit, with a proper compleime it of artillery' in nutnb"_1Jst the British io- pound* -"•Id. (Ri1^ thf- 4.5-ijvr'. howitzer and the 60-pounder "Long from" vere ^upericr 1 to the eoi,respondi,ng Gernian -tteiijyofls. The enemy forced the tetreat ■catrae of 4 great superiority in numos s. perthitting enveloping movements which ■threatened the surrounding and destruction, pf the British forces if they did not fall back Z4 tH a nMtp fa,voor{»hIe nt" c- Jtoal.,situation, even more than to their t Mpoildqrnnc-e ut nnmbers of guns, j As the at least in action to every British division, the artillery of the latter was of course at a terrible disadvantage; but had the conr fiict been between equal forces the British would have been handicapped neither in the number of their field pieces, light or heavy, or their quality. The German monster guns had no diiec? part or lot in the fights from Mons onwards, until *he Ai?ne when the lack of any British heavy ordnance was first felt, and felt badly. The German superiority in machine-gui* (there were 16 to every German battalion, against two to every British battalion) aIM counted for little. The British, with their opea formation,s and their entrenchments, offered, as a rule, no good target for machine-gun fire; the far fewer British machine-guns had, in point of fact, far more numerous aad better targets in the masses. of German infantry, who crowded forward aoross the open to the attack at Mons and at Le Gateau. Even in respect to the ter- ribly outnumbered British artillery, in their sternest ordeal, at Le Cateau, the testi- j mony of all observer, is that by their ex- traordinary skill and devotion against heavy I odds they beat the German gunners aaid saved at least halt the British Army from j complete destruction. Such narratives as those of Lord Ernest Hamilton and Sir A. Conan Doyle, collected from the evidence of numerous British official and professional eye-witnesses, brings that out clearly. We j Jbst heavily in guns at Le Cateau; 42 are said to have been left upon the field, mostly in pieces. But they had done their work and saved the day. When the nature cf the wa.r changed, ajid it becani-e a battle for entrenched positions which could onJy be taken frontally, the German advantage in machine-guns and in heavy guns became apparent. ✓ The lighter Allied field pieces, the British 18-pounder and the French 75," could not destroy the German entrenchments and emplacements; the Allied heavy artillen; existed only in totally inadequate numbers; and the abundance of German machine-guns enabled the enemy to pour out overwhelming storms ■ of bullets, whilst the shortness of the range, t,he flatness of the trajectory, and the un- t limited expenditure of ammunitiop of the German gunners more than made up for the lack upon their part of such a refinement of Skill as distiingitifh^ the musketry of the Regulars of the British First Seven Divisions at Mons and Le Cateau. There is no doubt but that the skill in marksmanship, and the rapidity of fire of the long-service British i professional rifleman, favoured with the easiest of targets, staggered the Germans. -Nothiing like it Was seen elsewhere at the time, or has probably been seen since, at least in respect to riiie fire. Every British Pegular of those days was a machine-gun to himself, but a Int-l.rhine-gun exceptionally in- telligent, disciplined and economical in fire. We voo the day at Mcuns and Le Cateau by sheer skill in marksmanship. and not by mere hlazing away from innumerable guns of unlimited ammunition. Mons and Lc Cateau are parallels to Cressy and Agincourt and Poictiers in their illustration of the ca- pacity of a few men of deadly skill in arms to arrest and throw back attacks of far greater masses of inexpert infantry. The ntai of the New Armies were certainly not to be compared with their immediate pre- decessora in that respect; setting f side the early Territorial battalions who went out. It is amazing and amu.fing ■ to find men who have passed years at the front come back and not only shoot badly on the range but display ignorance of, or at least a marked lack of familiarity with, the various "points"' of the bayonet. The Armies which stop at home, to meet the contingency of an invasion, kre much better trained than th-e Men who were bundled out of the oolin- try in 1915 to meet and endeavour to over- | throw the flower of the German Army. f c fu-In the Emitter of trtftitts, we have picked -wp ■'Mttny Iditte from the ^rroans, but have ^im- j proved far beyoiinl our teacher*. In commer- cial life in times of peacr, we were ferhiliar with the case of the German who, working upon a British idea or hint or patent, dis- regarded in this country, created and en- joyed a lucrative pie-eminence in some branch of commerce, as a consequence as in the case of thfe dye stuffs invention of the British chemist Parkin. In war, the process has been reversed; the German gave us the hint, in the shape of the 17-inch gun, the i flame-thrower, and gas, and the counteract- ing gas helmet. And in all these matters we are clearly &head of the enemy. The millions of British men who are familiar with the simplicity of the Mill's Grenade No. 5 or the Hotchkiss machine-gun are amazed at the rapidity with which they can be I' mastered, and cannot conceive how they can ,be improved upon. .The Mill's grenade can be described in twenty seconds the Hotchkiss machine-gun can be pulled to pieces (entirely by hand, with the exception of a isk\gle operation) in 35 seconds and reassembled in 75 seconds by An expert. The Tank is unique; the British gas and smoke and flame projecting ap- I pliances throw- those of the Germans into the shade, and the British gas helmets and respirators are not only iinsurpassed but un- equalled, and their ufe is characterised by an ingenuity add success that must ma-ke the, Germans bitterly rue the day when they Sent the poison gas clouds creeping across the battlefield of Ypres. More important than all of these superiorities it, however, I the old and still maintained ascendancy in the fighting spirit of the British the I German soldier. That is, in the long run, what counts for more by far than all the I advantages or handicaps in weapons that have ever been manifest in the course of the war,

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