It was a retirement which has had one advantage in spite of its
acknowledgment of the enemy's amazing pertinacity. It has enabled the
allied armies to draw closer together, its firm front sweeping around in
a crescent from Abbeville, around south of Amiens, and thence in an
irregular line to the eastern frontier.
On the map it is at first sight a rather unhappy thing to see that
practically the whole of France north of Amiens lies open to German
descent from Belgium. To break up the German Army piecemeal and lure it
to its own destruction it was almost necessary to manoeuvre it into
precisely the position which it now occupies. The success of Gen. Pau
shows that the allied army is taking the offensive again, and that as a
great fighting machine it is still powerful and menacing.
I must again emphasize the difficulty of grasping the significance of a
great campaign by isolated incidents, and the danger of drawing
important deductions from the misfortunes in one part of the field. I do
so because I have been tempted again and again during the past few days
to fall into similar mistakes. Perhaps in my case it was pardonable.
It is impossible for the armchair reader to realize the psychological
effect of being mixed up in the panic of a great people and the retreat
from a battlefield.
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