The Dominion. TUESDAY, JANUARY 18, 1916. CO-OPERATIVE WAR

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2671, 18 January 1916, Page 4

The Dominion. TUESDAY, JANUARY 18, 1916. CO-OPERATIVE WAR

The lack of a clearly-defincd and comprehensive plan of campaign on the part of the Allies and the dissipation of energy caused by want of concerted action arc possibly in some measure responsible for .the overrunning of Serbia and Montenegro by the armies of the Central Powers. One cannot help fcoling that there is a good deal of justification for the remark of M. Barzilai, a Montenegrin Minister, that tho temporary scaling of his country's fate is largely due to the failure of the Allies to settle on a common and far-seeing programme regarding their Balkan activities. M. Barzilai lays stress upon the need for closer co-ordina-tion of effort on tho part of the jntcnle. Powars. Without

plete unity of aini and action the advantages which their superiority in men, munitions, ships, and economic and financial resources give them may be frittered away. The Allies have been slow to learn this lesson, but recent events indicate a keener realisation of the necessity . for a combined', war policy based , upon the conception of a single front, a single war, and a common aim. It would be a mistake to jump to the conclusion that the failure of the Allies to send troops to Monte : > negro is due to procrastination or ■ want of co-ordination. It is quite ' possible an extensive campaign in that locality would not fit in with . the larger plan upon which the Allies , may have agreed. They may have satisfied themselves that they can ■ deal with the enemy more effectively in Some other way, and their strategy may bo perfectly consistent with a strict adherence to the method of treating the whole of the campaigns as one war waged on a comprehensive and concerted plan. The final fate of Serbia and Montenegro will depend upon the rosult of the war a-s a whole, and not upon vicissitudes of the struggle in any particular the--1 atre. It would be very dangerous to permit sentiment to hamper strategy. ( When the Allies have so thoroughly beaten the Central Powers as to be in a position to 1 dictate their own 1 terms of peace, then they will see that justice is done to the smaller nations which have been temporarily crushed under the heel of the invader. It is the "final victory" to which Kino George refers in his sympathetic message to Kinq Peter which will decide the ultimate fate of these gallant little States. It would, of course,_ be absurd to expect the Allies to disclose the details of that unified strategy upon which they now seem to have agreed. . There have been many, indications during the last few months that a much greater degree of unity of direction has now been secured than was the case six months ago. The urgent need for closer and prompter co-operation was strongly emphasised in the first Ministerial declaration of the new French Premier. He expressed the opinion that the cooperation of the efforts of the Allied nations can and should be made more thorough and complete. He recogniscd the difficulty of securing the fullest co-ordination of all the various theatres of war, but said the Allies are resolved to accomplish it by more frequent consultations and closer contact. The visits of General Joffre to Italy and England, and Lord Kitchener's journeys to France and the Near East may be oxpected to have good' results from this point of view. The Paris correspondent of the London Observer states that in France the desire for "unity of command" has become very strong.. Public opinion is realising with increasing keenness that the sucoesses which Germany has achieved are in a great measure due to oneman rul,e. The Kaiser has the tremendous advantage of being able to control the movements of Germans, Austriaris, Bulgarians, and Turks "by a wave of his hand." One French military expert declares that the ideal war board for the Allies would be a triumvirate, and the great desideratum is rapid decision. The correspondent referred to goes on to say that "events no doubt are moving towards the concentration of control into as few hands as possible. Not only should there bo perfect unity and identity of command on each front, but each front should be closely linked, so that movements in' Serbia, Italy, and Russia are correlated with those on the Western front." A Russian authority recently pointed out that th 2 most not able successes of any of the belligerents have been the outcome of co-ordina-tion of plans in contradistinction to the failure of isolated effort. He contends that on the side of the Entente there have only been two instances of complete solidarity: _ the first when the Russian advance into . East Prussia facilitated the French offensive at the Marne; the second when the Anglo-French offensive in Champagne coincided with the culminating point of the Austro-Ger-man advance in the Eastern theatre, compelling the enemy to transfer thrco corps to the Western front just when fresh forces were urgently required to defeat the Russians. He also states that such succcsses as the Austro-German arms have so far achieved date from the time when Austria submitted to the control of the higher German command aiter the failures attending disconnected operations. "It is worthy of note that the Germans won success against the Allies only in detail, and never when we acted in confoimity with a pre-determined plan." These expert opinions and examples are interesting and instructive, but no elaborate argument is needed to convince the average layman _ of the necessity for concerted action. The advantages of a complete and combined scheme of attack and defence which, would link together operations in all the theatres of war are quite obvious, however difficult it may bo to plan and carry out such a gigantic system of co-operative warfare.