NOTES ON THE CABLES

Otago Witness, Issue 3195, 9 June 1915, Page 34

NOTES ON THE CABLES

By Shrapnel.

THE FALL OF FEZEMYSL AND ITS LESSONS. Some considerable depression will have taken hold of the minds of the people in the allied countries on the receipt of the news that the forces of the central empires have retaken Przemysl. In November, 1914, the fortress was in the hands of the Russians for a short period, but it was retaken by the Austrians. Subsequently Generals Russki and Brussilof, in a scries of successful actions, compelled the Austrian general (Dankyl) to retire on Przemysl with 100,000 men. There was in the fortress a garrison of 40,000 men, and the town was provisioned for that number. • The rapid advance of the Russians prevented the escape of General Dankyl’s forces, and they were shut up. The Russians left sufficient men to mask the fortress and carry on a slow siege. That siege lasted from November till March 22, when the fortress was again taken by the Russians. During the period between November and the end of March the Austrians are said, in their attempts to relieve the beleaguered city, to have lost 100,000 men, these figures including the casualties of the defenders and those of the forces that were attempting to break through the Russian cordon. When the city was retaken by the Russians they captured over 100,000 Austrians and much railway material. The Austrians, before their surrender, however, destroyed the arsenal and the forts, and what guns they did not destroy they threw into the San, which runs through the town. The Russians undoubtedly repaired the forts as well as they could during the tune at their disposal, but it is questionable whether they had the guns to spare that are so necessary for the defence of a fixed position. In any case the time at their disposal since Field-marshal von Hindcnburg commenced his rapid thrust from the Donajec River, near Cracow, would not allow the Russians the chance to make the fortress to any degree impregnable. It is also questionable whether the Russians could afford to store in Przemysl any largo supplies of ammunition. As there was no great chance, therefore, of their holding the city, the Russians have not been inclined to make it a pivot of operations; and to them it has simply been, through necessity, a comparatively strong section of their new front from a point of view of trench warfare. The city itself has been for some time in danger of envelopment, both from the north and south, but the success of the Russians north and south of Jaroslav and their opposition to the eastward of Hussakof, in the south-east of the fortress, caused Marshal von Hindcnburg to change his plan of envelopment into one of direct attack from the west. For this operation he trans-

ferred troops from the south-east and carried the western forces by massed attack preluded by heavy artillery concentration. 1. the artillery attack he used the heaviest art.; lery that he could bring to boar on the fort; notably the great Austrian llin howitzers The Russians have made mention also o, 12in guns. The Germans may be using such guns, but it is probable that the guns wen Austrian howitzers, as the Austr.ans wee specialising in the manufacture of such guntor several years previous to the war. Thcs howitzers weight 14 tons, .which is about tin limit of weight that ordinary bridges will stand. Over that weight such guns become an encumbrance and a danger to the armyusing thorn, unless it is absolutely sure of its ground. Eleven-inch guns, however, are sufficiently effective, and their shell fire is so destructive that they can give to fixed positions all the punishment required to aid the forces attacking those positions. So, as at Liege, Namur, Mons, and Maubeuge, it may be said that the inability of the Russians to hold any positions from the Donajcc to Przr.mysl has been duo to the fact that the Germans massed such -an amount of heavy metal against them. The fact that the Germans could bring so many heavy

guns into the field and provide for such an xpendituro of ammunition shows how iioroughly organised the nation was for war ■ng before war broke out. If their supplies f ammunition on two great fronts had non coming forward at only a normal rate, hey would have been unable to continue .heir offensive tactics. When their pre-war applies arc exhausted events will take a lifferent course. Not one of the Alhes had •repared supplies for such a great _ war, and just now Russia is feeling the pinch, and ihe Germans are making the most of the ’onditions that arc favourable to them. The sooner the Dardanelles are forced the better it will be for all parties on the Allied side. The Dardanelles must bo forced at all costs is soon as possible. Every man who can be spared is wanted there Just now, and, ■above all, hundreds—if possible, thousands—of howitzers, small and great, so that the -ain of shells may make every hill and hcl'ow untenable. Once the Dardanelles arc forced the whole outside world can rush munitions to Odessa, and the Russians will •lo the vest, as far as what will be required of them, on the eastern frontiers of the Central Empires.