Notes on the War.- XXXVII
Notes on the War.- XXXVII(1)
[The Pall Mall Gazette, No. 1854, January 21, 1871]
This has been a most unfortunate week for the French arms. After Chanzy's defeat came the repulse of Bourbaki before Belfort, and now comes the check which, according to Prussian accounts,(2) Faidherbe has just suffered in front of St. Quentin.[113]
There can be no mistake about Bourbaki's failure. Ever since the affair at Villersexel on the 9th, he has displayed a slowness of movement which indicated either indecision on the part of the General or insufficient strength on the part of the troops. The attack upon the entrenched positions which Werder had prepared for the protection of the siege of Belfort beyond the Lisaine (or Isel on other maps) was not commenced before the 15th, and on the evening of the 17th Bourbaki gave it up in despair. There can be no doubt now that the expedition had been undertaken with insufficient forces. The 15th Corps had been left near Nevers; of the 19th we have not heard for a month; the troops brought up from Lyons reduce themselves to one army corps, the 24th. We now hear of considerable reinforcements being hurried up to Dijon, but, in the face of the strong reinforcements rapidly arriving on the other side, they will not enable Bourbaki at once to resume the offensive.
It may be questioned whether Bourbaki ought to have led his young troops to the assault of entrenched positions defended by breech-loaders; but we know little as yet of the tactical conditions under which the three days' fight took place: he may have been unable to act otherwise.
That the Prussian headquarters did not look upon Bourbaki's expedition with the same contemptuous shrug as most people did here in London is shown by the extreme eagerness with which they took steps to meet it. From these steps there can be no doubt that Bourbaki's move was known in Versailles as soon as he began his eastward march, if not before. On the 2nd of January the 2nd Corps received orders to march from Paris in a south-easterly direction, towards the basin of the Upper Seine. About the same time Zastrow left the neighbourhood of Metz with the 13th division for Châtillon. Immediately after the reduction of Rocroi, on the 9th, the 14th division (the remaining one of Zastrow's 7th Corps) was ordered from Charleville towards Paris, thence to follow the 2nd Corps; and on the 15th already we find its advance (a battalion of the 77th regiment) engaged near Langres. At the same time landwehr troops were hurried on towards southern Alsace from Germany, and Manteuffel evidently owes his new command(3) to no other cause than this first serious movement against the weakest point of the whole German line. Had Bourbaki brought sufficient forces to overthrow Werder, he might have cast him back into the Rhine valley, placed the chain of the Vosges between Werder and his own troops, and marched with the greater part of his forces against these reinforcements, which he might have attacked in detail as they arrived from different directions. He might have penetrated as far as the Paris-Strasbourg Railway, in which case it is very doubtful whether the investment of Paris could have been continued. His defeat proves nothing against the strategy of his movement: it proves merely that it was carried on with insufficient forces. The writer of these Notes is still of opinion that the shortest and safest plan to relieve Paris is an attack upon the Strasbourg-Paris Railway,(4) the only through line of rail the Germans have, for we know now that the other line, via Thionville and Mézières, is still impracticable, and will remain so for some time yet, on account of the blowing-up of a tunnel in the Ardennes. This, by the way, is the second instance in this war in which the demolition of a tunnel stops a railway for months, while the destruction of bridges and viaducts has been in every case repaired in an incredibly short time.
As to Chanzy, he evidently made a very great mistake in accepting a pitched battle at all. He must have been aware of Bourbaki's move for nearly a month; he must have known that this was the real move for the relief of Paris, and that in the meantime he might have the whole weight of Frederick Charles's army brought to bear against himself. He was not compelled to accept batde; on the contrary, he might have drawn on his opponent farther than was safe for the latter, by a slow retreat under continuous rear-guard engagements, such as those by which he first established his reputation in December. He had plenty of time to get his stores sent off to places of safety, and he had the choice of retiring either upon Brittany with its fortified naval ports, or by Nantes to the south of the Loire. Moreover, Frederick Charles, with all his forces, could not have followed him very far. Such a military retreat would be more in keeping with our previous experience of Chanzy; and as he must have known that the new reinforcements he had received were not yet fit for a general action either by equipment, armament, or discipline, we cannot but come to the conclusion that the battle before Le Mans was fought not for military but for political reasons, and that the man responsible for it is not Chanzy but Gambetta. As to Chanzy's retreat now, it is, of course, rendered far more difficult by the preceding defeat; but Chanzy excels in retreats, and, so far, the victors do not appear to have materially damaged the cohesion of his army. Otherwise they would have substantial proofs to show for their assertion that this army "shows signs of dissolution."(5)
Whether the retreat of Chanzy's army is really an eccentric one is not certain. At all events, from the fact that part of his troops retreated towards Alençon, and another part towards Laval, it does not necessarily follow that the first portion will be driven into the peninsula of the Cotentin towards Cherbourg, and the other into that of Brittany towards Brest. As the French fleet can steam from the one port to the other in a few hours, even this would be no severe disaster. In Brittany, the country, by its numerous thickset hedges — as thick as those in the Isle of Wight, only far more plentiful — is eminently adapted for defence, especially by raw troops, whose inferiority almost disappears there. Frederick Charles is not likely to entangle himself in a labyrinth where the armies of the first Republic fought for years against a mere peasant insurrection.[114]
The conclusion we must come to upon the whole of the campaign of January is this — that the French lost it everywhere by trying to do too many different things at the same time. They can hope to win only by concentrating their masses upon one point, at the risk of being temporarily driven back on the other points, where, of course, they should avoid pitched battles. Unless they do this, and soon, Paris may be considered doomed. But if they act on this old-established principle they may still win — however black things may look for them to-day. The Germans now have received all the reinforcements they can expect for three months to come; while the French must have in their camps of instruction at least from two to three hundred thousand men, who during that time will be got ready to meet the enemy.
NOTES ON THE WAR.—XXXVIII[3]
[The Pall Mall Gazette, No. 1858, January 26, 1871]
We are again in a critical period of the war, which may turn out to be the critical period. From the moment we heard that bread had been rationed out in Paris by the Government, there could be no longer any doubt that the beginning of the end had come. How soon after that the offer of surrender would follow was a mere question of detail. We suppose, then, that it is intended to surrender to some 220,000 besiegers a besieged force of some 500,000 armed men on any terms the besiegers choose to impose. Whether it will be possible to carry this out without another struggle remains to be seen; at all events, any such struggle could not materially alter the state of things. Whether Paris holds out another fortnight, or whether a portion of these 500,000 armed men succeed in forcing a road across the lines of investment, will not much affect the ulterior course of the war.
We cannot but hold General Trochu mainly responsible for this result of the siege. He certainly was not the man to form an army out of the undoubtedly excellent material under his hands. He had nearly five months' time to make soldiers out of his men; yet at the end they appear to fight no better than at the beginning of the siege. The final sortie from Valerien [1](6) was carried out with far less dash than the previous one across the Marne; there appears a good deal of theatrical display in it — little of the rage of despair. It will not do to say that the troops were not fit to be sent out to storm breastworks manned by the German veterans. Why were they not? Five months are a sufficient time to make very respectable soldiers out of the men Trochu had at his command, and there are no circumstances better adapted for that purpose than those of the siege of a large entrenched camp. No doubt the men after the sorties of November and December had lost heart; but was it because they knew their inferiority with regard to their opponents, or because they had lost all faith in the pretended determination of Trochu to fight the matter out? All reports from Paris agree in ascribing the want of success to the absence of confidence of the soldiers in the supreme command. And rightly so. Trochu, we must not forget, is an Orleanist, and, as such, lives in bodily fear of La Villette, Belleville, and the other "revolutionary" quarters of Paris. He feared them more than the Prussians. This is not a mere supposition or deduction on our part. We know, from a source which admits of no doubt, of a letter sent out of Paris by a member of the Government(7) in which it is stated that Trochu was on every side urged on to take the offensive energetically, but that he constantly refused, because such a course might hand over Paris to the "demagogues."
The fall of Paris, then, appears now all but certain. It will be a hard blow to the French nation, immediately after St. Quentin, Le
Mans, and Héricourt, and its moral effect under these circumstances will be very great. Moreover, there are events impending in the south-east which may render this blow morally crushing. Bourbaki appears to be tarrying in the neighbourhood of Belfort in a way which seems to imply that he does not at all comprehend his situation. The 24th Corps, under Bressolles, on the 24th was still at Blâmont, about twelve miles south of Montbéliard, and close to the Swiss frontier; and even supposing that this was Bourbaki's rearguard, it is not to be expected that the other two corps he had with him would be far away. In the meantime, we find that Prussian detachments, as early as the 21st, had cut, at Dole, the railway between Besançon and Dijon; that they have since occupied St. Vith, another station on the same line nearer to Besançon; and that they are thus confining Bourbaki's retreat, towards Lyons, to the narrow strip between the Doubs and the Swiss frontier, a country of parallel longitudinal mountain chains and valleys where a comparatively small force may find plenty of positions in which it can stop the retreat of an army such as Bourbaki's has shown itself to be. These detachments on the Doubs we take to be the 13th Division of Zastrow's 7th Corps, or perhaps a portion of Fransecky's 2nd Corps, which has turned up on the 23rd at Dijon. The 60th regiment, which with the 21st forms the 8th Brigade (or 4th brigade of the 2nd Corps), was repulsed before that town by Garibaldi, and lost its colours. As Garibaldi has but 15,000 men at the utmost, he will not be able to hold the town against the superior forces which are sure to have arrived before it in the meantime. He will be driven back, and the Prussian advance will be continued towards and beyond the Doubs. Unless Bourbaki has in the meantime used the legs of his men to good advantage, he may be driven, with all his army, into the fortress of Besançon to play Metz over again, or into a corner of the Jura abutting on Swiss territory, and compelled to lay down his arms either on this side or on the other of the frontier.[116] And if he should escape with the greater portion of his troops, it is almost certain that large numbers of stragglers, much baggage, and perhaps artillery, will have to be sacrificed.
After the three days' fighting at Héricourt, Bourbaki had no business to remain a day longer in his exposed position near the frontier, with Prussian reinforcements marching towards his communications. His attempts to relieve Belfort had failed; every chance of a further offensive movement in that direction had disappeared; his position became every day more dangerous, and nothing but rapid retreat could save him. By all appearances he has neglected that too, and if his imprudence should lead to a second Sedan, the blow to the French people might be morally overwhelming.
Morally, we say, for materially it need not be. Germany is certainly not so exhausted as Gambetta pretends,(8) but Germany is at this very moment displaying a greater absolute and relative strength than she will again display for months to come. For some time the German forces must decline, while nothing prevents the French forces, even after the surrender of the Paris garrison and Bourbaki, should it come to that, from again increasing. The Prussians themselves appear to have given up all hopes of being able to conquer and occupy the whole of France; and as long as the compact block of territory in the South remains free, and as long as resistance, passive and occasionally active (like the blowing up of the Moselle bridge near Toul), is not given up in the North, we do not see how France can be compelled to give in unless she be tired of the war.
Endnotes
[113] In the Battle of St. Quentin (North-Eastern France) on January 19, 1871, the 1st German Army under General Goeben crushed the French Army of the North under General Faidherbe. The defeat had a demoralising effect on the French army and marked the end of its active operations in the region.
[114] This refers to the Royalist insurrection during the French Revolution, which began in March 1793 in Vendée and spread to Brittany and Normandy. The bulk of the insurgents were local peasants, incited and organised by counter-i evolutionary clergy and gentry. The insurrection in Vendée and Brittany was put down in 1795-96, although new attempts were made in 1799 and subsequent years.
[3] A reference to the coup d'état of December 2, 1851, which gave birth to the Second Empire.
[1] The first Address (The General Council of the International Workingmen's Association on the War ) was written by Marx between July 19 and 23, 1870. On July 19, 1870, when the Franco-Prussian war broke out, the General Council instructed Marx to draft an address on the war, of which Marx informed Engels in his letter of July 20 (see present edition, Vol. 44). The Address was adopted by the Standing Committee of the General Council on July 23, and then unanimously approved at the Council meeting on July 26, 1870. It was first published in English, in the London Pall Mall Gazette, No. 1702, July 28, 1870, and a few days later it appeared as a leaflet in 1,000 copies. The Address was reprinted, in full or in part, by a number of British provincial newspapers. As the first edition of the Address was quickly sold out, on August 2, 1870, the General Council resolved to have additional 1,000 copies printed. In September that year, the first Address was published in English again, together with the General Council's second Address on the Franco-Prussian war. In this edition, Marx corrected the misprints that had occurred in the first edition of the First Address. On August 9, the General Council appointed a commission to have the first Address translated into German and French and then distributed. The commission included Marx, Jung, Serraillier and Eccarius. The first German translation of the Address, made by Wilhelm Liebknecht, appeared in Der Volksstaat (Leipzig), No. 63, August 7, 1870. Marx edited it heavily and made a new translation of more than half the text. The new German translation of the Address was published in Der Vorbote (Geneva), No. 8, August 1870, and as a leaflet. Then it appeared in the Arbeiter Union (New York), August 12; Die Tagwacht (Zurich), No. 26, August 13; the Volkswille (Vienna), No. 26, August 13, and the Proletarier (Augsburg), No. 56, August 21. By the twentieth anniversary of the Paris Commune in 1891, Engels had the General Council's first and second addresses published in the book K. Marx, Der Bürgerkrieg in Frankreich, 3rd German edition, Berlin, 1891, Vorwärts Publishing House. The translation of the two addresses for this edition was made by Louise Kautsky and edited by Engels. The French translation of the Address appeared in L'Égalité (Geneva), No. 28, August 6, 1870; L'Internationale (Brussels), No. 82, August 7, 1870, and Le Mirabeau (Verviers), No. 55, August 7, 1870. The Address was also published as a leaflet in the French translation made by the General Council's commission. The first Russian translation of the first Address was published in Narodnoye Dyelo (People's Cause) (Geneva), No. 6-7, August-September 1870. In this volume, the first Address is reproduced from the first edition of the English leaflet, checked against its second edition and the text of the German 1870 authorised edition and that of 1891. The most important textual differences are marked by footnotes.
[116] 116 _The Army of the East, as Engels had foreseen, found itself pushed to the Swiss frontier having retreated after an unsuccessful battle at Héricourt on January 15-17, 1871 (see also Note 110). On February 1, it was compelled to cross the frontier and surrender (see also Note 121).