31 MARCH 1944, Page 5

THE CARPATHIAN BARRIER

By STRATEG1CUS T is easy to recognise the risks the Germans have taken by I standing 'so far to the east on lines that they have no longer the resources to maintain ; but it is more difficult to see how skil- fully they have purchased time. Their strategy has been described on many occasions. But the strain it lays on thy German forces compels them to buy time at all costs, but at bargain prices if at all possible. Their main preoccupation being with the Western Front, they must retain there numbers of divisions that would be of inestimable value elsewhere ; but only now is the true extent of the risks they run beginning to become apparent. They still think that a decisive check in the west would enable them to deal with the east ; but, whereas the decisiveness of the check depends on the force in the west being kept at its present level, they have lost the conviction of being able to break the power of the eastern offensive even should the battle of the west be won. In fine, it begins to appear ever more clearly that they stand to exchange a certain defeat in the east for dispositions which, at best, only give them a good chance in the west.

There can be no reasonable justification for risking something that looks like a certainty for something that merely seems a fair chance ; but when we put the position in this way we have to realise that there is very little else Hitler can do. The climax of the issues which his grand strategy entailed has developed with unexpected suddenness. He has now, at this moment, to decide whether to revise his .strategy or to make shift with it, and, so far, he has apparently refused to change it. So swiftly are events developing in the east that he may yet be driven to make a change, and the probability is that he will come to that decision too late to save himself. But it must be recognised that he is making the best of a bad position by holding firmly beyond the Dniester, as he certainly did well to maintain himself on the Dnieper. If he could have disengaged at the Dnieper and retired to a much shorter line previously arranged for defence, he might have done better ; but since the Russians would not permit him to disengage, it was better that he should cling to the positions farthest east, and thereby keep the Russians at as great a distance as possible from the home bases. So now it is costly and perilous to hold beyond the Dniester ; but we can see what he gains by it if we imagine how different it would be if Malinovsky were not also detained there.

As a choice of evils. it seems that he has justified his decision, and it is only now that we can see in the event in what evil case he has been for some time. Indeed, in no other way can we under- stand how the Russian armies have made so swift a march into Rumania and Galicia. It is incredible they should for so long have continued to make such a pace, in spite of the brake of intolerable weather conditions, if the Germans had had the force to meet them on approximately even terms. Vast distances which include broad waterways cannot be crossed at such disconcerting speed unless the resistance is negligible ; and the Germans never could have been so weak on the Eastern Front if their reserves had not been almost whittled away and numbers of units pinned down in distant theatres. General Dittmar is very frank on this point.

There are now pockets of Germans east and north of Kamenets Podolsk and across the Dniester. What are the dimensions of these forces we do not know, and in part, or in whole, they will probably be wiped out very shortly. It may be the Russians will take no direct steps to liquidate them, and turn their attention rather to exploiting their present position on the Pruth and in the Carpathian foothills. They have a number of alternatives, all of which must impose upon the Germans the necessity to make painful decisions. They can move towards the Danube and proceed to follow that historic path towards Belgrade and the heart of Europe, taking in the Ploesti oilfields by the way, and this would give them good ground for swift movement in a period of the year when the weather should be suitable. With this they might combine a movement across Galicia towards Silesia and Berlin. Or they might combine the advance up the Danube valley with a direct movement on Warsaw and Berlin.

In view of the already great achievements of the Russian armies, can one say that such projects are over-ambitious? There can be no doubt at all that the confident advance of the two Russian marshals aims at nothing less than a decision, and, if they can maintain the same rate of movement for the next few weeks that they have achieved during the last three, it is difficult to imagine how the Germans can continue to cling to their present dispositions in the south and west. Indeed, as far as one can see, if they withdrew half the divisions retained in the west, it would not save them. The Russian: are in such superior strength that they have the power still to strike on other sectors. They are, in point of fact, said to be attacking far to the north ; it is certain that, sooner or later, the centre and north will be set in motion.

Yet we cannot doubt that the offenkive developed at this particular moment is designed to divert from the west and south units which might prejudice the success of the early phases of the western expedition, and the dilemma already suggested is being drawn in firmer lines every day. Manstein's command has apparently been cut into two parts by the Russian advance, and it is obvious that neither Kleist's southern armies nor the forces in Galicia and southern Poland can cope with the skill and power of the two Russian marshals. Indeed, it is only reasonable to assume that the Germans have yet to face the worst. At Uman they suffered badly in a tank battle with the Russians, and the tank forces of Rodimtsov have not yet found suitable ground for full play. Britain and America have shown the Germans what can be done with the machine on which they most prided themselves—aircraft ; the Russians will probably demonstrate the use of armour, the second of the weapons which it was thought would secure a victory. The Germans may still be right ; but it will not be their victory.

The Carpathians inevitably enter into the centre of the picture for some time. They form a flank protecting the Hungarian plain from the north, but they also form a barrier against interference from the south. Konev may turn the barrier and sweep through the plain in the south ; and Zhukov, with his flank covered from the south, may move with security towards the west. Russian generals in the last war seemed to move backwards and forwards across Galicia almost like the advances and retirements across Cyrcnaica. There can be no doubt that they have studied those campaigns to good purpose ; and it has before been pointed out how inevitably tradition governs Russian strategic developments. But just as there came a time when a British general at Benghazi was able to say "we are not going back," so now it seems probable that the Russians have the force to move across Galicia finally.

If Hitler insists that everywhere positions should be held to "the last man," if he persists in taking the risk of maintaining his present dispositions in the south and west, he may meet final defeat in the east. It is, of course, possible that these "stand to the last man" orders are governed by the law of diminishing returns. But in general the broad sense of the orders has been followed ; and it has its perils as well as its advantages. The German reaction-time has proved much more impressive than that of the Allies ; but the developments in Russia suggest that if changes have not already been made to meet the threats in the east, it may now be too late to make them. In this case, in refusing to make readjustments which would facilitate the western invasion, Hitler may in the final resort be compelled to make larger changes that will facilitate it more.

It would be less surprising on the whole to find a decision on the front which engages the greatest forces. If the decision should come in the east, we should have no reason to grudge the Russians their fame ; and they, like Dittmar, would recognise that the Allied operations in the south and west had established the conditions under which it became inevitable.