Russia v. The West
War Between Continents. F. 0. Mitzsche and E. Combaux. (Faber and Faber. 15s.)
COLONEL MITZSC.HE served in the Spanish Civil War as a General Staff Officer on the Republican side, and wrote in 1941 an interesting book called Blitzkrieg dedicated to the International Brigade. His new book, written in conjunction with Colonel Combaux of the French Army, does not disguise his political sympathies. Conserva- tives will "fight any battle to protect their crumbling privileges from the onslaught of social reform." Britain is accused of large-scale military preparations near the Afghan frontier and of determination to use Palestine as an alternative base to Egypt. The Russian High Command is far superior on land to the Anglo-American generals. The Russian soldier is the most feared fighting man in the world. All this rather stale stuff is discounted in the last chapter, in which the policy and performances of the Kremlin are more realistically considered, some virtue is detected in the West, and an eloquent plea is made for European federation.
Much the most interesting parts of the book deal with the hypo- thetical next war. The strategical forecast is as follows : the Russians will attack the lifeline of the West, running through San Francisco, Hawaii, Wake Island, Guam, Singapore, Ceylon, Aden, Suez, Gibraltar, the Azores and New York. The Far East is geographically unsuitable as a springboard for the attack, and a super Schieffen Plan of a right swing on New York embracing en route Scandinavia, Iceland and the United Kingdom will be rejected by the Russians as likely to fail. The plan will therefore be for a pincer movement upon Africa the right claw passing through Spain and Gibraltar and the left with a twofold movement, the first on the Suez Canal via Mosul and Damascus, and the second on Aden via tl Persian Gulf. There will be a subsidiary movement on India via Afghanistan. In accordance with precedent, the West will not be prepared, but, having at length stabilised, will have to recapture the key points one by one, only to be beaten in the end (particularly if the authors' warning about the importance of capturing Moscow is disregarded) by the weather and the Russian capacity for defensive fighting. This is very global, and there are apparent holes in each stage of the argument, but when "an empire of unchallenged superiority on land is facing a coalition of equal superiority on sea and in the air," these guesses are as good as any other. The main criticism is that to consider strategy at all before discussing technique and tactics is indeed putting the cart before the horse.
The authors admit that without knowledge of what is happening by way of scientific development it is impossible to forecast the tactics of the next war, but they deal in a frightening manner with long- range projectiles, atom bombs and inter-continental artillery duels. Their conclusions broadly speaking, are that war will be total, the new weapons will be more valuable in defence than attack and in the resulting chaos guerrillas will be all-important. They predict, at all events by inference, that the West will never be able to conquer a guerrilla-infested Russia. An interesting diagram produces for the benefit of the Russian General Staff a suitable defence lay-out for the East against the West.
The outstanding criticisms which present themselves are that the
authors have underestimated the scale of national resistance in countries overrun by the very extended Russian armies, and that they have not appreciated the scope and importance of the air arm under modern, conditions. Field-Marshal Montgomery used to lay it down as a first principle that it was almost impossible for ground forces to operate successfully in the offensive until the air battle had been won. Modern developments in range, lift and the nature of air attack make it difficult to believe that the air arm is not capable, by itself, of paralysing an opponent, provided suitable bases are available and the production resources required to feed it can be maintained. The authors, also, do not take into account the possibility of the West holding a lead in the development of methods of defence against the new weapons or projectiles.
However, this is a very stimulating and readable book containing many clear and succinctly expressed ideas,- with some interesting maps and diagrams. It is as well worth reading in 1948 as was Blitzkrieg in 1942, and that is and is meant to be high praise.
SELWYN LLOYD.
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