field artillery, in
the now famous "seventy-fives," could France claim any advantage.

In 1870 Sedan had come four weeks after the first German troops had
entered France. For the new campaign the Germans allowed six weeks.
For this time German high command reckoned that Russia could be
mobilized in the east, and that any incidental Russian success in
East Prussia or Silesia would be counterbalanced by the tremendous
victories to be won in northern France. Paris itself would be a
sufficient counterprize for Posen, Breslau, or Cracow.

The time limit, however, imposed certain other conditions. The
Franco-German frontier from Luxemburg to Switzerland had been
transformed into one long barrier, garnished with detached forts
and resting upon the first-class fortresses of Verdun, Toul, Epinal,
and Belfort. To pierce such a barrier was not impossible but to
break through in three weeks, with the whole French army before the
forts and the shortness of the front offering the Germans no
opportunity to take advantage of their superior numbers, was
recognized as next to impossible.

There was left the roads through Belgium and Luxemburg. To come this
way Germany had for more than a decade been constructing strategic
railways leading from the Rhine and Moselle valleys to the Belgian
frontier, double-track roads that served in a desolate country, but
were provided with all the necessary machinery for detraining
thousands of soldiers.

Belgium might not consent to suffer this invasion of her territory
but the Belgian army was negligible, and the German heavy artillery
was known to be adequate to dispose of the antiquated forts of Namur
and Liege with brief delay. Once the Germans had passed the Meuse
and deployed upon the Belgian plain, they could turn south and pass
the Franco-Belgian frontier, which was destitute of real defenses,
the few fortresses being obsolete, and thence the road ran down to
Paris clear and open.

Conceivably Great Britain might make the Belgian invasion a cause
for joining France. But, again, the British army was small, there
was the gravest doubt as to whether it would be sent to the
Continent at all, and even if it came, it would not redress the
balance between the French and German armies. Such being the case,
as German high command saw it, Belgium was summoned, and refusing,
was attacked, the German armies passing the Belgian frontier in the
direction of Liege on August 4, 1914, the day on which Ge