172 The Great War enabling her to have an overwhelming advantage at the decisive point. The problem for the French was to avoid destruc- tion or the division of their forces until such time as the deflection of German troops to the Russian fron- tier should deprive Germany of the numerical ad- vantage. They were then, in the nature of things, compelled to retreat, always endeavoring to inflict as great punishment as possible on the Germans and yet escape a dangerous decisive action. To delay as long as possible German advance to the line where the French always knew they must stand; to await the progress of Russian advance until such time as the Kaiser's General Staff would have to send army corps east and then to turn upon the Ger- man Army, diminished in numbers by drafts to the east, wearied by tremendous exertions and weakened by the enormous losses Incident to their method of making attacks by mass, separated by many miles from their railway bases, in a hostile country, com- pelled to detach many thousands of men to guard their communications, this had been French strategy', and the French answer to the imperious necessity of German strategy, namely to crush France before Russia came up. Now Russia had come up. Her victories in the East have compelled the withdrawal of many thou- sands of first line troops from France. Meantime German losses had been enormous and as yet no real German strategical success had rewarded the mag-