This is well known to military
experts. The difference is mainly a question of discipline,
technique, and preparedness, the main factor being, as indicated, the
ability to throw the greater number of troops in the shortest possible
time against the enemy at any given point, without exhausting man and
beast unnecessarily and enervating the country to be traversed. It is
therefore necessary to have numerous arteries of traffic at disposal.
This will lead us later to the question of victualization, Germany
following closely one of Moltke's axioms: "March separately, but fight
conjointly."
Only in a country where all railroads, highways, and waterways, and
where post and telegraph are owned and controlled by the state, is it
possible to evolve and perfect a system of transportation such as is
at the disposal of the German General Staff. Every mile of German
railroads, especially the ones built within the last twenty years, has
been constructed mainly for strategical reasons. Taking Berlin as the
center you will find on looking at a German, more especially a
Prussian, railroad map, close similarity to a spider's web. From
Berlin you will see trunk lines extending in an almost direct route to
her French and Russian frontiers. Not single or double, but treble
and quadruple lines of steel converging with other strategic lines at
certain points such as Magdeburg, Hanover, Nordhausen, Kassel,
Frankfort-on-the-Main, Cologne, or Strassburg--to name but a few.
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