Napoleon, when he was still General Buonaparte, insisted once to General Moreau, on the importance of numbers as a decisive factor in war.[5] He said: "Victory falls in the final event to the biggest battalions." Moreau is said to have retorted that this was quite correct in itself, but that in point of fact Napoleon himself had just proved in Italy that superiority of numbers does not always decide. "Does it not often happen that numerical superiority is compensated for by bravery, experience, discipline, and, above all, by the talent of the leader?" To which Buonaparte replied: "In a battle, certainly, but in a whole war seldom." Victories used up armies slowly but just as surely as defeats. Thus the German offensive at the beginning of September, 1914, was not powerful enough to effect the overthrow of the enemy. The intention was to effect an envelopment from two sides. The envelopment by the left wing of the army, was, however, brought to a standstill before the fortifications of the French eastern frontier, which, in view of the prompt successes achieved against the Belgian fortifications, it had been hoped to overcome. The envelopment of the French left wing was successful up to in front of Paris and across the Marne, but here the German troops found their frontal advance arrested, while they in their turn were threatened with an envelopment. The defensive tactics of the leaders of the French army were rendered very much easier owing to the strong support which the fortifications on the eastern frontier gave to their wing, and also the possibility of effecting rapid transfers of troops afforded by a very convenient network of railways and a very numerous supply of motor wagons upon good roads. Moreover, they commanded the inner, shorter line. At the same time, even apart from this, it was proved on the Marne that the age of armies numbering millions, with their improved armament and the widely extended fronts which they necessitate, engenders very special conditions. On the Vistula and in Galicia in October, 1914, at Lodz and after the winter battle at the Masurian Lakes, as well as in the autumn of 1915 at Vilna, the same phenomena always made their appearance, even though the conditions of extent and character of the ground, as well as the main course of events, were in each case completely different. Forces which suffice to achieve victory and even to destroy strong sections of the enemy's forces prove inadequate for the attainment of the complete success which is desired. The individual armies of the enemy may be enveloped--as happened at Tannenburg and later at Hermannstadt, where the "Cannae" of Schlieffen was realised, but the envelopment of the whole host of the enemy is a very difficult matter. In order to accomplish it at the Marne, we should have required yet another army, disposed in echelon behind the right German wing, while on the East the possibility of any effective