The Central Empires, however, made no serious effort to capture Galatz; they appeared to be content with Braila and complete control of the Danube Valley between that port and the Iron Gate. From a strategical point of view their position was good. An immense force of Russians was immobilized in Moldavia and held there by the threat to Odessa; this force could only be freed for offensive operations by a complete reversal of Allied policy in the Near East, a contingency not likely to occur. In the meantime, the stocks of corn in Wallachia were being transferred to Germany and restorative measures were being taken in the oilfields, where the machinery and plant had been destroyed in wholesale fashion during the retreat. Famine was approaching in Moldavia and typhus was raging in the towns and countryside, when the Allies convened a conference at Petrograd to determine their future plans. General Gourko had replaced General Alexieff as Chief of the Russian Staff, owing to the illness of the latter. At the outset of the Conference, Russia’s principal military delegate submitted an appreciation of the military situation which, in so far as it concerned Rumania, either displayed an inexcusable ignorance of the facts or was intentionally false. He described new railway lines in Bessarabia as approaching completion, whose construction could not be commenced before the spring was far enough advanced to melt the ice and snow; on such premises as these he based a plan of operations, which even _Russian_ Generals on the spot described as suicide. The other Allied representatives listened with grateful ears; for them, a Russo-Rumanian offensive in the spring had many great advantages--it would relieve the pressure on the Western front and help Cadorna on the Carso. They argued that if the General Staff in Petrograd thought this offensive could be made, it was the best solution of the problem, and all that remained for them to do was to arrange for liberal supplies of war material and guns. It is difficult to believe that the Government of the Czar, had it survived, would have permitted this offensive to take place; a few ambitious Generals may have been in favour of it, but the rulers of Russia had realized that autocracies which made war on the Central Empires, were undermining the last barrier against the advancing flood of democratic sentiment, and were, in fact, cutting their own throats. Both at the Imperial Court and in Government circles, German influence was gaining ground, and the Russian people as a whole were profoundly pessimistic. Germany was considered irresistible, officers of high rank admitted that if Mackensen invaded Bessarabia, salvation could be found only in retreat. They talked of a retirement to the Volga even, and the Rumanians listened with dismay.