In the autumn of 1915, the era of Allied counter-offensives began. The slaughter on both sides was immense, but no appreciable results were achieved. While these operations were being carried out, Bulgaria joined the Central Empires, the greater part of Servia and Albania was over-run, and, according to an official report on the operations against the Dardanelles, “the flow of munitions and drafts fell away.” Throughout the whole of 1916, the war of attrition was waged in deadly earnest and exacted a ghastly toll. By the end of the year no decision had been reached on the three main fronts, but the richest part of Rumania had fallen into the hands of the enemy. Public opinion in both France and Great Britain seemed to approve the methods of the Westerners. The French naturally desired above everything to drive the invaders out of France, and the British people had become resigned to a war of workshops, which was lucrative to those who stayed at home. From a purely military point of view, the attitude of the Westerners was comprehensible. The Western Front was close to the Allied bases of supply, it had good communications, the climate was healthy, on this front the Germans were encountered, and they formed the backbone of the hostile combination. Undoubtedly a victory in the West was the ideal way to win the war. No one disputed that, but at the end of 1916 that victory was still remote. Germany’s position on the Western Front was very strong, her army was homogeneous, her communications were superior to ours, and her recent conquests in the East had mitigated the effects of two years of blockade. Since September, 1914, both sets of belligerents had made offensives, but these had failed, though in each case an initial success had raised the highest hopes. Stupendous preparations had been made, artillery had been employed on an unprecedented scale, lives had been sacrificed ruthlessly, but, invariably, the forward movement had been arrested, had ebbed a little and immobility had ensued. Some law appeared to operate in this most modern form of warfare. Killing without manœuvre had become an exact science, but battles are not merely battues, the armies must advance, and this they could not do--their mass and the enormous assemblage of destructive appliances, necessary for the preliminary process of annihilation, produced a congestion which brought the best organized offensive to a standstill. In such circumstances it seemed that final victory might be postponed for months and even years.