26

THE NEUTRALITY OF BELGIUM

and Holland, have also not thought it necessary to make
the violation of Luxemburg a casus be/Ii.

III
It is evident to all who study closely the map of
France that her eastern frontier falls into two sharply
contrasted divisions, the north-eastern which reaches
from the sea to the valley of the Sambre, and the southeastern which extends from that river to, and along
the Swiss boundary. The former is flat country, easy
for military operations; the latter is mountainous, intersected with many deep valleys. After the loss of
Alsace-Lorraine, the French set to work to ' rectify
artificially the strategical weakness of their frontier; and
in a chain of fortresses behind the Vosges Mountains
they erected a rampart which has the reputation of
being impregnable. This is the line Belfort, Epinal,
Taul, Verdun. A German attack launched upon this
line without violating neutral territory would have to be
frontal, for on the north the line is covered by the
neutral states of Belgium and Luxemburg, while on the
south, although the gap between the Vosges and
the Swiss frontier apparently gives a chance of outflanking the French defences, the fortress of Belfort,
which was neYer reduced even in the war of 1870-1,
was considered too formidable an obstacle against which
to launch an invading army. A rapid advance on Paris
was therefore deemed impossible if respect were to be
paid to the neutrality of Belgium and Luxemburg, and
it was for this purely military reason that Germany has
to-day violated her promises to regard the neutrality
of these states. This was frankly admitted by Herr von
Jagow to Sir Edward Goschen: 'if th ey had gone by
the more southern route they could not have hoped, in
view of the paucity of roads and the strength of the