ABSTRACT
These last words made me jump: ‘Isn’t it possible for them to confi ne themselves – provisionally at any rate –
to a partial mobilization?’ ‘No. The question has just been gone into thoroughly by a council of our
highest military offi cers. They have come to the conclusion that in existing circumstances the Russian Government has no choice between partial and general mobilization as from the technical point of view a partial mobilization could be carried out only at the price of dislocating the entire machinery of general mobilization. So if to-day we stopped at mobilizing the thirteen corps destined for operations against Austria and tomorrow Germany decided to give her ally military support, we should be powerless to defend ourselves on the frontiers of Poland and East Prussia.’
