The evening leader. (Tarpon Springs, Fla.) 191?-19??, 1917-07-12
MACHINE GUN IS
BEST WAR WEAPON
lndisputabIy the Most Terrible
instrument of Defense,
Says Observer.
BIG GUNS OFTEN INACCURATE
While Necessary in Offensive Warfare
Heavy Artillery Is Not in Same
Glass With Machine Guns
In Defensive Tactics.
BY A FRENCH SOLDIER.

Paris.-Months of furious assault ON
the French lines at Verdun, which
have brought into play the most pow
-erful known means of attack, have
barely succeeded in bending the adj
versary's lines. There is, it is true, a
diminution of forces on both sides, and
one may look forward to the day when
the accumulation of material and the
| superiority in numbers of men on the
side of the allies will enable the latter
to break more rapidly the adyersary's
tenacious resistance.
But why is it, one asks, that despite
the accumulation of heavy cannon it
costs so much in men and money and
time to break the enemy's resistance?
1t is because this war is being fought
in period of development of the art
of war, in which the means of defense
are vastly superior to the means of
offense in the facility with which they
can be brought into action and manu-
featured at low cost, and above all in
their efficacy, arising both from the.
difficulty which the adversary finds in
demolishing them, and from the abso-
lutte accuracy of their aim.
Means of Defense.
To understand this one has merely
to review the means of defense at the
disposal of the armies in the field.
First, besides the trenches, and the
barbed wire that prevents access to.
them, which are the basis of the pres
| ent system of defense, aud Of which
the shell hole wherein the soldier Icon-
5ceals himself from the enemy, is but a
variation, the two great arms of de-
Tense are the machine gun and the
.'75n cannon, the last resort of the
French army and one of the great de-
tenders of Verdun.
In the factory there is nothing.
easier or relatively cheaper to make
than the machine gun. And at the
front there is nothing simpler TO trans
port than this light arm, which three
or four men can carry as they run.
Its aim is most accurate; it can, when
necessary, fire from 500 to 600 car
tridges per minute, sowing death on
every side with incredible speed. But
against a trench it, is powerless, and
therefore 1t is pre-eminently the arm
Of defense. When properly handled,
it is so redoubtable that one alone has
been known to stop an entire regi-
ment. 1t is indisputably the most ter
rible instrument of war.
Yet well-directed battery of ''75"
cannon, sweeping space of ground, is
more certain to leave nothing alive.
These, then, are the primordial
means of defense, to which naturally
are to be added the numerous rifles
of the defenders of the trenches, those
trenches in which are invisible loop
holes where the enemy awaits our ap-
pearance.
Heavy Shells for offense.
What are the adversary's means of
annihilating these hidden, powerful de-
lenses? Only heavy artillery; the large
shell, the huge torpedo, the heavy pro-
jectile of steel, inclosing a violent ex-
plosive, is capable of demolishing a
netting, of demoralizing those occu-
pants of the trench whom it does not
kill and keeping the adversary's nerves
on edge by the menace of its sudden
arrival several kilometers behind the
lines. Thus the means Of offensive are
the heavy cannon, the large trench
n1ortars, the large caliber howitzers,
the formidable marine gun mounted on
rails, all that is longest, most difficult
and costly to manufacture, to trans
port, to set In motion. A machine gun
can be installed anywhere in two min
utes or less. A month is required to
install the 1920" trench mortar. TO
put naval gun on rails in running
order necessitates months of work and
the installation of railway. Even
guns that are easy to handle, such as
the "155," are moved with difficulty !;
at times 1t takes two or three days to
place them In a battery.
And this is not all. The heavy ar
tillery is naturally less accurate than
the field artillery. When one consld-
ers that heavy guns soon wear out, as
the big gun can fire only more or less
limited number of shots, as its caliber
Increases, and as it must constantly
be replaced, one understands why 1t is
SO much easier to take the defensive
than the offensive. and why the situa-