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H TTTTTTTTTTTTT I C TTTTTTTTTTTTTT D
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14. The general configuration of the bases ought also to influence the
direction to be given to the lines of operations, these latter being
naturally dependent upon the former. It has already been shown that the
greatest advantage that can result from a choice of bases is when the
frontiers allow it to be assumed parallel to the line of operations of
the enemy, thus affording the opportunity of seizing this line and
cutting him from his base.

But if, instead of directing the operations upon the decisive point, the
line of operations be badly chosen, all the advantages of the
perpendicular base may be lost, as will be seen by referring to the
figure on page 79. The army E, having the double base A C and C D, if it
marched toward F, instead of to the right toward G H, would lose all the
strategic advantages of its base C D.

The great art, then, of properly directing lines of operations, is so to
establish them in reference to the bases and to the marches of the army
as to seize the communications of the enemy without imperiling one's
own, and is the most important and most difficult problem in strategy.

15. There is another point which exercises a manifest influence over the
direction to be given to the line of operations; it is when the
principal enterprise of the campaign is to cross a large river in the
presence of a numerous and well-appointed enemy. In this case, the
choice of this line depends neither upon the will of the general nor the
advantages to be gained by an attack on one or another point; for the
first consideration will be to ascertain where the passage can be most
certainly effected, and where are to be found the means for this
purpose. The passage of the Rhine in 1795, by Jourdan, was near
Dusseldorf, for the same reason that the Vistula in 1831 was crossed by
Marshal Paskevitch near Ossiek,--viz., that in neither case was there
the bridge-train necessary for the purpose, and both were obliged to
procure and take up the rivers large boats, bought by the French in
Holland, and by the Russians at Thorn and Dantzic. The neutrality of
Prussia permitted the ascent of the river in both cases, and the enemy
was not able to prevent it. This apparently incalcula