Stakes

No matter how much scheming went on, wars still had to be decided on the battlefield. While Prussia and Russia were locked in a diplomatic contest, the Lithuanian Campaign erupted as well.

At this point, Moltke had fallen into an awkward predicament. Whether or not to fight a decisive battle with the enemy in Lithuania was a vexing question.

The Russian Navy had stagnated for over a decade and had long since fallen behind the times. Yet even this antiquated fleet was not something the Prusso-Polish Federation's pocket-sized navy could compare with.

Times had changed. Both Prussia and Russia had prepared for this war, and the Tsarist Government had stockpiled vast quantities of strategic supplies in Saint Petersburg. They would not lack supplies even if the war dragged on for a year or more.

Against this backdrop, their advantage at sea could be fully brought into play. Ivanov had launched the Lithuanian Campaign now precisely because he wanted to make use of those advantages.

Having lost control of the sea, going to fight a decisive battle along the Baltic Sea coast against a prepared enemy—Moltke could only say that he had not gone mad yet.

The problem was that war was not something one could simply choose not to fight. The Russians had already launched their offensive. Unless they abandoned Lithuania, Latvia, and other regions, they could only grit their teeth and meet it head-on.

Abandoning them was impossible. Once Lithuania fell, the flames of war would once again spread to East Prussia. All the gains won during the First Prusso-Russian War would be lost.

Had it been another enemy, Moltke might have dared to gamble, searching for an opportunity to break them. Unfortunately, he was facing Ivanov, renowned for his conservatism. Such tactics would simply have no effect.

Warsaw,