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But the rapid growth of the city and the increasing range of guns made Brialmont's ring of forts, which was drawn little more than two miles from the walls, useless as a protection against bombardment, and twenty years later a wider circle of forts, which was barely completed when war broke out, was begun ten miles farther out, beyond the Rupel and the Nethe, and extending almost to Malines.
The mounds were turfed and so inconspicuous that in times of peace sheep grazed over them. In Brialmont's original plan each fort was to be connected by infantry trenches with sunken emplacements for light artillery, but this important part of his design was relegated to the dangerous hour of a threatening enemy. This work was undertaken too late before the onsweep of the Germans.
Had not General Brialmont's original plans of the forts been unduly curtailed, this resistance would have proved still more effective. Credits for the defences of Liége and Namur, like those of Antwerp a few years before, were voted grudgingly by a Chamber lulled into a false state of security by the experience of 1870.
Instead, Brialmont's single weak detail in surrounding each fort with an infantry platform was tenaciously preserved long after its uselessness must have been apparent. Thus Liege was made a ring fortress to distinguish it from the former latest pattern of earth ramparts and outworks. Six major and six minor of these forts encircled Liege.
Directly east, the Meuse flows into the precipitous cut on its way to Liege. But in Belgian eyes the fame of Namur lay to a great extent in its being the second of Brialmont's fortress masterpieces. Its plan was that of Liege a ring of outer detached forts, constructed on the same armor-clad cupola principle. At Namur these were nine in number, four major forts and five fortins.
He immediately set to work to overcome the cause of the failure of Brialmont's plan at Liege, by constructing trenches between the forts, protected by barbed wire entanglements, and mines in advance of the German approach. As his circumference of defense was less than that of Liege, his force promised to be capable of a more prolonged resistance. Besides the Allies were close at hand.
During the morning of August 5, Fort Fleron was put out of action by shell destruction of its cupola-hoisting machinery. This proved a weak point in Brialmont's fortress plan. It was presently discovered that the fire of the supporting forts Evegnée and Chaudfontaine could not command the lines forming the apex of their triangle.
The Belgians fought more stubbornly than was anticipated; and aided by Brialmont's fortification of Liège, although his plans for defence were not properly executed, they held up the Germans for two days in front of the city.
The retreat of the main army on Antwerp was part of Brialmont's plan for the defense of Belgium, since the position of Brussels was not capable of a strong defense. By this time the main army was safely passing down the valley of the Dyle to the shelter of the Antwerp forts, leaving the right wing to its fate. Louvain thus fell to the Germans.
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