The Carpathian mountain range stretches over nine hundred and thirty miles. By the beginning of the First World War, the Carpathians had cut eighteen highways and twenty-two wheeled roads, but in the winter season only highways remained accessible to traffic. The Carpathian offensive operation lasted no more than four months. However, Russian losses in it exceeded the losses suffered by the North-Western and South-Western fronts in total in the four largest operations of 1914. During the assault on the Carpathians, the last cadres of the trained reserve were wasted and the last reserves of artillery shells were shot. Their shortage in the 1915 campaign would be the main reason for the severe defeats of the Russian armies on the Eastern Front, the surrender of the western Polish and Lithuanian provinces, huge losses in manpower and a disproportionate breakdown of the will to continue the fight both at the front and in the rear.