On 11 November, in a raging snowstorm, his forces surprised the Russian flank in the fierce Battle of Łódź, which ended the immediate Russian threat to Silesia and also captured Poland's second largest city. 1915 Disagreements with Falkenhayn Hindenburg argued that the still miserably equipped Russians—some only carried spears—in the huge Polish salient were in a trap in which they could be snared in a cauldron by a southward pincer from East Prussia and a northward pincer from Galicia, using motor vehicles for speed, even though the Russians outnumbered the Germans by three to one. From Hindenburg's point of view, such an overwhelming triumph could end the war in the Eastern Front. Erich von Falkenhayn, the Chief of Germany's Great General Staff, rejected his plan as a pipe dream. Nevertheless, urged on by Ludendorff and Hoffman, Hindenburg spent the winter fighting for his strategy by badgering the Kaiser while his press officer recruited notables like the Kaiserin and the Crown Prince to "stab the Kaiser in the back". The Kaiser compromised by keeping Falkenhayn in supreme command, but replacing him as Prussian war minister. In retaliation, Falkenhayn reassigned some of Hindenburg's forces to a new army group under Prince Leopold of Bavaria and transferred Ludendorff to a new joint German and Austro-Hungarian Southern Army. Hindenburg and Ludendorff reacted by threatening to resign thereby resulting in Ludendorff's reinstatement under Hindenburg's command. Counterattacks in East Prussia and Poland Following his return, Ludendorff provided Hindenburg with a depressing evaluation of their allies' army, which already had lost many of their professional officers and had been driven out of much of the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, their part of what once had been Poland. Meanwhile, the Russians were inexorably pushing from Galicia toward Hungary through the Carpathian passes. Under orders from Falkenhayn to contain the resurgent Russians, Hindenburg mounted an unsuccessful attack in Poland with his Ninth Army as well as an offensive by the newly formed Tenth Army which made only local gains. Following these setbacks, he set up temporary headquarters at Insterburg, and made plans to eliminate the Russians' remaining toehold in East Prussia by ensnaring them in a pincer movement between the Tenth Army in the north and Eighth Army in the south. The attack was launched on 7 February. Hindenburg's forces encircled an entire corps and captured more than 100,000 men in the Second Battle of the Masurian Lakes.