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A BRIEF HISTORY
OF THE
GREAT WAR
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A BRIEF HISTORY
OF THE
GREAT WAR
BY
CARLTON J. H. HAYES
PROFESSOR OF HISTORY IN COLUMBIA. UNIVERSITY
AUTHOR OF "A POLITICAL AND SOCIAL
HISTORY OF MODERN EUROPE"
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1920
All rights reserved
Copyright, 1920,
Bv THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.
Set up and electrotyped. Published May, 1920.
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BOOKS AND PROUDLY PAID THE SUPREME SACRI-
FICE IN THE CAUSE OF HUMAN SOLIDARITY
AGAINST INTERNATIONAL ANARCHY
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PREFACE
The following pages constitute a connected story of the late
war from its origins to the conclusion of the Peace of Versailles,
not for the edification of ''experts," military or other, but rather
for the enlightenment of the general reader and student. A
"definitive" history of the war will never be written ; it is much
too early, of course, even to attempt it. All that the author has
here essayed to do is to sketch tentatively what seem to him
its broad outHnes — domestic poHtics of the several belligerents
no less than army campaigns and naval battles, — and in present-
ing his synthesis to be guided so far as in him lay by an honest
desire to put heat and passion aside and to write candidly and
objectively for the instruction of the succeeding generation.
The author is under special obligation to Messrs. Dodd,
Mead and Company for the kind permission which they have
accorded him of drawing freely upon the articles on ''The War
of the Nations" which he wrote in 191 4, 1915, and 191 6 for their
invaluable New International Year Book. In the opening chap-
ter of the present work the author has also incorporated a few
paragraphs from the last chapter of his Political and Social
History of Modern Europe, to which, in a way, the Brief History
OF THE Great War is supplementary.
Carlton J. H. Hayes.
Afton, New York,
April 5, 1920.
vu
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I. The Great War Comes
The General Cause : International Anarchy .
The Immediate Cause : Germany .
The Occasion : The Assassination of an Archduke
II. Germany Conquers Belgium and Invades France
Mobilization and Strategy
The Conquest of Belgium
The Invasion of France .
German Gains in the West — and Failure
III. Russia Fails to Overwhelm Germany
The Russian Invasion of East Prussia
The Russian Invasion of Galicia
The German Invasion of Russian Poland
The Security of Serbia
IV.
Great Britain Masters the Seas
Importance of Sea Power
The Participation of Japan
The Conquest of the German Colonies
Turkey's Support of Germany
Germany's Counter-Offensive on the Seas
V. The Allies Endeavor to Dominate the Near East
Allied Optimism in the Spring of 191 5
The Attack on the Dardanelles ....
Italy's Entry into the War
VI. Russia Retreats
Mackensen's Drive : The Austrian Recovery of Galicia
Hindenburg's Drive : The German Conquest of Poland
Revival of Political Unrest in Russia
Failure of the Allies to Relieve Russia
VII. Germany Masters the Near East ....
Decline of Allied Prestige
Bulgaria's Entry into the War and the Conquest of Serbia
PAGE
I
I
7
13
21
21
27
30
37
41
41
43
50
55
58
58
62
65
69
73
■'80
80
S3
89
99
99
102
107
112
121
121
124
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
Failure of the Allies to Relieve Serbia: The Salonica
Expedition
vm.
Completion of German Mastery of the Near East
Germany Fails to Obtain a Decision in 1916
Teutonic Optimism at the Beginning of 19 16 .
The Difficulty at Verdun : "They Shall Not Pass"
The Difficulty in the Trentino : Italy's Defense
The Difficulty in Ireland : Suppression of Rebellion
Difficulties at Sea: The Grand Fleet and the United
States Government
IX.
The Allies Fail to Obtain a Decision in 19 16
Attempted Coordination of Allied Plans .
Simultaneous Allied Drives: The Somme, the Isonzo
and the Sereth
The Participation and Defeat of Rumania
Stalemate and the Teutonic Peace Drive
X. The United States Intervenes ....
The Stakes : Isolation or a League of Nations ?
The Occasion : Unrestricted Submarine Warfare
The Problem : Preparedness ....
1917)
917)
XI. RussLA. Revolts and Makes "Peace"
Destruction of Russian Autocracy: the March
Revolution
Disintegration of Democracy: Political and Military
Experiments
Dictatorship of the Bolsheviki: the November (
Revolution
Defection of Russia : the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
XII. The Allies Pave the Way for Ultimate Victory
Allied Plans and Prospects in 191 7 .
The Lesson of the Hindenburg Line
Recovery of Allied Prestige in the Near East .
Seeming Obstacles to Allied Victory
XIII. Germany Makes the Supreme Effort
"Whom the Gods Would Destroy"
The Drive against the British : The Battle of Picardy
The Drive against the French : The Aisne and the Oise
129
134
143
143
J48
156^
158
162
'168
168
171
181
191
201
201
213
219
225
225
231
246
252
261
261
272
281
287
299
299
304
3^3
CONTENTS a
CHAPTER PAGE
The Drive against the Italians : The Piave . . .317
The Final German Drive: The Second Battle of the
Maine . 320
XIV. The Allies Triumph and Central Europe Revolts . 326
Allied Victories in the West 326
Allied Intervention in Russia 334
Allied Triumph in the Near East : Surrender of Bulgaria
and Turkey 342
The Collapse of Austria-Hungary: Resurgence of Op-
pressed Nationalities 348
The End of Hostilities : Flight of William II . . .356
XV. A New Era Begins 365
The Settlement 365
The Losses 388
Landmarks of the New Era 395
Appendix I : The Covenant of the League of Nations . . 413
Appendix II: American Reservations to the Treaty of Ver-
sailles 424
Appendix III : Proposed Agreement Between the United
States and France 428
Select Bibliography 431
Index 437
MAPS IN COLOR
PRECEDING PAGE
1. Europe, 1914 i
2. Germany, 1871-1914 7
3. Austria-Hungary, 1914 . . 15
4. War Area of Western Europe 27
5. War Area of Eastern Europe . . . . . . .41
6. The Ottoman Empire and the Balkan States . . .81
7. Central Europe, January, 1916 143
8. Central Europe, March, 19 18 299
9. Europe, 1920 365
10. Colonial Dominions of the Great Powers . . . . 401
SKETCH MAPS
PAGE
1. Farthest German Advance in France 34
2. Allies' Western Front, December, 1914 • • • • 37
3. Japan's Position in Relation to Korea, Kiao-chao, and
China 63
4. German "War Zone" OF February 18, 191 5 .... 77
5. The Dardanelles Campaign, 191 5 86
6. Habsburg Territories Promised to Italy by the Allies . 93
7. The Austro-Italian War Area 96
8. Eastern Battle Front, 191 5 103
9. The Second Battle of Ypres, April-May, 191 5 . . .116
10. The Allied Offensive in September, 191 5 . . . .119
11. Serbia, 1914 128
12. Asiatic Turkey, 1914 138
13. Mesopotamia and Its Strategic Position .... 141
14. Battle Lines around Verdun, 1916 154
15. The Russian Drive ON THE Styr, 1916 172
16. The Russian Drive on the Sereth, 1916 . . . .173
xiii
xiv SKETCH MAPS
PAGE
17. The Italian Campaign AGAINST GoRiziA 175
18. Battle of the Somme 179
19. Rumania and Transylvania, 1916 186
20. German "War Zone" OF February I, 19 1 7 .... 214
21. The Western Front near Arras and on the Aisne . .273
22. The Heights of the Aisne 275
23. Battles of Messines Ridge and Ypres 279
24. Battle of Cambrai . . 281
25. Scene of British and Arab Advance in Palestine . . . 286
26. The Austro-German Invasion of Italy 295
27. German Gains, 1918 305
28. Second Phase of the Battle of Picardy 309
29. Scene of the Last Austrian Offensive 318
30. Scene of the Last German Offensive : The Second Battle
OF THE Marne 323
31. Principal Changes in Western Front from August, 19 14,
TO November, 1918 327
32. The St. MmiEL Drive OF the Americans . . . .329
33. The Franco- American Offensive on the Meuse and in the
Argonne 333
34. Allied Intervention in Russia. 339
35. Macedonian Front at Time of Bulgaria's Surrender . . 345
36. Progress of British and Arab Offensives in Turkey,
October, 1918 347
37. Territory Occupied by the Allies under the Armistice of
November ii 358
38. New Western Boundaries of Germany 374
39. New Eastern Boundaries of Germany 375
A BRIEF HISTORY
OF THE
GREAT WAR
I
A BRIEF HISTORY OF
THE GREAT WAR
CHAPTER I
THE GREAT WAR COMES
THE GENERAL CAUSE: INTERNATIONAL ANARCHY
Self-interest was the dominant note of the years imme-
diately preceding the outbreak of the Great War. In economics
and in pohtics, among individuals, social classes, and nations,
flourished a self-interest that tended more and more to degenerate
into mere cynical selfishness. Pseudo-scientists there were to
justify the tendency as part of an inevitable ''struggle for exist-
ence" and to extol it as assuring the "survival of the fittest."
Economic circumstances had provided the setting for the
dogma of self-interest. The latest age in world history had
been the age of steam and electricity, of the factory and the
workshop, of the locomotive, the steamship, and the automobile.
It had been the age of big competitive business. Between the
capitalists of the new era had developed the keenest rivalry in
exploiting machinery, mines, raw materials, and even human
beings, with a view to securing the largest share of the world's
riches and the world's prestige. It was a race of the strong, and
"the devil take the hindmost."
Competition in big business gave manners and tone to the
whole age. It inspired a multitude of mankind to emulate the
"captains of industry." It furnished the starting-point and
the main impulse for the development of the doctrines of Social-
ists and of Anarchists and of all those who laid stress upon
"class consciousness " and " class struggle." It even served to set
farmers against manufacturers and to pit "producers" against
"consumers." To secure power and thereby to obtain wealth,
or to secure wealth and thereby to obtain power, became the
more or less conscious end and aim of individuals and of whole
classes.
2 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Trade — the veritable red blood of modern industrial life
— has not been, and from its nature cannot be, narrowly national.
Not only must there be commerce between one highly civiHzed
nation and another, but there must Hkewise be trade between
an industrialized nation and more backward peoples in tropical
or semi-tropical regions. The modern business man has need
of raw materials from the tropics ; he has manufactured goods
to sell in return; most important of all, he frequently finds
that investments in backward countries are especially lucrative
in themselves and stimulative of greater and more advantageous
trade. So self-interest has been pursued abroad as well as at
home, and usually with the most calamitously anarchical results.
Whatever restrictions might be imposed by a strong national
state on the selfish activities of its citizens at home were either
non-existent or ineffective in restraining them wherever govern-
ments were unstable or weak. In backward countries the
foreign exploiter often behaved as though "getting rich quick''
was the supreme obligation imposed upon him by the civilization
whose representative and exponent he was. The natives suffered
from the unregulated dealings of the foreigners. And the
foreigners, drawn perhaps from several different nations, carried
their mutual economic rivalries into the sphere of international
competition and thereby created "danger zones" or "arenas of
friction."
After 1870 this aspect of capitalistic imperialism was increas-
ingly in evidence. Any one who would follow an outline story
of the exploitation of backward regions by business men of Great
Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Russia, Japan, and the United
States would perceive the process and would appreciate its
attendant dangers. Any one who is at all familiar with the
"arenas of friction" in Egypt, in China, in Siam, in the Sudan,
in Morocco, in Persia, in the Ottoman Empire, and in the Bal-
kans would be in possession of a valuable clew to a significant
cause of every war of the twentieth century, particularly to
the chief cause of the Great War.
What had complicated the situation was the fact that trade,
though in essence international, had been conducted in practice
on a national basis, and that foreign investors had been per-
petually appeahng for support not to an international conscience
and an international poHce but to the patriotism and armed
forces of their respective national states. In other words,
anarchy had continued to characterize international politics as
well as domestic economics.
THE GREAT WAR COMES 3
There was no international organization. There was no
general authority for the determination of disputes and for the
regulation of world interests. There were at the opening of the
twentieth century some fifty states, in theory absolutely inde-
pendent, sovereign, and equal. In fact, the fifty were very
unequal and even the strongest among them was not strong
enough to maintain its independence should the others unite
against it. Yet each proceeded to act on the assumption in
most cases that it was self-sufficient and that its own self-interest
was its supreme guide.
Running through the whole anarchic state-system, as woof
through warp, was the doctrine of nationality. It is a common-
place to us that a compact people speaking the same language
and sharing the same historical traditions and social customs
should be politically united as an independent nation. To the
nineteenth century, however, nationalism was a revolutionary
force. At its dawn there was no free German nation, no free
Italian nation. But the all-conquering armies of the French
Revolutionaries brought to the disjointed and dispirited peoples
of Europe a new gospel of Fraternity, that men of the same
nation should be brothers-in-arms to defend their liberties
against the tyrant and their homes against the foreign foe.
Poetry glorified the idea of national patriotism, religion sanc-
tioned it, and political theory invested it with all the finahty of
a scientific dogma. Within a century, the spirit of nationality
produced an independent Greece, a Serbia, a Rumania, a Bul-
garia, a Belgium, a Norway, an Italy, a Germany. Each nation —
old and young — was proud of its national language, its national
customs, its frequently fictitious but always glorious national
history, and above all, of its national political unification and
freedom.
Everywhere the doctrine of nationality has brought forth
fruits in abundance. It has awakened all peoples to national
self -consciousness. It has inspired noble and glorious deeds.
It has stimulated art and literature. It has promoted popular
education and political democracy. It should have led, not
backwards to eighteenth-century indifferent cosmopolitanism,
but forwards to twentieth-century inter-nationalism, to a con-
federation of all the free nations of the world for mutual co-
operation and support. Hither, on the eve of the Great War,
it had not led. And this was the tragedy of nationalism.
Nationalism was utilized too often to point citizens to what
was peculiar to their own nation rather than to what was common
4 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
to all mankind. It served to emphasize the exclusiveness of each
state and to promote selfishness in a new and national form. It
led nations which had not yet achieved complete unity and inde-
pendence, like the Irish, the Poles, the Czechs, the Serbs, and the
Rumans, to combat more fortunate nations ; and among the per-
fected nations it aroused such selfish intolerance as to render them
tyrannical over dissident minorities and to cause them to enter-
tain the notion that they were manifestly destined to impose their
own brand of civilization or Kultur upon, if not arbitrarily to
rule over, ''inferior" races.
Nationalism, moreover, prompted whole peoples to give patri-
otic support to the pretensions of their relatively few fellow-citi-
zens who in less favored lands were seeking profits at the expense
of natives and perhaps of neighbors. The foreign tradesman or
investor was under no obligation to an impartial international
tribunal : he had only to present his international grievances to
the uncritical and sympathetic ears of his distant fellow-nationals,
with the usual result that his cause was championed at home and
that redress for his real or fancied wrongs was forthcoming from a
single one of the fifty sovereign states. And when tradesmen or
investors of other nationalities appealed from the same distant
regions to their several states, what had been an arena of economic
friction between competing capitalists in backward lands speedily
became an arena of poHtical friction between civilized sovereign
states.
In this fashion the spirit of nationalism operated to reenforce
the anarchy both of international politics and of international
economics. Modern imperialism, curiously enough, became an
arc on the circle of exclusive nationaHsm. It was a vicious circle,
and the only way to break it seemed to involve the method most
terribly anarchic — employment of brute force — war ! It had
been in view of this grim eventuahty that in the nineteenth cen-
tury every sovereign state had been arming itself and utilizing
every landmark in the progress of civilization in order to forge
instruments of destruction. Imperialism — Nationalism — Mili-
tarism — these three stalked forth hand in hand.
Armed force was comparatively Httle used ; its mere existence
and the mere threat of its use ordinarily sufficed. Indirectly, if
not directly, however, force and power were final arbitrament be-
tween each two of the fifty sovereign states. And it was no eu-
phemism that every such state was styled a "Power," and that
certain states on account of the thickness and weight of their ar-
mor and the success that customarily attended their threats were
THE GREAT WAR COMES 5
popularly dubbed *' Great Powers." In a world like this there
was little chance for international order and security. It was in-
ternational anarchy — and that was all.
For many generations before the Great War the delicate rela-
tions between the jealously sovereign states — aptly called the
''balance of power" — had been manipulated by a professional
class of "diplomatists" with the aid of military and naval attaches
and of spies and secret service. The customs and methods of
diplomacy had been determined in large part at a time when they
conformed quite nicely to the purposes and ideals of the divine-
right dynasts of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but
in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, when democracy was
constantly preached and increasingly practiced, they might have
seemed old-fashioned and anachronistic. To be sure, there were
some modifications both in the objects and in the methods of di-
plomacy : as a result of the industrial changes in our own day,
economic questions provided a larger and more attractive field for
tortuous diplomatic negotiation than mere dynastic problems;
and by the use of the telegraph, the telephone, and the cable the
individual diplomatist was kept in closer touch than formerly
with his home government. Still, however, the diplomatists were
mainly persons of a class, elderly, suave, insinuating, moving
mysteriously their wonders to perform. Democrats who in many
countries had laid violent hands upon innumerable institutions
of despotism and had brought most matters of public concern to
the knowledge of a universal electorate, hesitated to assail this
last rehc of divine-right monarchy or to trust the guidance of in-
ternational relations to an enfranchised democracy which might
by the slightest slip upset the balance of power and plunge an
anarchic world into an abyss.
So the diplomatists in our own day continued to manage affairs
after their old models. They got what they could for their fellow-
nationals by cajolery or by threats. If they thought they could
do more for their fellow-nationals by making special "deals" with
diplomatists of other Powers, they did so, and presto! a "con-
vention," an "entente," or a "treaty of alliance" defensive or
offensive or both. The game had become quite involved and ab-
sorbing by 191 4, and quite hazardous. Germany thought she
needed aid to enable her to retain the loot which she had taken
from France ; Austria-Hungary thought she needed assistance
in the development of her Balkan policy ; Italy thought she must
have help in safeguarding Rome and in defending herself from
possible French or Austrian aggression. So German and Aus-
6 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
trian diplomatists formed a "defensive alliance" in 1879, and
Italy, joining them in 1882, transformed it into the "Triple Alli-
ance." This was the beginning of the ahgnment of the Great
Powers in our own generation. Diplomatists of repubHcan
France and autocratic Russia cemented the secret defensive
"Dual Alliance" in 1892. Diplomatists of democratic Great
Britain and oligarchical Japan formed a Far Eastern "alUance"
in 1902. Diplomatists of Great Britain and France effected a
rapprochement and an "entente" in 1904. To this "entente"
the diplomatists of Russia were admitted in 1907. And between
Triple Alliance and Triple Entente the balance of power was so
neatly adjusted that from 1907 to 19 14 one trivial occurrence
after another almost upset it.
Of course, the smaller states — the "lesser powers" — were
mainly at the mercy of the "Great Powers" and their delicate
balance. On the very eve of the Great War diplomatists of Ger-
many and Great Britain were secretly negotiating the virtual
partition of the colonial empire of Portugal. On the other hand,
changes among the lesser powers might produce prodigious dan-
ger to the balance of the Great Powers. The defeat of Turkey by
four Httle Balkan states in 1912-1913 appeared on the surface to
be slightly more advantageous to Russia than to Austria-Hungary,
with the result that Germany and her Habsburg ally were thrown
into a paroxysm of fear, and one Power after another consecrated
the year 1913 to unprecedented armed preparedness. By 1914
it actually required nothing less trivial in itself than the assassi-
nation of an archduke to exhaust the imagination and endeavor of
the professional balancers between the Powers and to send the
diplomatists scurrying homewards, leaving the common people
of the several nations to confront one another in the most formi-
dable and portentous battle-array that the world in all its long
recorded history had ever beheld.
Those last years before the storm and the hurricane were indeed
a strange, nightmarish time. Man had gained a large measure
of control over his physical environment and a very small amount
of knowledge about his true political, social, and economic needs.
In most countries democracy and nationalism were growing by
leaps and bounds. In other countries there was more or less
mute protest against interference with national right and demo-
cratic development. Everywhere the Industrial Revolution was
providing an economic foundation for international federation.
Yet the spirit of the age seemed incapable of expression save in
institutions which had been distantly inherited and which in most
THE GREAT WAR COMES 7
instances had outlived their usefulness. Recurring crises between
sovereign states and increasing social unrest in every country-
were alike signs of the passing of a worn-.out age and of the coming
of a new age which should more perfectly square institutions with
vital popular needs and longings. Those three shibboleths of the
nineteenth century, — Nationahsm, Imperiahsm, Militarism, —
as interpreted in the traditional language of the exclusive state-
system, were producing the utmost confusion. Together they
embodied the spirit of Anarchy, a spirit that could not perma-
nently endure on a shrinking globe or among social animals. To-
gether they were operating to produce a cataclysm which should
stand forth as one of those great crises in Man's historic evolution,
such as the break-up of the Roman Empire, the Reformation, and
the French Revolution. And the cataclysm came in the Great
War. Its underlying cause was international anarchy. Its
stakes were the perpetuation or the destruction of that anarchy.
THE IMMEDIATE CAUSE: GERMANY
The vices of modern political and economic life might be exem-
plified in greater or less degree by reference to the history of any
Power or any country. Obviously they were more developed in
the *' Great Powers" than in the "Lesser Powers" ; and of all the
*' Great Powers" the most perfect exemplar of nationalism, im-
perialism, and militarism, and therefore the most viciously an-
archic in international relations, was Germany. It was Germany
which precipitated the Great War.
Militarism is not merely the possession of large armed forces ;
it involves also the exaltation of such armed forces to the chief
place in the state, the subordination to them of the civil authori-
ties, the reliance upon them in every dispute. In explaining why
a given nation may be pecuHarly predisposed to militarism, at
least four factors should be taken into account : (i) geographical
situation, (2) historical traditions, (3) political organization,
and (4) social structure. In every country one or another of
these factors has worked toward militarism, sometimes two or
three. In Germany all four have been fully operative in that
direction.
For centuries German lands had been battlefields for aggressive
neighbors. Situated in the center of Europe, with weak natural
frontiers, these lands had been the prey of Spaniards, Swedes,
Frenchmen, Poles, and Russians. From the Thirty Years' War,
in the first half of the seventeenth century, down to the domi-
8 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
nation of Napoleon Bonaparte, in the first decade of the nineteenth
century, most of the German states were at the mercy of foreigners.
What international prestige Germans retained thnroughout that
dreary period was credited to the military prowess of Austria and
more particularly to the waxing strength of Prussia. Prussia had
no easily defensible boundaries, and her rise to eminence was due
to the soldierly qualities of her Hohenzollern sovereigns — the
Great Elector, King Frederick William I, and Frederick the Great.
When, in the nineteenth century, the German Empire was created,
it was the work of the large, well-organized, well-equipped army
of Prussia, and it was achieved only at the price of French mihtary
defeat and of diplomatic concessions to Russia. After the crea-
tion of the German Empire in 187 1 most of its citizens continued
to believe that its geographical position between populous Russia
and well-armed France required the guarantee of militarism for
its future maintenance.
Despite the drawback of their geographical situation the Ger-
mans had finally achieved national unification, and among a
people zealously worshiping the spirit of nationalism the process
by which they had secured national union became their most hal-
lowed historical tradition. It will be recalled that the first serious
attempt to achieve the political unification of the Germanics was
made by the democratic Frankfort Assembly in the stormy days
of 1 848-1 849 ; that it represented a combination of nationaUsm
and liberaHsm, of the German nation with the German democracy.
But this first attempt failed. The second attempt, Bismarck's
attempt ^'by iron and blood," was crowned with success. Bis-
marck's three wars of 1864, 1866, and 1870-187 1, solidly estab-
lished the united German Empire. ''Nothing succeeds like suc-
cess," and the three wars simultaneously sanctified the union of
nationaHsm and militarism, of the German nation with the Prus-
sian army. Moreover, as Prussia henceforth embraced two-
thirds the area and three-fifths the population of the Empire and
as the Hohenzollern king of Prussia was henceforth the German
Emperor, the whole Empire was inevitably Prussianized, and
Prussian history and Prussian tradition supphed the patriotic
impulse to all Germans. In this way the tradition of miHtarism
— the most important one that Prussia had — gradually sup-
planted the more cosmopolitan and cultural traditions which had
once flourished in southern and central Germany, and in the pan-
theon of national heroes all German patriots inscribed tablets to
the long line of warlike Hohenzollern monarchs, to the valorous
Queen Louise, to Scharnhorst, Gneisenau, Moltke, and Roon, to
THE GREAT WAR COMES 9
the unscrupulous and forceful Bismarck — a veritable galaxy of
Thors and Wodens.
With this tradition the poHtical organization of the German
Empire was in perfect harmony. Chief authority in the central
government was confided to the Bundesrat, a close corporation
of diplomatists representing the hereditary princes of the German
states, meeting in secret session, and largely controlled by the
chancellor, an official appointed by, and responsible to, the king
of Prussia. Only secondary authority was intrusted to the
popularly elected Reichstag. Prussia, as the dominant state in
the confederation, retained her oligarchical and plutocratic form
of government, with her parliament elected by the absurd and
thoroughly undemocratic three-class system of voting. The
Emperor, in training and profession a soldier rather than a civilian,
was commander-in-chief of the army and navy, and his tenure
was for life. Under the constitution of Prussia, whose contingent
comprised the greater part of the German army, the Emperor-
King might apply indefinitely from year to year to the support of
the army the amount last voted by the parliament, instead of
being obliged to depend upon annual financial grants. The Ger-
man soldier took an oath of allegiance to the Kaiser and not to
the Constitution. In Germany, finally, the military authorities
were accountable for their acts only to military tribunals. Such
an affair as that at Saverne in Alsace in 1913-1914 ^ was a clear
illustration of the disregard of the mihtary for civilian rights and
of the inability of civilians under German political institutions
to obtain redress for their just grievances against the military.
Most potent of all factors in predisposing Germany to milita-
rism was the structure of her society. In Germany more nearly
than in any other highly industriaHzed country, agriculture
has held its own and the agricultural classes have suffered less in
purse and in prestige through competition with manufacturers
and tradesmen. Not only have the German farmers preserved
their economic independence, but a conspicuous group of them
have continued to our own day to enjoy the greatest social pres-
tige and to exert the greatest influence in politics. These are the
^ Saverne, or Zabem as the Germans called it, was the scene throughout 1913-
1914 of the harshest and most offensive conduct of the German garrison toward the
native civilian population, culminating in the slashing of a lame cobbler by a
Junker lieutenant. In vain did the local authorities and even the Reichstag en-
deavor to establish the supremacy of the civil courts in handling the situation;
the army proved itself superior to the law, and the responsible officers received no
part of the punishment which they richly deserved. For a detailed account of the
Saverne Affair, see C. D. Hazen, Alsace-Lorraine under German Rule (1917), ch.
lO A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
landholding nobles and the country gentlemen of Prussia — the
squirearchy, or Junkerthum. From time immemorial they had
divided their attention between oversight of their extensive es-
tates and the service of their Hohenzollern overlord in his civil
bureaucracy or in his army. Unlike their fellows in France no
mighty revolution had wrested their lands from them and no
republican regime had deprived them of their offices and privi-
leges. In our own generation the efficient civil service in Prussia
and throughout Germany was still largely recruited from them ;
most commissioned officers in the large Prussian army were still
appointed from their number ; and they were still utilizing their
positions of trust and power in order to serve their own class-
interests. The Junkers could afford to be most intensely loyal
and patriotic. They extolled militarism, and the extolling of mili-
tarism exalted them.
Second only to the Junkers in significance and influence were
the capitalists, the product of that amazing industrial and com-
mercial evolution through which Germany had passed in the last
forty years. Not a country in the world had witnessed in so
brief a time an economic transformation of such prodigious di-
mensions as the German Empire had experienced. Cities had
grown rapidly; factories had been reared overnight; mine-
shafts had been quickly sunk into the bowels of the earth ; an
ever expanding fleet of merchant vessels had put to sea, carrying
German manufactures to the uttermost parts of the globe ; tra-
ders, suddenly gorged with gold, had speedily turned investors,
and, imitating the example of older foreign industrialists, had
rushed to exploit Africa and South Sea Islands and China and
South America and the Ottoman Empire.
The capitaHsts, and the middle classes generally, might have
been expected to come into sharp collision with the Junkers,
so divergent were the natural interests of the two classes. As a
matter of fact they did colHde repeatedly in shaping domestic
policies, and much of the internal history of the German Empire
from 1870 to 1 9 14 was the story of the conflicts and compromises
between theni. One sacred German institution, however, kept
the class-struggle within patriotic bounds, and that institution
was militarism. German traders and investors, arriving late
in foreign and backward lands, usually found the keenest economic
competition already proceeding between business-men of Great
Britain, France, or some other industrialized Power; and were
they to have an equal or a better chance in the international
scramble for economic exploitation they would have to invoke
GERMANY
1871-1914
Longitude East
ENaRAVEO BY BORMAY <l CO.4 N.Yk'
THE GREAT WAR COMES ii
the armed forces of Germany, their own ''Great Power." At
home a huge mihtary machine was ready to aim and fire. Ad-
mitting that the German army of the 1870's was reUed upon
chiefly for defense against potential attacks of neighboring France
and Russia, it may be affirmed that twenty and thirty years later
it had become the standing threat by means of which German
citizens were prosecuting their unregulated economic activities
abroad and by means of which the whole German Empire was
championing unrestrained anarchy in international relations.
To the existing army, the capitalistic interests of Germany added
the rapidly expanding navy with the threats therein implied.
The Junkers officered all the armed forces and naturally extolled
militarism. Militarism proved serviceable to the capitaHsts, and
they in turn extolled militarism. By the iron ring of miHtarism
were agricultural and industrial interests wedded. The Junkers
were now serving the capitalists, and the capitalists were honor-
ing the Junkers. The promise "to obey" was left out of the
covenant, for both contracting parties had freely given that pledge
to the high priest who solemnized the nuptials, to the Kaiser him-
self.
Even in Germany protests were raised from time to time against
the extent of militarism and against some of the uses to which it
was put. The numerically important party of the Social Demo-
crats were particularly vocal in their denunciations. The Center,
or Catholic, party had not always taken kindly to militarism.
There were various groups of radicals who had inveighed against
it. It was naturally viewed with dislike by dissident nationalities
within the German Empire, such as the Poles, the Danes, and the
Alsatians. Yet over these parties and factions the Junker and
capitalistic patriots always managed to keep the upper hand, and
in course of time the opposition dwindled rather than increased.
The dissident nationahsts and the pacifist radicals were relatively
few and quite impotent. The Catholics grew more resigned to
militarism when they discovered that it was being used to bolster
up Austria-Hungary, Germany's Catholic ally. And the Social
Democrats were never given to violence ; as time went on, they
were too intent upon rolling up electoral pluralities to take a posi-
tive stand that might shock the patriotic instincts of their fellow-
countrymen. The militarists in Germany were having their own
way.
Forcefully the mihtarists cleared the way for German capitalists
abroad. The German fist was shaken in the face of Japan in 1895
and in the face of China in 1897 ^^^ again in 19CX). In 1896 there
12 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
were threats against Great Britain in connection with affairs in
South Africa. In 1898 there were veiled threats against the
United States in connection with affairs in the PhiUppines, and
in 1903 America was concerned with German threats against
Venezuela. In 1896 the Kaiser himself, on a spectacular visit to
Turkey, declared at Damascus that " at all times he was the friend
and protector of the three hundred million Mussulmans who hon-
ored Sultan Abdul Hamid as Caliph" — an assertion not only
of German political and economic interests in the Ottoman Em-
pire but also of German opposition to British rule in India and
in Egypt and to French rule in northern Africa. In 1904 the
Kaiser encouraged Russia to fight Japan, and in the following
year he utilized Russian miHtary defeats in order to compel
France, Russia's ally, to alter her Moroccan policy. In 1908-
1909 he stood *'in shining armor" beside his own ally, Austria-
Hungary, enabling her coolly and calmly to tear up an interna-
tional treaty and to appropriate the Serb-Turkish provinces of
Bosnia and Herzegovina despite the entreaties of the states of
Serbia and Montenegro and despite the lively sympathy of the
Russians with their South Slav (Jugoslav) brethren. In 191 1
Germany unsheathed the sword at Agadir, and put it up again
only on condition of receiving a hundred thousand square miles
of French colonial dominion in equatorial Africa. In 191 2 and
1913, during the Balkan Wars, Germany proved herself a bril-
liant second to Austria-Hungary in preventing Serbian egress to
the Adriatic, in driving the Montenegrins out of the town of
Scutari which they had captured from the Turks, in erecting the
petty principahty of Albania, and otherwise in strengthening the
Austro- German strangle-hold on Turkey and the Balkans. From
1895 to 1914 Germany pursued without cessation the policy of
employing force and threats and bluff in order to win economic
advantages and political prestige. *'It is only by relying on our
good German sword," wrote Crown Prince Frederick William in
1 913, ''that we can hope to conquer that place in the sun which
rightly belongs to us, and which no one will yield to us volun-
tarily. . . . Till the world comes to an end, the ultimate deci-
sion must rest with the sword."
Militarism has been most frequently excused on the ground
that it guarantees order and security. Paradoxical as it may
seem, German militarism from 1895 to 1914 produced no such
happy results. Not only was there a renewed epidemic of wars
and rumors of war between states but there was the most as-
tounding lack of a sense of security in Germany. The more
THE GREAT WAR COMES 13
Germany affronted Russia, France, and Great Britain, the higher
rolled the wave of fear, even of panic, within Germany. Patri-
otic mihtaristic societies came into being by the score, societies
like the Navy League, the Pan-German League, the Security
League, performing the twofold function of preparing the mind
for additional deeds of aggression and of instilHng in the same
popular mind the basest sort of fright and terror. Under the
auspices of these leagues what might be termed a ''psychology of
suggestion" was communicated gradually and skillfully to the
German masses. Russia was ''menacing," and as formerly there
had been a "Yellow Peril" so now there was a "Slavic Peril."
France was thirsting for "revenge," was "vengeful," but also the
French were "decadent." The English were insanely "jealous"
and Great Britain was "the vampire of the Continent." More-
over, when " menacing " Russia and "vengeful" France and "jeal-
ous" Britain tended to draw together, the German professors of
suggestive psychology began to exploit the word "encirclement"
and to expatiate upon the ring of dangerous, greedy neighbors by
which the Fatherland and child Austria were surrounded. As
the ring best known to the German mind was of iron, this foreign
"encirclement" was naturally termed the "iron ring."
One step further went the terrifying phrase-makers of Ger-
many. Now that they had made up their own minds and had
gone far toward fashioning the conviction of the bulk of their
fellow-countrymen that sooner or later Germany and Austria-
Hungary would be crushed to death by the inevitable pressure
of the encircling "iron ring," they began to suggest and then to
preach the necessity of a speedy open attack before the iron ring
should become so strong as to be irresistible. Such an attack upon
nominally peaceful neighbors could not be construed as "defensive
war." Yet from the German standpoint it would not be "ofifen-
sive war." The psychologists escaped from the dilemma by urging
the plausible slogan of "preventive war." And to the problem
of finding the most favorable opportunity for inaugurating the
"preventive war," German mihtarists and German patriots turned
their attention. In 1914 Germany was ready, and her governing
class of Junkers and capitalists were willing, to precipitate war.
THE OCCASION: THE ASSASSINATION OF AN ARCHDUKE
On June 28, 19 14, the Archduke Francis Ferdinand, nephew
of the aged Emperor- King Francis Joseph and heir to the Habs-
burg crowns, was assassinated, together with his wife, in the
k
14 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
streets of the Bosnian city of Serajevo by youthful Serb conspir-
ators. The outrage caused an instantaneous outburst of in-
dignation throughout Austria-Hungary and Germany. For on
Francis Ferdinand many hopes had been pinned. His piety had
made him a favorite with Catholics ; his loyalty to the German
alliance augured well for the future maintenance of the interna-
tional soHdarity of the two great Teutonic Powers ; his vigorous
patriotism and his conscientious fulfillment of administrative
duties were harbingers of the continued integrity and stability
of the Dual Monarchy after the demise of Francis Joseph. More-
over, Francis Ferdinand was supposed to favor a special poHcy
on. the part of Austria-Hungary toward the Slavs of Southern
Europe : to him was attributed the leadership in a scheme to
transform the Dual Monarchy into a Triple Monarchy, in
which the Serbs of Bosnia and the Serbo-Croats of Croatia-
Slavonia and probably the Slovenes would constitute an au-
tonomous entity resembling Austria and Hungary ; and to him,
therefore, was imputed by patriotic Serbians and Montenegrins
the inspiration of the hostile attitude which Austria-Hungary,
with Germany's powerful backing, had taken, especially since
1908, toward the territorial expansion of the two independent
Serb kingdoms.
Certainly the Serbs disliked Francis Ferdinand immensely and
certainly from 1908 to 1914 they organized secret societies in
Bosnia as well as in Serbia and Montenegro and conducted a de-
liberate propaganda with the more or less avowed object of wholly
detaching the South Slav peoples from the Habsburg Empire.
Naturally, then, when the official Austrian investigation into the
archduke's assassination indicated that the plot had been exe-
cuted by Bosnian youths animated by the revolutionary secret
societies of the Serbs and with the connivance of at least two offi-
cials of the kingdom of Serbia, the indignation of both Germans
and Magyars was aroused. The government of Austria-Hungary
solemnly affirmed that the very existence of the Dual Monarchy
depended upon putting an end once for all to Serbian machina-
tions, and with practical unanimity the responsible press of Ger-
many declared that Austria-Hungary's welfare was Germany's
welfare. But by the same token and with equal unanimity the
press of Russia declared that Serbia's welfare was Russia's wel-
fare. A new crisis, and a most serious one, had arisen in the
Balkans.
One week after the Serajevo assassination, a conference of
German and Austrian dignitaries was held at Potsdam. Pre-
i
THE GREAT WAR COMES 15
cisely what was there discussed and determined upon we do not
know. There is little doubt, however, that the Austro-Hun-
garian government received carte blanche to use the archduke's
murder as the pretext for dealing drastically with the one obstrep-
erous Balkan state which had been thwarting the full realization
of Teutonic poUtical and economic aims in southeastern Europe.
As recently as August, 1913, Austria had formally invited Italy
to cooperate with her in crushing Serbia. At that time no good
excuse existed for such a use of force and Italy had declined the
invitation, but now the occasion was propitious and the ruling
classes in Germany were favorably disposed.^ Perhaps the Ger-
man dignitaries, mindful of the success of their former military
threats in 1 908-1 909 and in 191 2-1 913, entertained the idea that
if Germany were now again to stand ''in shining armor" beside
her ally, Russia would once more back down and leave Serbia to
the tender mercy of Austria-Hungary. It would be Germany's
role by threats and intimidation to keep the Balkan conflict ''lo-
cahzed." Assuredly the German dignitaries must have foreseen
the possibiHty of Russia's not backing down and of the resulting
precipitation of a general and truly Great War. But such a war,
precipitated by Austria's act and Germany's threat, might be
the heralded ''preventive war," through which Germany would
break the "iron ring" of her jealous and greedy neighbors and
assume in the wide world a position to which her might and her
Kultur destined her. It was a pecuHarly opportune moment for
provoking the ''preventive war," for at that very moment each
one of the Entente Powers was embarrassed by domestic diffi-
culties ^ Russia by a serious and violent strike of workingmen
in Petrograd, France by an alarming popular opposition to the
new three-year mihtary law and by a scandalous murder trial of
political importance at Paris, and Great Britain by the menace
of civil war in Ireland. It was time to cast the die, and whether
strained peace or vast war would eventuate was a minor consider-
ation to the Imperial German Government. If Russia simply
blustered, Germany would gain her point; if Russia fought,
Germany would succeed even better. It would be another in-
stance of "heads, you lose; tails, I win."
Such at any rate is the burden of the testimony of a conspicu-
ous German diplomatist, Prince Lichnowsky, the Kaiser's am-
bassador at London during those decisive days. In a private
^ Italy, though an ally of Austria-Hungary and Germany, was not represented
at the Potsdam Conference and was not privy to the Teutonic plot of 1914. Italy's
refusal to cooperate with Austria-Hungary in 1913 probably made the latter quite
wary of her in 1914.
i6 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
memorandum prepared in 191 6 and indiscreetly published in
March, 1918, Prince Lichnowsky gives the most damning lie to
the official contention of his government that it had had no prior
knowledge of Austria's plans against Serbia and that it had been
most anxious to preserve peace and thereto had counseled moder-
ation at Vienna. Referring to the Potsdam conference of July 5,
19 14, he affirms that " an inquiry addressed to us by Vienna found
positive assent among all personages in authority. Indeed, they
added that there would be no harm if war with Russia were to
result." Prince Lichnowsky, who from personal acquaintance
with the members of the British government had come to believe
impHcitly in the pacific purposes and poKcy of Great Britain, was
greatly perturbed by what he deemed the mistaken pohcy of his
own government in backing Austria-Hungary's selfish Balkan
poUcy, and he accordingly besought Herr von Jagow, the German
foreign secretary, to recommend moderation to the Austrians.
''Herr von Jagow answered me that Russia was not ready, that
there doubtless would be a certain amount of bluster, but the
more firmly we stood by Austria the more would Russia draw
back. He said Austria already was accusing us of want of spirit
and we must not squeeze her ; and that, on the other hand, feel-
ing in Russia was becoming more an ti- German and so we must
simply risk it." If any confirmation of this point of Prince Lich-
nowsky 's memorandum is required, it is provided by the reve-
lations of Dr. Miihlon, an ex-director of the Krupps, who learned
from high German officials in the middle of July, 19 14, that the
Kaiser was fully cognizant of the Austrian purpose and that it
was not the intention of the German government to maintain
peace.
Provided, as we now know, with secret assurances of Germany's
unqualified support, Austria-Hungary presented to Serbia, on
July 23, 1 914, an ultimatum couched in the most peremptory
terms ; it breathed a ruthless determination to crush all Pan-
Serb plotting regardless of international usage or of constitutional
formalities. The ultimatum alleged that, by failing to suppress
an ti- Austrian conspiracies, Serbia had violated her promise of
1909 to ''live on good neighborly terms" with Austria-Hungary,
and had compelled the government of the Dual Monarchy to
abandon its attitude of benevolent and patient forbearance, to
put an end "to the intrigues which form a perpetual menace to
the tranquilHty of the Monarchy," and to demand effective guar-
antees from the Serbian government. As definite guarantees of
good behavior Serbia was called upon to suppress anti- Austrian
THE GREAT WAR COMES 17
publications and societies, to discharge such governmental em-
ployees as the Austro-Hungarian government should accuse of
anti-Austrian propaganda, to exclude anti-Austrian teachers and
textbooks from the Serbian schools, *'to accept the collaboration
in Serbia of representatives of the Austro-Hungarian government
for the suppression of the subversive movement directed against
the territorial integrity of the Monarchy," and to signify uncon-
ditional acceptance of these and the other Austro-Hungarian de-
mands within forty-eight hours.
Thenceforth events marched fast. Russia, France, and Great
Britain at once endeavored to obtain from Austria an extension
of the time-limit of the ultimatum in order that the whole ques-
tion might be submitted to general international negotiation, but
to international anarchy rather than to international cooperation
Austria-Hungary was committed and she sharply declined the
request. On July 25, Serbia replied to the ultimatum, promising
to comply with such demands as did not seem to impair her inde-
pendence and sovereignty and offering to refer all disputed points
to the Hague Tribunal or to a conference of the Great Powers.
The Austrian government pronounced the reply evasive and un-
satisfactory, broke off diplomatic relations with Serbia, and
started the mobilization of her army. The Serbians removed
their capital from Belgrade to Nish and began a counter-mobili-
zation. War was clearly impending between Austria-Hungary
and Serbia.
But a much vaster and more terrible war was impending. To
the Russian view it was obvious that Austria-Hungary was plan-
ning to deprive Serbia of independence and to annihilate Russian
influence in southeastern Europe. On the other hand the Ger-
man government insisted that the quarrel was one which con-
cerned Austria-Hungary and Serbia alone : it consistently and
pertinaciously opposed the repeated efforts of Russian, British,
French, and even Italian, diplomatists to refer the quarrel to an
international congress or to the Hague Tribunal. Unequivocally
Germany declared that if Russia should come to the assistance
of Serbia, she would support Austria-Hungary with all the armed
forces at her command. The last resort of an anarchic world
was in a test of physical strength, and the most powerful of all
the Great Powers, thoroughly possessed of the demon of milita-
rism, was deaf to all suggestions of negotiation and compromise
and by threats and imprecations was pushing the whole civilized
world to that ultimate anarchic test.
On July 28, 1914, — exactly one month after the archduke's
i8 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
assassination, — Austria-Hungary formally declared war against
Serbia. On the next day the Russian government decreed the
mobilization of its army. On August i, the frantic endeavors of
various diplomatists to arrive at some peaceful solution of the
Serbian problem were rudely arrested by the outbreak of war
between Germany and Russia. Germany had presented a twelve-
hour ultimatum to Russia, demanding immediate and complete
demobilization ; Russia had refused to comply ; and Germany
had declared war.
The German government knew that war with Russia was hkely
to involve France. France was the sworn ally of Russia. There
was popular feeling in France that common cause must be made
with Russia if France were to preserve her own prestige and re-
cover Alsace-Lorraine. Accordingly, on the very day of deliver-
ing the ultimatum to Russia, the German government demanded
to know within eighteen hours what would be the attitude of
France ; if the French government should repudiate its alliance
with Russia and promise to observe neutrahty, the German am-
bassador at Paris was instructed to demand that the powerful
French fortress of Toul and Verdun be handed over to Germany
for the duration of the war. Apparently the German government
was resolved thoroughly to humiliate, if not to crush, France.
The French government, however, gave a non-committal answer
to the German ultimatum, and began mobilization. On August 3
Germany declared war against France.
Thus, within a week of the declaration of hostilities by Austria-
Hungary against Serbia, four Great Powers were in a state of war
— Germany and Austria-Hungary against Russia and France.
The attitude of the other two Great Powers of Europe — Great
Britain and Italy — did not long remain in doubt. Italy promptly
proclaimed her neutrality, on the ground that the war waged by
her allies was not defensive, but offensive, and that therefore she
was riot bound to give assistance to them. Great Britain, how-
ever, appeared more hesitant. The English people certainly
had sympathy for France and little love for Germany, and the
British government, though liberal and pacifistic, had already in-
formed Germany that, while their country was not formally en-
gaged to help France or Russia, they could not promise in case
of war to observe neutrality. By August 2, the British govern-
ment had gone further and had announced that they would not
tolerate German naval attacks on the unprotected western coast
of France. And on the next day occurred an event which decided
Great Britain to enter the war on the side of Russia and France.
THE GREAT WAR COMES 19
On August 2, — twenty-four hours before the formal declara-
tion of war by Germany against France, — German troops were
set in motion toward the French frontier, not directly against the
strong French border fortresses of Verdun, Toul, and Belfort, but
toward the neutral countries of Luxemburg and Belgium, which
lay between Germany and less well-defended districts of northern
France. Both Germany and France had signed treaties to respect
the neutrality of these '^buffer states," and France had already
announced her intention of adhering loyally to her treaty en-
gagements. But on August 2 German troops occupied Luxem-
burg in spite of protests from the grand-duchess of the little state ;
and on the same day the German government presented an ulti-
matum to Belgium demanding within twelve hours the grant of
permission to move German troops across that country into
France, promising, if permission were accorded, to guarantee
Belgian independence and integrity and to pay an indemnity, and
threatening that, if any resistance should be encountered, Ger-
many would treat Belgium as an enemy and that "the decision
of arms" would determine the subsequent relations between the
two Powers. The Belgian government characterized the ulti-
matum as a gross violation of international law and not only
refused categorically to grant Germany's request but appealed at
once to Great Britain for aid in upholding the neutrality of Bel-
gium.
The neutrality of Belgium had long been a cardinal point in
the foreign policy of Great Britain. The British had fought
against Napoleon I in part because of the annexation of Belgium
by France, and they had opposed the threatened aggression of
Napoleon III against the little kingdom ; they were not likely to
view with favor German attacks upon Belgium or its possible in-
corporation into the German Empire. On August 4, therefore,
when news was received in London that German troops had ac-
tually crossed the border into Belgium, Sir Edward Grey, the
British foreign secretary, dispatched an ultimatum to Germany,
requiring assurance by midnight that Germany would respect
Belgian neutrality. Germany refused, on the ground of "mili-
tary necessity," and Bethmann-Hollweg, the German chancellor,
with evidence of anger and disappointment, rebuked Great
Britain for making war for "a scrap of paper." The next day,
Mr. Asquith, the British prime minister, announced that a state
of war existed between Great Britain and Germany.
On August 6, Austria-Hungary declared war on Russia. On
the following day little Montenegro joined her fellow-Serb state
20 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
of Serbia against Austria-Hungary. On August 9, a state of
war was proclaimed between Montenegro and Serbia, on one
hand, and Germany, on the other ; on August 13, between France
and Great Britain, on one hand, and Austria-Hungary, on the
other. This completed the first alignment of the European
Powers in the Great War: Germany and Austria-Hungary, on
the one side, against Russia, France, Great Britain, Serbia, Mon-
tenegro, and Belgium, on the other. It was speedily evident that
the opposing combinations were fairly evenly matched in re-
sources, in prowess, and in determination, and that the war would
be not only terribly expensive but horribly destructive and long
drawn out. There was no sign that either Germany or Austria-
Hungary would consent to make peace separately ; and on the
other side. Great Britain, France, and Russia mutually engaged
by the Pact of London, of September, 1914, not to conclude peace
separately nor to demand terms of peace without the previous
agreement of each of the others.
CHAPTER II
GERMANY CONQUERS BELGIUM AND INVADES FRANCE
MOBILIZATION AND STRATEGY
In precipitating the Great War, the German militarists had
dictated to the governments and the diplomatists; in waging
it, they dictated to the nations. No European people was
advised of the actual situation until war had been declared, and
every popular demonstration against war was inexorably sup-
pressed. At Berhn meetings of Social Democrats and pacifistic
radicals were broken up, and as soon as war was proclaimed a
most rigorous censorship of the press was enforced. So skillful
were the German Government's pleas ''that the sword had
been thrust into its hands," so densely ignorant of the real
facts were the bulk of the German people, so patriotic were they
all, that there was a pathetically general and speedy acquiescence
in the decision of the militarists. With the formal order for
mobilization, issued in Germany on August i, 1914, crowds
surged through the streets of Berlin cheering and singing patriotic
songs. The war found the German nation superbly confident
and tremendously loyal. On August 4 the Reichstag unani-
mously passed all the necessary war bills and authorized extraor-
dinary war credits. This time the Social Democrats joined
with the other parties in applauding the Kaiser.
If an aggressive Power could so instantly command the
enthusiastic support of all its citizens, it is not surprising that
the peoples obviously attacked should rally immediately and
whole-heartedly to the military aid of their governments. This
was what happened in Serbia, Russia, Belgium, and France.
Even in Great Britain, though the resignation of three members
of the cabinet on the eve of hostilities indicated opposition to
entering the struggle, the appointment of Lord Kitchener as
secretary of war and the popularjfavor accompanying it subse-
quently signalized the triumph of the war-spirit. From German
sources emanated reports that a serious pacifist and Laborite
resistance was being encountered by the British government;
22 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
on the contrary, a statement issued by representatives of all
sections of the labor movement in October, 19 14, pledged the
loyal support of the British working classes for the war against
German militarism, since the victory of the German army
" would mean the death of democracy in Europe." All the
independent peoples of Europe were loyal to their several Govern-
ments. Truly the Great War was to be a War of the Nations.
Before mihtary operations could be inaugurated on a large
scale in any theater of the war, the millions of men composing
the *' citizen armies" of the various Continental belHgerents
had to be collected, equipped, and sent to the front, that is
*' mobilized." In time of peace each nation had troops scattered
in towns and camps all over the country. Take Germany for
example. Germany's standing, or ''peace," army was composed
of about 800,000 officers and men, organized in twenty-five army
corps. On a peace footing, an army corps numbered about
20,000. For war each army corps was raised to a strength of
about 43,000 men by the inclusion of ''active reserves," i.e.
men who had recently served and were still under twenty-eight
years of age. This gave Germany a field army of over 1,100,000
young trained men. Next, the Landwehr or second line, con-
sisting of trained men between twenty-eight and thirty-nine
years of age, was called up to reenforce the first fine. The
Landwehr numbered about 2,200,000. The third line or Land-
sturm included 600,000 trained men of middle age, who would
be called upon for special aid behind the front and for defense
against invasion. In addition Germany had at least 500,000
able-bodied men of military age who had been excused from
regular military service and could be used in case of war to replace
the wounded and killed. Thus there were mihtary forces in
Germany, already trained, amounting to 4,400,000, and of the
untrained enough more potential soldiers to bring up the grand
total to nearly seven million men. War, therefore, meant
military service for some member of almost every family.
The word of mobilization, flashed by telegraph to every corner
of the German Empire on August i, brought the active reserves
to the appointed mobilizing center of each army corps. Some
German corps were mobilized at frontier towns, such as Strass-
burg, Metz, Saarburg, and Coblenz. Others had to be trans-
ported by rail from the interior. The immensity of this move-
ment may be faintly appreciated when one considers that an
army corps required more than one hundred trains, each com-
posed of fifty-five cars, for its transportation. Guns, rations,
GERMANY CONQUERS BELGIUM 23
ammunition, artillery, clothing, hospital supplies, trucks, and
horses went with the troops. In many cases the rations and
horses had to be purchased from farmers at the beginning of
mobilization, and motor trucks and clothing from merchants.
The whole railway system was operated by miUtary authorities
on a special schedule calculated to bring the troops to the front
in the shortest possible time. The huge national army was a
perfect mechanism whose delicate adjustments might be thrown
into fatal confusion by the blunder of one stupid official or the
delay of one special train. Travelers who witnessed the Ger-
man armies concentrating on the French frontier afhrm that
the marvelous German mobilization progressed with the precision
of clockwork.
In France, in Austria-Hungary, and in Russia, mobilization
was slower and less perfect in its appointments. But most
reports confirm the impression that both the French and the
Russian armies were put in the field with greater celerity and
with far less confusion than could have been expected. Great
Britain, alone of the belHgerents, did not have the general com-
pulsory military service, but her small standing army of 250,000
men was already in a state of high efficiency and preparedness ;
a hundred thousand volunteers appeared in a day or two ; another
army of half a million was recruited with little difficulty ; and
it was estimated that Britain, with her colonies and dependencies,
could within three years send four million men to the theater
of war.
No less perfect than the organization and movement of the
enormous armies was the equipment with which they fought.
The Great War was to be a war of machines, waged with the
help of every deadly device science could invent. A feature
of the conflict in the Franco-Belgian theater was the new Krupp
ii-inch howitzer,^ weighing about seven tons, hauled by power-
ful motors, and capable of throwing an ii-inch shell at any
object within a radius of five miles. But the surpassing achieve-
ment of the Krupp gun-factory at Essen in the early stage of
the war was the production of a 16-inch (42-centimeter) siege-
piece which could be transported by rail and readily emplaced
on a concrete foundation. From this mortar, discharged by
electricity, a shell one meter in length, weighing almost a ton,
and filled with high explosives, could be hurled some fifteen miles.
^ A "gun" throws its projectile in almost a straight line; a "howitzer" dis-
charges its shell at an angle of elevation varying from fifteen to forty-five degrees ;
a "mortar" is fired at a still greater angle of elevation, the object being to drop a
shell on the top of a fortification or behind the earthworks of the enemy.
24 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
In the field much smaller guns were ordinarily used. The
German army employed a three-inch gun capable of throwing
twenty 15-pound shells a minute at an enemy three miles away.
The French field gun (the famous "75") was of slightly smaller
bore than the German, but of greater power and weight. Ma-
chine guns were used on both sides with telHng effect. A ma-
chine gun is light enough to be packed on the back of a horse
or drawn on a Hght carriage ; it fires from five hundred to seven
hundred shots a minute. The regular arm of the infantry was,
of course, the rifle, tipped with the bayonet for hand-to-hand
encounters ; of the various makes, the German Mauser possessed
the greatest muzzle velocity, although the French Lebel had a
longer effective range.
Airplanes, whose value in warfare had long been discussed,
now rendered priceless service, not only for general reconnaissance
but also in locating the hostile force so that the artillery officers
could instruct their gunners at what angle to fire at the unseen
enemy. Even more important than the airplane was the automo-
bile. Motor cars incased in steel and armed with rapid-fire
guns accompanied the German cavalry on its swift advance.
Speedy automobiles and motorcycles were invaluable for com-
munication where telephone, telegraph, or airplane was not
available. Enormous motor trucks, often provided with mon-
ster searchlights, were ceaselessly employed in conveying incal-
culable quantities of foodstuffs.
The Great War originated as a struggle on the part of Austria-
Hungary and Germany against the *' Slavic Peril," against the
great Slav empire of Russia and the small Slav kingdoms of
Serbia and Montenegro. But from the very beginning of hos-
tilities, Teutonic defense against Russia was of minor interest
as compared with the attack on Belgium and France. The reason
was quite simple. The German General Staff had planned to
hurl the bulk of the German army first against France and then,
having crushed France, to transfer it to the east to turn back
the tide of Russia's slow-mobiKzing multitudes. For Russia,
with all her 180 millions of inhabitants in Europe and in Asia,
was spread over so vast an area and was so deficient in railways
that ten of her thirty-six army corps could not arrive on the scene
within two months, and the remaining twenty-six were not
expected to begin a serious attack within the first few weeks
of the war. Germany would leave a small force of her own to
cooperate with Austro-Hungarian armies in holding back the
GERMANY CONQUERS BELGIUM 25
Russian advance-guard, while with the rest she would overwhelm
France. The German armies in the west would sweep across
Belgium — with its network of convenient railways and smooth
highways — turning the flank of the strong line of French forti-
fications along the Franco- German frontier, and swoop down
upon Paris with irresistible might. The French army anni-
hilated, the German troops could be shifted from the west to
the east (it is less than 600 miles from Belgium to Russia, that
is, about the distance from New York to Cleveland), and reserves
could be brought up to defeat the oncoming Russians.
The French plan of defense had originally been based on the
assumption that the neutrality of Belgium and Luxemburg would
be respected. To appreciate the importance of the neutrality
of these "buffer" states, one needs only to observe that with
Belgium and Luxemburg neutral, approximately half of the
northern frontier of France was immune from attack. The
eastern half of that frontier, from Luxemburg to Switzerland,
was defended by the Vosges mountains and by a line of for-
tified towns from Verdun through Toul and Epinal to Belfort.
French mobilization, moreover, was directed so as to place
the main strength of the French army in the trenches and
forts along the Franco- German frontier proper, if not actually
to take the offensive in this region. If the Germans endeav-
ored to strike into France from Lorraine, they would encounter
the bulk of the French army intrenched along a strong line of
defense.
As events proved, the German military authorities had deter-
mined to deliver the chief attack not from Lorraine but from
Belgium and Luxemburg. By adopting this cojirse, Germany
brought 150,000 Belgians into the field as enemies and three
British army corps whom Lord Kitchener dispatched as an
Expeditionary Force to aid the French and Belgians. But the
immediate advantages to be gained were considered more im-
portant by the Germans than the addition of 300,000 soldiers
to the enemy's ranks. The Belgian forces were of the nature of
miHtia rather than of a perfect military machine ; and the small
British Expeditionary Force — all that un-military Great Britain
could at that time put in the field — was referred to by the
Kaiser as a ''contemptible little army." As yet the Germans
had formed no idea of the dogged determination and enormous
resources of the British, and they failed utterly to comprehend
the strength of the moral indignation with which the whole world
would view the violation of Belgium's neutrality. It was the
26 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
price they must pay for intrusting all decisions to the mihtarists
and for basing all actions on ''mihtary necessity."
Meanwhile the attack on France by way of Belgium appealed
irresistibly to the German mihtary mind. In the first place,
through Belgium and Luxemburg, German armies would have
two natural routes leading into the heart of France. The
northern route, leading from the German military bases at
Cologne and Aix-la-Chapelle through Liege, Namur, and Mau-
beuge, was that of the main railway between Berlin and Paris ;
the network of roads and railways in Belgium and northern
France would facilitate the transportation of troops and sup-
plies, and the comparatively level country would admit of the
extensive use of the famous Krupp howitzers. The other route
followed the Moselle valley from the German base of Coblenz
on the Rhine through Trier up to Luxemburg and thence entered
France at Longwy and passed south to Verdun.
In the second place, the French did not possess such formidable
defenses along the frontier opposite Belgium and Luxemburg
as those opposite Lorraine and Alsace : Dunkirk,^ Lille, and
Maubeuge could not compare with Verdun, Toul, Epinal, and
Belfort. In the third place, the use of routes through the
'' buffer" states would enable the German General Staff to put
its entire effective forces immediately in the field and to use
them in decisive flanking movements rather than in protracted
frontal attacks. Finally, and perhaps this was the most impor-
tant consideration, a swift incursion of German armies by way
of Belgium and Luxemburg would compel the French army to
change the front of its mobilization from the Lorraine frontier
to the Belgian ; and in attempting to re-form its lines the French
army might conceivably be thrown into such confusion and
disorder that a gigantic victory — a Sedan on a colossal scale —
might be won by the Germans. This was the supreme purpose
of German strategy, to demoralize and break up the French
field army. Paris could be taken later.
The nineteen army corps which Germany had immediately
available for the invasion of France were grouped in seven
great armies; three were detailed to cut a swath through cen-
tral Belgium, past Maubeuge, and down the Oise; two were
sent through Luxemburg and southeastern Belgium (Belgian
Luxemburg) ; and two were stationed in Alsace-Lorraine. The
seven main armies were: (i) General von Kluck's army, north
of the Meuse; (2) General von Billow's, south of the Meuse;
(3) General von Hansen's, directed against Givet; (4) Duke
^^^r-
4 " Longitude
GERMANY CONQUERS BELGIUM 27
Albert of Wiirttemberg's, directed against southeastern Belgium ;
(5) the Prussian Crown Prince's, occupying Luxemburg; (6)
the Bavarian Crown Prince's, based on Metz ; (7) General von
Heeringen's, based on Strassburg. It seemed a happy omen
that over all these armies the supreme German commander,
the chief of the General Staff, was Helmuth von Moltke, a nephew
of that illustrious Moltke who had overwhelmed France in 1870.
A detachment of the first army was intrusted to General von
Emmich for the immediate task of seizing Liege.
THE CONQUEST OF BELGIUM
From the German frontier, opposite Aix-la-Chapelle, to the
gap of the Gise, on the Franco-Belgian frontier, it would be six
days' march for an unresisted German army. But the Belgians
were unanimously and heroically determined to resist Germany's
outrageous violation of their country's neutrality. In the face
of national disaster, and in an unparalleled outburst of national
patriotism, even the most fundamental party differences and
social distinctions were swept aside. ''Irreconcilable" Socialists
sprang to the support of their plucky King; and the SociaHst
leader, Emile Vandervelde, entered the Catholic cabinet on
August 4. Belgium had nothing to gain from the war ; she was
resolved that it should not take from her the most priceless
treasure of her plighted word and national honor.
Situated just across the Belgian frontier and directly in the
path of the German advance from Cologne up the valley of the
Meuse was the strongly fortified city of Liege. Against Liege
the detachment of General von Emmich struck on August 4.
So anxious were the German military authorities not to lose time,
that Emmich recklessly sacrificed his men in futile attempts
to carry the city by assault. Compact masses of German sol-
diery were hurled against the Belgian forts, only to be mowed
down by murderous artillery fire or annihilated by exploding
mines. Assault failing, Emmich brought up giant 42-centi-
meter howitzers which speedily demolished some of the forts
encircling the city and enabled the Germans to enter the town
on August 7. It was not until eight days later, however, that
the last of the encircling forts was silenced.
After the fall of Liege, the German cavalry swept over the
neighboring country and the German armies penetrated Bel-
gium. Constant skirmishing marked the retirement of the main
Belgian force to its principal line of defense at Louvain. There,
k
28 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
on August 19, the Belgian army made its last important stand
against overwhelming odds, was defeated, and the greater part
of it was driven back in a northwesterly direction on Malines
and Antwerp. General von Kluck, after dispatching a force
to press the retreat of the Belgians northward, entered Brussels
on August 20, and then, with the principal part of his army,
swung southward in the direction of Mons and Maubeuge.
Meanwhile, the armies of General von Hansen and Duke Albert
of Wiirttemberg were striking into the hilly country of the Ar-
dennes in southeastern Belgium; and between the forces of
Kluck and Hansen, General von Blilow was pursuing a small
Belgian detachment up the Meuse to the fortress of Namur.
On August 22 Namur succumbed to Bulow's siege howitzers,
and the way was at length cleared for a German invasion of
France. Belgian resistance had meant that the German march
across Belgium had taken eighteen days instead of six and that
both the French and the British had been given a longer respite
in which to prepare their defense.
The French were unable to come to the immediate assistance
of the Belgians, because their mobihzation, as the enemy an-
ticipated, was proceeding along the Franco- German frontier
proper, and General Jofifre, the French commander-in-chief,
was unwilling to risk too sudden a disarrangement of his plans.
As some relief to the hard-pressed Belgians, however, General
Jofifre ordered a counter-ofifensive against Alsace-Lorraine.
In the extreme south, an army stepped over into Alsace at Alt-
kirch, carried the German trenches there on August 7, and on
the next day occupied the city of Miilhausen. Driven out,
the French reentered Miilhausen on August 19. General Paul
Pau was in actual charge of this invasion of Alsace and was
hailed as a liberator by a large part of the population, which
had never ceased to long for reunion with France, although
more than a generation had passed since Alsace-Lorraine was
appropriated by German conquerors. General Pau's forces
penetrated as far north as Colmar.
Simultaneously other troops mastered the difficult passes of
the Vosges mountains and descended from the west into the
Alsatian valleys. Further north, General Castelnau with five
army corps invaded Lorraine, and took Saarburg on August
18. But here the French advance was halted. With slower
mobilization, Joffre was unable to reenforce the army corps in
Alsace-Lorraine and at the same time to take needful measures
of precaution against the rapidly growing German menace from
GERMANY CONQUERS BELGIUM 29
Belgium and Luxemburg. French armies had to be moved up
to face the Duke of Wiirttemberg and the Prussian Crown Prince
in the region of the forest of the Ardennes in southeastern Bel-
gium. Another French army, under General Lanrezac, had to
be dispatched to the Belgian border, for the two or three British
corps which had been hurried to France and which by August
21 had managed to take up a defensive position north of Mau-
beuge on a line from Conde in France to Mons in Belgium,
were far too few to make a decisive stand against the German
hordes ; General Lanrezac took position, on the British right
flank, in the angle formed between the Sambre and Meuse rivers
south of Namur.
In the four days, August 20-23, the advanced* Franco-British
lines made an unsuccessful attempt to stay the German conquest
of Belgium, and the French counter-offensive in Alsace-Lorraine
definitely failed. In Lorraine, General Castelnau's invading
army was attacked from three sides at once by General von
Heeringen, the Bavarian Crown Prince, and garrison forces
from Metz. For the first time under fire, one French corps
suddenly gave way, and Castelnau was able to extricate his
defeated army only with the greatest difficulty. He now took
the defensive before Nancy. In southern Alsace, the French
invaders were compelled to retreat as rapidly as they had ad-
vanced and to abandon nearly all the ground they had won.
The French counter-offensive had been politically advantageous
in that it had strengthened French morale and had stirred up
all France to seek the reconquest of the ''lost provinces," but
from a strictly miHtary standpoint it had been unsuccessful if
not disastrous.
There remained the principal business of giving aid to the hard-
pressed Belgians and of checking the flood of German invasion
before it had rolled quite to the French frontier. On August
20, with the arrival of the British Expeditionary Force under
Field Marshal Sir John French and with the posting of a French
army south of Namur and of two other French armies in the
Ardennes, General Joffre gave orders for an offensive.
On the next two days the French offensive in southeastern
Belgium broke down completely. ''There were imprudences
committed under German fire, divisions ill-engaged, rash deploy-
ments, a premature waste of men, and a notable incompetence
of certain French troops and their commanders." ^ The French
were soon in precipitate retreat from the Ardennes toward Sedan,
^ From the French official report.
30 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Montmedy, and Longwy, across the border. To the west, the
Allies still had a chance of success if General Lanrezac's army
and the British could obtain a decisive result.
This was unfortunately not the case. General Lanrezac's
right flank was too exposed as a result of the French retirement
from the Ardennes, and by the fall of Namur on August 22 he
was exposed to the powerful blows of Billow's army. After a
savage struggle at Charleroi on August 22-23, he retired up the
Meuse to the French border towns of Givet and Maubeuge.
Now the British army was endangered : it lacked support on
its right, and in front and on the left appeared four German
army corps. Obviously General von Kluck intended to over-
whelm the two British corps and turn the flank of the allied
line. UnwilHng to be either outflanked or overwhelmed, General
French abandoned his precarious position after a hot contest
at Mons, August 23-24, and conducted a hasty retreat — an
orderly flight, one might say — back into France. Trenches
had been prepared at the line Cambrai-Le Cateau-Landrecies ;
but the continued pressure of Kluck's superior numbers forced
the British to continue their flight. In six days' retreat, hotly
pursued by Kluck's cavalry and armored motor cars, strugghng
desperately to prevent its artillery and supplies from falling
into the enemy's hands, the little British army lost 230 officers
and 13,413 men.
Most of Belgium was conquered by the Germans and the route
to France was now cleared.
THE INVASION OF FRANCE
The sensational retreat of Sir John French from Belgium
far back into France should be regarded as but one detail of the
general strategic retreat ordered by General Joffre after the
French defeats of August 20-23. The fate of the whole French
army depended upon avoiding a decisive battle until the French
forces could be concentrated upon an advantageous battle-Hne
and could confront the Germans with equal or superior numbers.
It would have been folly to rush troops northward to sure defeat.
General Joffre, therefore, ordered a strategic retreat southward.
Into France poured the German armies. Occasionally they
were obstructed for a few hours by a fortress-garrison or by the
allies' turning at bay in order to save the retreat from becoming
a rout. Past the border towns of Lille, Valenciennes, Maubeuge,
Mezieres, Montmedy, and Longwy swept the German forces
GERMANY CONQUERS BELGIUM 31
down over northern France. By September 2 the invasion had
progressed far. General von Kluck's army had passed Com-
piegne; General von Bulow had reached Laon; General von
Hausen had crossed the Aisne near Attigny ; the duke of Wiirt-
temberg and the Prussian Crown Prince had advanced to the
upper Aisne and taken positions between Vouziers and Verdun ;
to the east, the sixth and seventh^ German armies faced the
French fortresses of Verdun, Toul, Epinal, and Belfort.
Hastily the French government-ofhces were removed from
Paris to Bordeaux ; General Gallieni began to prepare the metrop-
olis for siege ; and as General von Kluck, on the extreme German
right, swiftly pursued the British and a newly organized French
army southward, until the din of battle could be heard by the
Parisians, the prediction seemed about to be verified that the
Germans would be in Paris six weeks after the declaration of
war. By September 5, though the eastern fortresses of France
were still holding, the Germans were threatening them from the
rear and were already in possession of St. Menehould, Chalons,
and Esternay.
After their long and exhausting retreat the French armies
stood with their left resting on Paris, their right holding Verdun,
and their center sagging south of the Marne. In reahty Verdun
was a central salient extending far into the German Hnes rather
than the extreme right of the French Hnes, for in the east French
and German armies faced each other from Verdun to the Swiss
border in a line almost at right angles with the Paris-Verdun
line. The French armies had now reached the ultimate points
of retreat ; for the first time they and the British army were
in touch with one another all along the line ; and on September
5 General Joffre issued his famous order for commencing the
battle of the Marne. *'The hour has come," he wrote, ''to
advance at all costs, and to die where you stand rather than
give way."
On the eve of the battle of the Marne, the German General
Staff was preparing to deliver a crushing blow against the French
armies. On the extreme right of the German line. General
Kluck had suddenly swerved from north of Paris toward the
southeast and was marching on Meaux and Coulommiers. Ob-
viously it was planned for him to cooperate with Generals Biilow
and Hausen in concentrating the force of a gigantic and decisive
blow against the center of the Paris- Verdun allied line, between
Sezanne and Vitry-le-Frangois. If the Germans could break
through the center, the French armies would be separated ; those
32 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
in the west might be driven into Paris and obliged in time to
surrender, while those in the east would be ground to pieces on
the Verdun-Belfort Kne of fortresses between the armies of the
Prussian Crown Prince, and the Bavarian Crown Prince, and
General von Heeringen.
The French center stood firm against the German onset,
however, and the battle of the Marne, September 6-12, marked
the culmination and the decline of the German invasion. As a
matter of fact, the ''battle of the Marne" is merely a conven-
tional name to designate a whole series of desperate battles
that were waged almost simultaneously along the entire Kne from
Paris to Belfort. On the extreme west of the line a brilliant
manoeuver of the allies led to a serious German reverse. Here
a newly organized French army under General Maunoury,
moving out eastward from Paris, fell upon the right of Kluck's
exposed forces. Turning west to confront these new assailants,
Kluck was attacked from the south by Sir John French's British
army and from the southeast by a French army under General
Franchet d'Esperey. By dint of desperate fighting he escaped
from the jaws of the Anglo-French trap and gradually shifted
his army northwards to shake off the French forces which clung
to his right flank. The harder Kluck was pressed, the fiercer
were the attacks which the Germans directed at the French
center, particularly in the neighborhood of Sezanne and Fere-
Champenoise. Here was the most critical position, and here
was the most furious fighting. That the French were able
at this crucial point not only to hold their own but to force the
Germans back was due to the heroism and elan of the common
soldiers and to the remarkable military genius of their com-
manding officer. General Ferdinand Foch. Foch's brilliant
qualities were supremely tested at Fere-Champenoise. With-
out his army and his generalship, the battle of the Marne might
have been a signal disaster to France.
Even the alHed manoeuver against -Kluck and the success of
Foch might not have availed the French in the extended battle
of the Marne if the Germans had been able in the east to turn
the Hne of French fortresses extending from Verdun to Belfort.
The Germans did their best to turn this Hne. While the armies
of the Bavarian Crown Prince and General von Heeringen en-
deavored to batter the fortifications from the direction of Lor-
raine and Alsace, the Prussian Crown Prince was struggling to
penetrate south through the region of the Argonne, between
Verdun and the rest of France, and thereby to complete, from
GERMANY CONQUERS BELGIUM 33
the west, the surrounding of the fortified line. The fate that
had already overtaken Liege, Namur, and the fortresses of
northern France made the French properly apprehensive of
trusting to the protection of forts against heavy German artillery.
The French understood that the defense of Verdun and the
other eastern fortresses would have to be undertaken in the field.
Thus it transpired that, at the very moment when at the west
Kluck was being forced back and in the center Foch was valiantly
gaining ground, French armies were fighting equally decisive
battles in the Argonne and before Nancy. In the Argonne,
General Sarrail finally stopped the advance of the Prussian
Crown Prince. Before Nancy, General Castelnau, with superb
tenacity, held his position against the superior numbers of the
easternmost German armies and even forced them back to the
Vosges mountains.
Against the solid wall of French resistance, German attacks
were everywhere unavailing. Everywhere the French advanced :
they recrossed the Marne ; they retook Chalons and Rheims ;
they were not halted until they had reached the Aisne and had
delivered the eastern fortresses from immediate danger.
Such was the seven days' battle of the Marne, in which more
than two millions of men were engaged. It was won by troops
who for two weeks had been retreating and who had to meet
practically the whole German army. In spite of the fatigue of
the allied forces, in spite of the German heavy artillery, the vic-
torious armies captured an enormous quantity of supplies and
thousands of prisoners. The battle of the Marne completely
upset the strategy of the German General Staff. It signified
that while France might be invaded, France was not to be
crushed and conquered^
When the French and British pushed north after the battle
of the Marne, they were halted abruptly on September 12 at
the Aisne. It was soon clear that the Germans were not simply
pausing in their retreat l^ut were occupying a battle-line of great
natural strength, prepared with trenches for infantry and with
concrete foundations for the big German guns. From the hiUs
of Noyon, just north of where the Aisne flows into the Oise,
the line followed the heights on the northern bank of the Aisne
as far as Berry-au-Bac and then, leaving the Aisne, it bent south-
ward almost to Rheims and extended across the forested ridge
of the Argonne to the region of Verdun. A French drive was
directed northward against Laon ; a German drive, southward
against Rheims. Both were checked. After an excessively
34
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
vigorous and destructive bombardment of Rheims on September
19-20, the battle along the Aisne practically came to a close,
although the opposing armies viewed each other fiercely from
their parallel lines of trenches.
While the armies in the center were coming to a deadlock,
events of great interest were transpiring on both wings. On
the east, the Prussian Crown Prince sent large forces to cut in
south of Verdun. The Germans had already reduced the fort
of Troyon, just south of Verdun, and had reached St. Mihiel,
a little further south on the Meuse, thus threatening to surround
Verdun, when the French reenforced their line at this point. St.
Mihiel continued, however, to be an additional outer defense for
Metz and a possible starting point for a strong German offensive.
In upper Alsace the French managed to cHng to the town of
Thann as a base for further operations in the *'lost provinces."
GERMANY CONQUERS BELGIUM 35
On the west of the long battle-Hne, the Germans and the
French engaged in a *'race to the sea." French troops were
hurried northward by way of Amiens in the hope of enveloping
the right wing of General von Kluck's army, and German troops
were hastily marched northward to frustrate the French flanking
movement. The net result was the extension of the battle-line,
almost at right angles with the Aisne sector, from Noyon to
Flanders and the Channel coast. The Germans possessed them-
selves of Cambrai, Douai, and Lille ; the French saved Amiens,
Arras, Ypres, and Dunkirk.
Since the last days of August the small Belgian army had
been annoying the Germans by occasionally sallying forth from
its positions at Malines and Antwerp. So long as these cities
remained in Belgian hands, they constituted potential points
of support for a large Franco-British expedition which might be
landed on the northern Belgian coast and thence harass the
rear of the German line. On September 27 the Germans bom-
barded and occupied Malines, and on the following day began
in earnest to attack the supposedly impregnable stronghold of
Antwerp. A small force of British and French bluejackets
was sent to the aid of the defenders, but too small to be of any
avail. The German artillery pounded the Belgian fortifications
to bits. During the night of October 8 the allied forces forsook
the doomed city, and on the following day the Germans entered
in triumph. The survivors of the heroic little Belgian army
were transferred to the extreme left flank of the allied line in
Flanders.
Had the Allies been able to retain Antwerp, they might con-
ceivably have stretched their long line in a northeasterly direc-
tion from Ypres past Ghent to the stronghold of Antwerp itself
and thereby have retained the whole Belgian coast and been
in a strategically favorable position from which to launch a
huge offensive against the Germans. The sorry loss of Antwerp
was due in part to mismanagement on the part of the British
authorities in London, and in greater part to the hard, cold
fact that the Allies were not prepared either in men or in equip-
ment for such an extension of their battle-Une as the retention
of Antwerp would involve. As it was, the Germans were enabled
not only to occupy Antwerp but also to appropriate Ghent,
Bruges, and the coast towns of Zeebrugge and Ostend.
German possession of coast towns would menace England
by providing bases for submarines and perhaps by cutting Eng-
land's communications with France. For these reasons the
36 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Germans desired to capture the French towns of Dunkirk,
Calais, and Boulogne, as well as the Belgian ports of Zeebrugge
and Ostend. Consequently, as soon as they had taken Ant-
werp, they massed three armies under the duke of Wilrttemberg,
the Bavarian Crown Prince, and General von Biilow, respec-
tively, for a drive towards the Straits of Dover. In the last
week of October, almost simultaneously, these armies furiously
assailed the Allied line along the Yser, at Ypres, at La Bassee,
and before Arras. The terrific battle of Flanders was on. At
first the brunt of the conflict was borne by the battered Bel-
gian army, which held Duke Albert of Wilrttemberg back of
the Yser until British warships could draw into range and open
fire with their heavy guns, forcing the Germans to desist. Further
inland, between Nieuport and Ypres, the German advance was
checked, after other means had failed, by the desperate expedient
of cutting the dikes and flooding the country. The town of
Dixmude, in this region, was finally won by the Germans.
Further south, the Bavarian Crown Prince managed after five
days' intense fighting to advance the few miles from La Bassee
to Neuve Chapelle, but no nearer the coast could he go. Still
further south General von Biilow drove hard against Arras,
but the French, under General Maud'huy, held their ground
most tenaciously. Near Ypres, however, the Germans delivered
their most savage and protracted assaults. The brave British
army, reenforced by colonials and French troops, was beaten
back a little, but its line was not broken. The Germans' effort
to reach the Channel ports was as much a failure in October
and November as had been their attempt to smash the whole
French army in August and September.
By the middle of November, the battle of Flanders, like the
battle of the Aisne, had lost its fury and become a dreary process
of trench-digging with intermittent cannonading. Here and
there a few hundred yards could be gained by one side or the
other by hurling masses of infantry at the opposing trenches,
but for such sacrifice the strategic gain was small. The rigors
of winter, moreover, now added to the sufferings of the soldiers,
who had to settle down in trenches filled with mud and water
if not with ice and snow.
The battle-line established after the struggles on the Aisne
and in Flanders extended some six hundred miles from the coast
of the Channel to the border of Switzerland; of this long line
the Belgians at the close of 1914 held about eighteen miles and
the British about thirty-one, while the French armies, two and
GERMANY CONQUERS BELGIUM
37
a half millions strong, defended the remaining 543 miles. By
this time the Hne had become almost stationary, and was so
Allies' Western Front, December, 1914
formidably intrenched and fortified that it could not possibly
be broken except at a terrible cost of life and with an enormous
expenditure of shells.
GERMAN GAINS IN THE WEST — AND FAILURE
What had the Germans gained by their attack upon Belgium
and France ? In the first place, they were in military occupation
of the whole kingdom of Belgium except a tiny strip in the south-
west corner extending from Nieuport to Ypres. The Belgian
government was exiled to Havre in France, and the Belgian people
were ruled by a German military governor at Brussels. To the
already great industrial resources of Germany were now added
those of Belgium, and by forced levies the conquerors obtained
goods and money from the vanquished as aids to the prosecution
of the war. The invasion of Belgium, however, had contributed
directly to bringing Great Britain into the war, and the horrors
amid which the conquest of Belgium was consummated aroused
the livehest enmity of the whole Belgian people and the keenest
sympathy of neutral nations as well as of the Allies. The Ger-
mans had won Belgian territory but no Belgian hearts.
A large part of the city of Louvain, including the famous
38 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Catholic university and church of St. Peter, was dehberately
razed by the Germans, because, said the German official report,
the civiHan population had concerted an attack on the German
troops which occupied the town. The vandahsm at Lou vain
especially shocked the consciences of civilized men, but it was
only one of numerous similar instances where towns or villages
had been ruthlessly burned and many of their inhabitants shot
or outraged. The spirit which prompted these acts may be
judged by an extract from the proclamation of General von
Billow to the citizens of Liege : "The inhabitants of the town of
Ardennes, after having declared their peaceful intentions, have
made a surprise attack on our troops. It is with my approval
that the commander has ordered the whole town to be burned
and that about a hundred persons have been shot. I bring
this to the knowledge of the city of Liege so that its citizens may
realize the fate with which they are menaced if they adopt a
similar attitude." In the town of Wavre, the German general
demanded a war levy of three million francs as a fine for the
resistance offered by the inhabitants, and threatened: "The
town will be burned and utterly destroyed if the levy is not paid
in due time, without regard for anyone ; the innocent will suffer
with the guilty." This was precisely the most distressing cir-
cumstance, that the innocent were made to suffer with the
guilty. Evidence collected on oath by French and British com-
missions of inquiry tended to show that in countless cases the
worst horrors of war had been inflicted on innocent women and
children. For instance, at Sommeilles, which was burned by
the Germans on September 6, two women, and four children
aged respectively eleven, five, four, and one, were afterwards
discovered lying in a pool of blood in a cellar where they had
been cruelly butchered. For such heinous crimes, for such
violation of international law and common decency, the Ger-
mans offered the curious pleas of "military necessity" and "war
is war."
Against German perfidy and German " f rightfulness, " the
Belgians found a courageous and able advocate in Cardinal
Mercier, archbishop of Malines and primate of the CathoKc
Church in Belgium. He was indefatigable in protesting against
the German conquest, in comforting his compatriots, and in
appealing to the Vatican and foreign Powers for aid. In vain
the German administration sought to silence him or to nullify
his efforts. In a famous pastoral letter addressed to his priests
on Christmas Day, 1914, the venerable prelate wrote: "I have
GERMANY CONQUERS BELGIUM 39
traversed the greater part of the districts most terribly devastated
in my diocese, and the ruins I beheld, and the ashes, were more
dreadful than I, prepared by the saddest forebodings, could
have imagined. . . . Churches, schools, asylums, hospitals,
convents, in great numbers, are in ruins. Entire villages have
all but disappeared. . . . God will save Belgium, my brethren,
ye cannot doubt it. Nay rather. He is saving her. ... Is
there a patriot among us who does not know that Belgium has
grown great? Which of us would have the courage to tear out
this last page of our national history? Which of us does not
exult in the brightness of the glory of this shattered nation?"
To the eloquent words of Cardinal Mercier should be added
the work of the special commission dispatched by the Belgian
government from Havre to the United States and the active
Belgian propaganda carried on in England. The wrongs done
Belgium were ceaselessly reviewed. One noteworthy result
was the organization of relief, chiefly under American auspices ;
for two years and a half, Mr. Brand Whitlock, the United States
minister at Brussels, cooperated with various Belgian and foreign
societies, in attempting to lessen the misery and suffering of
millions of men and women in Belgium. Another result was
the increasing fervor of the British in prosecuting the war.
The ^' assassination of Belgium" became one of the most effective
aids to Lord Kitchener in Securing volunteers for his armies.
The British Expeditionary Force, which in August, 1914,
amounted to but 150,000, was thenceforth steadily augmented
until by April, 191 5, it numbered at least 750,000, to say nothing
of colonial troops that were arriving from Canada, Australia,
New Zealand, and even India.
What had the Germans gained? In the first place, they had
gained Belgium — but also the hatred of the Belgian people,
the ever greater and more determined hostility of the British
at home and overseas, and the suspicion and horror of nearly
the whole world. Incidentally, they had opened up a more
strategically suitable route for their major attack upon France.
In the second place, they had invaded France and possessed
themselves of a fairly large strip of northern French territory,
including the populous towns of Lille, St. Quentin, Douai, Valen-
ciennes, Maubeuge, Sedan, Montmedy, Vervins, and Laon.
Though the occupied territory constituted only about one-twen-
tieth of the total area of European France, it was a fraction which,
because of its industrial and mining wealth, was of great impor-
tance for the successful conduct of the war. It included ninety
40 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
per cent, of France's iron ore, eighty per cent, of her iron and
steel manufactures, and seventy per cent, of her coal resources.
Despite this serious handicap, however, France was not crushed.
Her armies were intact. Her government had returned from
Bordeaux to Paris in December, 1914. Her national spirit
was quickened. Her confidence in ultimate victory was superb.
The strategy of the German General Staff on the Western Front
had failed. The Germans had not attained their objectives.
The invasion of France in the late summer of 19 14 had exposed
a momentous fallacy. The beUef that before the terrific on-
slaught of the German armies, with their swift mobihzation,
their unrivaled discipline, and their ponderous howitzers, the
French people would prove themselves cowardly, decadent, and
excitable, and the armed resistance of France would wither and
crumple up, was definitely relegated to the realm of fancy by
the absolutely calm and heroic conduct of the French during the
crisis and by the battle of the Marne. The magnificent holding
battle fought by the French along the line from Paris to Verdun,
after a long and discouraging retreat, effectually dispelled the
illusion that the swift Prussian victory over France in 1870
could be repeated in 19 14. That the omens had fickly changed
was evidenced in the autumn of 19 14 by the supersession of
Helmuth von Moltke as Chief of the German General Staff by
Erich von Falkenhayn, the Prussian minister of war.
The German General Staff had planned to overcome France
quickly and then turn its whole force against Russia. Unable
to overcome France, what would it do with Russia ?
20 Longitude East 22" rrom Greenwiob 24^
CHAPTER III
RUSSIA FAILS TO OVERWHELM GERMANY
THE RUSSIAN INVASION OF EAST PRUSSIA
One significant effect of the German failure speedily to crush
France was the inability of the German General Staff to transfer
its main forces from the west to the east before the first Russian
armies had been mobilized. As a matter of fact the mobiliza-
tion of the Russian *' hordes" proceeded practically unhindered
and with unexpected rapidity. By the third week of August,
some two million Russian soldiers were under arms; and of
the twenty-six Russian army corps then available, eight were
assigned to deal with the five left in the east by Germany, and
eighteen were massed against the Austrians' twelve.
As the gigantic battles in northern France assumed more and
more the character of a deadlock between intrenched troops, the
Allies looked to Russia to invade Germany with her vast armies
and compel Germany to turn attention to the east. It was
generally assumed that the Russians would sweep like a tidal
wave toward Berlin, while the weakened German battle-line
in the west would be beaten back out of France and Belgium.
But month after month dragged by, and although the fighting
forces surged back and forth on the eastern frontier of Germany
there was little sign of the ''tidal wave."
In order to understand the failure of the Russians in the early
stages of the war to overwhelm Germany in the east, one must
realize that Russia had to battle not only against the well-
trained and perfectly equipped soldiers of Germany, and the
somewhat less efficient soldiers of Austria-Hungary, but also
against geography. European Russia, it should be observed,
formed a huge wedge, with Russian Poland as the rather blunt
point of the wedge, thrust in between German East Prussia on
the north and Austrian Galicia on the south. The point of the
wedge was less than two hundred miles from Berlin, but before
the wedge could be driven into Germany, the Germans would
have to be crowded out of East Prussia and the Austrians out
41
42 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
of Galicia. In other words, no army would be safe in proceeding
from Russian Poland against Berlin so long as the Germans from
the north and the Austrians from the south could close in and
cut off the communications of that army with its sources of supply
in Russia. For this reason the Russian generalissimo, the Grand
Duke Nicholas, instead of marching his chief armies straight
westward from Warsaw to Berlin, deflected them to the north
and to the south.
To the north lay East Prussia, and hither the Russians pene-
trated about the middle of August. In invading East Prussia,
the Russians would have to overcome three serious obstacles.
First there was a chain of almost impassable lakes, marshes,
and rivers, stretching from Johannisberg to Insterburg. Be-
hind this lake barrier lay the fortified camp of Konigsberg with
one German army corps, in the north, and Aliens tein, with an-
other army corps, in the south. Still further west was the strong
line of the Vistula river, defended by Danzig, Marienburg,
Graudenz, and Thorn. The main bodies of Russian invaders
avoided the lake country near the eastern frontier of East
Prussia. One Russian army, under General Rennenkampf,
proceeded directly westward from Kovno, defeated the Germans
at Gumbinnen on August 17-20, pressed on to Insterburg, and
drove the Konigsberg army corps to the shelter of its fortifica-
tions. Simultaneously another and larger Russian army in-
vaded East Prussia from the south, between the lake barrier
on the east and the Vistula on the west, and with dash and vigor
took Aliens tein and pressed back a second German army corps.
But suddenly, as they turned westward, the Russians dis-
covered on their flank three fresh German army corps which
had hastily been brought up by rail and detrained near Allen-
stein. In the battle that then took place, August 26-31, in
the neighborhood of Tannenburg and the Masurian lakes, the
Russian army was enveloped and completely routed. At the
end of the contest, the German commander, General von Hinden-
burg, could report the capture of 90,000 Russians, including two
generals, besides the equipment and supplies of three whole
army corps. The news reached Berlin in time to transform the
anniversary of Sedan (September i) into a triumphal celebration
of Hindenburg's great victory. The German general followed
up his success by driving the Russians out of East Prussia. The
Russian invasion of East Prussia had definitely failed. Hinden-
burg was the *'man of the hour"; he was to all the German
people both savior and hero ; and the Kaiser promptly raised
RUSSIA FAILS TO OVERWHELM GERMANY 43
him to the rank of Field Marshal and made him generalissimo
of the armies in the East.
On September 15, Hindenburg passed the East Prussian border
on a wide front and carried the war into the Russian district
of Suwalki. Rennenkampf retired before him, fighting rear-
guard actions, until the Niemen river was reached. Here the
Russian commander, reenforced from Kovno and Vilna, turned
at bay. In vain did the Germans struggle to efifect a crossing
of the Niemen. Unable to make further headway, Hindenburg
late in September ordered a retreat to the East Prussian frontier.
This time it was the Russian army which followed and harassed
a retiring foe. In the vicinity of Augustovo Rennenkampf in-
flicted a serious defeat upon Hindenburg early in October ; and
the Germans found no rest or safety until they were again on
their own soil. If the Russians had failed to conquer East
Prussia, so too had the Germans failed to invade Russia from
East Prussia.
It had been proved alike to the Russians and to the Germans
that East Prussia was an isolated area splendidly fitted by
nature for defense but poorly adapted as a base for offense.
Between Russian Poland and Austrian GaKcia, however, there
were no such natural barriers. Galicia was not an isolated area,
nor was it defended by a Hindenburg or by perfectly disciplined
German troops. To Galicia, therefore, the Russians directed
their major attention.
THE RUSSIAN INVASION OF GALICIA
At the outbreak of the Great War it had fallen to the lot of
the Austrians to bear the brunt of the struggle with Russia, while
the Germans were conquering Belgium and France. It was a
hard lot, for Austria-Hungary as a military Power was far less
efficient than Germany ; she was a hodge-podge of quarrelsome
nationalities; and now she had to wage war on the Bosnian
front against Serbia and Montenegro and keep a reserve force
at Trieste and in the Trentino against the possible intervention
of Italy as well as to defend Galicia. Galicia belonged naturally
and geographically to Russia and Poland, for from Austria
proper and from Hungary it was separated by the range of the
Carpathians. To be sure, an invading army would have to
cross numerous rivers with which Galicia was provided, and
would have to encounter very strong fortifications which Austria
had erected at Lemberg, at Jaroslav and Przemysl, and at
44 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Cracow. But after all, the best means of defending Galicia
would probably be an attack upon Russian Poland before the
Russians were fully mobilized.
Accordingly, two Austro-Hungarian armies, numbering 300,000
men each, were collected in Galicia early in August, 19 14. The
one, commanded by General Dankl, was based on the fortresses
of Przemysl and Jaroslav and was destined for an invasion of
Russian Poland on a front east and west from Tomasov to the
Vistula. The other, under General von Auffenburg, was based
on Lemberg and extended north and south from the upper
waters of the Bug to the town of Halicz, at right angles with
General Dankl's. On August 10 General Dankl crossed the
frontier, captured Krasnik, won successes near Lublin, and
pressed the Russians under General Ivanov back over the Bug
river.
The Russians had not planned to attack Galicia from the
north. Their mobilization was proceeding more to the east,
especially at Lutsk, Dubno, and Kiev. Their real plans were
gradually disclosed when they at once retired before Dankl
and assailed Auffenburg in full force. On August 14, General
Ruzsky, with a large Russian army, based on Lutsk and Dubno,
moved over the northeastern boundary of GaHcia, captured
Sokal, and in six days marched to within thirty miles of Lem-
berg. Simultaneously another large Russian army, under
General Brussilov, had come westwards from Kiev and was
advancing against Auffenburg' s right flank by way of Tarnapol
and the valley of the Sereth. Brussilov took Tarnapol on
August 27, then Halicz, and then wheeled north against Lemberg.
On September 1-2, the critical battle of Lemberg was fought.
While Brussilov fiercely attacked the Austrian right and carried
the hne of the Gnila Lipa, Ruzsky swept to the north of the city,
drove in the Austrian left, and threatened Auffenburg's com-
munications. Austrian generalship proved defective, and some
of the Slav contingents in the Austrian army abandoned their
posts and threw down their arms at the first favorable oppor-
tunity. The Russians took at least 100,000 prisoners, and on
September 3 entered Lemberg in triumph, giving the city the
genuinely Slavic name of Lvov.
After the battle of Lemberg, Brussilov sent a detachment of
his army to occupy Czernowitz, the capital of Bukowina, and
to seize the passes through the Carpathians, and with his main
force, in company with Ruzsky, advanced toward Przemysl
on a front from Stryj to Rawaruska. The Russian advance in
RUSSIA FAILS TO OVERWHELM GERMANY 45
Galicia seriously menaced General Dankl's operations in Russian
Poland. Two German army corps were dispatched to the aid
of Auffenburg; Austrian reenforcements were hastily brought
up; and a new Austrian army, under the Archduke Joseph
Ferdinand, was put in the field, from the Vistula to LubUn.
Thus, early in September, the three Austrian armies were drawn
up in the form of a quarter arc extending from the Vistula, past
Lublin, Rawaruska, and Grodek, to the Dniester.
On this extended front a great battle was fought, September
6-10. The Archduke Joseph was decisively beaten and driven
in ignominious retreat southward toward the San. Dankl
fought well, but failed to maintain his position. Auffenburg
was worse battered than before. This time there was a rout
along the entire Austrian front. This time there was a head-
long flight to Jaroslav and Przemysl, and the vanguard of the
vanquished halted only under the protecting guns of far-away
Cracow. The synchronizing of this great Russian victory with
the battle of the Marne on the Western Front gave new courage
and delight to the Allies : Austrians could be overcome by
Russians as decisively as Germans could be defeated by French
and British. Teutonic ''invincibility" was a myth.
Onward in Galicia pressed the Russians. On September 23,
they captured Jaroslav and invested the fortress of Przemysl.
By the end of September they reached Tarnow, less than a
hundred miles from Cracow. Nearly all of Galicia was in their
possession, and could they but seize Cracow they would have
in their grasp the most important base for either an advance
through Silesia toward Berlin or a direct thrust at Vienna. Occu-
pation of Cracow would afford them a means of turning the
flank of the strong German positions in East Prussia and Posen
and of seriously interfering with the economic resources of the
Teutonic Powers.
But the Russians were too optimistic. Early in October,
Field Marshal von Hindenburg was put in command of all the
German and Austro-Hungarian forces in the East. Leaving a
small army in East Prussia, he immediately set to work to pre-
pare a counter-offensive against the Russians in Poland. Now
that the contest on the Western Front had assumed the character
of trench warfare, fewer men were needed there to defend the
trenches than had been required to conduct field operations.
Consequently several army corps were transferred to the East,
and with these and with army corps and reservists already in
Silesia and Posen, Hindenburg massed an army of at least
46 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
750,000 Germans between the fortress of Thorn and the town of
LubHnitz in southern Silesia. At the same time he superin-
tended the organization, near Cracow, of two Austrian armies,
which, bolstered up with several German officers and including
a hberal interspersing of German soldiers, aggregated close to one
million.
In the second week of October, Hindenburg struck out all
along his extended line. The Grand Duke Nicholas, the Russian
generalissimo, at once perceiving the danger to his armies operat-
ing in western Galicia, ordered a general withdrawal to Warsaw,
the Vistula, and the San. By the middle of October, Hinden-
burg's left wing was at Plock on the lower Vistula ; his center
was east of Lowicz and nearing Warsaw ; his left was between
Radom and Ostrowiecs ; while Dankl with one Austrian army
was at the junction of the San and Vistula, and the other Austrian
army was recapturing Jaroslav and raising the siege of Przemysl.
A fight for Warsaw raged on October 16-19. The German
left flank was turned by a Russian reserve army unexpectedly
brought up from Novo Georgievsk by General Rennenkampf,
and Hindenburg's left and center were compelled to retire. But
the most determined fighting took place on his right as the result
of a desperate attempt of the Germans to cross the Vistula at
Ivangorod and at the narrows near Josefov. The Russians
under General Ruzsky successfully held Ivangorod and allowed
only such divisions to cross at Josefov as could be captured or
annihilated in the roadless country behind the town. On
October 22, the German right wing was compelled to retire from
the Vistula; on November 3, Ruzsky drove it from Kielce.
Hindenburg's first great offensive against Warsaw had failed.
He withdrew his forces behind the Warthe river near the German
frontier, and the Austrians were again back on Cracow. Again
the Russians occupied Jaroslav and invested Przemysl; again
they advanced upon Cracow.
The Russians were determined to possess themselves of all
Galicia. In spite of renewed counter-offensives conducted by
the Germans in Poland and by the Austrians in the Carpathians,
they clung doggedly to their task throughout the winter of
1914-1915. On December 8, 1914, a Russian army under
Radko Dmitriev, formerly chief of staff of the Bulgarian army
but now in the service of the Tsar, fought an indecisive battle
almost at the outskirts of Cracow. A few days later the Aus-
trians' capture of the Dukla Pass in the Carpathians obHged
him to withdraw from the vicinity of Cracow, but he intrenched
RUSSIA FAILS TO OVERWHELM GERMANY 47
himself near Tarnow and held this position throughout the
winter.
Meanwhile another Russian army was overrunning Bukpwina,
which commanded the southeastern end of the Carpathian
barrier. On January 6, 191 5, it captured the town of Kimpo-
lung, at the southern extremity of the province, and on Janu-
ary 17, it gained the pass of Kirlibaba, leading westward into
Hungary, and threatened Transylvania. If the Russians could
successfully occupy both Bukowina and Transylvania, —
provinces peopled mainly by Rumans, — Rumania would be
likely to enter the war and cooperate with the Russians, turning
the eastern flank of the Carpathian ridge, while the Russians
swarmed over the central Carpathian passes.
The situation called for strenuous and immediate action on
the part of Austria-Hungary. The supersession of Count
Berchtold as foreign minister of the Dual Monarchy by Baron
Stephan Burian, a friend and compatriot of Count Tisza, the
Hungarian premier, on January 13, 191 5, was interpreted as a
sign of the Emperor's determination to protect Magyar interests
at all costs. While Hindenburg prepared to distract the at-
tention of the Russians by new attacks in Poland, Archduke
Eugene of Austria marshaled his forces in three great armies
for a supreme effort to secure the Carpathian ridge, relieve the
hard-pressed garrison of Przemysl, free Bukowina, and intimi-
date Rumania.
In the second half of January the Austrian counter-offensive
was launched. The first Austrian army, under General Boehm-
ErmolH, moved up into the three central Carpathian passes
(Dukla, Lupkow, and Uzsok) with the object of advancing north
to the rehef of beleaguered Przemysl. The second army, under
the command of the German General von Linsingen, operated
from Munkacs northward in the passes east of Uzsok. The
third army, comprising both German and Austro-Hungarian
troops, was led by General von Pflanzer against the Russians
in Bukowina. General von Pflanzer made rapid progress.
KirHbaba Pass was retaken; the weak Russian defense of
Czernowitz succumbed on February 18 ; and the Austro- Ger-
mans turned northward into Galicia, passing Kolomea, and
holding the important railway center of Stanislau for a brief
space, until they were forced back on Kolomea, March 3 . General
von Linsingen, however, failed dismally in his attempt to ad-
vance from Munkacs toward Lemberg. Even more disappoint-
ing was the result of General Boehm-ErmolH's campaign against
48 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
the central passes : after two months of bitter battles in the
snow-bound mountain defiles, the Russians at the end of the
third week in March held the Dukla Pass and the northern
entrance to Lupkow.
The culminating failure of the Austrian counter-offensive
and the crowning success of the Russian Galician campaign
was the surrender, on March 22, of the Austrian fortress of
Przemysl, which had been besieged by the Russians ever since
November 12. The situation of the garrison had become alarm-
ing early in March. After provisions were well-nigh exhausted
and a breach had been effected by the Russians in the outer
ring of defenses. General von Kusmanek had ordered a last
desperate sortie, March 18. This failing disastrously, he de-
stroyed a considerable quantity of ammunition and then sur-
rendered the city. By the capture of Przemysl the Russians
won 120,000 prisoners, about a thousand guns, and less im-
portant stores of small arms. More significant still, the rail-
way leading westward from Lemberg through Przemysl to Tarnow
and Cracow was at last cleared, and the investing army of
100,000 men was released for aggressive operations elsewhere.
The Russians profited by their improved position to renew the
offensive in the Carpathian passes, and by the end of April they
were in possession of the Carpathian crest for seventy-five miles,
commanding Dukla, Lupkow, and Rostok passes, and they were
fiercely attacking Uzsok Pass.
Thus, from August, 19 14, to April, 191 5, the Russians struggled
to conquer GaHcia. They had met with some setbacks, but
on the whole their gains had been steadily augmented and
solidified. Their generals had committed few mistakes or
blunders and the rank and file had fought courageously and
stubbornly. They were in complete possession of all eastern
Galicia, and at its capital city of Lemberg (Lvov) they had
installed a Russian administration. They now occupied Jaro-
slav and Przemysl; they controlled most of the Carpathian
passes ; they threatened Bukowina and Hungary at one end of
their Galician conquest; and at the other end they menaced
Cracow and with it the most direct routes to Berlin and Vienna.
To many publicists of Western Europe it seemed high time that
the long-heralded Russian *' tidal wave" or "steam roller"
should sweep out of the comparatively restricted province of
Galicia and descend with magnificent might and irresistible force
over the plains of Austria and Hungary, on one side, and over
the rich valley of the Oder, on the other. It had been for this
RUSSIA FAILS TO OVERWHELM GERMANY 49
spectacular denouement that French and British and Belgians
had been pouring out their blood upon the Western battlefields ;
for this they had been impatiently waiting in their trenches
throughout the long, dreary winter-months. It was now spring,
and the Russians were still a goodly number of miles away from
Cracow. Until Cracow should be captured and Gahcia en-
tirely cleared of the enemy, the Russian commander-in-chief
knew it would be suicidal to undertake an invasion of Germany.
As the event proved, there had been a fallacy in the reason-
ing of Western publicists concerning the Russian '' masses''
and ''hordes." These publicists had at first underestimated
the speed and efficiency with which the early mobihzation was
effected. Then, knowing that Russia comprised a population
almost three times as large as that of the German Empire, they
had proceeded to underestimate the difficulties of continued
military activity on the part of Russia and therefore to over-
estimate the momentum of the ''steam roller."
The Russian armies, in fact, were not "steam rollers" and
were not likely to be. The lines of communication upon which
they had to depend were wretchedly inadequate. Most of the
soldiers were distressingly ignorant not only of the rudiments
of reading and writing but also of why they were fighting. The
ofiicers and men alike were woefully dependent upon an auto-
cratic regime at Petrograd, which at its best was clumsy, in-
efficient, and capricious, and which at its worst was tyrannical,
cruel, and corrupt. Corruption had eaten into the very vitals
of the military administration, as well as of the civil bureaucracy,
and in the critical year 1914-1915 signs were plenty that large
funds which should have bought guns and rifles and ammunition
and airplanes and motor cars had shamefully disappeared in
the pockets of grafting officials and contractors. A war that was
to be waged by weight of armor and projectiles even more than
by weight of numbers found the Russians pecuHarly short of
heavy artillery. To be sure, the lack of ammunition and other
military equipment was gradually supplied, at least in con-
siderable part, by importations from Japan and America, but
such supplies had to be transported over the long, light Siberian
railway (much of it single track) ; and imports from western
Europe could enter only through the port of Archangel, which
was blocked by ice six months of the year. Throughout Russia
the few, ill-equipped railways were congested with foodstuffs
and army suppHes going to the troops in Poland and Galicia.
The more troops there were at the front, the greater was the con-
50 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
gestion on the railways; the greater the congestion, the more
difficult it was properly to take care of the troops at the front
or to bring up reenforcements of men. In other words, the
preliminary mobilization in August, 1914, was Russia's best.
For Russia it was physically impossible to mobilize all her fight-
ing men and get them to the front for effective service. If
Russia could not overwhelm Germany in the early stages of
the war, her chances of doing so as time went on grew less rather
than greater. Despite what was said at the time in western
Europe, it is probable that in the spring of 191 5 the combined
forces of Germany and Austria-Hungary in the East already
outnumbered the effectives of Russia.
In view of these facts it is wonderful that the Russian armies
achieved what they did. They were unable successfully to
invade Germany, but they wrested most of GaHcia from Austria-
Hungary. They might conceivably have gone further, taken
Cracow, and entered Silesia, had not the Germans transferred
large forces from Flanders and France to Poland and Gahcia.
This gave the Allies some respite in the West ; and it compelled
Germany to wage the war simultaneously on two fronts, shifting
her troops back and forth as occasion required, and finding her
magnificent strategic railways of incalculable value. Skillful
distribution of forces, able generalship, and superior equip-
ment enabled the Germans, with Austrian assistance, to hold
back the early Russian invasions and later to take up an ad-
vanced position in Russian Poland.
That the Russian invasion of Galicia was finally halted early
in the spring of 191 5 and that it never reached the all-important
city of Cracow, is to be explained not only by reference to cor-
ruption and inefficiency in the Russian government but also
by the series of counter-offensives which Hindenburg directed
against Russian Poland in the winter of 1914-1915.
THE GERMAN INVASION OF RUSSIAN POLAND
In October, 19 14, Field Marshal von Hindenburg, as we have
seen, had undertaken the first German invasion of Russian
Poland. Though he had failed on that occasion to capture
Warsaw or to compel the permanent withdrawal of Russian forces
from western Gahcia, he had utilized his retreat from the Vistula
so as to pave the way for a second invasion* As he retired to
the trenches which he had constructed behind the Warthe,
he systematically tore up the railways and laid waste the broad
RUSSIA FAILS TO OVERWHELM GERMANY 51
belt of country in southwestern Poland between the Vistula
and the Warthe, so that the Russians who followed him to his
trenches were without adequate means of communication in
their rear. Then, Hindenburg, leaving a small force to man the
trenches in front of the desolated PoHsh region, commissioned
General von Mackensen to collect a large army at Thorn and
to advance with it up the Vistula into the still flourishing
district of northwestern Poland.
Early in November, Mackensen collected an army of at least
800,000, based on the fortress of Thorn ; and the second German
drive against Warsaw began. Aided by Mackensen from the
northwest, Hindenburg struck out from the Warthe, and on
November 23-24 pierced the hostile Unes near Lodz and cap-
tured some 90,000 Russians. Reenforcements came up and the
battle continued nearly two weeks, but at length, on December 6,
the Russians abandoned Lodz and fell back to within thirty-
five miles of Warsaw. Here, another great battle was waged
until Christmas, by which time the Russian defenders and the
German assailants were facing each other in parallel lines of
trenches not unlike those from which Germans and Allies were
viewing each other on the Western Front. The second German
invasion of Russian Poland, like the first, had failed to reach
Warsaw; unlike the first, it had not caused the Russians even
temporarily to withdraw from western Galicia. Yet this second
invasion secured the permanent possession of western Poland
for Germany and inaugurated on a large scale in the East the
system of trench warfare.
At the beginning of 191 5, the Russian armies were strung out
in a battle-line almost nine hundred miles long. The center of
the Russian line, under General Ruzsky, was strongly intrenched
in Russian Poland, behind the Rawka and Bzura rivers, and in
front of the powerful fortresses of Novo Georgievsk, Warsaw, and
Ivangorod. The right of the Russian Kne, likewise under
Ruzsky's general command, stretched northeastwards of the
Narew river, through the Masurian lake region of East Prussia,
to the Niemen river. The left of the Russian army, under
General Ivanov, included General Ewarts's army on the Nida
river, west of Kielce; General Radko Dmitriev's army in
GaKcia, holding Tarnow; General Brussilov's army, holding
the northern approaches to the Carpathian mountain passes;
and General Alexeiev's army, operating in Bukowina. Opposing
the Russian right wing were four German army corps in East
Prussia; the Russian center was confronted by strongly in-
k
52 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
trenched German forces under General von Mackensen; on
the left wing was General Dankl's Austrian army west of the
Nida river ; south of that and west of Tarnow, General Woyrsch's
Austro- German army; and the extreme Russian left flank in
the Carpathians was harried by the Austrian Archduke Eugene
.from the south.
Throughout the winter of 1914-1915, Hindenburg's strategy
was to direct powerful blows, now from East Prussia against
the Russian right, now from Mackensen's front in middle Poland
against the Russian center, in the hope that thereby the Russian
right or the Russian center would be so weakened as to admit
of a deep penetration by the Germans. In this fashion Warsaw
and its protecting positions might either be taken by a frontal
attack or be turned by a flanking movement from East Prussia.
In December, 1914, Mackensen tried a gigantic frontal attack,
and failed. During the first week of February, 191 5, he at-
tempted another vast frontal attack: under cover of a terrific
bombardment, and in the face of a blinding snowstorm, his
troops carried three lines of Russian trenches east of the Rawka
river, only to be met by the fiercest and bravest resistance and
ultimately to be pushed back on the Rawka. In the middle of
February, Hindenburg tried a huge flanking movement from
East Prussia : in the north a German army annihilated a Russian
corps at Suwalki, won a foothold on the eastern bank of the
Niemen near Grodno, and reached a point only ten miles from
the Petrograd-Warsaw railway; simultaneously, another Ger-
man army advanced to the Bobr river and began a bombardment
of Ossowietz, while a third swiftly struck at Przasnysz, sixty
miles north of Warsaw, in a determined effort to cross the Narew
and cut the lines of communication with the Polish capital.
But the flanking movement, like the frontal attacks, failed. By
the end of February, the assaults on the Niemen, on the Bobr,
and on the Narew had been stopped, and the Germans were in
full retreat towards the East Prussian frontier. In March and
April there was a lull — the lull before the great storm.
By April, 191 5, the Russians were in possession of the greater
part of Austrian Galicia, but the Germans Were secure in East
Prussia and were in occupation of one- third of Russian Poland.
The Russians still held Warsaw and the main strongholds of
Poland, and they had brilliantly resisted drive after drive of
Hindenburg and Mackensen. As time went on, however, it
became apparent that the offensive was passing more and more
from the Russians to the Germans. It was believed in the West
RUSSIA FAILS TO OVERWHELM GERMANY 53
that time was on the side of the Russians. Events were soon
to demonstrate that time was on the side of the Germans.
In reading the story of the military operations in the Polish
theater of war, one should not entirely forget the tragic plight
of the Polish nation. The once glorious kingdom of Poland,
it will be remembered, had been partitioned toward the close of
the eighteenth century by Russia, Prussia, and Austria. Con-
sequently, although the Poles constituted a homogeneous nation
of twenty- three milhons, possessing a national language and
literature and in Roman Catholicism a common religion, dwelling
in the plains of Russian Poland, Prussian Posen, and Austrian
Galicia, and passionately desiring to restore their political unity
and freedom, they were now compelled to fight in opposing armies
and to furnish the battleground for Russia, Germany, and
Austria-Hungary. The march and counter-march of milhons
of soldiers, and the havoc caused by hundreds of howitzers, to
say nothing of systematic destruction wrought by German orders,
devastated Poland more completely than Belgium. Without
food or homes the Polish peasants perished miserably.
Yet for the future, perhaps, a sHght ray of hope could be dis-
cerned. Russia, long the cruel oppressor of the largest section
of Poland, now feared a Pohsh revolt and promised Poland
autonomy in return for loyalty. Early in August, 19 14, the
Grand Duke Nicholas, generahssimo of the Russian forces, issued
the following eloquent manifesto to the Poles: *'The hour has
sounded when the sacred dream of your fathers and your grand-
fathers may be realized. A century and a half has passed since
the living body of Poland was torn in pieces, but the soul of the
country is not dead. It continues to live, inspired by the hope
that there will come for the Polish people an hour of resurrection,
and of fraternal reconcihation with Great Russia. The Russian
army brings you the solemn news of this reconciliation which
obliterates the frontiers dividing the Polish peoples, which it
unites conjointly under the scepter of the Russian Tsar. Under
this scepter Poland will be born again, free in her rehgipn and
her language, and autonomous. Russia only expects from you
the same respect for the rights of those nationaHties to which
history has bound you. With open heart and brotherly hand
Great Russia advances to meet you. She beheves that the
sword, with which she struck down her enemies at Griinewald,^
^ The battle of Griinewald, or Tannenberg as it is more usually called, was fought
in 1410 between the Teutonic Knights of Prussia, on one side, and the Poles and
Lithuanians on the other. It was a decisive victory for the latter and marked the
emergence of Poland as a Great Power.
54 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
is not yet rusted. From the shores of the Pacific to the North
Sea the Russian armies are marching. The dawn of a new life
is beginning for you, and in this glorious dawn, is seen the sign
of the cross, the symbol of suffering and of the resurrection of
peoples."
Similar appeals to the Poles were made by Austria-Hungary,
who undoubtedly had accorded the Poles within her borders
far better treatment than was received by the unfortunate Poles
in Russia or in Prussia. In respect of Germany, no promise
could efface from Pohsh memory the wrongs suffered under the
harsh Prussian administration, which had pursued a deliberate
policy not only of denying the Poles the use of their mother-
tongue but also of depriving them of their lands.
Had the Russian Tsar given immediate effect to the fair words
of his generaHssimo, it is probable that the Russian Poles would
have ralUed enthusiastically to his banner and that serious se-
dition would have ensued in the Polish legions of the Austro-
German armies. So long as the Russians remained in military
occupation of Warsaw and GaHcia, however, ^'Polish autonomy"
remained but a hope and a promise, until, as months passed by,
it seemed to an increasing number of Poles to be but a mirage.
The less enthusiastically the Russian Poles fought for the Auto-
crat of All the Russias and the less frequently their kinsmen
deserted Teutonic service, the more quibbhng became the
Russia,n f)romises even of ^' autonomy." The longer the Russians,
stilMn- possession of most of Poland, delayed to make real con-
cessions to the Poles, the more expectantly did the Poles turn
to the prospect of Austro-German conquest. They certainly
did not love the Germans ; they certainly did not desire an
overwhelming German victory. Yet they were becoming con-
vinced that they had nothing — perhaps less than nothing —
to gain from an overwhelming Russian victory.
Imperialistic autocracy in Russia was storing up great future
tribulations for itself. Its inefficiency and corruption were
gradually paralyzing the might of the Russian armies in the
field. Its overweening pride and arrogance were perceptibly
weakening the loyalty not only of Poles but of other subject
nationalities within the Russian Empire — Ukrainians, Lithu-
anians, and Finns. It was utilizing the temporary heat of
national altruism and patriotism in order to forge enduring
iron Hnks in the chain of social inequality and poHtical abso-
lutism. Liberals in Russia were depressed, and revolutionaries
desperate. Well-wishers of Russia and of the Allied cause
RUSSIA FAILS TO OVERWHELM GERMANY 55
throughout the world should have been alarmed and should
have made energetic representations at Petrograd that this war
was a war in behalf of small nationaHties, that it was "a, war to
end war."
Nothing of the sort happened. On the contrary, the Russian
conquest of GaHcia and the stubborn Russian defense of Warsaw
deceived the diplomatists of France and Great Britain as to
the true strength of their Russian ally. On the Western Front,
the Alhes were fully holding their own, and on the Eastern Front
the Russians seemed to be more than holding their own. What
merely ''seemed," was taken as proved reality; and the diplo-
matists of all the Allied Powers, instead of urging moderation
and unselfishness upon the Tsar's government, devoted the late
winter and early spring of 19 15 to making secret treaties with
one another whereby some of the worst features of German and
Russian imperialism were consecrated as guiding principles for
the peace which, in their optimistic opinion, was about to follow
a speedy Allied victory. Russia not only was to annex GaHcia
and Posen and exercise her own sweet will over all Poland but
she was to appropriate Constantinople and realize her age-long
imperialistic dream of succeeding to the destinies of Byzantium.
France not only was to regain Alsace-Lorraine but she was
virtually to establish a protectorate over the entire left bank of
the Rhine. Great Britain was to appropriate Egypt and Meso-
potamia and, in conjunction with France and Japan, to partition
all the German colonies. It was the supreme blunder of the
Allies. It was a blunder that eventually was to constitute the
worst indictment of professional diplomatists.
THE SECURITY OF SERBIA
It will be recalled that in July, 19 14, Austria-Hungary had
set out to "punish" Serbia. The task was not altogether an
easy one. The little Slav state, poor and small as it might ap-
pear, could boast a war army of 250,000 men, mostly seasoned
veterans, besides a territorial reserve of 50,000; moreover,
Serbia's ally, Montenegro, could put in the field about 50,000
hardy mountaineers, renowned for their valor. In spite of the
fact that the Serbs were deficient in heavy artillery, airplanes,
and sanitary service, they enjoyed the immense advantage of
recent experience in war and the courageous confidence imparted
to them by their victories of 1912-1913 over Turks and Bulgars.
Nevertheless, short shrift would undoubtedly have been made
$6 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
of Serbia, had not Austria-Hungary been much engaged during
the year of 1914-1915 with large Russian armies in GaHcia and
Poland. With such forces as could be spared from the Eastern
theater of war, the Dual Monarchy undertook to preserve its
southern lands from Serb invasion and to attempt incursions
into Serbian territory.
About the middle of August, Austrian columns were thrown
across the Drina and Save rivers. Obviously the intention was
to invade the northwestern corner of Serbia simultaneously
from the west and from the north, and to converge on the Serbian
military depot at Vahevo. With frantic haste the Serbian
Crown Prince brought his main armies by forced marches west-
ward to meet the Austrian invasion. In the mountainous
northwest district of their country, between the Save and the
Drina, the Serbians fought the battles of Shabatz and the Jadar,
August 16-23, to prevent the junction of the invading columns.
So successful were the Serbian tactics that the Austrians were
defeated at all points and compelled to retreat into their own
territory. In repelKng the 200,000 Austrians, the Serbians had
lost 3000 killed and 15,000 wounded; but they had killed some
8000 of the enemy, wounded perhaps 30,000 and captured
4000 ; they had, in addition, captured much needed supplies of
rifles and ammunition.
It was now the turn of Austria-Hungary to suffer invasion.
Early in September, the Serbians took Semhn, across the river
from Belgrade, while another Serbian army struck into southern
Bosnia in the direction of Serajevo. These forces had to be
speedily withdrawn, however, for Austria-Hungary again as-
sumed the offensive, massing 250,000 men against the same
northwest corner of Serbia.
In the second week of September the Austrians advanced a
second time on Vahevo. Though fierce resistance was en-
countered, and though another Austrian army crossing the
Danube east of Belgrade was routed at Semendria, the main
Austrian offensive was continued and Vahevo was taken on
November 15. Belgrade, which had been besieged and inter-
mittently bombarded since July 29, capitulated to the Austrians
on December 2.
Just when Serbia's complete collapse was momentarily ex-
pected, news came that the Serbians had broken through the
center of the advancing Austrian army, recaptured Vahevo, and
inflicted a crushing defeat on two Austrian corps, capturing
40,000 prisoners, fifty cannon, and munitions in immense quantity.
RUSSIA FAILS TO OVERWHELM GERMANY 57
The Austrian right wing was driven back in disorder across the
Drina, where it was still further punished by the Montenegrins
at Vishegrad. On December 15, the Serbians recaptured Bel-
grade, and King Peter was able to reenter his former capital
at the head of his victorious army, while all Serbia rejoiced over
the announcement that not a single Austrian invader remained
on Serbian soil.
After the exhausting campaign of December, 19 14, a period
of inaction ensued in the Serbian theater of war. Serbs and
Austrians alike had suffered heavily and needed time to repair
their losses. Inclement weather and impassable roads added
to the disinclination of either party to renew active operations.
On the Austrian side, there was talk of undertaking a decisive
offensive in February, 191 5, but this time the ItaKan government
warned Austria-Hungary that any mihtary action undertaken
in the Balkans without previous agreement regarding the com-
pensation to be granted Italy, would lead to grave consequences.
Relations were already becoming strained between Italy and
Austria-Hungary, and the latter was not inclined to draw her
ally into the circle of her enemies just for the sake of *' punish-
ing" Serbia. Meanwhile, profiting by the inactivity of Austria-
Hungary in the south, Serbia sought as best she could, with some
foreign aid, to repair the horrible ravages which the typhus, in
combination with the past year's campaigns, had wrought in
her army and among her civihan population. *
With the exception of minor frontier engagements and rather
desultory bombardments of Belgrade, the Serbian front remained
comparatively quiet until October, 191 5. Austria-Hungary had
as yet failed to *' punish" Serbia, but, on the other hand, the
Serbs had as yet been unable to take advantage of the Dual
Monarchy's discomfiture in GaHcia in order to free their kins-
folk of Bosnia-Herzegovina and of Croatia-Slavonia from Habs-
burg rule. Serbian despair and Serbian rejoicing ahke waited
on the outcome of the tremendous battles in progress between
Russians and Austro- Germans along the nine-hundred mile
line from the Niemen river through Russian Poland and Galicia
to the Carpathian mountain passes and Bukowina. To a lesser
degree they waited on the outcome of a contest of wit which at
the very time was being carried on between Teutonic and Allied
diplomatists in the several Balkan capitals. But this story
belongs to a later chapter.
CHAPTER IV
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS
IMPORTANCE OF SEA POWER
At the beginning of the Great War it was confidently beheved
in Allied countries that France and Russia would be able to hold
in equipoise the military forces of Germany and Austria-Hun-
gary, while Great Britain, by means of the weight of her enor-
mous naval superiority, could tip the balance against the Teu-
tonic Powers. Little was expected from unmiHtary Britain in
the way of armed intervention on the continent of Europe, but
much was expected from her naval power and her naval prowess.
The Great War was far more than a conflict over Serbia and
Alsace-Lorraine; it was a struggle for world dominion. And
world dominion depended quite as much on the mastery of the
seas as upon a conquest of Belgium or an invasion of Galicia.
From the time she entered the war on that fateful day in
August, 1 9 14, Great Britain used her naval superiority both for
defense and for offense. Of the two, defense was the more vitally
necessary. From the very nature of things, the command of the
seas was even more essential to Great Britain's preservation than
it was injurious to Germany's welfare. To be sure, the German
merchant marine and German commerce would be swept from
the seas, involving thereby the partial inability of Germany to
import foodstuffs, copper, or munitions of war, or to market the
products of her industry. All this would entail direct financial
losses of alarming size. But Germany might make her food sup-
ply last by strict economy ; she had large stores of most mate-
rials requisite for war ; and the effectiveness of her army did not
depend absolutely upon control of the sea. To Great Britain, how-
ever, the loss of the seas would have spelled ruin. Her people
would have been starved, her industries throttled, and her army
prevented from engaging in the battles of France. The very fact
that Germany was a large country combining agriculture and
manufacture, surrounded by contiguous neutral countries, as con-
trasted with the insularity and almost complete industrialization
S8
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS 59
of Great Britain, explains the secondary importance of naval
power to Germany, and its primary importance to Great Britain.
Though the paramount purpose of the British navy was de-
fense, the Germans shuddered perceptibly when they fell to
thinking of the purposes of offense for which it would now be
employed. In the first place Great Britain undertook a drastic
/'war on German trade," which threatened to deprive the manu-
facturer of his business, the workingman of his employment, and
the statesman of his country's prosperity. In the second place,
the control of the high seas by Great Britain would make it
increasingly difficult for Germany to carry on the war success-
fully ; it would enable Great Britain to scour the four quarters of
the globe for recruits and to bring back negroes from Africa,
Asiatics from India, Malays, Australians, New Zealanders, and
Canadians, to fight in Europe against Germany ; it would make
possible the landing in France of a million British soldiers already
in training in England ; it would create bitter hardship for the
civihan population of Germany through lack of sufficient food.
Finally, even should the German armies crush France and Russia,
the British fleet could still stand between Germany and her
dreams of world empire, for as long as the British fleet sailed the
seas it could prevent Germany from becoming the greatest
colonial and commercial Power and could assure to Great Britain
the possession of the most valuable colonies and *' spheres of
influence" throughout the world. It was this naval superiority
of Great Britain and the thought of its significance that caused
the Germans forthwith to take up the chanting of hymns of hate
as a national pastime.
Early in the war the British fleet achieved much. Though it
could not altogether prevent the Germans from planting mines
and torpedoes along the coasts of the North Sea and bombarding
Russian ports in the Baltic, it compelled the German battle
squadron to lie idle at its moorings in Wilhelmshaven, Cuxhaven,
and Kiel. Admiral von Tirpitz, the director of the German
navy, was so much incHned to consider discretion the better part
of valor that the Enghsh comic papers appropriately styled him
the ''Admiral of the Kiel Canal." The only hostile warships
which proved embarrassing to the British were two in the Medi-
terranean and a squadron in the Far East.
At the outbreak of the war one of Germany's swiftest and
most powerful battle-cruisers, the Goehen, and a light cruiser, the
Breslau, happened to be in the western Mediterranean, where
they might conceivably interfere with the transportation of
6o A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
French troops from Algeria to France, but were much more
Ukely to fall in with superior French or British naval units.
British and French warships immediately gave chase to the two
German cruisers, which, however, eluded pursuit and made port
first at Messina and then at Constantinople. From the refuge
of these cruisers in Turkish waters led the causal chain of cir-
cumstances which subsequently lugged the Ottoman Empire
into the Great War.
In the Far East Germany possessed a squadron of eight
cruisers, which early in the war managed to escape from the
naval base of Kiao-chao and for some time to elude capture or
destruction. Five of the number, the Scharnhorst, Gneisenau,
Niirnberg, Leipzig, and Dresden, under command of Admiral von
Spee, were at last sighted by Admiral Cradock's smaller British
squadron on the evening of November i, 1914, off the coast of
Chile near Coronel. As the sun sank behind the horizon, and
the heavy seas dashed against the bows of the British ships, the
British gunners experienced serious difficulty in training their
guns on the German ships and were unable to make any impres-
sion upon the heavier armor of the Germans. Fifty minutes
after the first shot was fired, the Good Hope blew up, shooting a
column of fire two hundred feet in the air. Shortly afterwards
the Monmouth was sunk, and the two other British ships were
making off to escape destruction.
The British had their revenge a little more than a month
later. On December 8 a powerful British squadron, which had
been sent out under Vice- Admiral Sturdee to search for the five
German cruisers, sighted them off the Falkland Islands. Accord-
ing to the laconic statement of the British admiralty, ''an action
followed, in the course of which the Scharnhorst, flying the flag of
Admiral Count von Spee, the Gneisenau, and the Leipzig were
sunk. The Dresden and the N Umber g made off during the
action and are being pursued. Two colliers also were captured.
The Vice Admiral reports that the British casualties are very
few in number. Some survivors have been rescued from the
Gneisenau and the Leipzig.^' The Nurnberg was overtaken and
destroyed the same night, but it was not until March, 191 5, that
the Dresden was wrecked.
The three swift German cruisers in the Far East not included
in Admiral von Spec's fleet had spectacular careers for some
time as commerce raiders and managed to inflict considerable
injury on AlHed shipping. One of these cruisers, the Emden,
commanded by the intrepid Captain Karl von Muller, cruised
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS 6i
the waters about the East Indies for three months, destroying
twenty-five merchant vessels valued, exclusive of their cargoes,
at ten million dollars, firing the oil tanks at Madras, sinking four
British steamers in Rangoon harbor alone, and steaUng into the
harbor of Penang disguised by the addition of a false smokestack
to sink a Russian cruiser and a French torpedo boat. The
Emden was not a powerful ship ; her displacement was only
3350 tons, her speed less than 25 knots, and her largest guns
only 4.1 inches. Again and again more powerful warships were
on the Emden^s trail, but each time she escaped, until one day
Captain Muller decided to destroy the wireless station at Cocos
Islands, southwest of Java. There the Emden was discovered
by an Australian cruiser and driven ashore in flames after a
sharp battle. The career of the second German raider, the
Konigsberg, had come to an end a few days earlier, when, after
destroying about a dozen merchantmen, she was caught hiding
in shoal waters up a river in German East Africa.
Once in a while a cruiser would slip out of a German home base
and commit depredations on the high seas, but such a raider
would ultimately be detected and lost. Thus the Prinz Eitel
Friedrich was obliged to take refuge in Newport News, Virginia,
on March 10, 191 5, after a destructive cruise of more than
30,000 miles. Similarly, the Kronprinz Wilhelm, after sinking
nine British, four French, and one Norwegian merchantmen,
entered Newport News on April 11, 191 5, and was interned.
But after all, the number of these German raiders was too small
and their life too precarious to constitute any grave menace to
British naval supremacy or even to affect British commerce seri-
ously. The exploits were spectacular rather than significant, and
the most they accompHshed was to dwarf in popular esteem the
quieter and more substantial achievements of the British navy.
The fact remains that the German merchant marine was
swept from the seas swiftly and methodically within a week of
the outbreak of war. In every quarter of the globe British war-
ships, in conjunction with the fleets of France and Russia, spread
their net and caught virtually the whole sea-borne trade of
Germany. German merchantmen in the ports of the Allies were
detained, and hundreds were made prizes of *'in the high and the
narrow seas." Some escaped to the shelter of ports still neutral,
especially to those of the United States, but none got back to
Germany. By the sheer threat of naval superiority, the British
had annihilated German commerce and protected their own and
that of their allies.
62 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
From British naval superiority it resulted, moreover, that the
French could transport colonial troops to the battle-line in
Western Europe, that the British Expeditionary Force under Sir
John French could be safely landed in France in August, 1914,
and that munitions and supplies could flow freely from the
United States to France and England while their entrance into
Germany was effectually barred.
Spectacular deeds were not entirely confined to the Germans.
As early as August 28, 191 4, Sir David Beatty, a promising aspir-
ant for naval fame, led a British fleet, accompanied by a flotilla
of submarines and destroyers, into the bight of Heligoland and
engaged part of the German fleet almost under the guns of the
great German naval base. Three German armored cruisers and
one destroyer were sunk, and 700 German sailors were killed and
300 taken prisoners ; the British casualties were thirty-two killed
and fifty-two wounded.
No other important naval engagement was fought until the
battle off Dogger Bank on January 24, 191 5, in which a German
battle-cruiser squadron raiding the coast of England was severely
punished for its temerity. Three powerful German cruisers
were seriously injured by a British fleet under Beatty, but made
their escape to Heligoland, thanks to the dense screening smoke
of a destroyer flotilla and to the timely appearance of German
submarines. A fourth cruiser, however, the slower and less
powerful Blilcher, fell an easy victim and was first crippled by
gunfire, then torpedoed and sunk. The engagement was a con-
clusive demonstration of the value of big guns and high speed in
modern naval warfare.
THE PARTICIPATION OF JAPAN
In mastering the seas and the German colonies Great Britain
enjoyed the special assistance of Japan. On August 15, 1914, —
less than two weeks after the declaration of war between Great
Britain and Germany, — the Japanese ambassador in Berlin
handed to the German Foreign Office an ultimatum, demanding
that Germany should immediately withdraw all warships from
Chinese and Japanese waters and deliver up the entire leased
territory of Kiao-chao before September 15, ''with a view to the
eventual restoration of the same to China."
Kiao-chao, it should be remembered, was a bay on the northern
Chinese coast, with 117 square miles of surrounding territory,
which had been seized in 1897 ^^^ ^^^^ leased for ninety-nine years
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS
63
by Germany as compensation for the murder of two German
missionaries in China. At Tsing-tao, on the leased ground,
the German government at great expense had erected strong forti-
fications, commanding the bay; under the shelter of frowning
forts the Germans had constructed a magnificent floating dock
which made Tsing-tao a splendid naval base. Leading back
from Tsing-tao the Germans had built the Shantung railway.
Germany had invested heavily in her Kiao-chao venture, and her
imperial position in the Far East depended largely upon its
security.
Upon the refusal of the German government to comply with
the terms of the ultimatum, Japan forthwith declared war,
August 23. The reasons for this step were set forth by Baron
Nanking
JAPAN'S POSITIOS III RELATION TO
KOBEA. KIAO-CHAO AND CHINA
Kato, the Japanese foreign minister: ''Early in August the
British government asked the Imperial (Japanese) government
for assistance under the terms of the Anglo- Japanese agreement
of alliance. German men-of-war and armed vessels were then
prowHng the seas of eastern Asia to the serious menace of our
commerce and that of our ally, while in Kiao-chao Germany was
busy with warlike preparations, apparently for the purpose of
making a base for warlike operations in eastern Asia. Grave
anxiety was thus felt for the maintenance of the peace of the Far
East. As all are aware, the agreement of alliance between
Japan and Great Britain has for its object, the consolidation and
maintenance of the general peace in eastern Asia, insuring the
independence and integrity of China as well as the principle of
equal opportunities for the commerce and industry of all nations
in that country, and the maintenance and defense respectively
64 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
of the territorial rights and of the special interests of the con-
tracting parties in eastern Asia. . . . Germany's possession of
a base for powerful activities in one corner of the Far East was
not only a serious obstacle to the maintenance of permanent
peace, but also was in conflict with the more immediate interests
of the Japanese Empire. The Japanese government, therefore,
resolved to comply with the British request, and, if necessary,
to open hostilities against Germany."
In addition to her desire to fulfill her obligations as Great
Britain's ally, Japan was undoubtedly actuated also by the
lingering resentment which had been aroused by the Kaiser's
references to the ''Yellow Peril" and by the part Germany had
played in preventing Japan from retaining Port Arthur in 1895
after the Chino- Japanese War.
Four days after the declaration of war, the Japanese navy
estabhshed a blockade of Kiao-chao ; and on September 2, 10,000
Japanese troops were landed on the Shantung peninsula outside
the German leased territory. This landing, and the subsequent
seizure of the Shantung railway in the Chinese hinterland, con-
stituted a technical violation of China's neutrahty and called
forth formal protests from Berlin and from Pekin. A small
British East Indian force of 1360 men arrived in September to
cooperate with the Japanese landing party, which was raised to
the strength of 23,000 men under the command of General Kamio.
On September 28, Tsing-tao was fully invested by the Anglo-
Japanese expedition and the siege begun. Bombardment by
two German cruisers in the harbor and a sortie by the garrison
failed to dislodge the assailants. Prince Heinrich hill, easily
carried by assault, was crowned with Japanese guns which on
the last day of October opened the final attack with the aid of
Japanese and British warships. The German forts, powerful
though they were, could not withstand the terrific fire. By
November 6 the forts had been silenced, and the word for an
infantry assault was given by General Kamio. Early the next
morning the attacking party discovered that white flags had been
hoisted in the city. The articles of capitulation were soon
signed, and on November 10, 1914, the German governor for-
mally handed over Kiao-chao to Japan. In addition to the
valuable naval base, Japan had captured 3000 German prisoners.
The Japanese landing party had lost 236 killed and 1282
wounded; the British, 12 killed and 61 wounded.
In the meantime Japanese naval forces were cooperating with
the British in the conquest of Germany's island possessions in the
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS 65
Pacific. Japan sent no troops to Europe, but her participation
in the Great War served the cause of the AlHes in several ways.
It deprived the swift German commerce-raiders of a most impor-
tant base in the Far East ; it hastened the conquest of the German
colonies ; it enabled Great Britain to rest easier about her Indian
Empire and her Chinese interests while she was centering her
military efforts in western Europe ; and it secured protection for
Russia from attacks in the rear and a steady, uninterrupted flow
of munitions of war from Japan and from America.
THE CONQUEST OF THE GERMAN COLONIES
It had been recognized that in case of war between Germany
and Great Britain, the latter's naval superiority would normally
admit of the conquest of the former's colonies and "spheres of
influence" in Asia, Africa, and the Pacific Islands. When the
war actually came in 19 14, the Germans trusted to two factors
which, they hoped, might delay, if not altogether prevent, the
reduction of their colonies. In the first place, mindful of an old
dictum that the destinies of the world are settled upon the battle-
fields of Europe, they planned to strike their enemies on the
Continent with such overwhelming military might that Great
Britain could not spare soldiers from Europe for expeditions
overseas and with such decisive results that any colonies which
might temporarily have been occupied by hostile forces would
be permanently restored as compensation for concessions from
the conqueror of Europe. In the second place, the Germans had
long cherished the notion that the whole British Empire was
seething with discontent and sedition and that when war came
Great Britain would be too embarrassed by revolts of her own
subjects in Ireland, Canada, India, and South Africa, to bother
about the conquest of new and foreign troublesome areas.
Obviously the first of these factors on which the Germans
depended was not quite operative even after a whole year of war
had gone by. Germany had not yet won a decision on the battle-
fields of Europe; France and Great Britain were fully holding
their own on the Western Front, and in the East Russia was
putting up an unexpectedly stubborn resistance. It might well
be that the old dictum was fallacious, and that a greater measure
of truth was contained in the argument that while other Powers
wore themselves out on the battlefields of Europe the nation
possessing superior sea power would conquer the four Great
Continents. A protracted war had not been counted on by
66 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Germany, but by the summer of 191 5 the Great War promised
to.be protracted.
Nor did the domestic poKtics of the British Empire during the
critical first year of the war conform to German expectations.
There were no serious and all-absorbing revolts anywhere.
Many Irishmen were disgruntled that the Home Rule Act, passed
in 1 9 14, was not immediately put into effect ; but John Redmond,
the CathoHc leader of the Nationalist party, joined with Sir
Edward Carson, the fiery Ulster Unionist, in promising united
Irish defense against German aggression, and thousands of
Irishmen, including several Irish members of ParHament, vol-
unteered for active service in the British army. In Canada,
there were many bickerings between English-speaking and
French-speaking colonists over the language question in the
schools, but early in the war French Canadians vied with British
Canadians, and Liberal followers of Sir Wilfred Laurier with
Conservative partisans of Sir Robert Borden, in offering their
lives and their goods to the Empire; by October, 191 5, the Do-
minion of Canada, with a population less than that of the state
of New York, had obtained a volunteer army of 200,000 men, of
which the larger part was already in overseas service. From the
outset no disloyalty was expected from Newfoundland, Aus-
tralia, or New Zealand ; but as time went on, these self-governing
British dominions surpassed expectations. Up to July, 191 5,
Australia had furnished 100,000 troops to the Allies ; New Zea-
land, 20,000 ; and Newfoundland, 3000. All these had contrib-
uted funds beyond their proportional share; and the two South
Pacific dominions had, in addition, given valuable naval assist-
ance to the Anglo- Japanese fleets. India was the more amazing.
In spite of systematic attempts on the part of German agents and
spies to fan the persistent spark of native unrest into the flame
of widespread rebellion, India remained comparatively calm and
loyal; numerous Indian princes contributed to British armies
and to British funds; in January, 191 5, Lord Hardinge, the
viceroy, declared that 200,000 Indian troops were then serving
in the active British forces at the front. Only in South Africa
was there anything resembling armed revolt.
In South Africa, especially in the Transvaal and the Orange
Free State, the resentment which some of the Boers still cherished
against their British conquerors combined with the prevalence
of acute industrial disquiet to pave the way for the insurrection
headed by three veteran generals of the Boer War — Beyers,
Maritz, and DeWet. However, General Louis Botha, the prime
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS 67
minister of the South African Union, who himself had once
borne arms against Great Britain, now remained unflinchingly
loyal, and with him the ablest of the Boer commanders. General
Smuts. The EngHsh-speaking South Africans and a majority of
the Boers supported General Botha's attitude of loyalty to the
Empire ; only a Boer minority sympathized with the rebellion.
The efforts of the rebels had to be confined to guerrilla warfare,
and by the close of 19 14 had proved fruitless. Beyers had been
drowned, DeWet taken prisoner, and Maritz pursued into Ger-
man Southwest Africa. Late in December, 1914, the Union
minister of justice stated that 4000 ex-rebels were in prison and
1000 on parole. Leniency was uniformly shown the rank and
file in the trials which ensued; and in 191 5 Generals Botha and
Smuts were aiding the British powerfully in the conquest of
German Southwest Africa and German East Africa. In Great
Britain General Smuts was received as a conquering hero.
Under such actual circumstances, the British, with their undis-
puted mastery of the seas, had no great difliculty in mastering
the German colonies. German Samoa surrendered to an expedi-
tionary force from New Zealand on August 28, 19 14. Aus-
tralian troops occupied Herbertshohe, the seat of government
for the Bismarck Archipelago and the Solomon Islands, on
September 11, and captured Kaiser Wilhelmsland, September
24-25. In October a Japanese fleet took possession of the Mar-
shall, Marianne, and CaroHne Islands. By an arrangement
effected in November, 19 14, the islands north of the equator were
to be administered by Japan ; Samoa, by New Zealand ; and the
other islands south of the equator, by Australia. The German
flag had vanished from the South Seas.
In Africa slower progress was made in reducing the German
colonies, for they were defended by fairly strong garrisons of
German and native troops. To be sure, Togo, the narrow strip
on the northern coast of the Gulf of Guinea, was conquered on
August 27, 1 9 14, by Anglo-French forces from the adjacent Brit-
ish colony of Gold Coast and the French protectorate of Dahomey.
But elsewhere serious obstacles were encountered. German
Southwest Africa was invaded by forces from the Union of South
Africa, and Liideritz Bay was occupied in September, 1914; but
the outbreak of the Boer rebellion in the Union necessitated the
recall of the South African troops and temporarily delayed mil-
itary operations against the Germans. In July, 191 5, however,
the conquest of German Southwest Africa was carried to com-
pletion by General Botha. Meanwhile, a French expedition
68 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
from Equatorial Africa and British expeditions from Nigeria had
been penetrating into the jungles and fastnesses of Kamerun;
it was not until February, 1916, that they were able to overcome
both the natural difficulties and the German commander's stub-
born defense and to put the whole area under Anglo-French rule.
In East Africa the German flag waved longest. Though Ger-
man East Africa bordered on two British colonies and on Belgian
Congo, its conquest proved difficult by reason of its inaccessi-
bility from the hinterland and also by reason of the marked
resourcefulness and real abihty of the German commander. Gen-
eral von Lettow-Vorbeck, and the loyal and efficient aid which
the native troops rendered their German officers. At the end of
1914 the coast was under blockade, but a British advance from
South Africa waited on the crushing of the Boer rebellion and the
subjugation of German Southwest Africa, and an attempted
invasion from British East Africa along the shores of Victoria
Nyanza had been checked. In 191 6, after long and difficult
campaigning on the part of a South African expeditionary force
under the tireless and energetic leadership of General Smuts, the
Germans were driven out of the northern and central portions of
the colony. In June, 191 7, a new offensive was begun and carried
on relentlessly, so that in November von Lettow-Vorbeck with a
slender column fled into Portuguese East Africa. Here, in 19 18,
incessantly chased, he made his way south nearly as far as the
Zambesi ; then, retracing his steps, he came again in September
into German East Africa, whence he sought refuge in northern
Rhodesia and finally surrendered to the British on November 14,
1 91 8. The surrender of von Lettow-Vorbeck ended the last
phase of German overseas control.
The conquest of the whole German colonial empire was more
than a proof of the naval superiority of Great Britain. It was
clear evidence of the fact that the British Empire was less a
family relationship of mother-country and subject colonies than
an alliance, defensive and offensive, between Great Britain and
British commonwealths beyond the sea. Australians and New
Zealanders who by force of arms had secured an imperial domain
from Germany in the South Seas, and South Africans who had
subjugated the vast tracts of German Southwest Africa and
German East Africa, would be even less Ukely than their British
kinsfolk in Europe to view with favor the return of their con-
quests to Germany after the war ; they were now by self-interest
as well as by sentiment thoroughly committed to the fight with
Germany, to the settling once for all, as between Teuton and
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS 69
Anglo-Saxon, of the leadership not merely of Europe but of the
whole world. To English-speaking peoples the globe over, it
seemed as if the stakes in the old historic conflict for commercial
and colonial supremacy between Englishman and Spaniard or
between Englishman and Frenchman were pitiful indeed in com-
parison with these mighty universal stakes of the twentieth
century between British and Germans.
TURKEY'S SUPPORT OF GERMANY
For at least twenty years prior to the outbreak of the Great
War, German influence had been steadily growing in the Otto-
man Empire. German military offlcers had reorganized, trained,
and equipped the Turkish army. German business-men had
exploited the natural resources and trade of Turkey. German
capitalists were constructing the Anatolian and Bagdad railways^
which stretched from the Bosphorus to the Persian Gulf. Ger-
man ambassadors and foreign secretaries had repeatedly posed
as champions of the integrity of the Ottomon Empire and had
exerted themselves on many occasions to bolster up the declining
fortunes of the Sultan and to apologize for acts of the Turkish
government which outraged the conscience of Christian Europe.
In fact, by the year 19 14 Turkey was regarded both politically
and economically as a German ^'sphere of influence," and dis-
tinguished German publicists, Hke Friedrich Naumann and Paul
Rohrbach, were extolling the mission of Germany as the leading
Power in a federation of ^' Mittel-Europa,'' a federation that
would include Austria-Hungary, Turkey, and certain Balkan
states, and would dominate the economic and political life of
the varied peoples from the Baltic and North Seas to Bagdad
and ports on the Persian Gulf.
Many Englishmen had come to feel before the war that the
scheme of a Germanized Mittel-Europa, especially the scheme
for the Bagdad railway, was not only a promise of great economic
gain to Germany but a threat against British ascendency in
India and in Egypt. Russian imperialists, also, grew fearful,
as they beheld the strengthening of German influence at Con-
stantinople, lest their ancient dream of restoring an Eastern
Empire under a Muscovite Tsar would never be realized. It was
primarily against Germany's designs in Turkey and in Persia
that Russia and Great Britain had concluded their entente in
1907 ; and thenceforth, the Entente Powers, including France,
had been arrayed against the Teutonic Powers in nearly all dip-
70 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
lomatic manoeuvers involving Turkey. On most occasions the
Teutonic Powers professed to champion the Turks, while the
Entente Powers were represented as the enemies of Turkey.
Such was certainly the case in the Balkan War of 1912-1913:
at London, Paris, and Petrograd rejoicing marked the receipt of
news of Turkish defeats and of the shrinkage of Ottoman terri-
tory; regret and grief marked the receipt of the same news at
Berlin and at Vienna. This distinction the Ottoman govern-
ment speedily perceived ; and Enver Pasha, the most conspicu-
ous and influential leader of the dominant Young Turk Party
since the Turkish revolution of 1908 and the national Turkish
hero in the Balkan war of 1912-1913, became an ardent Ger-
manophile. Turkey, under the guidance of Enver Pasha, was
predisposed to support Germany in the crisis of the Great War.
Soon after the declaration of war, two German cruisers in the
Mediterranean, the Goeben and the Breslau, took refuge, as we
have seen, in the harbor of Constantinople. There their German
officers and crews cooperated with German agents and with
Enver Pasha and other Germanophile Turks in inflaming popular
sentiment against the Allies. Some members of the Turkish
ministry hesitated to hazard an actual war with Britain and
Russia, but they could not act independently while their capital
was honeycombed with German propaganda and threatened by
two powerful German cruisers cleared for action. The officers
and men of the cruisers refused to put to sea or to be interned ;
the Turkish government, even if it so desired, did not have ade-
quate means of enforcing its international obligations in this
respect ; the Allies protested ; the Turks answered by abrogating
the *' capitulations," under which foreigners on Ottoman soil had
been tried by judges of their own nationahty; again the AlHes
protested ; the Turks under German pressure replied by closing
the Dardanelles to commerce, thereby cutting Mediterranean
communication with Russia ; again the Allies protested ; and the
Turks joyfully received a fresh batch of officers from Berlin to
prepare them for war.
On October 29, 1914, the Breslau, now masquerading as a
Turkish cruiser, shelled Russian towns on the Black Sea, and
three Turkish torpedo-boats raided the port of Odessa. Finding
the responsible Turkish authorities unwilling or unable to make
reparation for these hostile acts or to take steps to prevent their
repetition, the Allied ambassadors asked for their passports and
left Constantinople. On November 3, Russia proclaimed hos-
tiUties, and two days later Great Britain and France declared
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS 71
war against the Ottoman Empire. Turkey had definitely cast
her lot with Germany and Austria-Hungary.
Turkey could not be of immediate, direct military value to the
Teutonic Powers, for from them she was separated by Bulgaria
and Rumania, both of which were still neutral, and by Serbia,
which was hostile. Turkish armies could not be brought to the
Teutonic battle-lines in France or in Poland. Yet the Germans
welcomed the support of Turkey for two reasons. In the first
place, the Mohammedan Turks were counted upon to stir up the
fellow-Moslem populations of Morocco, Algeria, Egypt, and
India, to engage in a ''Holy War" against Great Britain and
France. In the second place, the Turkish army was expected to
require the attention of a considerable body of Russian and
British troops, who would thus be prevented from participating
in the battles of Galicia and Flanders. Neither of these expec-
tations was fully realized. The "Holy War," it is true, was
solemnly proclaimed at Constantinople on November 15, 19 14,
but despite some spasmodic uprisings in Morocco against French
rule and a certain amount of general Moslem unrest elsewhere,
in the main the Mohammedan subjects of Great Britain and
France gave little heed to the Chief of the Faithful at Constan-
tinople. No general insurrection ensued, and the hoped-for
diversion from the conquest of German colonies overseas was not
forthcoming. Nor were the AlHed forces in Europe seriously
weakened by Turkey's entry into the war. The Russians uti-
lized such forces as they could not easily transport to Poland to
inaugurate their campaign from the Caucasus into Armenia;
the British could depend largely on colonial troops to defend
Egypt and to invade Mesopotamia; and the Alhes might even
count on a timely Mohammedan diversion in their favor within
the Ottoman Empire itself, for the Arabs of the Hedjaz, under their
respected chieftain, the Sherif of Mecca, were disgusted with the
Young Turk regime at Constantinople and were ripe for revolt.
In one way Turkey's entry into the war was a boomerang
against Germany. To Germany the ''sphere of influence" in
Turkey was of far greater economic and political importance
than all her "colonies" in Africa and in the South Seas put to-
gether. The latter, under the German flag, were an obvious and
quick prey to Great Britain's naval superiority, but so long as
Turkey remained out of the war the German sphere of influence
in Anatolia and Mesopotamia was protected by the neutral
Crescent flag. As soon as Turkey entered the war, however,
Great Britain's naval superiority could be brought to bear upon
72 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Germany's interests in the Near East as well as upon her interests
in Africa and Oceanica. If German imperialists were devoted
to a Berlin-to-Bagdad Mittel-Europa project, there were British
imperiahsts whose hearts and minds were set upon a Suez-to-
Singapore South-Asia project. The Ottoman Empire occupied
a strategic position in both schemes. A neutral Turkey, on the
whole, was favorable to German imperialism. A Turkey in
armed alHance with Germany presented a splendid opportunity
for British imperiaHsm.
Coincident with Turkey's entry into the war, the British for-
mally annexed the Greek-speaking island of Cyprus, in ''miUtary
occupation" of which they had been since 1878. On December
17, 1914, the legal status of Egypt was changed by a decision of
the British government: ''In view of the state of war arising
out of the action of Turkey, Egypt is placed under the protection
of His Britannic Majesty, and will henceforth constitute a British
protectorate. The suzerainty of Turkey is thus terminated.
His Majesty's government will adopt all the measures necessary
for the defense of Egypt and the protection of its inhabitants and
interests." At the same time the khedive of Egypt, Abbas II,
who had thrown in his lot with Turkey, was deposed, and the
Egyptian crown was given, with the title of sultan, to Hussein
Kemal Pasha, an uncle of the khedive. Already a British force
from India had landed at the head of the Persian Gulf, had taken
Basra on November 23, and was preparing for an invasion of
Mesopotamia, with Bagdad, three hundred miles up the Tigris,
as the objective. In vain the Turks struggled against their
foes on many fronts : their efforts to invade Russian Caucasia
and to drive the Russians from northwestern Persia were frus-
trated in January, 191 5, and their attacks on the Suez Canal
failed dismally in February, 191 5.
An opportunity of another kind was afforded the AlHes by
Turkey's entry into the war. It might now be possible to dis-
integrate the whole Ottoman Empire and to utilize the extensive
spoils as inducements for strengthening and enlarging the armed
alliance against the Teutonic Powers. Here was an opportunity
for Great Britain and France to undo the work which they had
accompUshed in the Crimean War, and by pledging Constan-
tinople to Russia to bind their Eastern ally more closely to
themselves. Here, too, was an opportunity for the Entente
Powers to draw Italy into a firm alHance with themselves : Italy
had long been anghng in the troubled waters of Near Eastern
diplomacy; she could now be promised Albania and attractive
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS 73
imperialistic concessions in Asiatic Turkey. From Turkish
spoils, moreover, sufficient territorial rewards might be dangled
before the eyes of Balkan statesmen to actuate them to put aside
their mutual jealousies, to reconstitute the Balkan League of 191 2,
and to add the considerable weight of their joint armaments to
the forces of the AlHes. Of the Balkan states, Serbia and Monte-
negro had the least to gain from making war on Turkey, but
they were already serving manfully the Allied cause. Bulgaria,
however, after conquering Adrianople in the First Balkan War,
had been despoiled of that rich prize by the Turks in 1913 ; now,
if she would espouse the cause of the AlUes, she might recover
what she had lost. Greece, likewise, might be rewarded for
timely aid by securing the Greek-speaking cities of Asia Minor,
which were still oppressed by foreign, Turkish rule, but toward
which the free Greeks turned ever longing eyes. A grand alli-
ance cemented between the Balkan States, Italy, Russia, France,
and Great Britain, would admit of the crushing not only of Tur-
key but of Austria-Hungary and Germany. The prospect was
alluring.
Turkey had gone to the support of Germany in October, 1914.
This action, however, did not serve, as the Germans expected,
to stay the conquest of the German colonies by Great Britain.
Rather, it widened the area which the British might master and
the opportunity which British naval superiority could seize.
Nay more, it offered the Allies a chance to terminate the Great
War favorably to their own interests by a noteworthy coup in the
Near East.
GERMANY'S COUNTER-OFFENSIVE ON THE SEAS
It was apparent soon after the outbreak of the Great War that
England was mastering the seas and vast dominions beyond the
seas. Neither rebelHon within the British Empire nor the strug-
gle on the continent of Europe was staying the rapid loss of
German commerce, German colonies, and German ^'spheres of
influence." Japan was assisting Great Britain, and to Germany
Turkey was rapidly becoming a hindrance rather than an aid.
Could not some counter-offensive be undertaken against the
Mistress of the Seas, some measures that would terrify her
merchants and paralyze her industry? Could not Teutonic
*'f rightfulness" succeed where Teutonic force failed?
In attempting to answer these questions, the German author-
ities from the beginning of the war utilized such weapons of
74 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
''{rightfulness" as floating mines, naval raids on unprotected
English coast towns, and the bombardment of populous cities by
Zeppelins and other aircraft. Allusion has already been made
to the planting of mines by the Germans along the North Sea
coasts; these mines caused considerable loss to British and
AlHed shipping.
Moreover, it was occasionally possible for a few very swift
German cruisers to elude the powerful British squadrons in the
North Sea and to conduct a sudden raid along the English and
Scottish coasts. Thus, for example, on November 3, 1914,
German warships threw shells at the towns of Yarmouth and
Lowestoft ; and in a second raid, on December 16, they inflicted
a good deal of damage on three other coast towns. At Hartle-
pool, the only one of the three towns which could be called a
fortified place, 119 persons were killed and over 300 were
wounded. Scarborough suffered less severely, losing eighteen
killed, mostly women and children, and about seventy wounded.
Whitby, the third town to be bombarded on this occasion, re-
ported the destruction of many houses, but only three persons
killed and two wounded. These raids called forth angry pro-
tests from the English press, on the ground that the shelling of
unfortified places, and the kilHng of unsuspecting civilians, was a
needless barbarity and could serve no miHtary purpose. But
obviously the German government considered it as important
to strike terror into the heart of the civiHan as to disarm the
soldier.
This was probably the major purpose of the frequent attacks
made by German aviators on cities Hke London and Dover, to
say nothing of Paris and Antwerp. Bombs dropped from a
Zeppelin or from an airplane might demolish a building or two
and kill a few women and children, but they would hardly
destroy extensive fortifications. Undoubtedly German air-
raids compelled the British to maintain a large defensive air-
force at London and thereby hampered Allied air-offensives on
the fighting front in France, but as a rule they were spectacular
and attracted attention out of all proportion to their real impor-
tance. They were significant, however, in that they brought
the Great War directly home to England's civilian population
and aroused a national rage against the ''Huns." It was the
first time since the Norman Conquest that the soil of England
had been violated by foreign foes ; never before had there been in
England such enthusiastic volunteering for naval defense at
home and for military offense overseas.
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS 75
The chief weapon of the German counter-offensive remains to
be mentioned — the submarine. From the outset Germany
recognized that it would be idle to risk its " supermarine " fleet in
a conflict with the far more powerful British navy. But her sub-
marines she could use to destroy not only belligerent warships
but enemy merchantmen, and even neutral vessels of the latter
sort if they were thought to carry contraband. All the Great
Powers had fleets of submarines at the beginning of the war, but
from the very nature of things only the Teutonic Powers found
general use for submarines. As German warships and German
merchantmen were speedily driven from the seas by British
naval superiority, British submarines had little or nothing to do.
On the other hand, German submarines now had much to do.
France and Russia might be invaded by German armies, but the
only way for Germany to strike directly at Great Britain was by
means of the submarine. The inhabitants of Great Britain, to
live, had to import large quantities of foodstuffs; to finance
their government and their allies in the Great War, they had to
keep their industries going, import raw materials, and export
manufactured goods ; to provide themselves with sufficient muni-
tions of war to cope with militaristic Germany, they had to rely
in part upon the United States. Hence uninterrupted sea-trade
was essential to Great Britain's prosecution of the war. To
most Germans it seemed as if the submarine was providentially
placed in their hands to enable them to achieve what a Napoleon
had not achieved, the breaking of Britain's sea power. By
means of the submarine they would stop the flow of munitions
from America, they would deprive England of her foreign mar-
kets, they would halt the turning of her factory- wheels, they
would bankrupt and starve her, they would obhge her to lift the
blockade she had imposed on Germany, they would ultimately
vanquish her. Germany would then regain a colonial empire
and secure naval superiority. Thereby would the ''freedom of
the seas," in a German sense, be estabhshed.
The Germans imagined that they could count on some aid
from the United States in forwarding their counter-offensive on
the seas. Early in the war the American government, like the
governments of other neutral countries, was strenuously engaged
in controversy with Great Britain over questions of contraband,
blockade, and interference with mails. Most of the historic
claims of the United States for the right of neutral trade in time
of war had been sanctioned by a declaration drawn up at London
in 1909 by authorities on international law, but as it had not
76 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
been formally ratified by all the maritime Powers the United
States could not get Great Britain to observe it in letter or in
spirit. In fact, the British government, ii^ its endeavors to
"starve out" Germany, arbitrarily lengthened the contraband
list, detained and seized cargoes in transit from America to Ger-
many, even from America to neutral Denmark and Holland, and
systematically intercepted and inspected neutral mail. The
result was a notable depression in many American, as well as
German, industries, a rising wave of ill-feehng against England,
and the dispatch of an energetic note of protest by the United
States to Great Britain on December 26, 1914.
On the same day the German government contributed to the
complications of the situation by placing under public control all
of the food supply of the Empire. This meant that no distinction
could henceforth be made between foodstuffs imported into
Germany for military use and similar imports for the use of non-
combatants. Wherefore the British government at once de-
clared that all foodstuffs intended for consumption in Germany
would be treated as contraband. Neutral trade with Germany
was thus practically prohibited, and American grievances against
Great Britain towered higher. A test case was made with the
steamship Wilhelmina, which reached England early in February,
1 91 5, from the United States, loaded with grain for Germany.
She was seized by the local authorities and condemned by a
British prize court. It seemed an auspicious moment for the
launching of the German counter-offensive.
So far the operations of German submarines had been re-
stricted to attacks on enemy warships and on a few enemy mer-
chantmen. Now, on February 4, 191 5, Germany announced
that from February 18 onward the waters around the British
Isles would be considered a ''war zone," that every enemy mer-
chant vessel found there "would be destroyed without its always
being possible to warn the crew or passengers of the dangers
threatening," and that ''even neutral ships would be exposed to
danger in the war zone." This proclamation heralded the
beginning of the great German counter-offensive on the seas,
unrestricted submarine warfare.
Grave dangers lurked in the counter-offensive, for the sub-
marine was a novel weapon for the purpose and one whose status
was not at all expKcitly established by international usage.
According to recognized rules of international law the pro-
cedure for capture of merchantmen at sea was fairly simple :
the merchantman must first be warned and ordered to undergo
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS
77
search; if then the merchantman resisted, she might be sunk;
otherwise the enemy warship might place a prize crew on the
captured merchantman and take her to port, or might sink her
provided the safety of her passengers and crew was assured.
But this procedure, quite appHcable to an ordinary warship, was
strikingly inapplicable to a submarine. In the first place, a sub-
marine had to attack quickly and without warning, for its frail
construction would make it an easy prey, if observed, even for
merchantmen. Secondly, the crew of a submarine was so small
that members could not be spared to constitute a prize crew on
a captured merchantman. And thirdly, a submarine was so
slight that it could not itself provide for the safety of the pas-
78 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
sengers and crew of a merchantman which it might sink. To
sink a merchantman by a first shot and to leave all persons on
board to shift for themselves as best they could, was the only
practicable method of "capture" by German submarines. For
this kind of "capture" there was absolutely no authority in
international custom or wont.
A twofold embarrassment now confronted the United States
and other neutral countries. On the one hand, trade with
Germany was cut off by the British. On the other hand, trade
with Great Britain was menaced by German submarines, and not
only trade but lives of neutral citizens also. On February lo,
1 91 5, the American government sent a communication to the
German government, calHng attention to the serious difficulties
that might arise if the contemplated policy of waging unre-
stricted submarine warfare were carried out, and declaring that
it would hold Germany to a "strict accountabihty " if any mer-
chant vessel of the United States was destroyed or citizens of
the United States lost their lives.
American expostulations ehcited from Berhn as well as from
London only nicely- worded "explanatory " and " supplementary "
notes. The situation grew ever more embarrassing to neutrals.
On the one hand, Mr. Asquith, the British premier, declared on
March i that Great Britain and France, in retaliation for Ger-
many's declaration of the "war zone" around the British Isles,
would confiscate all goods of "presumed enemy destination,
ownership, or origin" ; no neutral vessel sailing from a German
port would be allowed to proceed, and no vessel would be suffered
to sail to any German port. On the other hand, Germany pro-
ceeded to carry out her threats in the "war zone." In March,
191 5, an American citizen lost his life in the sinking of a British
steamship ; on April 28 an American vessel was attacked by a
German airplane ; and three days later an assault upon an Amer-
ican steamer by a submarine caused the death of three American
citizens.
Before the government of the United States had formulated
any action in connection with these cases, the whole civilized
world was shocked at the terrible news that the unarmed Cunard
Line steamship Liisitania had been sunk on May 7, 191 5, by a
German submarine off Old Head of Kinsale at the southeastern
point of Ireland, with the loss of 1195 lives, of whom 114 were
known to be American citizens. The first feeling of horror at the
catastrophe was succeeded in the United States by a feehng of
bitter resentment at what was certainly a ruthless sacrifice of
GREAT BRITAIN MASTERS THE SEAS 79
innocent civilians. It appeared at first as if a break between the
United States and Germany was immediately inevitable. Pres-
ident Wilson, however, was resolved to act "with dehberation
as well as with firmness," and there ensued a protracted inter-
change of diplomatic notes between the American and German
governments, interspersed now and then with new submarine
outrages and with new crises. The United States was not the
only neutral Power which suffered from Germany's counter-
offensive ; the Scandinavian countries, Holland, Spain, and Latin
America suffered serious losses, too. But the United States was
a Great Power, and one whose friendship Germany could ill
afford to lose.
In spite of widespread German propaganda in America, the
grievances of the United States against Germany came to weigh
more heavily than those against Great Britain. Property rights
alone were involved in the latter, and they could be redressed
after the war in accordance with the arbitration treaty in force
between Great Britain and the United States. Between the
United States and Germany there was no general arbitration
treaty, and even if there were it would be impossible to arbitrate
the loss of human Hfe, in addition to property, which the sub-
marine warfare involved. Germany had counted on American
sympathy, if not active assistance, in her counter-offensive.
She soon found that in practice it aroused American enmity.
How far could she go with it and still keep the United States
neutral ?
During the year 191 5 Germany did not press her counter-
offensive on the seas to the utmost. She was "feehng her way"
with neutral Powers. Yet the sinkings of AlKed merchantmen
in that experimental year were sufficient to convince the German
admiralty that a perfectly ruthless and unrestricted submarine
campaign would compel Great Britain to sue for peace "in six
months at the most." Before undertaking such a final holo-
caust, it would be best, in German opinion, to crush the British
alHes on the Continent. This done, all the resources of Germany
and Austria-Hungary, all their raiding cruisers, all their Zep-
peHns and airplanes, all their subtle submarines, could be brought
to bear upon the task of disputing with Britain the mastery of
the seas and of dominions beyond the seas.
CHAPTER V
THE ALLIES ENDEAVOR TO DOMINATE THE NEAR EAST
ALLIED OPTIMISM IN THE SPRING OF 1915
The events narrated in the three preceding chapters, occurring
simultaneously in the autumn of 19 14 and the winter of 1914-
191 5, gave the Allies confidence in ultimate victory. Germany
had counted upon a speedy, decisive crushing of France and upon
the abiHty of Austria-Hungary to hold the Russians in check until
the joint forces of the Teutonic Powers could overwhelm the
Muscovite ''hordes." Germany had also scoffed at England's
''contemptible Httle army" and had relied upon uprisings within
the British Empire to prevent Great Britain from giving timely
aid to France or Russia. All these calculations had been upset.
France was not crushed. Austria had suffered a Russian inva-
sion of Galicia. No serious revolt had broken out in the British
Empire, and Britain's army in Flanders was growing less and less
"contemptible" as the days went by.
In the West the fighting had been taken out of the open field
and confined to trenches, and the allied French, British, and Bel-
gians were conducting a "war of attrition," gradually "nibbling"
at the German fines and gradually depleting the German forces.
In the East, it is true, the Russian invasion of Galicia had been
offset by a Teutonic invasion of Poland ; several disastrous de-
feats had overtaken Russian armies ; and it was already obvious
that without adequate railway facifities, without proper training
and equipment, and without sufficient ammunition, the Russian
"hordes" could not immediately menace Germany. In short,
by the spring of 191 5 it had become reasonably clear that neither
the efficiency of the Germans nor the numbers of the Russians
would suffice to achieve a quick victory. The Great War was to
be a long war. It was to be an endurance-test, in which mere
battles might play a far less decisive role than political and eco-
nomic factors.
A long war, an endurance-test, appealed more to the Allies than
to the Germans. The outcome of such a struggle would depend
80
ALLIES ATTEMPT TO DOMINATE NEAR EAST 8i
not upon the military might of the moment but upon collective
national resources of men, munitions, and money. And the AlHed
Powers were conceded to be vastly superior to the Teutonic Pow-
ers in latent resources. As Mr. Winston Churchill, the EngUsh
statesman, put it : ''It is not necessary for us to win the war to
push the German line back over all the territory they have ab-
sorbed, nor to pierce it. While the German lines extend far be-
yond their frontiers, while their flag flies over conquered capitals
and subjected provinces, while all the appearances of military
success greet their arms, Germany may be defeated more fatally
in the second or third year of the war than if the Allied armies
had entered Berlin in the first year." The factors upon which
Mr. Churchill, in common with other Allied and pro-Ally ob-
servers, counted to insure the Entente's final victory, may be
indicated in five brief paragraphs.
(i) Resources of Men. The population of Germany, Austria-
Hungary, and Turkey amounted to 140 millions, while that of
the Entente Powers and Belgium exceeded 295 millions. Even
this obvious disparity did not tell the whole tale, for in the latter
figure were not included the teeming millions of India and other
subject states of the British Empire or the population of the French
colonies or of Japan. At the beginning of the w^ar, the Teutonic
Powers, by virtue of their elaborate military preparedness, could
put a relatively larger number of men in the field than their
enemies ; as time went on, however, their initial advantage would
be outweighed and obliterated by the mere weight of numbers
which the Entente Powers could train and dispatch to the front.
(2) Economic Resources. Even should the Allies fail to over-
whelm the Central Empires by sheer weight of numbers, it was
believed that the failure of Germany's economic resources would
bestow the final victory upon the financially invincible coaHtion
of London and Paris. To the student of finance elaborate statis-
tical reviews professed to prove the inevitable bankruptcy of
Germany and the financial solidity of France and England. Ger-
man economists, it is only fair to remark, published similar arrays
of figures to demonstrate the ability of Germany to endure to the
end, thanks to the willingness of her patriotic citizens to invest in
the government's war loans, and thanks to more efficient man-
agement of resources.
(3) Naval Supremacy. With increasing frequency as the war
progressed, allusion was made to the historic parallel between the
present struggle and that of Napoleon with Britain's sea power.
As sea power at the beginning of the nineteenth century had
82 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
overcome invincible armies then, so it was assumed that Eng-
land's superdreadnoughts would overcome Germany's armies in
the twentieth century. Command of the seas enabled the Allies
to utiHze their own resources to the full, to preserve their own
trade, to *' capture" German trade, and to institute a virtual
blockade of Germany. Germany's attempt to break the block-
ade by means of submarines was still in its incipient stage and as
yet promised to achieve little except to anger the United States
and other neutral Powers. It remained to be seen whether
German efficiency, which had already staved off a food crisis,
could so wisely regulate the economic life of the nation, and so
advantageously exploit the resources of Belgium, Poland, and
Turkey, that the British navy would be unable to reverse the
victories of German armies.
(4) Prospect of Domestic Disturbances. In measure as the
Germans lost hope of Moslem rebellions in India, in Egypt, and
in Morocco, and of popular uprisings against the British and
French governments, the Allies grew more optimistic about the
chance of revolution within the Teutonic countries. It became
known that a group of ''Minority Socialists" in Germany was
opposing the war and that serious mutinies were developing among
the Czechoslovak and Jugoslav subjects of Austria-Hungary.
It was also thought that the Arabs would rebel against the Turks,
and that the more conservative and reasonable elements in the
Ottoman Empire would become disgusted with Enver Pasha's
Young Turk clique. It was believed that appeals to the cause of
^'liberty, democracy, and humanity," against Prussian ''mili-
tarism" and Turkish "barbarism" would gradually enHst the
sympathy of the "oppressed masses" in the Central Powers and
Turkey. Time would be required for the disillusionment of the
Teutonic people, and time was on the side of the AlHes.
(5) Diplomacy. Allied diplomacy was supposed to be more
adroit and more sympathetic than that of Germany. The Bal-
kan states, because of their hereditary enmity towards the Otto-
man Empire, and Italy, because of her traditional rivalry with
Austria-Hungary, could readily be cultivated by the superior
Allied diplomatists and induced to cast in their lot with the En-
tente Powers. With such an accession of strength and resources
to the AlHes, the defeat of Germany would be a foregone con-
clusion.
Such were the factors which inspired Allied optimism in the
spring of 191 5. To be sure, Germany still had the advantage of
waging the war on "interior" lines and of utilizing more effi-
ALLIES ATTEMPT TO DOMINATE NEAR EAST 83
ciently and economically her available resources. But already
France and Great Britain were taking steps, if not to unify all
their military efforts, at least to reform and strengthen their re-
spective internal administrations with a view to securing some
part of the "efficiency" which Germany enjoyed. In France, as
early as August, 19 14, a non-partisan war cabinet had been
formed under the premiership of Rene Viviani, including two
Sociahsts and such well-known statesmen as Theophile Delcasse,
Alexandre Millerand, Aristide Briand, and Alexandre Ribot.
In Great Britain, Mr. Asquith constituted a "coalition cabinet"
in May, 191 5, including twelve Liberals, eight Unionists, one
Labor member, and Lord Kitchener ; and David Lloyd George,
the ablest of Mr. Asquith's co-laborers, was put in charge of a
newly created ministry of munitions.
In the summer of 19 14, Germany had taken the offensive
against France. By the spring of 191 5 it seemed to France and
Great Britain that the time had arrived for an offensive on their
part. The Balkans were a field ripening for harvest. From the
Balkans might be inaugurated that final offensive which would
put the Teutonic Powers decisively on the defensive. To the
Balkans the Allies turned their attention.
THE ATTACK ON THE DARDANELLES
The key to the Near East was thought to be the Dardanelles,
the long, narrow straits connecting the ^gean and the Sea of
Marmora. Once through the Dardanelles, a victorious AlHed
fleet would have Constantinople at its mercy, and Turkey, if not
wholly eliminated from the war, would at the very least be cut in
two and gravely crippled. All serious danger of Ottoman attacks
on Egypt, Persia, or India would be obviated. The Germans
would be deprived of any control of the Bagdad railway. The
Russian armies in the Caucasus could be largely withdrawn and
sent to reenforce the line in Poland. Moreover, the straits being
opened, Russia would at last find a free outlet for her huge stores
of grain; and the guns and ammunition of which the Russians
were in sore need could be freely and cheaply imported by way of
the Dardanelles and the Black Sea, as fast as the factories of
France, England, and America could produce them.
The moral effect of the capture of Constantinople by the Allies
would be tremendous. Not only would it put new life into the
forces of France, Russia, and Great Britain ; not only would it be
an awe-inspiring lesson to the Mohammedan millions in Egypt
84 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
and in India ; it would also, by increasing the probability of the
Entente's ultimate victory, hasten the decision of wavering neu-
tral nations to join the winning side. Italy was already seeking
important concessions from Austria-Hungary as the price of her
continued neutrality ; the Allies would presently be in a position
to make her better offers as the price of belligerency. Most im-
portant of all, a successful attack upon the Dardanelles would
probably bring the Balkan states into the war on the side of the
Entente. Both Greece and Rumania had Germanophile kings
and mihtary castes that were under the spell of German military
prestige ; in both countries, however, there were popular parties
already favorably disposed to the AlHed cause, and in Greece,
the able prime minister, Eleutherios Venizelos, was known to be
enthusiastically pro- Ally ; only a victory at the Dardanelles was
needed to convince Greece and Rumania that it would be safe
for them to join the Entente. Bulgaria, smarting under the
injuries inflicted upon her by her fellow Balkan states in the war
of 1 913 and restless under her wily King Ferdinand, was suspected
of secret leanings toward the Central Empires ^ ; but in case of
an Allied victory at the Dardanelles, Bulgaria would not dare to
oppose the Entente Powers, for Greece, Serbia, Rumania, and the
Allied forces at Constantinople could completely encircle and
crush her ; the cession to her of Adrianople and Turkish Thrace
might readily resign her to her fate.
Forcing the Dardanelles, the AUied naval authorities had every
reason to believe, would be a difficult and hazardous operation.
To be sure, a British squadron had accomplished the feat in 1807 ;
but that was long ago, and since then the ineffective, antiquated
fortifications in the straits had been replaced by the most modern
and scientific defensive works; expert German advisers had di-
rected the emplacement of formidable batteries to command the
approaches by land and sea ; and 14-inch Krupp guns could now
be trained on an attacking fleet. But if the hazard was great,
the stakes to be won were still greater.
For the sake of a momentous victory the British and French
risked a powerful fleet in the attack on the Dardanelles. During
February, 191 5, the warships which had been watching the en-
trance to the straits since the outbreak of the war were reenforced
by new arrivals, until, at the time the principal assault was de-
^ What was then merely suspected was subsequently established by the dis-
closure of a secret treaty concluded between Bulgaria and Austria in September,
19 14, whereby Bulgaria agreed not to enter into any alliance or arrangement with
the Entente Powers but to attack Rumania, if Rumania, on her part, should side
with the Allies.
ALLIES ATTEMPT TO DOMINATE NEAR EAST 85
livered, there were fifteen British battleships under command
of Vice- Admiral DeRobeck and four French battleships under
Rear- Admiral Guepratte. Altogether the Franco-British fleet
mounted, besides the immense 15-inch guns of the superdread-
nought Queen Elizabeth, almost seventy 12-inch guns and an even
greater number of secondary guns.
On February 19, 191 5, the Allied fleet began a heavy bombard-
ment of the forts at the entrance to the Dardanelles. On the tip
of the Gallipoli peninsula, constituting the northern side of the
entrance, were the fortifications of Sedd-el-Bahr, and on the
southern or Asiatic side, two and three-eighths miles opposite,
were the forts of Kum Kale. After repeated bombardments, the
big guns of the forts were put out of action, and, although landing
parties were beaten off by intrenched Turks, the AlUed battle-
ships could venture early in March into the lower end of the straits
in order to bombard the forts situated fourteen or fifteen miles
from the entrance. These forts, Kilid Bahr on the western shore
and Chanak on the eastern shore, commanding the channel where
it narrowed to about three-quarters of a mile in width, were the
cardinal defenses of the Dardanelles. Here the German advisers
of the Turkish government had planted their 14-inch Krupp guns.
The forts at the entrance had been mere outposts, designed to
delay rather than to stop the invader. The decisive battle would
be the battle for the Narrows.
By March 18, all was ready for the supreme naval effort which
might carry the Anglo-French fleet past the menacing Narrows
and on into the Sea of Marmora. It was thought that the guns
at Chanak had been silenced by a long-range bombardment con-
ducted on previous days from the Gulf of Saros by the Queen
Elizabeth and other British battleships. Now the Allied fleet
steamed toward the Narrows and aimed their fire at Kilid Bahr.
Suddenly forts which were supposed to have been dismantled
blazed forth again, and floating mines were let loose against the
assailants. Three large shells and a mine simultaneously struck
the French ship Bouvet, which immediately sank with all on board.
Another mine destroyed the British ship Irresistible. And a third
demolished the Ocean. Meanwhile Turkish guns from shore
batteries had set the Inflexible on fire, opened an ugly gap in the
armor-plate of the Gaulois, and inflicted severe punishment on
other ships. At twihght the great fleet quietly steamed out of the
straits, followed by a salvo of parting shots from the forts which
it had striven to annihilate. Three first-class battleships and
more than two thousand men had been sacrificed in vain. The
S6
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
naval attack on the Dardanelles had failed. The most modern
battleships had been proved helpless against up-to-date land
batteries.
Instead of admitting defeat and abandoning the Dardanelles
campaign entirely, however, the Allies decided to disembark
Dardanelles Campaign, 19 15
troops on the Gallipoli peninsula in the hope that a land attack
might succeed where the navy had failed. From March 18 to
April 25, 191 5, the fleet passively awaited the arrival of troops on
the scene, contenting itself with preventing the Turks from re-
pairing the ruined forts at Kum Kale and Sedd-el-Bahr. It was
a long wait, fraught with serious consequences. The Allies at
ALLIES ATTEMPT TO DOMINATE NEAR EAST 87
first hoped they could prevail upon Greece and Bulgaria to fur-
nish the necessary troops for the land attack upon the Dardanelles
and Constantinople, but neither Power was particularly heartened
by the Anglo-French naval failure, and both Powers made seem-
ingly exorbitant demands as the price of their assistance. Bul-
garia would not content herself with Adrianople and Thrace;
she must also obtain Kavala from Greece and Macedonia from
Serbia. Greece would not be satisfied with Smyrna and its hin-
terland ; she must have Cyprus, all the ^gean islands, and half
of Albania ; and the idea of making any cessions to Bulgaria was
most distasteful to her. Were the AlHes to grant all the requests
of Bulgaria, they would antagonize their faithful friend Serbia ;
were they fully to satisfy Greek ambitions, they would outrage
those of Italy, for Italy actually held twelve Aegean islands and
had definite designs on Albania and parts of Asia Minor. Italy,
as a Great Power, would eventually be more of an asset to the
AlKes than Greece or Bulgaria, and Italy must not be ahenated.
Despite this difficulty, Venizelos, the Greek premier, would have
accepted the rather vague offer of Cyprus and other territories
and would have ceded Kavala to Bulgaria and given invaluable
mihtary aid to the AlHes on the Gallipoli peninsula, had not King
Constantine sternly forbidden and dismissed him from the min-
istry. As for Bulgaria, King Ferdinand dilly-dallied, played
politics at home and abroad, and sent no troops to Gallipoli.
Unable to procure troops from any of the Balkan states for a
land attack upon the Dardanelles and Constantinople, the Allies
proceeded to collect an army of their own as best they could.
General Joffre, still fearful lest the Germans might break through
his own lines, would spare no troops from the Western Front.
Russia had no means of getting forces to the Dardanelles. Great
Britain's relatively small army at home was needed to offset the
wastage in France. The Allies were not grasping the full signifi-
cance of the Dardanelles enterprise; they were most unfortu-
nately underestimating the results both of success and of failure.
Either they should have abandoned the whole undertaking in
March, 19 15, or they should have moved heaven and earth to
push it to a speedy and decisive result. They did neither.
Late in April, 191 5, an Anglo-French expeditionary force of
120,000 men under the command of Sir Ian Hamilton was at last
ready for a land attack upon the Gallipoli peninsula. A motley
force it was. There were a few British regulars, an Australian
division, a New Zealand division, a detachment of Indian troops,
a division of British Territorials, and some French colonials and
88 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
marines. This heterogeneous aggregation, amounting in all to
three army corps, was destined to attack a much stronger Turkish
army, commanded by a skillful German general, Liman von San-
ders, and ensconced in practically impregnable positions. The
long delay had enabled the Turco- Germans to prepare a most
redoubtable defense.
During the last week of April, the expeditionary forces managed
to effect landings in two different regions of the GalHpoH coast,
one at Suvla Bay and ''Anzac Cove," ^ on the ^Egean shore,
north and across the peninsula from Kilid Bahr, and the other
in the vicinity of Sedd-el-Bahr, at the tip of the peninsula. From
the two regions it was planned that the attackers should advance
respectively southeastwards and northwards, join forces, and
capture Kilid Bahr from the rear. On the tip of the peninsula,
in a three-day battle. May 6-8, the Anglo-French line made a
supreme attempt to expel the Turks from Krithia. By dint of
desperate infantry charges, covered by field and naval artillery,
the AlHes were barely able to advance a thousand yards. To
their intense disappointment and chagrin they discovered that
the terrain had been carefully prepared by expert engineers ; wire
entanglements, concealed trenches, and hidden batteries were
encountered at every turn. Turkish guns on the heights over-
looking Krithia commanded the whole position and were so well
protected that even the heavy guns of the British battleships,
which assisted in the attack, could not disable them. In the other
theater, the '' Anzacs" fought most gallantly and heroically, but,
though they stood their ground against savage Turkish assaults,
they were unable to make any appreciable advance to the south
or to the east. Meanwhile, the fleet, which had been cooperating
with the land forces, was further weakened by the destruction in
May of three more battleships — the Goliath, Triumph, and Ma-
jestic — so that the British Admiralty, thinking discretion the
better part of valor, withdrew the Queen Elizabeth and the other
large battleships from the iEgean. Glory was added to the Brit-
ish navy by exploits of two submarines which had passed the
Narrows and penetrated into the Sea of Marmora, but glory was
small recompense for the general naval failure at the Dardanelles.
On June 4, a third offensive against Krithia was ordered by Sir
Ian Hamilton. Five hundred yards were gained at one point,
but an equal distance was lost at another. This battle marked
* Ari Bumu, called "Anzac Cove" because the Australasians landed there, the
word "Anzac" being composed of the initials of "AustraUan and New Zealand
Army Corps."
ALLIES ATTEMPT TO DOMINATE NEAR EAST 89
the failure of the Allies' campaign on the tip of GallipoK : three
bloody battles had been fought, ammunition had been wasted in
terrific bombardments, and some 55,000 men had been sacrificed ;
yet the principal Turkish positions remained untaken and the
way to KiHd Bahr blocked. The land attack on the Dardanelles
was an even more costly failure than the naval attack.
From February to June, 191 5, the AlHes endeavored by a coup
at the Dardanelles to dominate the Near East. In their immedi-
ate purposes they failed : the straits were still closed ; Constanti-
nople was still a Turkish possession ; Bulgaria and Greece evinced
fewer signs of submitting to AlHed arrangements for their future
welfare. But as the strain between Balkan states and Entente
Powers increased, Italy perceived an opportunity to drive a hard
bargain with the AlKes. The latter, with Italian aid, might over-
awe the Balkans; and thus the domination of the Near East
would be realized, if not through conciliatory diplomatic negotia-
tions direct with Bulgaria and Greece, at least by means of the
might and prestige of the kingdom of Italy. Despite the failure-
of the Allies at the Dardanelles, they still had a good chance of
dominating the Near East. Nay more, if France and Great
Britain stubbornly maintained the defensive on the Western
Front, and Russia pressed her offensive in Galicia, the AlHes had
a capital chance, with the added weight of Italy's strength and
resources, of dominating all Europe.
ITALY'S ENTRY INTO THE WAR
The optimism of the Allies in the spring of 191 5 was shared by
several neutral Powers, notably by Italy. The failure of Ger-
many to crush France and of Austria-Hungary to defend Gahcia
against Russian invasion served in Italy to reawaken the Irre-
dentist agitation for the annexation of ItaHan-speaking districts
of the Dual Monarchy and to quicken imperiaHstic ambitions
for a share of Balkan and Near Eastern spoils. Belligerent
speeches by Italian patriots during the winter and early spring,
when the general situation seemed most favorable to the Allies,
had stimulated popular enthusiasm for war to such a degree in
May, 191 5, that the momentum of anti- Austrian feeHng carried
Italy into the war.
From the Green Book published by the Italian government to
justify its participation in the war, from the information given out
on the other side by the Teutonic governments, and from dis-
closures made by the revolutionary Russian government in No-
90 • A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
vember, 191 7, it is now possible to reconstruct at least the main
outlines of the diplomatic manoeuvers which preceded the Austro-
ItaHan break. A secret treaty, it will be recalled, first negotiated
in 1882, when Italy was full of resentment against France for
seizing Tunis, renewed in 1887, in 189 1, in 1903, and most recently
in 191 2, bound Italy to the Central Powers in the defensive Triple
AlHance. From what we have learned of the provisions of this
secret treaty, it appears that if either or both of her allies, ''with-
out direct provocation on their part," should be attacked by
another Power, Italy would be obliged to join in the war against
the attacking Power. If either ally should be forced to declare
defensive war against a Great Power which menaced its security,
the other members of the Triple AlHance would either join in the
war or '' maintain benevolent neutraHty towards their ally."
At the outbreak of the Great War in August, 1914, Italy had
remained neutral, announcing that, since Germany and Austria-
Hungary were engaged in an offensive war, the casus foederis did
not exist. At the same time the foreign minister, the Germano-
phile Marquis San Giuliano, had construed Italian neutrality as
benevolent toward Germany. As the war progressed, however,
and especially after the death of San Giuliano in December, 19 14,
and the accession to the foreign office of Baron Sidney Sonnino,
in whose ancestry were both Jewish and British elements, the
spirit of Italy's neutrality became less and less '' benevolent,"
and the Italian government began to accuse Austria-Hungary
of violating a clause of the Triple- AlHance treaty which stipulated
that as far as the ''territorial status quo in the East" was con-
cerned, the members of the alliance ''will give reciprocally all
information calculated to enlighten each other concerning their
own intentions and those of other Powers." "Should, however,
the case arise that in the course of events the maintenance of the
status quo in the territory of the Balkans or of the Ottoman coasts
and islands in the Adriatic or the yEgean Sea becomes impossible,
and that, either in consequence of the action of a third Power, or
for any other reason, Austria-Hungary or Italy should be obliged
to change the status quo for their part by a temporary or a perma-
nent occupation, such occupation would take place only after pre-
vious agreement between the two Powers, which would have to
be based upon the principle of a reciprocal compensation for all
territorial or other advantages that either of them might acquire
over and above the existing status quo, and would have to satisfy
the interests and rightful claims of both parties." This clause
had been invoked by Austria-Hungary in the Turco-ItaHan war
ALLIES ATTEMPT TO DOMINATE NEAR EAST 91
of 1911-1912 to restrict Italy's operations against Turkey. In
December, 19 14, it was invoked by Italy to justify a demand for
*' compensation" for the advantages which the attack on Serbia
would probably give the Dual Monarchy. As *' compensation"
Italy demanded not only the port of Avlona on the Albanian
coast, whither an Italian expedition was dispatched late in
December, 19 14, but also direct cessions of Habsburg territory
to Italy.
The Austro-Hungarian government, directed since January by
Baron Burian, naturally objected to the Italian interpretation of
the treaty, yet it could ill afford, in view of the Russian advance in
Galicia, to alienate Italy. Negotiations were therefore carried
on, but with the utmost procrastination on the Austrian side. At
length, on February 21, 191 5, Italy forbade further Austrian opera-
tions in the Balkans until an agreement should have been reached
as to compensations ; and on March 9, Austria-Hungary acceded
in principle to Italy's threat. The German government, which
had consistently urged the concihation of Italy and had sent
Prince von Biilow to urge moderation in Italy, offered to guar-
antee the execution of whatever terms should be agreed upon.
The Itahan demands on Austria-Hungary, as formulated finally
on April 8, 191 5, embraced (i) the cession of Trentino up to the
boundary of 181 1, the towns of Rovereto, Trent, and Bozen;
(2) an extension of the eastern Italian frontier along the Isonzo
river to include the strong positions of Tolmino, Gorizia, Gra-
disca, and Monfalcone; (3) the erection of Trieste into an
autonomous state ; (4) the cession of several Dalmatian islands ;
(5) the recognition of Italian sovereignty over Avlona, and the
declaration of Austria-Hungary's disinterestedness in Albania
and in the twelve ^Egean islands. Austria-Hungary absolutely
refused the second, third, and fourth demands, and modified the
first by reserving Bozen. Besides, Austria-Hungary was averse
from making any cessions to Italy until the end of the war ; and she
set up a counter-demand that Italy should promise perfect neu-
trality in respect of herself and Germany so long as the war might
last. The Italian government, on its side, felt that it had been
daUied with and rebuffed by Austria and that Germany's ^'guar-
antees " were not very impressive. Germany had once guaranteed
the neutrality of Belgium and had then rebuked Great Britain
for minding a ''scrap of paper." Germany now promised to
guarantee cessions of Austrian territory at the conclusion of
hostihties, but if she should be defeated, as seemed probable, she
would be in no position to fulfill her engagements, and if by chance
92 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
she should win, she most Hkely would laugh at Italy's ''scrap
of paper."
All this transpired just at the time when the Entente Powers
were conducting their Dardanelles campaign and were encoun-
tering serious difficulties in obtaining support from Greece and
Bulgaria. It was a splendid opportunity for ItaHan diplomatists.
The latter were in a position to utilize Allied offers to raise the
offer of Austria, and then to utilize Austrian concessions to raise
the offers of the Allies. Italy was apparently willing to sell to
the highest bidder, and the Entente could bid higher than the
Teutonic Powers. The Entente Powers could promise large
sUces of Austria to Italy without hurting themselves in the least,
and in the Near East, in the existing emergency, they could
promise enormous imperialistic profits. The fulfillment of the
Entente's promises would be Kke that of Germany's, ''at the
conclusion of the war," but the Entente had every motive for
keeping its word which Germany lacked, and the Entente was
more Hkely in the long run to win the war than were the Teutonic
Powers. The more protracted were the Austro-Italian negotia-
tions, the more zealously the Allied diplomatists courted Italy
and the harder was the bargain which Italy drove with the Allies.
On May 4, 191 5, Italy denounced her treaty of alliance with
Austria-Hungary. Already, on April 26, Italy had signed a
secret agreement at London with representatives of Great Britain,
France, and Russia, whereby she was to receive Trentino, all
southern Tyrol to the Brenner Pass, Trieste, Gorizia, and Gra-
disca, the provinces of Istria and Dalmatia, and all the Austrian
islands in the Adriatic. Italy, moreover, was to annex Avlona
and its neighborhood although she was not to object if it were
later decided to apportion parts of Albania to Montenegro, Serbia,
and Greece. Besides, Italy was to strengthen her hold on Libya,
and, in the event of an increase of French and British dominion
in Africa at the expense of Germany, she was to have the right
of enlarging hers. Finally, Italy was to retain the twelve Greek-
speaking islands in the JEgesm and to secure on the partition of
Turkey a share, commensurate with those of France, Great Brit-
ain, and Russia, in the basin of the Mediterranean and more
specifically in that part of it contiguous to the Turkish province
of Adalia. By an additional article, "France, England, and
Russia obligate themselves to support Italy in her desire for the
non-admittance of the Holy See to any kind of diplomatic steps
for the conclusion of peace or the regulation of questions arising
from the present war."
ALLIES ATTEMPT TO DOMINATE NEAR EAST 93
While this amazing treaty was being signed, Italy was prepar-
ing for war. Before the final rupture, Austria-Hungary, unaware
of the Entente agreement, made a last attempt to purchase Italy's
neutrality. According to a statement made by Bethmann-Holl-
weg, the German chancellor, on May 18, the Dual Monarchy
JERMANY ^<^
■" *^ A Ur' S J, U S T Y R I A /'
f Mrnvt ' ^■"^hlenzA ^ Spittal /
/ /Trent J
offered: (i) The Italian part of Tyrol; (2) the western bank
of the Isonzo, ''in so far as the population is purely Italian," and
the town of Gradisca; (3) sovereignty over Avlona and a free
hand in Albania ; (4) special privileges for ItaKan-speaking sub-
jects of Austria-Hungary; (5) ''Trieste to be made an imperial
94 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
free city, with an administration giving an Italian character to
the city, and with an Italian university." Moreover, the Austro-
Hungarian government accepted the previous ItaHan demand
that the cessions should be made as soon as the new boundaries
could be deHmited, instead of awaiting the conclusion of the war.
Signor Salandra, the Italian premier, was already committed to
the Allies, and now, having tested the strength of the war-spirit
in Italy by tentatively resigning, was so confident of popular sup-
port that he abruptly broke ofif further bargaining. On the
evening of May 23, 191 5, the Italian government announced that
war against Austria-Hungary would begin the following day.
Italian intervention in the war must not be regarded simply as
the culmination of the government's haggling over patches of terri-
tory. Italy went to war first of all because the people had been
aroused by wild enthusiasm for a war of emancipation to redeem
the ItaHan populations of Trentino and Trieste from the heredi-
tary enemy of Italian national unity. At the same time chauvin-
istic journals had begun to preach the doctrine that Italy as a
great and growing Power, as the modern heir to ''the grandeur
that was Rome," must estabHsh an hegemony of the Adriatic
and reach out for imperial dominion in the East. While chau-
vinists were frankly urging an aggressive war for colonial ex-
pansion, humanitarians and liberals and radicals were exhorting
the Italian nation to join in the defense of civilization, democracy,
and liberty, against Austro-German militaristic imperialism.
These three powerful sentiments — anti-Austrian nationalism,
aggressive imperiaHsm, and an ti- German liberaHsm — enabled
a majority of the Italian people to accept with approval, if
not with jubilation, the result of the diplomatic manoeuvers.
The SociaHsts objected ; Giolitti and a few other pro-German
politicians were pacifistic ; some clericals at the outset were op-
posed to war with Catholic Austria. The opposition was com-
posed of numbers too few and of elements too diverse to affect
the course of events.
The ItaHan declaration of war, as might have been expected,
was received with delight in France and England, with deep re-
sentment in the Teutonic countries. It is significant, however,
that notwithstanding its abhorrence of Italy's ''treachery," the
German government did not declare war against Italy ^ ; prob-
ably Germany thought that thereby the way would be left open
for Italy in the future to desert the Entente Powers and to make
a separate peace with Austria-Hungary. As a precaution against
1 Italy, however, declared war against Turkey on August 21, 191 5.
ALLIES ATTEMPT TO DOMINATE NEAR EAST 95
such a contingency, the Allies prevailed upon Italy to adhere on
September 5, 191 5, to the Pact of London ; and by the adherence
of Japan on October 19, five Great Powers — Great Britain,
France, Russia, Italy, and Japan — were then bound individually
not to make peace except in concert.
Italy's entry into the war added to the Allied forces a field
army of one million men and some two million reservists, under
the nominal command of King Victor Emmanuel, and the actual
command of Count Luigi Cadorna, and a navy comprising four
dreadnoughts, ten older battleships, and numerous smaller craft,
under the direction of the Duke of Abruzzi. It was anticipated
by pubhcists in AlHed countries that an attack of the large Italian
army upon Trentino and Trieste, synchronizing with a Serb offen-
sive in Bosnia and with a big Russian thrust from Galicia, would
effectually grind Austria-Hungary between upper and nether
millstones and would speedily compel the Dual Monarchy to sue
for peace. It was expected, raoreover, that without lessening
the efficacy of this major blow Italy would have troops enough
to spare to reenforce the Allies in the Near East. Italy might
help the Anglo-French expedition at the Dardanelles, might aid
the Serbians, and by means of her diplomatic influence at Bu-
charest might prevail upon Rumania to enter the war and par-
ticipate in the division of Habsburg spoils.
The pubhcists were altogether too optimistic. They failed to
recognize the grave handicaps to the Allied cause inherent both
in Italy's military position and in the nature of the secret agree-
ment by which Italy's services had been secured. The secret
agreement, as we know, promised to Italy y^gean islands and
territory in Asia Minor which Greece coveted, and Dalmatia,
which was peopled largely by Jugoslavs and to which for national
and economic reasons Serbia aspired. The result was embarrass-
ing to AlHed diplomacy. The AlHes were already having trouble
enough with King Constantine of Greece, and in taking sides with
Italy in the Graeco-Itahan rivalry they were strengthening the
pro- German Greek king against Venizelos, the pro- Ally Greek
statesman. At the same time, they were endeavoring to satisfy
Bulgarian ambitions by obtaining from Serbia the cession of
Macedonia to Bulgaria, but now that Dalmatia was pledged to
Italy the AlHes had to be pretty vague in promising ''compensa-
tions" to Serbia for the great self-sacrifice they expected from
her. The Serbian government consequently grew more intran-
sigeant about ceding territory to Bulgaria ; Bulgaria grew more
hostile to the Allies; and the Jugoslavs of southern Austria-
96
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Hungary, kinsfolk of the Serbians, gradually feeling that they
were being left in the lurch by the AlHes, temporarily evinced an
unseemly loyalty to the Dual Monarchy. Italy's entry into the
war kept Greece neutral, rendered Bulgaria hostile, and made
Serbia and Montenegro lukewarm. As for Rumania, secret
negotiations were known to have been carried on between that
enterprising state and Italy, and it was confidently beheved that
Italy's declaration of war heralded Rumania's. As we shall
see in the next chapter, however, Rumania's conduct in 191 5
was conditioned less by Italy's declaration of war than by Russia's
overwhelming defeat. With flanks exposed to Teutonic attacks,
Rumania kept the peace.
Temporary diplomatic embarrassment would not have signified
much to the Allies had effective military support come speedily
from the Italians. That it was not forthcoming was most dis-
concerting to optimistic publicists, but it was not the fault of
Italy or of the Italian people. It was the fault of nature and
geography and of the strategic frontier which Austria-Hungary
had cunningly held for many years as protection against a possible
Italian attack. The boundary between Italy and Austria lay
across precipitate snow-clad Alpine peaks, across deep narrow
ravines, across mountain torrents and swiftly flowing streams,
and all the highest points and most accessible passes were on the
Austrian side. To the ItaKan General Staff was presented the
problem of conducting a campaign on one of the most difficult
ALLIES ATTEMPT TO DOMINATE NEAR EAST 97
terrains in Europe. The Austrians required a minimum of troops
to hold positions that both by nature and by artifice were admi-
rably adapted to defense; the ItaHans needed a maximum of
force to take the offensive. This geographical difficulty explains
better than anything else the seemingly long delay of the Italians
in invading Austria. It likewise explains the unwilHngness of
the Itahan government to dispatch troops to Serbia or to the
Dardanelles. Under the circumstances, Italy undoubtedly did
the best she could.
General Cadorna concentrated the main strength of his armies
at the railheads along the southeastern portion of the Austro-
Italian frontier, for an attack in force on positions along the Isonzo
river, just east of the border ; within a week of the declaration
of war the Isonzo had been reached, but there the Italians were
confronted with strongly fortified heights east of the river, from
Monte Nero in the north to Monfalcone and the Carso plateau
on the coast. All summer the Italians struggled bravely but
vainly to master these heights. Meanwhile, against the middle
sector of the Austro-Italian frontier, which is simply a north-
ward-bulging mountain-ridge, General Cadorna sent only a com-
paratively thin fine of troops, with instructions to guard the passes
and prevent an Austrian counter-invasion. The third, or west-
ern, sector of the frontier was formed by the irregular triangle
of Trentino, jutting southward into Italy. The strong popular
sentiment demanding the liberation of the Italian inhabitants
of Trentino, taken in conjunction with the military necessity of
forestalling an Austrian offensive from the commanding heights
of the district, furnished ample justification for an Italian move-
ment against Trentino. With this object, one ItaHan army pene-
trated the blunt apex of the triangle, following up the valley of
the Adige and the basin of Lake Garda towards Rovereto, while
small parties of Italian mountaineers assailed the mountain passes
along both sides of the triangle, threatening Trent from the east
and from the west. It was slow and difficult campaigning, and
great or decisive results were not speedily manifest.
Early in the spring of 191 5 the Allies endeavored to domi-
nate the Near East. Their first attempt — the naval attack on
the Dardanelles — had failed. Then their efforts to obtain mili-
tary assistance from Greece and Bulgaria had been fruitless.
Their next attempt — the land attack on the Gallipoh peninsula
— had netted them no considerable gain. Then they had pre-
vailed upon Italy to enter the war. But Italy could not spare
98 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
troops from her own difficult frontiers for immediate operations
in the Near East. At the outset the domination of the Near East
had seemed to the AlHes a relatively easy, minor affair. By the
summer of 191 5 it had assumed a major importance but had
enormously increased in difficulty. Could the Allies dominate
the Near East? There was still a chance.
Perhaps, though, it was not necessary for the AlKes to domi-
nate the Near East. With intense pressure exerted simultaneously
by Russia and by Italy against the Dual Monarchy, the quick-
est and best way of defeating Germany might he in the collapse
of Austria-Hungary rather than in the fate of the Ottoman Em-
pire and the Near East. To that end it was imperative, however,
that Russia as well as Italy should fight victoriously. The sum-
mer of 191 5 beheld Russia in retreat. It was a critical time.
CHAPTER VI
RUSSIA RETREATS
MACKENSEN'S DRIVE: THE AUSTRIAN RECOVERY OF
GALICIA
Up to the end of April, 191 5, the Russian situation seemed
most promising to the Allies. The Grand Duke Nicholas had
failed to invade East Prussia, but he had successfully defended
Warsaw and other fortified positions in Russian Poland against
repeated Austro-German assaults, while in Galicia he had con-
ducted a brilliant offensive. The Carpathian passes and the
fortresses of Lemberg, Jaroslav, and Przemysl were in his posses-
sion. Cracow was not far from his advanced lines along the
Biala river. All this had been achieved by the Russians during
the autumn of 19 14 and the winter of 1914-1915. Surely,
sufficient time had elapsed to enable the full utiHzation of Russia's
vast reserve of man-power, and the Allies naturally expected
decisive results in the campaign to be waged on the Eastern Front
during the summer of 19 15. The ''miUtary experts" of English
and French journals optimistically debated the question whether
Silesia or Hungary would constitute the field of the final vic-
tories. And the imminent entry of Italy into the war on the
side of the Allies promised to complete the dissolution of the
Dual Monarchy, so gloriously begun by Russian prowess.
In a way the campaign of 191 5 on the Eastern Front was
decisive, but it was decisive in a manner wholly unforeseen by
the AlHes. In the Allies' calculations, too much emphasis had
been put upon man-power and not enough upon machine-power,
too much importance had been attached to numbers and not
enough to efficiency. In an earlier chapter ^ it has been pointed
out that the Russians were fearfully handicapped by a clumsy,
corrupt government, by poor means of communications, and by
a woeful shortage of supplies, and that the Germans not only
had plentiful supplies, excellent railways, and a phenomenal
1 See above, p. 54.
99
100 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
military organization, but also were in a geographical position
which permitted them, a^ soon as the fighting on the Western
Front assumed the character of trench- warfare, to transfer large
forces with dispatch and efficiency to the Eastern Front. But,
above all, Russia was predominantly an agricultural country,
while Germany was a veritable hive of manufacturing and in-
dustry; and it cannot be stated too insistently that the Great
War was a war of machines, that a highly industrialized State
was bound to enjoy a tremendous advantage when pitted against
a peasant-state.
All winter long the factories of Germany had worked day and
night, turning out guns and howitzers and airplanes and rifles
and bombs and shells, preparing with skill and ingenuity for a
great day of reckoning with the Russians. For the Russians
no such preparedness was possible. More men might be brought
up, but what could mere men do empty-handed? Guns and
ammunition could be suppHed in relatively small quantities by
Russian factories, and Russia geographically was almost cut
off from foreign assistance: during the winter of 1914-1915 the
EngHsh and French could ship no suppHes to Archangel or other
White Sea ports because of ice, and none to Black Sea ports
because of the Turks ; supplies from Japan and the United States
could be brought only over sea and then over thousands of
miles of a single rickety railway.
So it is exphcable to us now, though it then amazed and
startled the Allies, that just when Italy entered the war, the
Russian armies, instead of continuing their offensive, were
suddenly put on the defensive and were compelled hurriedly
to retreat from Galicia. With marvelous secrecy and speed
Austro-Hungarian and German armies, aggregating at least
two milHon men, had been concentrated in April, 191 5, for
a prodigious blow in Galicia. In Hungary the armies of General
Boehm-Ermolli and General von Linsingen were ready for a
new assault upon the Carpathian passes. In Bukowina, Gen-
eral von Pflanzer was prepared to resume his advance into south-
eastern Galicia. The main strength of the Austro- German
concentration, however, was directed against the advanced
Russian line in western Galicia along the Donajetz and Biala
rivers from the Vistula through Tarnow to Gorlice and the
Carpathians : here were the Teutonic armies of General von
Woyrsch, the Archduke Joseph Ferdinand, and General von
Mackensen, the guiding genius of the whole Galician movement.
These armies were provided with at least 1500 heavy guns,
RUSSIA RETREATS lOl
thousands of lighter field-pieces, and unlimited supplies of am-
munition.
By sending Linsingen into the Carpathian passes to threaten
Stryj and the railway to Lemberg, Mackensen kept the Russians
in uncertainty as to the point at which the principal attack was
to be dehvered, if indeed the Russians realized at all the grave
danger in which they stood. Then quickly, on May i, 191 5,
the main Austro-German attack began along the Biala river
with an artillery bombardment of unprecedented magnitude.
The opposing Russian trenches were blasted out of existence,
and on the next day Mackensen occupied Gorlice and Tarnow.
After their first reverse in western GaHcia, the Russians fell
back some twenty miles to the eastern bank of the Wisloka.
From this line, too, despite desperate resistance, they were
dislodged on May 7. Dukla Pass, now menaced from both
sides, was abandoned, and large bodies of fugitive Russian troops
were made captive. By the middle of May the Russians were
defending the line of the San in central Galicia.
The battle of the San, one of the most momentous engage-
ments of the war, began on May 15 with a Russian counter-
attack, and ended two days later with the Austro-Germans
crossing the river at Jaroslav, under the personal observation
of the German Emperor. Przemysl, farther south on the San,
held out until June 2. Meanwhile, Linsingen, striking north
through the Carpathians, captured Stryj on June i and advanced
across the Dniester. Although Linsingen was temporarily
checked by General Brussilov, the Austro-German advance
continued to make headway. On June 20, Mackensen captured
Rawaruska, north of Lemberg. Mackensen's victory at Rawar-
uska rendered Lemberg untenable and compelled the Russians
to evacuate the strong line of lakes, river, and marshes which
constituted the ''Grodek position," just west of Lemberg. On
June 22 the Austrians under General Boehm-Ermolli triumphantly
reentered the city which the Russians had taken nine months
before. The fall of Lemberg may be taken as the crowning
achievement of Mackensen's great drive. The Russians had
been driven out of the Carpathian passes in headlong rout;'
Tarnow, Jaroslav, Przemysl, and Lemberg had been reconquered ;
and within an incredibly brief space of time the Russians had
been all but expelled from Galicia (they still held a strip of eastern
Galicia, including Sokal, Brody, and Tarnapol). During
June alone the Teutonic forces captured 145,000 prisoners, 80
heavy guns, and 268 machine guns. In recognition of his brilliant
I02 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
success, Mackensen was appointed a Field Marshal. Archduke
Frederick, commander-in-chief of the Austrian army, was simi-
larly honored.
Mackensen's honors were deserved. In less than two months
he had undone what had taken the Russians nine months to do.
Moreover, with combined German and Austrian armies, he had
succeeded where the Austrians alone had failed. Thereby
was the Austro-German alUance cemented. The Habsburg
Emperor received back his "lost province" from the hands of
a German general, and thenceforth the Dual Monarchy was
absolutely dependent upon the military support and dictation
of the German General Staff. The recovery of Galicia was of
incalculable benefit to the Teutons not only for sentimental
and moral reasons but also for economic and poHtical reasons.
The one substantial conquest of the Allies was lost, and with it
were lost oil-wells, mines, and other natural resources that
were greatly needed by the Germans; with it, too, was lost
any immediate chance of bringing Rumania into the war on the
side of the Allies. The Teutonic recovery of Galicia rendered
Italy's ultimate success in Istria and Trentino slower and more
problematical; at the same time it guaranteed the security of
the Hungarian grain-fields and appeased Count Tisza, the Hun-
garian premier. It was to have far-reaching effects upon the
diplomatic duel then proceeding between Teutons and Allies
in the Balkans.
But the most important benefit which the resources of GaHcia
conferred immediately upon the Teutons was strictly military.
It exposed Russian Poland to an attack on both flanks. Macken-
sen's Drive was but a phase of a grandiose scheme to put Russia
entirely out of the war. The German plan of campaign in Au-
gust, 1914, had been to crush France and then to turn against
Russia. Failing to crush France, the German General Staff
in April, 191 5, had altered their plan; they were now going to
overwhelm Russia and then turn against France.
HINDENBURG'S DRIVE: THE GERMAN CONQUEST OF
POLAND
As soon as Mackensen had cleared the Russians out of the
greater part of GaHcia, Field Marshal von Hindenburg launched
a gigantic offensive against them in Poland. ''Hindenburg's
Drive," as the movement was popularly called, was the mightiest
effort yet put forth in any theater of war. Its aim was obviously
RUSSIA RETREATS
103
(i) to. push the Russians back to a safe distance from Galicia
and East Prussia, (2) to conquer Russian Poland, which the
Teutonic coalition desired for miHtary, economic, and poKtical
reasons, and (3) either to shatter the Russian field armies com-
pletely, or to drive them in a badly battered condition to a strate-
gically disadvantageous position where they would be obhged
to remain comparatively inactive.
To follow the course of Hindenburg's Drive, the reader must
grasp the cardinal significance of Poland's geographical situation
and of her railway system. Russian Poland, it must be
remembered, was a blunt wedge inserted between German East
Prussia and Austrian Galicia; and just as the Russians at the
I04 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
beginning of the war had recognized that they could not safely
advance on Berlin until the Teutons had been expelled from
East Prussia or GaUcia or both, so now Hindenburg fully appre-
ciated the fact that a German offensive simultaneously begun
from GaUcia and from East Prussia would imperil the whole
Russian position in Poland. The first objectives of such an
offensive would be the side of a westward-pointing wedge of rail-
ways — the most important means of communication for the
Russian armies in the field. Of this sharp railway wedge, War-
saw, the capital of Russian Poland, was the apex ; the northern
side was the railway running northeast from Warsaw through
Bialystok, Grodno, Vilna, and Dvinsk to Petrograd ; the southern
side, the railway extending southeast from Warsaw through
Ivangorod, Lublin, Cholm, Kovel, and Rovno to Kiev. Be-
tween the northern and southern sides, the only useful railway
links behind W^arsaw were (i) from Bialystok to Cholm, by way
of B rest-Li tovsk, and (2) from Vilna to Rovno.
The importance of defending Warsaw and its converging rail-
ways was fully realized by the Russian General Staff. The city
itself was strongly fortified, and to the north and northeast a
line of fortresses — Novo Georgievsk, Pultusk, Ostrolenka,
and Ossowietz — made the natural line of the Narew river an
artificially stronger protection against any attack from East
Prussia aimed at the northern side of the railway-wedge ; while
to the southeast the broad Hne of the Vistula with its heavy
fortifications at Ivangorod had been deemed sufficiently strong
to repel a flanking movement from the southwest. It was
reassuring that Hindenburg in his two earher offensives ^ in
Russian Poland had been unable to penetrate beyond these
major lines of defense.
Late in June, 191 5, just after the fall of Lemberg and the loss
of most of Galicia, the Russians were still in possession of the
railway salient centering in Warsaw. Their long battle-Hne
stretched from ,Windau on the Baltic southward in front of
Kovno and Grodno ; bent westward through Ossowietz, Lomza,
Ostrolenka, and Przasnysz ; curved southward again in front
of Pultusk, Novo Georgievsk, and Warsaw; and swept south-
east near Radom, Krasnik, Zamosc, Sokal, Brody, and Tarnapol.
But already the blackest kind of storm-clouds were gathering
on the whole Russian horizon. Mackensen's Drive in Galicia
had served to divert the attention and chief energies of the
Russians to that quarter, and Hindenburg utilized the diversion
^See above, pp. 50-52.
RUSSIA RETREATS 105
to strengthen the whole Teutonic battle-line from the Baltic to
the Vistula. It is estimated that, including Mackensen's forces
in GaUcia, not less than forty-one German and twenty-six Aus-
trian army corps were disposed for the crowning stroke. Russia
could produce equal numbers, but she did not have the rifles,
and above all she did not have the heavy guns and the shells.
Hindenburg's armies were equipped for sledge-hammer blows.
The recovery of GaHcia made it possible for Hindenburg to
direct his great offensive quite differently from the manner in
which he had conducted his earHer and smaller offensives in
Russian Poland. Warsaw would no longer have to be assailed
from the west; it could now be flanked from the southeast.
Mackensen's Drive would be merged into Hindenburg's Drive.
In fact, in the last week of June, Field Marshal von Mackensen,
leaving General von Pflanzer to complete the reconquest of
easternmost Galicia, turned the main group of armies under
his command northward and crossed the border into Russian
Poland. By the middle of July he himself had captured Zamosc
and advanced to within ten miles of Cholm on the southern side
of the Polish railway-wedge, while farther west his lieutenant,
the Archduke Joseph, took Krasnik and threatened the same
railway at Lublin, and ' still farther west another lieutenant,
General von Woyrsch, obtained Radom and drove the Russians
back on their fortress of Ivangorod.
Simultaneously the northern groups of German armies began
to press the Russians. All the way from Novo Georgievsk to
Kovno the pressure was hourly intensified. On July 14, a Ger-
man army captured the town of Przasnysz and crossed the Narew
near Pultusk. In the extreme north, Windau fell on July 20
and the Germans advanced toward Riga. At the south it was
the same story. On July 28 Woyrsch forced the passage of the
Vistula between Warsaw and Ivangorod, and on the next day
Mackensen cut the Warsaw-Kiev railway between Lublin and
Cholm.
The simultaneous attacks on the northern and southern sides
of the Polish rail way- wedge, and the interruption of rail com-
munication toward the southeast rendered the position of the
Russian center at Warsaw and Ivangorod extremely precarious.
At any moment the Teutonic armies might bite into the salient
behind Warsaw, and the Russian center would then be caught
between the jaws of the great German offensive. The Grand
Duke Nicholas, realizing this peril, chose to sacrifice the city
of Warsaw and the fortress of Ivangorod. With feverish haste
io6 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
guns and supplies were dragged out of the doomed places, and
on August 4 the Russians evacuated both Ivangorod and War-
saw. On the morning of August 5, 191 5, a German army under
the command of Prince Leopold of Bavaria entered the PoHsh
capital.
The fall of Warsaw marked the success of the first phase of
Hindenburg's Drive; within a month the Russians had been
forced to abandon the apex and western sections of their rail-
way-wedge. An isolated garrison at Novo Georgievsk, it is
true, held out for a fortnight longer ; but the main body of the
Russian center during the first week of August raced back madly
toward eastern Poland. For a time it seemed as though the
bulk of the Russian field army would be entrapped. But the
able generalship of the Grand Duke Nicholas and the stubborn
defense of Ossowietz, which guarded the northern flank of the
retreating center, enabled the Russians to preserve some form
and order in their ranks.
Despite the loss of Warsaw, the converging point of the main
northern and southern railways in Poland, it might still be possible
for the Russians to maintain communications between the major
portions of these railways by means of the connecting link through
Brest-Litovsk. This, in fact, was the purpose of the secondary
line of Russian defense, to hold the railways from Petrograd
and Riga, through D vinsk, Vilna (protected by Kovno) , Grodno,
Bialystok, Brest-Litovsk, Kovel, and Rovno, to Kiev. If the
Russians could hold this line, they would be in good defensive
position from which in course of time they might start a successful
counter-offensive. This line the Russians were holding by the
middle of August.
The second phase of Hindenburg's Drive consisted of efforts
to drive the Russians from their secondary line before they had
time to organize its defense. In the far north of the long battle-
line the Teutonic invaders encountered the most stubborn resist-
ance and, though they reached the Diina river, they were unable
to capture either Dvinsk or Riga. At Riga a desperate attempt
to land a marine expedition was foiled on August 20 by a naval
victory of the Russians over the Germans in the Gulf. But
the more southern parts of the secondary line speedily proved
as untenable as the Warsaw line.
Already, on August 17, the Brest-Litovsk line was threatened
both to the north and to the south. To the north, the fortress of
Kovno, inadequately prepared against attack, was surrendered
by a Russian general who subsequently was brought up on charges
RUSSIA RETREATS 107
of criminal neglect of duty. In the south, the line was menaced
by Mackensen's continued advance east of Cholm toward Kovel.
On August 18 a German force cut the railway between Bialystok
and Brest-Litovsk. Ossowietz fell five days later. Both Bialy-
stok and Brest-Litovsk were evacuated on August 25, and Grodno
on September 2. In vain the Russians launched a counter-
offensive near Tarnapol, in GaKcia. In vain was their desperate
and imprudent defense of the important railway junction of
Vilna. Here, while they heroically held in check the German
advance from Kovno, other German armies were concentrating
north, south, and east. Finally, on September 18, the Russians
evacuated Vilna and by means of brilliant holding battles man-
aged to extricate themselves with the greatest difficulty from an
impossible position.
With the fall of Vilna, the whole secondary line of Russian
defense, except the northernmost sector from Riga to Dvinsk,
was in Teutonic hands. By the first of October, i9i5,Hinden-
burg's Drive had come virtually to a standstill, and the Russians
rested from their exhausting and demorahzing retreat. The
Russian right wing now held the Diina river from Riga to Dvinsk
and the lake region from Dvinsk to Smorgon (on the Vilna-Minsk
railway) ; the center maintained an almost straight north-and-
south line from Smorgon to the Pripet marshes east of Pinsk;
the left wing was fighting for possession of the Lutsk-Dubno-
Rovno fortress-triangle near the Galician border and was annoy-
ing the Austrians in the vicinity of Tarnapol. All Poland,
together with most of Courland and a strip of Lithuania, was a
Teutonic conquest.
REVIVAL OF POLITICAL UNREST IN RUSSIA
The rapid expulsion of the Russian armies from GaHcia and
Poland produced a marked effect upon the political situation
in Russia. No sooner was Mackensen's Drive well under way
than patriots began to speak out against the incompetence of
the military leaders and the inefficiency and corruption of the
government; and as Mackensen's Drive broadened into Hin-
denburg's, these voices of protest grew more numerous and
louder and angrier. On all sides demands were made for an
early assembhng of the Duma and the formation of a really
''representative" national government.
An autocracy, such as the Russian, might endure through
long periods of piping peace ; it might even acquire new vigor
io8 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
and lease of life by means of military victory. But military
defeat was almost certain to discredit, if not to destroy, it. In
the last war in which Russia had been engaged — the Russo-
Japanese War of 1 904-1 905 — foreign defeats of the Tsar's
troops had been a prelude to domestic revolts against the Tsar's
government. Now, ten years later, would Russian history
repeat itself? That was the question.
In one important respect the situation in 1914-1915 was
fundamentally different from that in 1 904-1 905. The Great
War had a significance to the Russian people far greater than
the Russo-Japanese War. The latter, strictly speaking, had
never been a popular war: it had been fought against ^'yellow
men" in far-off eastern Siberia, and its stakes had been the
Tsar's imperialistic domination over Korea and China ; its re-
verses had been defeats of the Tsar rather than of the Russian
people.
The Great War, on the other hand, was distinctly a national
war which appealed alike to the reason and to the imagination
of the Russian people : it was being fought at home to defend
fellow-Slavic states from Teutonic imperialism; and in the
alliance between the Tsar and the democracies of France, Italy,
and Great Britain, Russian Hberals perceived a means of working
in their country a reformation without a revolution. Early
in the war, all the political parties of Russia, save only an extreme
group of Social Democrats, had pledged unanimous and cordial
support to the Tsar's government.
Nevertheless no country can suffer as Russia suffered from
May to September, 191 5, without a strong reaction. The crowds
of homeless peasants pouring eastwards along every highway,
the troops tattered and torn and driven backwards frequently
in confusion, the endless stream of wounded, were most oppressive
reminders of a huge national calamity. The mere problem of
relief, to say nothing of the problem of preparing new defensive
positions, was enough to strain the capacity of the country to
the utmost. The refugees alone by the first of October were
estimated at two millions. These men had enormous distances
to travel on foot, and shelter had to be provided along the roads
as well as reHef at the end of the journey. Of the armed forces
the casualties were appalling. It was estimated in October,
191 5, that to date Russia had lost half a million men killed, a
million wounded, and another million in prisoners, — a frightful
loss exceeding two and a half milHon able-bodied young Russians.
Worse than all else, there was some justification for the popular
RUSSIA RETREATS 109
impression that much of this loss and most of its attendant
miseries might have been prevented if the Tsar's ministers and
agents had been as soUcitous for their country's welfare as for
court-favor and their own pockets.
Already in June, following Mackensen's Drive, but before
the full extent of the Russian disaster was manifest, Premier
Goremykin had so far yielded to popular criticism of the govern-
ment as to dismiss several officials of proved inefficiency or
corruption. Makarov, the unpopular minister of the interior,
was succeeded by the more Hberal Prince Cherbatov ; and Gen-
eral Soukhomlinov, the boastful and thoroughly dishonest min-
ister of war, was compelled to make way for General Poh-
vanov. These and other changes were in the right direction,
but reform was not drastic enough to satisfy popular critics.
And as Hindenburg's Drive succeeded Mackensen's, popular
unrest and criticism increased.
On August I, 191 5, the anniversary of the outbreak of war,
the Duma was convened to listen to speeches, at once inspiriting
and apologetic, by Rodzianko, president of the Duma, and by
Premier Goremykin. In the eloquent opening address of
Rodzianko, two themes were dominant. First, he gave voice
to the tremendous loyalty and patriotism of the Russian people,
and expressed his belief that 'Hhe steel breasts of her sons"
would unfailingly protect ^' Holy Russia" from the enemy.
However, and this was his second theme, the government must
collaborate with the people in a more democratic spirit. "A
change of the spirit itself and of the administration of the exist-
ing system is necessary." The premier seemed to meet Rod-
zianko halfway, for he declared it his policy ^'to unite in a single
institution and materially to extend the participation of the
representatives of legislative assembHes, pubHc offices, and
Russian industry, in the business of supplying the army with
munitions and in the coordination of measures for the feeding
of the army and the country."
The central feature of Premier Goremykin's plan to enlist
the cooperation of the nation by the creation of advisory boards
including experts and delegates from the towns, from the zem-
stvos, from the Duma, and from the Council of the Empire, to
assist the ministers of war, commerce, communications, and
agriculture, was readily assented to by the Duma. The Pre-
mier's concessions were not enough, however, to satisfy the more
democratic of the nation's representatives, who demanded that
the ministry itself should be reorganized so as to cooperate
no A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
more closely with the Duma. To this course the liberals were
impelled not so much by the actual German victories as by
amazing revelations of the corruption in Russian officialdom.
It became known that German influence was at work in Petrograd
offices as well as on Polish battlefields. It was astounding
that various Russian banks under German manipulation were
endeavoring to ''corner" certain commodities and hamper the
manufacture of munitions for the Russian army, that the Putilov
Armament Company, half of whose stock was controlled by
Krupp, was dismissing workmen or limiting them to a five-hour
day, and that the Russian ministry was taking no effective
steps against these abuses.
Late in August, 191 5, the leaders of the moderate groups in
the Duma finally agreed upon a program of reforms; the
first week in September witnessed the organization of a hloc,
including all the groups of the Duma with the exception of the
Reactionaries at one extreme and the Social Democrats at the
other, on a platform calHng for (i) the reconstruction of the
ministry with a view to the appointment of persons able to com-
mand the nation's confidence, (2) the adoption of a governmental
program calculated to reconcile discontented nationaHties and
concihate aggrieved classes, (3) the reform of local adminis-
tration, (4) the punishment of criminally inefficient commanders
and officials, and (5) the vigorous prosecution of the war. Pro-
fessor Paul Milyukov, the leader of the group of Constitutional
Democrats, became the spokesman of the reform movement.
Here obviously was the golden opportunity for the Tsar to
adopt a moderate program of political reform and thereby
to heighten the loyalty to his person and the enthusiasm for
the war which, despite the most painful mihtary reverses, still
characterized the Russian body-politic. For a brief moment it
appeared as though the Tsar understood the situation and was
resolved to act upon it. On September 5, 191 5, in the darkest
hour of Russian defeat, the Tsar signed an army order announcing
that he himself had taken supreme command.^ ''To-day I have
taken supreme command of all the forces of the sea and land
armies operating in the theater of war. With firm faith in the
clemency of God, with unshakable assurance in final victory,
we shall fulfill our sacred duty to defend our country to the last.
1 The order transferred the Grand Duke Nicholas to the Caucasus. Subse-
quently the action of the Tsar appeared in a less favorable light. The Grand Duke
Nicholas was a very able general, and his removal was later interpreted as the
result less of the Tsar's patriotic initiative than of a sinister court intrigue. See
below, p. 226.
RUSSIA RETREATS iii
We will not dishonor the Russian land." By the appointment
of the popular General Alexeiev as chief of staff, the new gener-
alissimo gave sign to the whole Russian people that so far as the
Autocrat himself was concerned German intrigue and Russian
corruption would not prevail against his purpose to wage the
war to a triumphant end.
As the event proved, the Tsar understood only the mihtary
aspect of the difficult situation in which Russia found herself.
The German Drive speedily came to a standstill, and the Tsar,
taking undeserved credit to himself for this surcease of imminent
miHtary danger, promptly shut his ears to the reforming clamor
in the Duma and throughout the country. The reactionaries
breathed more freely, and a certain sullenness possessed the
souls of the Hberals. It was a crisis whose distant effects no
foreigner and hardly any Russian fully perceived.
Scarcely had the progressive hloc formulated its program of
reform when an imperial ukase was issued, September i6, un-
expectedly proroguing the Duma. Protests were voiced through-
out the country, especially in Moscow, where a congress of the
zemstvos was in session, against this arbitrary exercise of the
Tsar's prerogative. Yet this was only the beginning of a pro-
nounced pohtical change in Russia, guided by the autocrat
and his ministers, not toward reform and democracy, but
straight in the direction of unqualified reaction. Early in
October Prince Cherbatov was superseded as minister of the
interior by Alexis Khvostov, a member of the party of the Ex-
treme Right in the Duma, who declared emphatically and re-
peatedly that "we must strengthen the machinery of authority."
One ministerial change followed another during the autumn and
winter, always more reactionary, until on February i, 191 6,
the very acme of reaction was reached with the retirement of
the octogenarian premier Goremykin and the succession to the
chief ministry of Boris Stiirmer, who was known to be not only
an ultra-conservative and an oppressive landlord but a man of
German descent, and who besides was reputed to be pro-German
in his personal sympathies.
Around the German conquest of Galicia and Poland in the
summer of 191 5, and even more around the unwillingness or
inability of the Tsar's government in the ensuing autumn and
winter fully to understand the resulting feehngs and emotions
of the Russian people, were gradually gathering storm-clouds
of popular misery and popular discontent. Russian losses were
already greater than those of any other country; Russians
112 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
had bled and died more numerously than any other nationality.
Yet what had it all signified ? The loss of Russia's one conquest
and the loss of her richest provinces, the adjournment of the
Duma, and the rise of Boris Stiirmer ! The great bulk of the
Russian people were still enthusiastic about the war and still
resolved to pour out treasure and blood to win it. But they
were coming to care less for the winning of provinces than for
the winning of political and social freedom. They still respected
the Tsar, but against his corrupt and inefficient reactionary
ministers they were growing bitter. The storm-cloud of revolu-
tion, no bigger in September, 191 5, than a man's hand, loomed
gradually larger throughout 1916, until by the end of the year
it promised to overspread the whole Russian sky.
Revolution in Russia would be bound to have marked effects
upon the fortunes of the Great War. As yet, however, in the
autumn of 191 5 revolution was not menacing, and in AlHed
countries fears of Russian defection were not expressed. It
was generally recognized that for some time to come Russia
would be quite unable to recover Poland, much less to threaten
Vienna or Berhn. The *' tidal wave" was stayed. But the
Allies did not yet despair of ultimate aid from Russia. Russia
was not crushed, and even if the Germans should overwhelm
her and precipitate revolution and chaos in Eastern Europe,
they would still have to deal on their Western Front with France
and Great Britain.
FAILURE OF THE ALLIES TO RELIEVE RUSSIA
At the Marne, in September, 19 14, France and Great Britain
had administered a decisive defeat to Germany. In May, 191 5,
Italy had entered the war on the side of the Entente Powers.
In view of these facts, it may seem strange that from May to
September, 191 5, Germany should have been able to win a series
of spectacular victories in Russia, driving her Eastern enemy
out of Galicia and Poland and out of a large section of Lithuania,
and threatening Russia's internal order and security.
The story of German successes against Russia could doubtless
have been differently told if in 191 5 the Italians had been able
to dispatch large forces to the Balkans and simultaneously to
capture Trieste and thence march towards Vienna. In that
case Rumania would probably have entered the war immedi-
ately on the Allied side ; and Germany, instead of being free to
chastise Russia, would have been obliged to come to the assist-
RUSSIA RETREATS 113
ance of her own ally, Austria-Hungary, encompassed on three
sides by enemies and struggling for her very existence. But
the Italians, as we have seen in an earlier chapter,^ were held
back by a most difficult terrain, and they did well in 191 5 to
reach the Isonzo : they could spare no troops for a Balkan ex-
pedition and they not so much as threatened Trieste. Under
the actual circumstances, Rumania preserved a troubled neu-
trality; Austria-Hungary was not seriously menaced on any
side ; and Germany could devote her energies to offensive, rather
than defensive, war.
But, even so, the fate of Russia was not wholly dependent
on an ItaHan drive. On a 600-mile Western Front were French
and British veterans of the victories of the Marne, the Aisne,
and Flanders, and a forward movement of these valorous hosts
in 191 5 might serve independently to bring respite and rehef
to hard-pressed Russians on the Eastern Front. This had been
the chief of AlHed calculations, that Germany, compelled to
stand on the defensive in the West, would be unable to take the
offensive in the East.
Such calculations were purely academic. Despite a lessening
of German numbers on the Western Front, a great AlKed advance
in France and Belgium failed to materiahze in 191 5. Germany
experienced no special difficulty in holding her own in the West
at the very time when she was more than holding her own in
the East. Why the Western Allies failed to relieve Russia re-
quires some explanation.
It will be recalled that by the end of 19 14 the fighting on the
Western Front had assumed the character of trench warfare.
AlHes and Germans faced each other in parallel ditches, from
thirty to two hundred yards apart, extending continuously
from the Alps to the North Sea. Behind the Allied front there
were second and third rows of trenches, and further positions
at intervals in the rear. But the Germans had these, and some-
thing more. Ever since their defeat at the Marne and their
failure to force France to a speedy peace, they had expended
immense ingenuity and labor in preparing defensive positions
whereby with the least possible effort they might be enabled to
retain permanently their first conquests — Belgium and the
rich iron and coal regions of northern France. The ramifications
of their trenches were endless, and great redoubts, almost flush
with the ground, consisting of a labyrinth of trenches and ma-
chine-gun "nests," studded their front. In natural defensive
1 See above, p. 96.
I
114 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
areas, such as the mining districts about Lille and in Lorraine,
every acre contained a fort. ''The German lines in the West
were a fortress in the fullest sense of the word. The day of
manoeuver battles had for the moment gone. There was no
question of envelopment or outflanking, for there were no flanks
to turn. The slow methods of fortress warfare — sap and
mine, battery and assault — were all that remained to the
offensive." ^
In 191 5 the burden of the offensive was on the Allies. They
knew it, and throughout the preceding winter they had been
planning for it. Even before the Germans had begun their
great drives against Russia, the Allies undertook to follow up
their own victories of the autumn of 19 14 by "breaking through"
the formidable new German trench-hnes.
The efforts of the AlUes on the Western Front will be more
readily evaluated if their front is considered as comprising three
sectors : (i) the northern sector, extending over a hundred miles
from the Belgian town of Nieuport, east of Ypres and Armen-
tieres, west of Lille, east of Arras, west of Peronne, east of Roye,
and through Noyon to a point on the Gise river a few miles
north of Compiegne, and held by Belgian and French troops from
Nieuport to Ypres, by British from Ypres to Bethune, and by
French alone from Bethune to the Oise ; (2) the central sector,
exclusively French, from the Oise to Soissons on the Aisne, fol-
lowing the northern bank of the Aisne for perhaps twenty miles,
then swinging southeast through the Champagne country,
northeast of Rheims, through Perthes across the forested ridge
of the Argonne to the Meuse River, just northwest of Verdun ;
(3) the eastern sector, swinging around the great fortifications
of Verdun, bending back sharply to the Meuse at St. Mihiel
(about ten miles south of Verdun), turning east again from St.
Mihiel to strike the Moselle river at a point near the Lorraine
frontier, thence extending southeast and crossing over the crest
of the Vosgeg into Upper Alsace, where Thann was still retained
by the French.
Early in 191 5 attempts were made by the Allies in each of
these sectors to carry opposing German lines. In the central
sector, the French managed to capture Perthes and fought
valiantly but vainly in the vicinity of Soissons. In the eastern
sector, the French made a desperate effort to wipe out the St.
Mihiel salient : small gains were secured on the northern and
southern sides of the wedge, but the main objective was not
* Nelson^ s History of the War, Vol. x, p. 107.
RUSSIA RETREATS 115
achieved. The most ambitious offensive, however, was under-
taken in the northern sector by the British, who by this time
numbered well-nigh half a milHon. Early in the morning of
March 10, 191 5, a terrific bombardment of the German trenches
west of Neuve Chapelle (about two-thirds of the distance from
Arras to Armentieres) and of the village itself prepared the way
for an infantry attack. Before noon the village of Neuve Cha-
pelle, now a smouldering heap of ruins, was completely in British
possession. In the afternoon, however, and on the two succeed-
ing days, the British were unable to push their advantage with
energy ; the Germans were allowed to recover from the surprise
and demorahzation of the sudden bombardment; and conse-
quently the British failed to gain the commanding ridge east
of Neuve Chapelle. At the cost of 13,000 lives, Sir John French
had advanced his line a mile or so, on a front of three miles,
but the great city of Lille, his main objective, was still securely
in German hands.
By the middle of April the Allied offensive in the West had
made small local gains ''nibbling" at the German Knes, but had
failed to accompHsh any strategically important object, either
in the movement toward Lille, in the advance in Champagne,
or in the attack on the St. Mihiel salient. Shortly after the
British offensive had come to a standstill, the British minister of
war. Lord Kitchener, told the House of Lords that the shortage
of munitions was causing him ''very serious anxiety," and Sir
John French's official report of the battle of Neuve Chapelle
likewise referred to the pressing need of *'an almost unKmited
supply of ammunition."
Herein lay the real explanation of Allied failure in 191 5. The
Great War was a war of machines and ammunition as well as of
men. Not only were the Russians deficient in ammunition and
artillery and airplanes, but in 191 5 the French and British
also. To make the first dent on the heavily armored German
trenches of the Western Front required, as the British and French
learned from sorry experience, the employment of all their reserve
cannon and all their reserve shells; to carry any considerable
section of the enemy lines and to "break through" would require
greater reserves than they then possessed.
To add to the discomfiture of the AlKes, the Germans actually
undertook a counter-offensive against Ypres in April and May,
191 5. The Germans did not prepare the way for their attack
by artillery but by a cloud of greenish vapor which a gentle
breeze wafted towards the AlHes' trenches. The vapor, as the
ii6 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Allied troops soon discovered to their amazement and consterna-
tion, was chlorine gas, which chokes and asphyxiates with horrible
effect. The French troops holding the line north of Ypres
broke and fled before this novel and diaboHcally cruel form of
attack, and Ypres itself was saved only by the gallant and dogged
The Second Battle of Ypres, April-May, 191 5
resistance of Canadian troops. After a month's incessant
fighting, the battle of Ypres died down : the Allies had prevented
the Germans from *' breaking through," but the Germans had
greatly reduced the Allied saHent in front of Ypres and
above all had put new fear and new terror into the hearts of
the Allies.
Thenceforth the Allies, and above all the British, labored
zealously and anxiously to supply an equipment of hand-grenades,
bombs, high-explosive shells, machine guns, airplanes, and
respirators (for protection against gas attacks), that would be
adequate for the new needs of trench- warfare. But such an
equipment could not be supphed by day-and-night output of
all the available factories of France and Great Britain, in a week,
or in a month, or even in several months. Meanwhile decisive
engagements on the Western Front must pause. But meanwhile
the Germans, satisfied that they had little to fear from French
RUSSIA RETREATS 117
or British during the next few months and that their own superior
equipment and technique would offset any superiority of Alhed
numbers, hastened to fight decisive engagements on the Eastern
Front. Russia must pay for the unpreparedness of Great Britain
and France.
Chlorine gas — the latest novelty in German ^'frightfulness"
— was emitted against the AlKes at Ypres in April, 1915. On
May I, Mackensen's Drive into Galicia began. And from May
to September occurred that series of sensational thrusts and
triumphs which, as we have already seen, carried German con-
quest into the heart of Russia.
Immediately after the first Russian reverses in GaHcia, Gen-
eral Foch, commanding the northern sector of the Western
Front, sought a diversion by directing his forces again to take
the offensive. On May 9, the French just north of Arras and the
British farther north in the vicinity of Neuve Chapelle simul-
taneously assailed the German trenches. The immediate objec-
tive of the French attack was the important railway center of
Lens ; that of the British was the Aubers ridge east of Neuve
Chapelle ; if successful, from Lens and Aubers the AlHes might
push on toward Lille. But after a month's most sanguinary
struggle the offensive broke down. The British had won ^'the
entire first-line system of trenches" on a front of 3200 yards
and the first and second lines on a front of two miles or more,
but they had not reached Aubers. The French had mastered
the so-called ^'Labyrinth," an intricate maze of trenches and
subterranean tunnels, but Lens remained uncap tured. No
relief was afforded the Russians — and none could be afforded.
In fact the AUies in the summer of 191 5 grew very fearful
lest by spending their small reserve of shells in fruitless assaults
on the German trenches they would be so impoverished of
suppHes that they would be unable to hold their own against a
later great German Drive in the West.^ So the best they could
do was to husband their resources, to hurry munition-production,
to harry the besieging Germans, and to suffer their enemy to
inflict upon their Eastern ally one defeat after another. They
wished to help Russia, but they were impotent.
It was not until late September, when Hindenburg's Drive
was practically completed, that the Alfies on the Western Front
felt themselves sufficiently suppHed with munitions to undertake
1 This fear was rendered acute in July by the success of the German Crown
Prince in advancing his Hues in the Argonne some four hundred yards despite his
supposed inferiority of numbers and his recognized deficiency in commanding
quaUties.
ii8 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
a forward movement. During the summer many thousands of
British soldiers, who before the war had been skilled mechanics,
had been released from active service in France and sent home
for munitions work. In Great Britain, the purchase of raw
materials and the employment of labor had been organized;
every machine-tool factory was under control of a governmental
Ministry of Munitions ; and, in addition to the twenty national
shell factories already in operation, eleven new projectile works
had been estabHshed. In France the situation was even better :
the hope expressed in the summer, that by October the full
complement of French shells would be attained, seemed hkely
to be realized.
In September, 191 5, intense activity of Allied aviators and
furious bombardment of the German trenches in France heralded
the beginning of a forward movement. The infantry attack
began on September 25. While unimportant assaults were
delivered near Ypres, and at other points along the line, the main
attacks were concentrated at two points, the* one in Artois just
north of Arras, the other in Champagne midway between Rheims
and Verdun.
In the Artois region the initial onset met with brilHant success.
A French army under General d'Urbal, north of Arras, captured
Souchez and reached the ridge dominating the town of Vimy.
Sir John French reported that cooperating British troops ^' carried
the enemy's first and most powerful line of intrenchments,
extending from our extreme right flank at Grenay (just west of
Lens) to a point north of the Hohenzollern redoubt — a dis-
tance of 6500 yards. The position was exceptionally strong,
consisting of a double Hne, which included some large redoubts
and a network of trenches and bomb-proof shelters. Dugouts
were constructed at short intervals all along the line, some
of them being large caves thirty feet below the ground." British
troops succeeded, moreover, in occupying the village of Loos and
the outskirts of Hulluck between Lens and La Bassee. ''The
enemy's second line posts were taken, the commanding position
known as Hill 70 in advance [east] of Loos was finally captured,
and a strong line was established and consolidated in close prox-
imity to the German third and last line."
Meanwhile, in Champagne, according to an official report,
the French under General Castelnau, during September 26-
27, ''succeeded north of Souain and Perthes in occupying a
front facing north, and in contact with the German second line,
along a stretch of seven and a half miles. The ground thus
RUSSIA RETREATS
119
conquered represented an area of some fifteen and a half square
miles, and was traversed by lines of trenches graduated to a
great depth. The borders of the woods were organized for
defense, and innumerable passages, trenches, and parallels
facilitated resistance foot by foot."
After the shock of the initial attack, however, the Allies failed
to press on, as popular critics expected, to capture the German
railway connections at Lens in Artois and at Somme-Py in Cham-
pagne. In Champagne, to be sure, the French captured the
village of Tahure, October 6, and further slight gains were made
in Artois, but the whole movement reached a standstill by the
middle of October. It was patent that, despite feverish activity
of Allied factories throughout the summer, the Germans still
enjoyed a superiority in munitions-production besides an almost
impregnable defensive position, and that to drive the Germans
out of France and Belgium would be a terribly difficult task.
I20 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Though France and Great Britain by their repeated failures
in 191 5 had displayed their inabihty to prevent Germany from
administering decisive defeats to Russia, they had more than
held their own. They had learned some valuable lessons in
trench- warfare by sad experience. They had, with severe
losses to themselves, considerably depleted Germany's man-
power, — and in the long run they could afford depletion of
man-power better than Germany. Most important of all,
they had utiHzed the lull in Germany's attacks upon them in
order to forge new weapons in constantly augmenting quantities.
They had failed to reheve Russia, but the great Drives of Mack-
ensen and Hindenburg against Russia had absorbed Germany's
attention and energies and had prevented her from crippHng
France and Great Britain in their weakest hour.^ As the event
subsequently proved, Russia had reheved Great Britain and
France.
In the meantime bitter criticism was heard in England, and
profound disappointment was expressed in France. In Ger-
many the latest forward movement of the AlHes was regarded
as a costly failure, and a clear proof of the abihty of the Germans,
with their superior technique, to hold their lines in France against
heavy numerical odds. Of the September movement alone a
BerHn report estimated the French casualties at 130,000, the
British at 60,000, and the German at 40,000.^ Sure of them-
selves in the West and elated at their continuous triumphs
in the East, the Germans were now quite obsessed by the mad
genius of *' grandeur." The Kaiser and the General Staff looked
about for new worlds to conquer.
1 In Great Britain, especially, zeal for recruiting and determination to win the
war were immeasurably heightened, despite Russian reverses, by continued German
outrages in Belgium, notably by the "judicial murder," on October 12, 191 5, of
Edith Cavell, a brave English nurse in Brussels, who had aided the escape of
wounded British prisoners.
2 The French General Staff estimated the German losses at 200,000.
CHAPTER VII
GERMANY MASTERS THE NEAR EAST
DECLINE OF ALLIED PRESTIGE
The year 191 5 marked the height of Teutonic triumph and
the nadir of Allied defeat. To the optimism of the AlHes at
the beginning of the year rapidly succeeded a profound pessimism
which speedily affected neutral countries, especially the waver-
ing Balkan states. In the spring of 191 5 the Allies had set out
with high hopes to dominate the Near East, but a series of
mistakes and misfortunes dashed their hopes and loosened
their hold.
Turkey's entry into the war on the side of the Central Empires
had appeared almost providential to the Allies; if properly
exploited, it might have provided a powerful motive and a
favorable opportunity for reviving the Balkan League and for
employing it not only to dissolve the Ottoman Empire but also
to disintegrate Austria-Hungary and bring Germany to terms.
But the failure of the Anglo-French naval attack on the Darda-
nelles in March and the repeated failures of the Anglo-French
land forces on Gallipoli in May and June signified for the Alhes
a falHng barometer in the Balkans. Thenceforth the barometer
fell rapidly.
In May, Italy was prevailed upon to enter the war on the side
of the Allies, but only by means of the most extravagant promises
of eventual territorial compensations, and territorial compensa-
tions in considerable part at the expense of the Balkan states.
Yet Italy sent no aid to Serbia or to the Dardanelles, and the
progress of her arms against Austria-Hungary in the summer
of 191 5 was not such as to inspire enthusiasm or confidence.
Meanwhile the Russian campaign in Galicia, so promising
in March, met with terrible disaster in May ; and from May to
September the Russians abandoned to the Austro-Germans one
city after another, one province after another. All of GaHcia,
all of Poland, large strips of Lithuania and Courland, became
Teutonic conquests.
122 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
And meanwhile, too, on the Western Front one Allied offensive
after another broke down. Apparently the French and British
could barely hold their own; certainly they could not reUeve
Russia in her hour of supreme need. How could they hope to
aid the Balkan states, if these were minded to declare war against
Turkey and the Central Empires and thereby incur the risk of
invasion by Turco-Teu tonic hosts ?
To regain some of their rapidly waning prestige in the Balkans
the Allies resolved to put forth one supreme effort to clear the
Gallipoli peninsula of Turkish defenders and open the way to
Constantinople. If the heights called Sari Bair, back of Anzac
Cove, could be carried by storm, an attack on the European
defenses of the Dardanelles might be undertaken with reasonable
probability of success. The great effort was made early in
August, just after the Russians had lost Warsaw. While re-
enforcements were landed at Suvla Bay, north of Sari Bair,
Australasian and Indian troops with reckless gallantry charged
up the slopes of the hill. Indians actually succeeded in reaching
a point on the heights whence they could look down upon the
Dardanelles, but they were compelled to fall back for lack of
support. With valor quite equal to that shown by the British
colonials, the Turks swept down the slopes, in the face of a
murderous artillery and machine-gun fire, to dislodge the British
from the footholds which had been gained. On August lo, at
the close of the battle, the British still held some of their gains,
but two commanding positions, which had been won by daring
assaults, had been lost again to the Turks, and the supreme
effort had failed with a loss of 40,000 British troops. In the
trenches at the tip of the Gallipoli peninsula, the Anglo-French
troops were decimated by disease ; before Sari Bair the British
colonials were maddened by thirst in consequence of unpardonable
inefficiency in the management of the water supply. The whole
Dardanelles and GalHpoli exploit was worse than a failure; it
was a disgrace. All things considered, it was small wonder
that by September, 191 5, the Allied barometer in the Balkans
had fallen until it indicated storms and tempests.
Throughout the spring and summer of 191 5 the diplomatists
of the Entente Powers had essayed to reconcile Bulgaria with
Serbia, Greece, and Rumania, and to bring about the joint inter-
vention of the three neutral states — Bulgaria, Greece, and
Rumania. But Bulgaria would not be reconciled unless her
neighbors should relinquish what she believed they had robbed
her of in the Balkan War of 1913 : she must have the Bulgarian
GERMANY MASTERS THE NEAR EAST 123
Dobrudja from Rumania, the towns of Drama and Kavala
from Greece, and from Serbia a wide extent of Macedonia in-
cluding Monastir. Serbia, however, after long negotiations,
was willing to give only partial satisfaction to Bulgaria's Mace-
donian aspirations, for since Italy's entry into the war she had
discovered an unwonted chariness on the part of the Entente
about pledging compensations on the Adriatic for sacrifices she
might make in Macedonia.
In Greece were divided counsels. On one hand, the party of
Premier Venizelos, which controlled the majority of the Greek
ParHament, was ardently in favor of the Entente and eager to
enter the war ; Venizelos felt that concessions might profitably
be made to Bulgaria in view of the prospect of Greece's securing
Smyrna and Cyprus. King Constantine, on the other hand, with
the support of his German-trained army officers, and with the
approval of a popular element, was stubbornly determined not
to join forces with the Entente. The king's refusal to intervene
in the war was perhaps partly ascribable to the influence of his
wife. Queen Sophia, a sister of the German Emperor; doubt-
less also the admiration for German military methods, to which
he had frequently given outspoken expression before the war,
now made him extremely reluctant to hazard his own army in
a struggle against the Central Empires, particularly since the
Entente armies had given no convincing proof as yet of their
ability to win the war. At any rate King Constantine positively
declined to approve any territorial cessions to Bulgaria, assign-
ing patriotic motives, although in so doing he had to part with
his popular premier (March, 19 15) and to ignore the mandate
of a general election (June). When at length, late in August,
Venizelos was reinstated in the premiership, the military situa-
tion was so universally unfavorable to the Entente that even he
promised to maintain neutrality and to countenance no cession
of Greek territory.
Rumania's position throughout this season was not a happy
one. She longed for territorial expansion, but its achievement
involved the solution of a difficult problem of tactics. If she
joined the Entente, she might wrest Transylvania and Bukowina
'from Austria-Hungary. If, on the other hand, she should join
the Central Empires, she might conquer Bessarabia from Russia.
Obviously, she could not ^'eat the cake and keep it too." If
she chose Bessarabia, she could not have Transylvania, and
vice versa her appropriation of Transylvania would bar her from
Bessarabia. Furthermore, her geographical situation was most
124 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
embarrassing. Her irregular and unshapely boundaries ex-
posed her to easy invasion from Russia, from Hungary, and
especially from Bulgaria. On whatever side she chose to fight,
she must be certain that the other sides were securely held by
friends. The royal family in Rumania, though Hohenzollern
by birth, were believed to be somewhat pro- Ally in sentiment ;
and probably a large majority of the Rumanian people hoped for
and expected an eventual Allied victory. It was but natural,
however, that the statesmen of the country should make Bul-
garia's adherence to the Allied cause a prerequisite to Rumania's
participation. Faced on the west by an unvanquished Austria
and on the north by a retreating Russia, Rumania could not view
with equanimity a hostile Bulgaria to the south. So, when
neither Serbia nor Greece would make the concessions demanded
by Bulgaria, Rumania prudently abstained from casting in her
lot with the Entente. And her prudence seemed amply justified
by the reverses and resulting miseries which beset great Russia
in September, 191 5.
The Anglo-French failures at the Dardanelles and on Gallipoli,
the spectacular victories of the Austro- Germans in Russia, and
the powerlessness of Great Britain, France, and Italy to render
effectual assistance to their hard-pressed ally, made the task
of Entente diplomacy in the Balkans difficult and painful. The
prestige of the Allies had reached the vanishing point ; they had
failed to dominate the Near East — and had failed utterly.
But by the same token the prestige of the Teutons had increased ;
their diplomatists found roses where the AlHes had discovered
thorns. Germany laid plans to master the Near East.
BULGARIA'S ENTRY INTO THE WAR AND THE CONQUEST
OF SERBIA
Shifty King Ferdinand of Bulgaria and his faithful henchman.
Premier Radoslavoff, were much-courted personages during the
summer of 191 5. Their active assistance was solicited alike by
Central Empires and by Entente Powers. Knowing full well
that Bulgaria held the balance of power in the Balkans, they
were resolved to sell their country's aid to the highest bidder.
As Radoslavoff said on August 9, ''Bulgaria is fully prepared
and waiting to enter the war the moment she receives absolute
guarantees that by so doing she will obtain that for which other
nations already engaged are striving, namely, the realization
of her national ideals. . . . The bulk of these aspirations lie
I
GERMANY MASTERS THE NEAR EAST 125
in Serbian Macedonia, which with its 1,500,000 Bulgar in-
habitants was pledged and assigned to us at the close of the
first Balkan war. It is still ours by right and principle of na-
tionality. When the Triple Entente can assure us that this
territory will be returned to Bulgaria and our minor claims in
Greek Macedonia and elsewhere realized, the Allies will find us
ready to fight with them. But these guarantees must be real
and absolute. No mere paper ones can be accepted."
It was already apparent to the Bulgarian government that
the offer of Macedonia, if made by the Entente, would not be
concurred in by the parties most vitally concerned, Serbia and
Greece, and could not be carried out by a France and Great
Britain impotent to defeat the Turks, or by a Russia incapable
of defending Warsaw. On the other hand, the Central Empires
promised Bulgaria not only larger Serbian spoils than the Entente
had ever contemplated but also a rectification of her Turkish
boundary, a liberal financial loan, and immediate military aid
by veterans of Mackensen's and Hindenburg's Drives. Ferdinand
and Radoslavoff hesitated no longer. On September 6, 191 5,
they signed at Sofia a secret convention with representatives
of the Dual Monarchy, providing for a joint attack upon Serbia
and for the territorial rewards to Bulgaria.
Bulgaria, in accordance with the secret convention, speedily
concluded arrangements with German bankers for an advance
of fifty million dollars, of which about half was to be paid forth-
with in cash and the remainder appHed to outstanding obUga-
tions.^ Likewise, in September, a treaty was signed with the
Ottoman Empire, whereby Bulgaria was to receive the corner
of European Turkey marked off by the line of the Maritza and
Tunja rivers, including the railway station at Karagatch though
not Adrianople, and in return was to maintain ^' armed neu-
trahty."
At once the Bulgarian army was mobilized "for the main-
tenance of armed neutrality." Sir Edward Grey, manifestly
unconvinced by the official announcement of the Bulgarian
government that mobilization was not preliminary to war, de-
clared in the British House of Commons on September 28, "If
it should result in Bulgaria assuming an aggressive attitude on
the side of our enemies we are prepared to give our friends in
the Balkans all the support in our power." Early in October,
Russia dispatched an ultimatum to Sofia, affirming that "The
presence of German and Austrian officers at the Ministry of
^ This was in addition to an advance of thirty millions made in February, 1915.
126 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
War and on the staff of the army, the concentration of troops
in the zone bordering Serbia, and the extensive financial sup-
port accepted from our enemies by the Sofia cabinet, no longer
leave any doubt as to the object of the military preparations
of Bulgaria." The ultimatum allowed the Bulgarian govern-
ment twenty-four hours in which to dismiss the Teuton officers
and '' openly break with the enemies of the Slav cause and of
Russia."
To the entreaties and threats of the Entente Powers Bul-
garia was deaf. On October 14, 191 5, she declared war on
Serbia. On the next day Great Britain declared war against
her, and France followed suit on October 16, and Russia and
Italy on October 19. Sir Edward Grey admitted that the
Central Powers had successfully outbid the Entente in their
offers for Bulgarian support.
When Bulgaria finally entered the war and began an invasion
of Serbia from the east, the conquest of Serbia was already
under way from the north. It will be recalled that the Great
War had been precipitated by the purpose of Austria-Hungary
to ''chastise" Serbia; yet for more than a year Serbia had re-
mained unchastised. This fact was due not so much to Serbian
valor, of which, however, there were plentiful instances, as to
Austria's need of defending herself against Russia and her
desire not to alienate Italy. The entry of Italy into the war in
May, 191 5, and the subsequent rapid retreat of Russia changed
the aspect of affairs. There was no longer any chance of keep-
ing Italy neutral and the distant retirement and resulting ex-
haustion of the Russians made it practicable for Austria-
Hungary at the end of September, 191 5, to transfer large forces
from the Russian to the Serbian Front. Moreover, the demon-
strated ability of the German troops on the Western Front to
hold the main armies of the French and British rendered it
possible for Germany to send some of her victorious veterans
of the Russian campaign to cooperate with Austrians and Hun-
garians in a sensational, whirlwind drive, whose purpose would
be more than the mere chastisement of Serbia — it would be
Teutonic mastery of the Near East.
Serbia was no longer in a position to thwart the Teutonic
purpose. Her great losses in the battles of 19 14 had been
succeeded by further depletions in 191 5 from pestilence and
famine, until her total armed strength, allowing for the use of
every available man, amounted to less than 200,000. Thrice
she had been invaded and thrice in heroic battles she had flung
GERMANY MASTERS THE NEAR EAST 127
back the invader, but each time the enemy had been Austrian
and in number had barely exceeded her own forces. Now,
however, her northern border was threatened by at least 300,000
Austro- Germans, equipped with the most up-to-date guns and
with unlimited stores of ammunition, flushed with recent victories
over the Russians, and commanded by Field-Marshal von
Mackensen, one of the ablest of German generals. Further-
more, unlike the campaigns of 19 14, Serbia was now doomed to
face an onset of Bulgarian troops, 350,000 strong, who would
cross her extended eastern border and threaten at many points
the capture of her one important line of railway up the Morava
and down the Vardar rivers, her one dependable Hne of com-
munication with Salonica and Western Europe. If no aid should
come to her from Greece or from England and France, she would
certainly be overborne by weight of numbers and quantity of
munitions ; her armies would be surrounded and probably
annihilated.
Austro- German forces were thrown across the Danube and
Save rivers on October 7. Belgrade fell two days later, and
Semendria and Pojarevatz in quick succession. The main body
of Mackensen's command were thus prepared to sweep south-
ward up the Morava valley toward Nish, the Serbian war-
capital, while the left flank possessed itself of the Danube valley
in northeastern Serbia and the right flank crossed the Drina
river and occupied northwestern Serbia. Then it was that
Bulgaria declared war. King Ferdinand scented a corpse and
proceeded to rifle dying Serbia.
The Serbians could barely cope with the Austro- Germans in
the north ; against the Bulgarians in the east and south they
could only oflfer pitifully inadequate resistance and trust in the
prompt arrival of foreign aid from Salonica. No aid arrived,
however, and the Bulgarians enjoyed a triumphal procession
into Macedonia. From Kustendil the main Bulgarian army,
under General Teodorov, advanced by way of Egri Palanka.
Rail connections between Nish and Salonica were cut first at
Vrania. Veles, or Kuprulu, fell on October 20, and two days
later the Bulgarians entered Uskub, the converging point of all
the roads of southern Serbia.
On October 26, another Bulgarian army, under General
Bojadiev, after crossing the Timok river and capturing Negotin
and Prahovo, effected a junction with the Teutonic left wing
in the northeastern corner of Serbia. Thereby the Teu to-
Bulgarian forces were in contact with each other on a wide semi-
128
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
circular front extending from the Drina around north of Kragu-
jevatz, west of Negotin, east of Nish, to a point west of Uskub.
The Serbians now formed two forces, hopelessly isolated by the
Bulgarian advance from Uskub towards Prishtina, the one, the
remnant of the armies of the North, lying from Kragujevatz
to east of Nish, the other and lesser in the hills north of Monastir.
The invaders pushed on relentlessly. Kragujevatz, the
principal Serbian arsenal, was captured on October 30. Nish,
after a stubborn defense, fell on November 6. In vain did the
GERMANY MASTERS THE NEAR EAST 129
Serbian armies of the north attempt to stand at the Ibar river ;
Novibazar was lost on November 20, and Mitrovitza and Prish-
tina three days later ; the remnants were swept together in the
plain of Kossovo by the converging Austrian, German, and
Bulgarian columns. Thousands were taken prisoner, and only
a band of refugees, including King Peter riding in a rude ox-
cart, succeeded in reaching Montenegro.
The last action before the complete conquest of Serbia was
fought by the small army in the south in a desperate effort to
stem the Bulgarian advance from Uskub upon Prisrend and
Monastir. At Babuna Pass, between Uskub and Prilep, the
Serbians checked overwhelmingly superior forces of the enemy
for a week and more. Eventually they had to abandon the
Pass and Prilep as well. Prisrend was surrendered on the last
day of November, and Monastir on December 5. The virtual
completion of the conquest of Serbia was signalized by an an-
nouncement of Field Marshal von Mackensen on November 28,
that "with the flight of the scanty remnants of the Serbian army
into the Albanian mountains our main operations are closed."
FAILURE OF THE ALLIES TO RELIEVE SERBIA: THE
SALONICA EXPEDITION
The only chance which , the Serbians had of stemming in-
vasion and preventing German mastery of the Near East lay
in prompt and effective military aid from the Allies. That
no such aid was forthcoming was due to several miscalculations
on the part of the Allies : (i) it was fondly believed until too
late that Bulgaria would not venture to ally herself with the
Central Empires ; (2) it was vainly expected that if perad venture
Bulgaria should attack Serbia, Greece would feel constrained
by the terms of her defensive treaty of 1913 with Serbia to go to
the assistance of that country ; and (3) it was foolishly imagined
that an immediate transfer of Allied forces from Gallipoli to
Salonica, from an offensive against the Turks to a defensive in
support of Serbia, would be a confession of failure ruinous alike
to domestic and to foreign prestige.
No doubt in the new crisis the Allies had good reason to count
on Greek assistance. Back in March, 191 5, Venizelos had been
forced to resign the Greek premiership because of King Con-
stantine's stubborn refusal to assent to the cession of Greek
territory necessary to reconstitute the Balkan League and to
draw Bulgaria, with Greece, into the war on the side of the
I30 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Entente. In August, however, when it was no longer a question
of conciliating Bulgaria but rather of respecting treaty engage-
ments with Serbia, Venizelos obtained from the king sufficient
assurances to enable him conscientiously to resume the premier-
ship. With Venizelos again in power, the Allies were encouraged.
Late in September, when the Allies first awoke to the gravity
of the situation confronting Serbia, Great Britain and France
promised Venizelos that they would send 150,000 men to Salonica
to help Greece fulfill her treaty obHgations. These obhgations
Venizelos acknowledged in a speech before the Greek Parliament
on October 4. ^'The danger of conflict is great," he said, ''but
we shall none the less fulfill the obhgations imposed on us by our
treaty of alfiance." He called for the complete mobiHzation
of the Greek army. About the same time the first contingent
of AlHed troops arrived at Salonica. It was obvious that the
Greek army of 350,000 men, in concert with an Anglo-French
force, was preparing to strike the Bulgarians as soon as these
should attack Serbia. Had matters worked out as thus planned,
the success of Mackensen's Drive into Serbia would have been
highly problematical.
Once more Venizelos had reckoned without his king. Con-
stantine was thoroughly distrustful of the potency of AlHed
arms and filled with a craven fear of what the combined Teutons
and Bulgarians would do to the Greek army ; quite likely he had
personal promises from the Kaiser of rich rewards for Greece
if he would remain neutral. At any rate on October 5, Con-
stantine for the second time forced the resignation of Venizelos,
to the surprise of the Greeks and the consternation of the AlKes.
The new Greek ministry promptly declared that it would main-
tain ''armed neutrality," but a neutraHty, so far as concerned
the British and French, ''to be characterized by the most com-
plete and sincere benevolence." If this assurance meant any-
thing, it signified that the AlHes might land troops of their own
at Salonica and use Greek Macedonia as a base of operations
against the Bulgarians, but they must not expect any armed
assistance from Greece.
Under these circumstances the Allies fell to disputing as to
what was best to do. Some of their officials urged that the de-
fection of Greece had put a new burden upon them and that they
should strain every nerve to gather quickly a very large army
of their own at Salonica ; the whole Anglo-French expeditionary
force should be withdrawn immediately from GalKpoli for this
purpose, and additional troops, if necessary, should be spared
GERMANY MASTERS THE NEAR EAST 131
from the Western front. Others felt that the burden put upon
them by Greek defection was more than they could bear ; these
disputants protested against any weakening of the Western
Front and against a wholesale withdrawal from Gallipoli ; they
advocated making a virtue of necessity and for the present leav-
ing Serbia to her fate.
Between the extreme counsels of sending no aid to Serbia and
of dispatching large forces thither, a curious compromise pre-
vailed. A few troops would be transported from Gallipoli,
but not all. General Sarrail would be brought from the Western
Front to command the expedition at Salonica, but no troops would
be spared from Marshal Joffre's command in France. An
Anglo-French force would gradually be assembled in Greek
Macedonia, large enough to overawe neutral Greece but small
enough to be of no striking assistance to friendly Serbia.^
Just as a mistaken faith in Bulgaria's good intentions had
prevented the Allies in September from concerting measures
for her coercion, so now in October the AlKes grossly under-
estimated the stubbornness and pro- German sympathies of the
Greek king. They still seemed to imagine that they could get
the Greek army to fight alongside of their Salonica expeditionary
force. Otherwise it is difficult to explain why Anglo-French
forces at Salonica were as large — and as small — as they were.
When, on October 14, 191 5, Bulgaria finally entered the war,
more than 200,000 Austro-Germans under Mackensen were
pushing southward from the Save and the Danube against the
Serbian front, a quarter of a million Bulgarians were moving
westward against Serbia's exposed right flank, to the north
Rumania was comfortably neutral, while far to the south 13,000
French and British troops in the vicinity of Salonica were pre-
paring to march inland, and King Constantine was declaring
that his treaty of alliance with Serbia had no binding force in
the existing emergency.
Throughout October and November the Allies continued to
dicker with King Constantine and his puppet ministers. They
begged and they implored. They made offers and overtures.
In November, the king dissolved his troublesome pro-Venizelist
Parliament, and the ensuing general election, from which the
Greek partisans of Venizelos absented themselves, appeared
1 In this connection it should be noted that Sir Edward Carson, in Great Britain,
and Theophile Delcasse, in France, resigned their ministerial posts rather than
share in the responsibiUty of sending a pitifully weak expeditionary force to certain
failure in Serbia. Carson thought a much larger expedition should be sent. Del-
casse would send no expedition at all.
132 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
on the face of its returns to be a signal vindication of the royal
policy. More obstinately than ever Constantine adhered to
his policy of *' armed neutrahty," which by December had be-
come to the AlHes as much a threat as a promise.
Meanwhile the Teutons and the Bulgarians were overrunning
Serbia, to the effective relief of which the Anglo-French forces
at Salonica were too weak to proceed. General Sarrail's small
army did manage to advance up the Vardar river and to in-
trench itself on a triangle of Serbian territory, the base of
the triangle being the Serbo- Greek frontier, its apex the con-
fluence of the Vardar and Tcherna rivers, its western leg the
Tcherna, and its eastern leg a line to Lake Doiran near the angle
of the Greek, Serbian, and Bulgarian frontiers. As soon as the
Bulgarians had put an end to active Serbian resistance in the
field and had occupied Prisrend and Monastir, they were free
to turn their attention to the AlHed positions in the south. The
battle of the Vardar, from December 3 to 12, 1915, was simply
a series of sledge-hammer blows delivered against the sides of
the Anglo-French triangle. During the course of the battle
the French line was withdrawn from the Tcherna to the eastern
bank of the Vardar, the apex was drawn back to Demir-Kapu,
the British line to the east was battered in, and the whole Anglo-
French force was finally pushed back into Greek territory. The
attempt of the Allies to relieve Serbia had ended in ignominious
failure.
That the battle of the Vardar ended in defeat and not disaster
was due to the ability of the Franco-British army, and the un-
willingness of the Bulgarians, to cross the Serbo- Greek frontier.
While the Bulgarians, doubtless in compliance with Germany's
request, stopped short at the frontier, the Allies retreated through
Greek territory and proceeded to strengthen the Greek city of
Salonica in expectation of a Teutonic-Bulgarian attack. King
Constantine, as might have been expected, caused his subservient
premier, Skouloudis, to protest vociferously against this ''"abuse"
of Greek neutraHty, but the Entente Powers could reply that
their troops had been sent to Salonica at the instance of Venizelos
to assist Greece in fulfilling the terms of the secret Serbo- Greek
defensive alHance against Bulgaria, and this interpretation was
confirmed by the Greek ex-premier from his retirement.
Nevertheless the situation of the Allies at Salonica was preca-
rious in the extreme. In front of them were a quarter of a million
Bulgarian soldiers reenforced by Teutonic and Turkish units,
awaiting only a word from the Kaiser's brother-in-law to cross
GERMANY MASTERS THE NEAR EAST 133
into Greek territory. Behind them were a quarter of a million
Greek soldiers held by King Constantine's orders under an
''armed neutrality" that daily grew more menacing. It was
now no longer a question of relieving Serbia ; it was a question
of reheving the Anglo-French expeditionary force at Salonica.
For this purpose the bulk of the Allied troops on the Gallipoli
peninsula were still available. In October, when General Sarrail
had loudly called for reenforcements to enable him to assume the
offensive in the Vardar valley, Sir Ian Hamilton, the British
commander on Gallipoli, had stoutly maintained that his troops
could not be disembarked thence without incurring disastrous
losses at the hands of the Turks and ruinous collapse of morale.
Sir Ian had been recalled and Lord Kitchener himself had been
sent to investigate the situation in Gallipoli. Withdrawal from
the peninsula was openly advised by General Monro, Sir lan's
successor, frankly discussed by the press, and postponed, it
seemed, only by the unwillingness of the British cabinet to ad-
mit a disheartening defeat at the very time when a supreme ef-
fort was being made at home to stir up popular enthusiasm for
recruiting. Towards the end of December, however, when it
appeared likely that disaster would overtake the expedition at
Salonica, as well as that on Gallipoli, the long-deferred step was
taken and the remaining British troops were withdrawn from the
Suvla Bay and Anzac regions on the western shore. Shortly
afterwards, early in January, 191 6, the trenches on the tip of
the peninsula were abandoned with sHght losses.
The campaign against the Dardanelles, thus brought to an
inglorious close, had cost the British alone from February to
December, 191 5, some 115,000 men, of whom 26,000 were dead.
The most telling criticism of the management of the Dardanelles
operations and at the same time the most vigorous apology for
the higher strategy which had dictated the inauguration of the
campaign, was expressed by Winston Spencer Churchill in a
noteworthy speech before the House of Commons on Novem-
ber 15 : *'It has been proved in this war," he said, ''that good
troops properly supported by artillery can make a direct ad-
vance two or three miles in the face of any defense. The ad-
vance, for instance, which took Neuve Chapelle, or Loos, or
Souchez, if made on the Gallipoli Peninusla, would have settled
the fate of the Turkish army on the promontory, would probably
have decided the whole operation, might have determined the
attitude of the Balkans, might have cut off Germany from the
East, and might have saved Serbia."
134 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
More bitter words could have been said. If Serbian entreaties
had been hearkened to and the whole Allied force on Gallipoli
had been withdrawn immediately after its August reverses and
sent into Serbia, it might have deterred Bulgaria from entering
the war, or, if Bulgaria had persisted, it might have saved Serbia
from Bulgarian conquest and might have upheld the hands of
Venizelos in his quarrel with a pro- German Greek king.
As it was, the Allies had two dismal failures to their debit in
the Near East. They had failed to defeat the Turks and open
the Dardanelles. They had also failed to resist the Bulgarians
and relieve Serbia. One thing only was accomplished : with
the arrival of the Gallipoli expeditionary force at Salonica in
December, 1915, and January, 1916, they were enabled to pre-
vent their Macedonian failure from becoming a disaster. They
now had enough troops to intrench the territory about Salonica
and temporarily to hold Constantine to the observance of
''benevolent neutrality." As to the future, they simply must
await developments. For the present, the developments else-
where in the Near East appeared universally favorable to their
enemies.
COMPLETION OF GERMAN MASTERY OF THE NEAR EAST
In October and November, 191 5, Germany had taken two
important steps toward the mastery of the Near East : the
fairly powerful state of Bulgaria had become her ally, and
troublesome Serbia had been '' chastised" and conquered.
Therefrom did many benefits accrue to the cause of the Central
Empires. In the first place, Turkey was no longer isolated
from her allies, for express trains could now be run from Berlin
to Constantinople by way of Belgrade, Nish, and Sofia, and
German domination of Turkey was strengthened. Secondly,
there were significant economic benefits: not only were the
copper mines of Serbia placed at Germany's disposal, but the
resources of the Balkan peninsula and of the Ottoman Empire
could be freely drawn upon to replenish the stock of foodstuffs
and of minerals in the Central Empires, while on the other hand
a large foreign market was at last procured, despite British
mastery of the seas, for overstocked German manufacturers.
Thirdly, the miUtary advantages were obvious: Turkey and
Bulgaria could now easily be suppKed with guns and munitions
and enabled to utilize their man-power to the full against the
Allies; if unable actually to conquer Egypt and India, Turkey
GERMANY MASTERS THE NEAR EAST 135
could at least so menace those rich outlying dominions of the
British Crown as to frighten the EngUsh and lead perhaps to a
weakening of British resistance on the Western Front. Finally,
the respect for Teutonic military prowess on the part of the two
neutral states in the Near East, — Rumania and Greece, — had
been enormously increased: Greece seemed quite dominated
by her pro- German king; Rumania saw fit to open her grain-
markets to German buyers.
To guarantee their conquest of Serbia, the Teutons and Bul-
garians forthwith set about the conquest of Montenegro and of
Albania, for otherwise these mountainous regions might become
dangerous rallying points for Serb and AlHed forces. In fact,
in December, 191 5, Italian garrisons were occupying the Albanian
ports of Avlona and Durazzo, and as many as 50,000 Serbian
fugitives were being assembled on the Greek island of Corfu
and there reorganized into a fighting force.
It was a fairly easy task to overwhelm Montenegro's little
army of 30,000 men. General von Koevess, with his Austrian
army, in December quickly occupied the towns of Jakova, Ipek,
and Plevlie, on the eastern border of Montenegro ; then, pene-
trating into the interior, his converging columns defeated the
Montenegrins in their last desperate stand in the Tara and Lim
valleys, in January. Meanwhile another Austrian detachment,
attacking the western frontier, from the Austrian harbor of
Cattaro, built military roads up the northern slopes of the
supposedly impregnable but really ill-fortified mountain strong-
hold of Lovtchen, around which wound the steep road to the
capital, Cettinje, five miles distant. After three days' bombard-
ment by the Austrian ships at Cattaro, Mount Lovtchen was
stormed on January 10, 1916. Lovtchen lost, the Montenegrins
made no serious attempt to defend their capital, which fell three
days later. King Nicholas, after some rather questionable
negotiations with the Austrians, made his way to Italy and
thence to France, where at Lyons he established his ^' court."
His fellow-Serb monarch. King Peter, found a more honorable
refuge with the Allied army at Salonica.
Hardly had the Montenegrin capital fallen when General von
Koevess with his Austrians turned southward into Albania.
Scutari and the port of San Giovanni di Medua were captured in
January, 1916, and early in February the Teutonic invaders reached
the heights of Tirana, in central Albania, ten or fifteen miles from
Durazzo. In the meantime Bulgarian forces had crossed into
Albania from southern Serbia and occupied El Bassan. Essad
136 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Pasha, the pro- Ally chief of the provisional Albanian govern-
ment, could offer but feeble resistance to the dual invasion;
and on February 27, the Italians were obliged to evacuate
Durazzo, under fire of Austrian guns. The larger ItaHan garrison
at Avlona, sixty miles south of Durazzo, was not dislodged,
however, so that from Avlona as a base the Italians were able to
dominate south-central Albania, while the northern and eastern
portions of the country remained in Austro-Bulgarian possession.
Thus was the new German rail connection with Constantinople
guaranteed against any hostile attack from the west. Monte-
negro and the strategically important part of Albania, together
with Serbia, were Teutonic conquests. True, an Allied army
was intrenched in the vicinity of Salonica and an ItaHan force
occupied Avlona, but these forces were too few to undertake a
successful counter-offensive : they were fearful of a possible
attack on their rear by the pro- German King Constantine of
Greece ; and in front they faced the stout Bulgarian army, now
flushed with victory and thoroughly loyal to the German alliance.
To the north, Rumania was isolated and wavering in her sym-
pathy for the Entente ; from Rumania, at least for the present,
Germany had nothing to fear. With the withdrawal of the
Anglo-French force from Gallipoli, moreover, no alHed soldier
remained on the soil of European Turkey ; the Ottoman Empire
had proof positive of the worth and value of alliance with Ger-
many, and news of rejoicing at Constantinople could be com-
municated uninterruptedly to Berhn by express- train or by
telegraph. By force and by prestige Germany had mastered
the whole Balkan peninsula. The ''Drang nach Osten" and
" Mittel-Europa " were more than words and wishes; they were
established facts.
It was now that Asiatic Turkey assumed an importance never
before recognized. From Asia Minor Turkish sovereignty
reached out in two directions, — eastward over Armenia and
Mesopotamia to the Persian Gulf and the confines of Russian
and British spheres of influence in Persia, and southward across
Syria and Palestine to the Red Sea and the borders of British
Egypt. Two great arteries traversed these reaches of Turkish
sovereignty, the German-owned Bagdad railway the one, and
the Mecca railway the other. By either route powerful blows
might be struck against British colonial dominion. And to
strike such blows the 200,000 Turkish soldiers who had been
engaged on the Gallipoli Peninsula for nearly a year, were now
available. The ''Drang nach Osten" suddenly assumed a
GERMANY MASTERS THE NEAR EAST 137
terrible significance. It meant not merely the attainment of
German mastery over the Balkans and Constantinople; it
meant also the threat of German mastery of Bagdad and Mecca
and perhaps of Egypt and India.
It was not toward Egypt and the south, however, that the
European Turkish army of 200,000 men was moved in January,
1916, but rather toward Persia and the east. It seemed prefer-
able to employ the entire force for a single end ; and complete
mastery of the Berlin- to-Bagdad route appeared a more service-
able aim than control of the Suez Canal. The difficulties of
campaigning in the desert region between Palestine and Egypt
were much greater, as the Turkish defeats of 19 14 had indicated,
than in the mountains of Armenia and the fertile valleys of
Mesopotamia. The stakes, too, were less significant : to strike
at Egypt might merely interrupt or inconvenience British trade
with the East Indies ; on the other hand, to secure the Persian
Gulf would certainly threaten British India itself. Besides,
while no invasion of the Ottoman Empire had yet been attempted
from Egypt, both British and Russian expeditions were already
in possession of parts of the eastern marches; completely to
rid the Ottoman Empire of Allied armies required an energetic
campaign in Armenia and Mesopotamia.
It will be remembered that soon after Turkey entered the
Great War a small expeditionary force of British regulars and
Indian colonials had been landed at the head of the Persian Gulf
as a sort of outpost of defense for British India. In the summer
of 191 5, without a very distinct purpose and with insignificant
numbers, the expedition pushed on more than two hundred miles
into Mesopotamia, until on September 29, it occupied the town
of Kut-el-Amara on the Tigris. Bagdad, the terminus of the
famous Turco- German railway,^ only a hundred miles farther
up the river, lured the British on, though what they would do
with Bagdad once they occupied it none could say. Perhaps it
was intended to offset in England the chagrin which concurrent
defeats on Gallipoli and in Serbia were causing. At any rate.
General Sir John Nixon, the commander of the expeditionary
force, directed General Townshend to proceed to Bagdad. On
November 22, 191 5, Townshend attacked and carried a line of
Turkish defenses at Ctesiphon, only eighteen miles from the
fabled city of the caliphs. Then the tide turned. Townshend,
^ The actual rail terminus of the Bagdad route was at Samara, seventy-five
miles farther up the river. Bagdad was about 350 miles from the Persian Gulf
by the shortest land route ; by river, it was almost 600 miles distant.
138 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
GERMANY MASTERS THE NEAR EAST 139
overwhelmed by superior numbers, was defeated with a loss of
4500 out of 20,000 men and driven back to Kut-el-Amara, which
was promptly surrounded and invested.
For the rehef of Townshend new British forces were dispatched
from India. Likewise Russian columns were sent to his relief
along the caravan route from Hamadan in Persia. Such was
the situation when Teutonic-Bulgarian victories in Macedonia
assured the security of Constantinople and when Anglo-French
withdrawal from Gallipoli released almost a quarter of a million
Turks for mihtary use elsewhere.
Over the Bagdad railway were transported many of these
Turkish troops, down into the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates.
There, under the able generalship of the German Marshal von
der Goltz, they pressed the siege of Kut-el-Amara and fought
off one relief expedition after another, whether British or Russian.
Doubtless quicker results would have been achieved by the
Turks and their German commander, had it not been for a great
danger which simultaneously threatened them in Armenia and
which might at any time nullify their immediate efforts in Meso-
potamia.
The Grand Duke Nicholas, who, as a result of the Russian
defeats in Poland, had been transferred to the Caucasus in
September, 191 5, had been marshahng an army of 180,000 men
in preparation for a big offensive in Armenia ^ in the spring of
1916, but the plight of the British in Mesopotamia and the re-
lease of 200,000 Turks in January, 191 6, for service in Asia,
decided him to attack forthwith. The very unexpected char-
acter of the attack, in the dead of winter, with roads blocked by
snow and the thermometer registering from twenty to forty
degrees below zero, may account for the ease with which at the
outset the unsuspecting Turks were routed. Under the actual
1 Christian Armenia, throughout the first eight months of 1915, had been the
scene of the most wholesale and cold-blooded massacres in the long history of the
distracted country. At Angora, Bitlis, Mush, Diarbekr, at Trebizond and Van,
even at distant Mosul, many thousands were butchered like sheep, partly by the
gendarmerie, partly by the mob. Women were violated, and they and their chil-
dren were shamelessly sold to Turkish harems and houses of ill-fame. Hundreds of
wretched creatures were driven into the deserts and mountains to perish miserably
of starvation. The protesting voices were few and ineffective : the sheikh-ul-Islam
resigned ; the pope remonstrated ; the American ambassador at Constantinople did
his best. The Turkish Government was obdurate: "I am taking the necessary
steps," its premier told the American ambassador, "to make it impossible for the
Armenians ever to utter the word autonomy during the next fifty years." And the
Germans, quite used themselves to committing outrages in Belgium, shuddered
not at the newest and gravest atrocities inflicted by their friends, the Mohammedan
Turks, upon the hapless and helpless Christian Armenians.
I40 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
command of General Yudenitch, who was intrusted with the
execution of the Grand Duke's design, the Russian columns
advanced south westward from the Russo-Turkish Caucasian
frontier, and about the middle of January, 191 6, began their
march through bleak mountain passes leading into Turkish
Armenia. The northern column isolated one Turkish corps
and drove it rapidly northward to the shores of the Black Sea ;
the southern column cut off two divisions from the main Turkish
army; while the central column, following the highway from
Sarikamish toward Erzerum, inflicted a crushing defeat on three
Turkish divisions at Kuprikeui, January 16-18, and forced the
crossing of the Araxes River in the midst of a blinding snowstorm.
Ruthlessly pursued by Cossack cavalry, the Turkish infantry
retired in disorder, strewing the road from Kuprikeui to Erze-
rum with discarded rifles, abandoned cannon, and half-frozen
stragglers.
Against Erzerum, reputed to be the strongest fortified city in
Asiatic Turkey, General Yudenitch now massed his heavy ar-
tillery. By a brilliant feat of arms a Siberian division planted
its 8-inch guns on supposedly inaccessible peaks commanding
the northernmost of Erzerum's many outlying forts. The
fortified ridge just to the east of the city was thus outflanked
and successfully stormed. Whereupon, without waiting to test
the antiquated inner circle of redoubts and ramparts, the German
staff officers and the Turkish garrison precipitately evacuated
Erzerum, on February 16, 1916, leaving 323 guns and a huge
stock of military supplies to fall into the hands of the victorious
Russians. Only 13,000 prisoners were taken, but the total
Turkish casualties in the whole campaign were estimated at
60,000. The capture of Erzerum was rightly recognized as a
particularly brilliant piece of strategy.
Two days after the fall of Erzerum, the Turks lost the town of
Mush to the southern column of the Grand Duke Nicholas's
invading army, and on March 2, the important city of Bitlis,
south of Erzerum and west of Lake Van. The northern column
of the Russian forces, sweeping the Black Sea coast from Batum
westwards, captured Trebizond on April 18 and pushed on as
far as Platana. By April, 19 16, the greater part of Turkish
Armenia was in Russian hands, and Russia had demonstrated
to the world that despite her sorry reverses of the preceding
summer in Poland and Lithuania she was still in the war and was
still a military power to be reckoned with. Optimists were not
lacking among Entente publicists who perceived in the Grand
GERMANY MASTERS THE NEAR EAST
141
Duke Nicholas's Armenian offensive not only certain relief to
the beleaguered British in Mesopotamia but a probable aid to
Allied fortunes in the Balkans.
Again these Entente publicists were too optimistic. By
April, 1 916, the full force of Turkey's released Gallipoli army
could be brought to bear in Mesopotamia and Armenia. Vigor-
ously did Von der Goltz press the siege of Kut-el-Amara. A
British relief detachment essayed in vain to break its way
through the Turkish line at Sanna-i-yat, sixteen miles east of
Mesopotamia and Its Strategic Position
Kut. So completely was Kut-el-Amara invested that no pro-
visions could be sent to the famished garrison except by air-
plane. Nine tons of suppKes reached General Townshend by
this means in April, but they were not enough. At last the
pressure of hunger constrained Townshend to surrender, on
April 29, 1 91 6, after enduring a siege of 143 days, — the only
example of a protracted siege, except that of Przemysl, in the
whole course of the Great War. Depleted by fighting and
famine, Townshend's force at the time of surrender numbered
only eight thousand men. Responsibility for the disastrous
Bagdad venture of the British rested not so much on General
142 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Townshend as on General Nixon and the military authorities
in India. Public opinion concurred in the verdict of a prominent
British historian of the war that "on every ground of strategy
and common sense" Townshend's expedition "was unjustifiable."
The fall of Kut-el-Amara enabled the Turks thenceforth to
devote almost all their force and energy to staying further ad-
vance of the Russians in Armenia. It is true that the Grand
Duke Nicholas enjoyed a brief good fortune in July, 1916 ; he
then advanced to, and captured, the city of Erzingian, no miles
west of Erzerum. But this marked the high tide of Russian
success. Thenceforth the Russians in Asiatic Turkey were
strictly on the defensive, and in August, BitHs was abandoned.
In the meantime the Russian column which had gone to the relief
of the British in Mesopotamia was routed by the Turks and
pursued back into Persia, past Kerind, Kermanshah, and Hama-
dan. If the Turks had lost part of Armenia, they had at least
saved Bagdad and carried the war into Persia.
By the summer of 191 6, Germany, with the aid of Austria-
Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey, had transformed "Mittel-
Europa" from a dream to a reality and had pushed far the
"Drang nach Osten." She now enjoyed uninterrupted and
unmenaced communication and commerce with Constantinople
not only, but far away, over the two great arteries of Asiatic
Turkey, with Damascus, Jerusalem, and Mecca, and with Bagdad
likewise. Her vassal Ottomans were actually striking into Persia ;
they might yet irrupt into India. With the exception of some
Italians in inaccessible southern Albania, an Allied force at
precarious Salonica, a Russian army in mountainous Armenia,
and a'handful of British at the head of the Persian Gulf, Germany
was unopposed in her mastery of that whole vast region of south-
eastern Europe and southwestern Asia which goes by the name
of the Near East.
To her spectacular defeat of Russia and conquest of Poland
was thus added Germany's equally spectacular mastery of the
Near East. But was Germany thereby really winning the
Great War? Not so long as there was an unyielding Western
Front. To win the war, Germany simply must smash allied
resistance in France.
CHAPTER VIII
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916
TEUTONIC OPTIMISM AT THE BEGINNING OF 1916
If military exploits had been as conclusive as they had been
spectacular, Germany should have won the Great War in 19 16
and imposed a Pax Germanica upon the world. Certainly the
most spectacular achievements at arms from August, 19 14, to
January, 19 16, had been Teutonic; and German statesmen and
pubHcists expressed a puzzled inabihty to understand the stub-
born refusal of the Entente Powers to sue for peace.
Spectacular had been the Teutonic ^'drives." In 1914 Bel-
gium and the richest section of France had been overrun and
occupied by German armies. In the summer of 191 5 the Russian
''steam roller" had been trundled back from GaHcia and from
Russian Poland to the Riga-Dvinsk-Tarnopol line in a badly bat-
tered condition. In the autumn of 191 5 Bulgaria had been won
over to the Turco-Teutonic coalition and had helped Field Mar-
shal von Mackensen to conquer Serbia and master the Near East.
As a result of these spectacular '' drives," the armed forces of
the Central Empires not only had preserved their own lands
practically inviolate, but had obtained extensive and valuable
conquests at their opponents' expense. It was notable that
whereas not a single Entente soldier stood on the soil of Germany
or Austria-Hungary, except a few Frenchmen in one corner of
upper Alsace and some ItaKans on a narrow strip near the
Isonzo, the territory dominated by the Teutonic alliance had been
expanded to embrace Belgium, northern France, Poland, parts
of Lithuania and the Baltic Provinces, Serbia, Montenegro, and
a portion of Albania. With the adherence of Turkey and Bul-
garia to the Teutonic Alliance, and the triumphs of those states
at the close of 191 5, a Germanized Mittel-Europa could be said to
stretch from the North Sea to the Persian Gulf, from the Baltic
to the Red Sea, from Lithuania and Ukrainia to Picardy and
Champagne. It was the greatest achievement in empire-building
on the continent of Europe since the days of Napoleon Bonaparte.
143
144 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Moreover, this Germanized Mittel-Europa appeared to possess
certain qualities of strength and endurance lacking in whole or
in part to the hostile coalition. In the first place, it was a con-
federation of four states — Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bul-
garia, and Turkey — of which the first was head and shoulders
above the other three in prowess and prestige, with the result
that there was relative unity of direction in the confederation's
policies and actions. Berlin completely overshadowed Vienna,
Sofia, and Constantinople ; and the chiefs of staff of Turkey,
Bulgaria, and Austria-Hungary had their plans mapped out for
them and much of their equipment supplied them by the German
High Command. At a time when BerKn could speak authori-
tatively for Mittel-Europa, the opposing Powers still act^d in
most respects independently of one another, and in Entente
counsels something like equal weight had to be given to fre-
quently diverse decisions of Paris, Petrograd, London, and Rome.
Unity of plan was an important asset of the Central Powers as
diversity was a liability of the Entente.
Secondly, Germanized Mittel-Europa occupied a geographical
position of great strategic value. It completely isolated Russia
from her Western Allies, save for most faulty transportation
from the White Sea or over the Siberian railway. Its extent was
sufficiently wide and continuous and its economic resources and
industry sufficiently varied to give promise of enabhng its civil-
ian population to support life without suffering too severe
hardship from British control of the seas. Its inclusion of Bel-
gium, northern France, and Poland provided it with a wealth of
minerals useful ahke to normal manufacturing and to abnormal
production of munitions of war. Moreover, its compactness and
its possession of an enviable network of railways admitted of
prompt and efficient transfer of troops from one frontier to
another, and, therefore, of concentration against hostile Powers
in turn. If Mittel-Europa was a kind of beleagured empire, it
had at any rate an advantage of interior fines of communication,
which, taken in conjunction with its advantage of unified com-
mand, seemingly compensated it for its lesser number of poten-
tial soldiers.
To husband the supply of mifitary man-power in Mittel-
Europa, the German government was already planning to deport
laborers from conquered districts, notably Belgium ^ and northern
^ The deportation of Belgians was formally inaugurated by decree of the Ger-
man military authorities on October 3, 1916. By the beginning of December,
some hundred thousand had already been deported with great cruelty and amidst
heartrending scenes.
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 145
France, and to compel them to work in German factories, thereby
releasing many Teutonic laborers for active service with the
colors. And to add to the resources of man-power, the Central
Empires sought to construct several dependent states out of
'' oppressed nationaHties." There was talk, for example, about
this time of creating a South Slav state under the protection of
Austria-Hungary and the nominal sovereignty of a Monte-
negrin prince who would ally himself with the Habsburg family.
There was an attempt also to sow dissension in Belgium between
Walloons and Flemings and to encourage the latter to estabHsh
a Flemish government under the protection of Germany. There
was an effort likewise to arouse a desire in the Russian Baltic
Provinces either for outright annexation to Prussia or for the
founding of an autonomous state under a German prince ; and
there were curious appeals to Polish patriots to perceive in
Germany the staunch friend of Polish nationaHsm. Little
progress had so far been made in any of these directions, but the
Pan- Germans and other fanatical advocates of Mittel-Europa
entertained high hopes for the future.
Teutonic optimists at the beginning of 19 16 pointed with
pride and assurance not only to the construction of mighty
Mittel-Europa during the preceding year and a half and to the
military discomfiture in turn of Belgians, French, Russians, and
Serbs, but also to what they imagined to be a resulting war-
weariness or even poKtical unrest in the chief Entente countries.
Italy, it was thought, had entered the war haltingly, had fought
lamely, and, in view of the fact that as yet she had not ventured
to declare war against Germany, might be expected to limp off
the battlefield if given half a chance. Russia was cast down by
defeat and by revelations of scandalous inefficiency and corrup-
tion, not to say treason, among her generals and her bureau-
crats ; she was honeycombed with popular disaffection and revo-
lutionary doctrine. France, still the very heart and soul of the
coalition hostile to Mittel-Europa, was believed to be rapidly
exhausting her never superfluous man-power; and the immi-
nence of a complete break in French morale was the lesson drawn
by Germans from the resignation of the Viviani Cabinet in
October, 191 5, and from the creation, seemingly '^ as a last resort,"
of a Ministry of All the Talents, including Aristide Briand as
premier, representatives of all parties (even the Monarchist),
and eight former prime ministers. Apparently France had
reached the end of her rope and would make but one more stand.
As for Great Britain the situation was somewhat different.
146 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
So far Germany had been unable to strike a direct blow at Eng-
land and had had to witness, without power to prevent, the
quick mastery of the seas by the British navy and the gradual
occupation of her own distant colonies by Allied forces ; and with
the exception of a short-lived Boer insurrection in South Africa,
no rebelHon had as yet broken out in any part of the far-flung
British Empire. Nevertheless, Germans at the beginning of
1916 professed greater optimism than ever as to the eventual
defeat and humiliation of their great maritime rival. They
insisted that the fate of colonial dominion would be settled on the
battlefields of Continental Europe; and on these battlefields
were the Teutons not winning victory after victory ? They in-
sisted, too, that British mastery of the seas was becoming a more
serious obstacle to the welfare of neutral states than the success
of the Teutonic Powers, and would surely prove in a brief while
a veritable boomerang : quite probably it would cause the Scan-
dinavian countries, the Netherlands, Spain, the United States,
and the states of Latin America to unite in an Armed Neutrality
which would recognize that ''freedom of the seas" was dependent
on British failure and German triumph. But even if such an
auxihary ''Armed NeutraHty" should not materiaUze, Germany
might still confidently expect Britain's vanquishment. British
prestige had recently suffered grievously from fiascoes at the
Dardanelles, in Serbia, and in Mesopotamia; and millions in
India, who only wanted a favorable opportunity, would presum-
ably welcome with open arms the Turco-German deliverers now
en route over the Bagdad Railway to Persia and the East. Be-
sides, the glowing embers of Irish discontent would require only
a little kindling from Germany to be fanned into consuming flame.
And there were signs, as interpreted by Teutonic opti-
mists, which would betoken a war- weariness in England. The
war was becoming a heavy charge on British wealth. Whereas
the total pubKc debt of Great Britain amounted in March, 19 14,
to three and a quarter billions of dollars, it had grown by war
credits, including those of February, 1916, to nearly ten and a
half billions, a sum which Premier Asquith characterized as not
only beyond precedent, but actually beyond the imagination of
the financiers of England or of any other country. Moreover,
the war was taking an unexpectedly heavy toll of Britain's
young manhood. British losses in battle up to January, 1916,
numbered 550,000, of whom 128,000 were dead. Yet despite
such heavy toll, Httle progress appeared to have been made.
That the authorities themselves were dissatisfied was evidenced
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 147
by the removal of Sir John French ^ from the supreme command
of the British armies in France in December, 191 5, and his super-
session by Sir Douglas Haig. That the British people were as
dissatisfied as their government, and more apathetic, was
gathered from the fact that although the rate of voluntary
recruiting for miHtary service had fallen very low by October,
191 5, the country at large evinced much opposition to any de-
parture from the traditional British policy of voluntary enlist-
ment and stubbornly resisted any effort to substitute conscrip-
tion. It was only after Lord Derby had conducted a final three-
months' campaign for soldier-volunteers throughout the length
and breadth of the British Isles that the Parliament was induced,
in January, 1916, to enact a conscription measure, and even this
was to apply only to unmarried men in England, Scotland, and
Wales.^ To the Germans it was obvious that the British armies
had reached their maximum size, under the volunteer system,
by the autumn of 191 5, and that, inasmuch as the new con-
scripts could not properly be trained and rendered effective
before the summer of 1916, the coming spring was most oppor-
tune for knock-out blows.
In fact, little more need be done. While more or less subtle
propagandists would be equipped with money and letters of
introduction, with typewriters and stenographers, with secret
inks and mysterious formulas for bomb-making, and turned loose
in neutral countries to win converts to the precepts and prac-
tices of Kultur, the doughty .armed hosts of the Teutonic coalition
would be provided with an extra supply of howitzers and machine-
guns, airplanes and Zeppelins, asphyxiating gases and poison for
wells, and in one supreme effort on the chief European fronts
would illustrate the irresistible might of Kultur in practical
operation. The Austro- Germans already in Lithuania would
suffice to put the finishing touches on crumbhng Russia. The
main armies of Austria-Hungary would be mobihzed in the
Trentino for a decisive drive into the vitals of desponding Italy.
And the German legions, now disengaged elsewhere, could be
consolidated into one mass that at last would break down the
barriers to Paris and reduce France to her appropriate position
as a tertiary power, as a lesser satellite to the full, glorious orb
of Mittel-Europa. With Russia, Italy, and France crushed, and
with despair and rebellion at home, what could Great Britain do ?
* Sir John French was created Viscount French of Ypres.
2 Subsequently, in May, 1916, the Conscription Act was extended to married
men, but Ireland remained exempted from its provisions.
148 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Early in 191 6 Teutonic optimism reached its zenith. There
was no talk at BerHn of conciliation or compromise. It was to be
a victory overwhelming and complete.
THE DIFFICULTY AT VERDUN: "THEY SHALL NOT PASS"
In planning war against combined Russia and France, the
German General Staff had emphasized the necessity of crushing
France first and then turning at leisure against slow-moving
Russia. But France had not been crushed, in 1914. The ever
memorable battle of the Marne had saved her field army, her
capital, and her most important fortresses — Verdun, Toul,
Epinal, and Belfort. And throughout 19 15, while Germany
was defeating Russia, France remained unconquered and un-
daunted.
At the beginning of 19 16, therefore, the German General
Staff, confronted with a new situation, adopted a new plan.
The Russians were to be held at bay far from Germany's eastern
frontier, while on the west a final irresistible blow would be dealt
the French. If France could be convinced that further sacri-
fices for the recovery of Alsace-Lorraine would be futile, would
not a victorious peace then be in sight for Germany? If this
train of thought had not of itself been sufficiently cogent to the
German General Staff, the preparations which General Joffre
was making for a great Anglo-French Drive would have been
reason enough for a German master-attack upon France. France
was training her classes of 19 16 and 191 7, according to War
Minister Gallieni's own statement, in readiness for ''the moment
when the intensive production of armaments and of munitions,
together with the reenforcement of the battle-Kne with new
masses of men, may permit new and decisive efforts." Great
Britain, thanks to the Derby recruiting campaign and the Jan-
uary conscription bill, might be expected to throw another
million of men into France in the spring, and her two thousand
government-controlled factories were already producing tre-
mendous and ever-increasing supplies of munitions. The antici-
pated Anglo-French offensive of 1916 would be of unprecedented
power; and, if Russia and Italy should attack simultaneously,
Falkenhayn, the German Chief of Staff, would then be unable
to transfer troops to France without inviting disaster on the
other fronts. Accordingly, it was imperative to forestall the
Anglo-French offensive and if possible to compel Joffre to put
his half-trained reserves into the battle-line prematurely.
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 149
Strategic and political considerations made Verdun the first
objective of the new German offensive against France. To be
sure, the concrete-and-steel forts and the disappearing armored
turrets, upon which French engineers had prided themselves
before the war, were no longer considered of great military value,
since 13 -inch howitzers had demonstrated the frailty of Belgian
fortifications. But the strategic importance of Verdun lay less in
its fortifications than in its position. The army that possessed
Verdun possessed the Heights of the Meuse, a plateau or ridge
some five miles broad extending north and south Hke a natural
palisade, just east of the Meuse river, on which Verdun is situ-
ated. Their position on the Heights of the Meuse would be of
incalculable advantage to the French when the time came for an
attempt to reconquer Lorraine ; impetuously descending the
slopes to push the Germans back across the plain of the Woevre,
to the eastward, the French troops would be supported by heavy
artillery mounted on hilltops five hundred feet or more above the
plain, while the Germans would find it extremely difficult to
emplace their heavy artillery on the clayey soil of the Woevre.
Should the French lose the Heights of the Meuse, not only would
a French attack on Lorraine be out of the question, but for
defensive purposes no new line could be found of such great
natural strength.
The poHtical considerations which recommended a German
thrust at Verdun may be stated briefly: first, if France lost
Verdun and the Heights of the Meuse, French patriots would
lose hope of realizing their chief purpose in the war — the recon-
quest of Alsace-Lorraine — and might consent to make peace ;
secondly, inasmuch as the German Crown Prince commanded
the Verdun sector, a victory there would enhance the prestige of
the heir to the imperial throne ; thirdly, certain influential ele-
ments in the Reichstag, notably the Conservative and National
Liberal parties, who at the time were bitterly criticizing the
Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg for his tendency to yield to
American remonstrances against ruthless submarine warfare,
might be silenced by a great success like the capture of Verdun.
Every effort was made to disguise the German preparations
for the intended move against Verdun. During January and
February, 191 6, while corps after corps was quietly taking its
place in the Crown Prince's fines, while hundreds of 4-inch, 7-
inch, 13-inch, and even 17-inch guns were being massed in the
forests of Verdun, feints were being made against a dozen other
sectors of the Anglo-French front. An attack against Nieuport
I50 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
on January 24, and rumors of troop movements through Bel-
gium, seemed to forecast a new drive toward Calais; on the
Somme, the village of Frise was captured by the Germans; in
Artois, on the bitterly contested slopes of Vimy Ridge, Prince
Rupprecht of Bavaria delivered a series of attacks with daily
mine-explosions and infantry assaults ; at the extreme southern
end of the Western Front, the French lines southwest of Altkirch
were assailed, and 15-inch shells began to drop into the French
fortress of Belfort Hke heralds of an approaching storm. Mean-
while the Crown Prince had concentrated fourteen German
divisions against the French trenches eight and a half miles north
of Verdun. All was ready for the great effort.
A terrific bombardment preceded the first attack, on February
21, 191 6. Never had artillery fire been of such withering inten-
sity. High explosive shells fairly obliterated the French first-
line trenches. Groves which might have afforded shelter to
French artillery were wiped out of existence, trees being up-
rooted and shattered into splinters. Under the terrible hail of
fire, the French soldiers with their machine-guns and ''75s" —
those that escaped destruction — waited with grim determina-
tion to make the German infantry pay heavily for its advance.
But the Germans did not intend to sacrifice their men needlessly.
No advance was attempted until scouts and sappers had cau-
tiously stolen forward to make sure that the bombardment had
accompKshed its work of destruction. Then, while the German
guns lengthened their range so as to place a *' curtain of fire" in
the rear of the French trenches, cutting off supphes and reen-
forcements, the German infantry with comparative safety oc-
cupied the ruined French first fine. This was considered auspi-
cious. Step by step the German howitzers would blast their
way into Verdun; there would be no need of reckless infantry
charges.
At first the German offensive against Verdun proceeded with
the mechanical regularity of clockwork. In four days the Ger-
mans progressed over four miles, until at Douaumont they
reached the first of the outlying permanent forts of Verdun. At
this time eighteen divisions were massed on a front of four and
one-half miles from the Cote du Poivre (Pepper Ridge) to Hardau-
mont. Throughout the day of February 25 the German infan-
try, wave upon wave, surged up the snow-covered slopes of the
Douaumont Hill, only to recede under the murderous fire of
French mitrailleuses and 75-milhmeter guns. Towards evening
a supreme assault, viewed from a distant hill by the Emperor
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 151
himself, carried Fort Douaumont. The fort itself was a crum-
bling heap of ruins, but the hilltop (388 meters high) on which it
was situated overlooked all the surrounding country and com-
manded a clear view of Verdun, less than five miles to the south-
west. If the French could be hurled back from this their
strongest natural position, before heavy reenforcements arrived
and while the defense was still suffering from the initial shock
of the German onslaught, Verdun's fate would be almost
certain.
But French reenforcements, which had been withheld until
General Joff re was sure the Verdun attack was not simply another
feint, arrived in the nick of time, and with them arrived General
Petain, on the very day of Fort Douaumont's fall. Petain in-
fused new energy into the demoralized defense. He had already
demonstrated his fighting temper in the battle of Artois (spring
and summer of 191 5) and in the Champagne offensive (Septem-
ber, 191 5) ; before the war he had been an inconspicuous colonel,
one of the many CathoKc army officers who could scarce hope for
promotion while anti-clerical politics held sway in the army ; in
actual warfare, however, his abiHty could not be ignored and he
had speedily won the rank of general and the reputation of being
one of Joffre's most brilhant subordinates.
On February 26, 1916, the morning after his arrival, Petain
ordered a counter-attack. By an impetuous charge the Ger-
mans were swept back down the hillside, and, although a German
regiment remained ensconced in Fort Douaumont, possession of
the fort was useless without command of the approaches and
communicating trenches. For four days more the battle raged
incessantly about the fort and village of Douaumont, until on
March i the German attack slackened. That brief lull marked
the passing of the crisis. The impact of the German drive had
been broken before a real breach had been made in the vital
defenses of Verdun; the French had recovered from their sur-
prise, and now with heavy reenforcements and ample supplies,
which an endless train of motor lorries was ceaselessly pouring
into Verdun, they were ready to dispute every inch of ground.
During the first phase of the battle, from February 21 to 29,
the brunt of the German drive had been borne by the French
lines on the Heights of the Meuse, where the Germans had bat-
tered their way four miles southward to the Douaumont-Pepper
Ridge position. Even more ground had been gained, though at
smaller cost, in the Woevre plain, directly east of Verdun, where
the French had been pushed back some six miles. On March i,
152 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
however, the French were standing as firmly at Eix and Fresnes,
east of Verdun, as at Pepper Hill and Douaumont, north of the
city.
So long as there was hope of capturing Verdun with a moderate
sacrifice of life, miUtary as well as political wisdom justified the
German offensive. But when the French Hnes, instead of crump-
ling fatally, stiffened resolutely, the whole aspect of the offensive
was altered. Henceforth the Crown Prince would be hurling
his men against carefully prepared, cunningly concealed, and
adequately manned defenses. As the French brought up their
heavy guns, the German advantage in artillery would dwindle
and disappear. Victory could be won neither swiftly enough to
terrify France nor cheaply enough to profit Germany. Yet the
German General Staff decided to purchase victory, cost what it
might. Discontinuance of the battle after the check at Douau-
mont would be a humiHating confession of defeat and a severe
blow to the prestige of German arms ; the name of the Crown
Prince, already associated with failure in the battle of the Marne,
would be brought into further disrepute ; and the political situa-
tion of the German government would be extremely embar-
rassing as it attempted to face the scathing criticism of the
Tirpitz party, which demanded ruthless submarine warfare, and
the bitter complaints of an independent faction of the Socialists,
who voiced the desire of a growing number of German civilians
for food and for peace. The battle of Verdun, therefore, must
continue.
In the second phase of the struggle for Verdun, interest shifted
to the west bank of the Meuse. Prior to March i , there had
been little fighting except on the narrow front, six or seven miles
in length, where the French line straddled the Heights of the
Meuse, north of Verdun ; the twelve-mile French sector east of the
Heights, it is true, had been forced out of the Woevre plain ; but
west of the Meuse only artillery had been active. Owing to the
fact that the hills west of the Meuse were much less imposing than
those on the other bank — for example, Dead Man's Hill, the key
of the situation on the western bank, was 280 feet lower than
Douaumont — an advance there would be easier than east of the
Meuse ; furthermore, it seemed imperative to push the line west
of the Meuse at least as far south as the line east of the river,
since the French guns on the hills west of the Meuse were now in
a position to rake the German line on the opposite bank from the
flank and rear and by their fire to prevent an effective assault on
Pepper Ridge. If the Crown Prince was to turn the Douaumont
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 153.
position by capturing Pepper Ridge, the menace from across the
Meuse must be removed.
So on March 2, 1916, the second phase of the battle of
Verdun began with an attack upon the French positions west of
the Meuse. By this time, however, the element of surprise con-
tributed nothing to the German advance ; the French were pre-
pared to defend with dogged determination every inch of ground.
For nearly two weeks the Germans struggled to master Goose
Ridge, immediately west of the Meuse ; for three weeks more they
spent munitions and Hfe recklessly in efforts to dominate l)ead
Man's Hill, farther west. From March 17 to April 8, the Ger-
man advance amounted to one mile on a six-mile front. Still
determined to conquer at any cost, the Crown Prince exhausted
nine infantry divisions in a ferocious assault against the whole
French Hne west of the Meuse, April 9-1 1. Yet in spite of the
frightful carnage. Dead Man's Hill could not be conquered.
Not only west of the Meuse, but east of the river too, the
Germans during March and April expended their strength in
heroic efforts, but without decisive results. Ruined Douaumont
changed hands several times, and the Germans got as far as the
village of Vaux — but no farther. While both sides lay ex-
hausted in the region of Vaux and Douaumont, the Germans
with indefatigable energy prepared to launch a new attack upon
Pepper Ridge. Their howitzers rained high-explosive shells on
the ridge until it seemed that the French trenches must be anni-
hilated ; then confidently on April 18 twelve German regiments
made the assault; but from the shattered French trenches the
machine-guns spoke with so deadly an effect that the Germans
recoiled in dismay.
The repulse at Pepper Ridge on April 18 and at Dead Man's
Hill on April 9-1 1 concluded the second phase of the great battle
for Verdun. French and British military critics already de-
clared that ''the battle of Verdun is won." True, throughout
April and May each daily bulletin gave news of a mine exploded,
a gas-attack resisted, a trench gained by the use of jets of Hquid
fire, a clash of grenadiers, or a duel of artillery. But having
tested the French lines on both sides of the Meuse, the Germans
at last knew that Verdun could not be gained by a few sledge-
hammer blows, and henceforth they fought not with the confident
expectation of victory, but rather with the fury of baffled but
indomitable determination.
Towards the end of May, 1916, the third phase of the battle
of Verdun was inaugurated by desperate and most sanguinary
.154 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
onslaughts on each side of the Meuse. The cHmax of the cam-
paign on the western bank was reached on May 29, when sixty
German batteries of heavy artillery poured a torrent of high-
explosive shells, continuing twelve hours, on the whole French
§J}M^:-
line from Cumieres to Avocourt, and a new infantry charge was
launched in which at least five fresh divisions participated. The
French had been expelled from Cumieres, and the summit of
Dead Man's Hill had been gained, but the French still clung
tenaciously to the southern slopes of the hill.
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 155
Simultaneously, on the east side of the Meuse, the Germans
foiled an attempt of General Nivelle ^ to secure Douaumont and
then moved in force against Fort Vaux. After a struggle of
inconceivable fury the Germans captured Fort Vaux on June 7
and thus obtained, with Fort Douaumont, two positions in the
outer ring of Verdun's permanent fortifications. Of the numer-
ous remaining obstacles, the next would be Fort Souville or
rather the hill (precisely the same altitude as Douaumont) upon
which Fort Souville was situated, not quite two miles southwest
of Fort Vaux and a little more than two miles directly south of
Fort Douaumont. Fort Souville might be approached either
from the north, by way of Thiaumont Redoubt and Fleury, or
from the northwest, by way of Damloup Redoubt. The Ger-
mans during June tried both of these approaches. Thiaumont
Redoubt and Fleury were gained on June 23-24, but were sub-
sequently recaptured by the French; similarly, Damloup Re-
doubt was captured, recaptured, and captured again. Through-
out July and August Fleury and the two redoubts repeatedly
changed hands. Never did the Germans reach Fort Souville.
Never were they able to drive the French from the southern
slopes of Dead Man's Hill. Never was the hold of the French
on Verdun reHnquished.
From February to July, 1916, the Germans had gained about
130 square miles of battle-scarred French territory north and
east of Verdun, with two demolished forts and desolate ruins
of two-score villages. As the price of this gain, probably as many
as three hundred thousand German soldiers had laid down their
lives, or fallen wounded on the field of battle, or been captured
by the French. The Crown Prince had played for high stakes
and had lost. The great plan to take Verdun by surprise, to
strike consternation into the heart of the French nation, to
forestall an Anglo-French offensive, had obviously gone wrong ;
and Germany faced the discouraging fact that her tremendous
sacrifices had failed of their chief purpose, while France, despite
most serious losses, rejoiced in the consciousness that the battle-
cry of her heroic sons at Verdun, ^'Passeront pas!" C'They
shall not pass!") had been realized in truth. Petain's holding
battle at Verdun ranks with Joffre's holding battle at the Marne
as one of the decisive conflicts of the Great War.
^ Nivelle had succeeded Petain in immediate command of the French defense at
Verdun early in May, when Petain was promoted to the command of the whole
army-group on the Soissons- Verdun sector of the Anglo-French front.
iS6 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
THE DIFFICULTY IN THE TRENTINO: ITALY'S DEFENSE
While the Germans were still pounding at Verdun, the Aus-
trians undertook an offensive against Italy. The Austrians
elected to deHver their attack in the difficult mountain-country
of the Trentino rather than in the Isonzo valley, for two reasons :
first, the Italian hne was less strongly held on the Trentino front ;
and, secondly, an offensive on the Isonzo, even if successful,
would only drive the main Italian army back into Italian ter-
ritory, whereas a quick thrust from the Trentino into the Vene-
tian plain might cut the communications and possibly compel
the capitulation of the Italian army of the Isonzo.
Up to May, 1916, there had been no large-scale fighting in the
Trentino. Comparatively small detachments of the ItaUan
Alpini had penetrated a Httle way into the inhospitable uplands
of the western Trentino border through several mountain passes.
In the south, the Italians had progressed fifteen miles up the
Adige River to the outskirts of Rovereto, about half the dis-
tance from the frontier to Trent. In the east, the Italian line
crossed the Val d'Astico not far from the border, and then cut
more deeply into Austrian territory west of Borgo, in the Val
Sugana.
The Italian line in the Trentino was hardly more than a
broken series of detached outposts pushed unsystematically into
the enemy's country. Even for defensive purposes it was
dangerously weak. The exposed saHent southeast of Rovereto
might easily be crushed between attacks from the west and
north : no good second-Hne position had been prepared ; and
some portions of the front were poorly munitioned and all parts
were gravely short of artillery.
Against the ill-prepared ItaHan lines in the Trentino, on a
front of less than thirty miles, the Austrians quietly concen-
trated 400,000 men and a mass of artillery, ready to overwhelm
the Italians by sheer weight of number and metal. After a
terrific bombardment on May 14, 1916, the Austrian infantry
rushed forward all along the front from Rovereto to Borgo, the
brunt of the attack being toward the center in the general direc-
tion of the Italian cities of Asiago and Arsiero. At first the
Austrians were highly successful. The Italians retreated in such
confusion that in several instances whole regiments lost their
way and valuable strategic points were sacrificed without a
struggle. Hurriedly General Cadorna rushed to the rescue and
attempted to reform the line of the Trentino army. The Aus-
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 157
trians, relentlessly pursuing, descended the Posina valley to
Arsiero (seven miles inside the Italian border) and, to the east,
came down the Val d'Assa as far as Asiago (eight miles inside
the border), which fell on May 28. The Italian troops that
should have occupied the commanding height of Pria Fora (two
miles south of Arsiero) on the night of May 29 lost their way in
the dark and fell back farther south to the inferior height of
Monte Ciove. From Pria Fora, at an elevation of nearly 5000
feet, the victorious Austrians could look down upon Schio and
Thiene, less than ten miles to the southeast, where the foothills
of the Venetian Alps gave place to a gently sloping plain, nowhere
more than 500 feet above sea-level. Only twenty miles from
Arsiero lay the city of Vicenza; twenty miles farther, Padua;
and another twenty miles across the plain would bring the
invader to Venice and cut off the whole Italian army on the
Isonzo. Exultantly the Austrian order of the day, June i,
announced that only one small mountain ridge (Ciove) remained
to be crossed before the army of invasion could swoop down into
the Venetian plain.
Fully conscious of the peril, General Cadorna ten days pre-
viously had ordered the concentration of every available reserve
at Vicenza, and now on June 3 he issued to the troops holding
the line south of Arsiero the famous order, "Remember that
here we defend the soil of our country and the honor of our army.
These positions are to be defended to the death." And they
were defended. On Monte Ciove, the key-position, one gallant
Italian brigade held fast though 4000 of its original 6000 men
were either killed or wounded. Likewise on Monte Pasubio,
which had halted the right wing of the advancing Austrians,
the Italians stood unflinchingly against odds of four to one under
a nerve-shattering bombardment. For three weeks Austrian
howitzers deluged Pasubio with high explosives ; for three weeks
dense masses of Austrian infantry were hurled against the
Italian left flank ; still the Italian defense stood firm. On
June 18 the Austrians made their final effort when they
flung twenty battalions against the Italian right flank, south
of Asiago, and failed. The Austrian offensive was definitely
checked.
As the result of a month's exertions, the Austrians had in-
flicted serious losses on the Italian army; they had captured a
large number of big guns, which the Italians could ill spare ; they
had recovered 270 miles of Austrian territory; they had con-
quered 230 square miles of Italian territory; and they had
k
158 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
improved their strategic position.^ On the other hand, the Aus-
trians had failed to achieve their main purpose; Vicenza and
Venice were still in Italian hands and the Italian army of the
Isonzo was still intact and ready to resume the offensive in
Istria. Nay more, the Austrians in putting forth their great
effort against Italy had so seriously weakened their Eastern
front that Russia was able to reorganize her army and invade
Galicia and Bukowina. German failure at Verdun and Aus-
trian failure before Vicenza were synchronous blows at Teutonic
optimism ; ^ they were sure signs that the Central Powers were
doomed not to win a victorious peace in 191 6.
THE DIFFICULTY IN IRELAND : SUPPRESSION OF REBELLION
At the very time when the Austrians were preparing to invade
Italy and when the Germans were making their supreme effort
against Verdun, Teutonic hopes of rebellion within the British
Empire promised to reach fruition. In April, 191 6, a republic
was proclaimed in Ireland and fighting took place in Dublin.
The trouble in Ireland was traceable to the bitter five-hundred-
year old feud between Englishmen and Irishmen, and particu-
larly to British treatment of Ireland since 19 10. Between 19 10
and the outbreak of the Great War in 19 14 the Nationalist Party
in the British House of Commons, representing three-fourths of
the population of Ireland, had taken nice advantage of the
exigencies of English politics to wring from the existing Liberal
government a measure of limited home rule for Ireland. But
even before the enactment of the measure Irish Unionists (descen-
dants of Scotch-English settlers in Ulster) had smuggled in arms
from Germany and had prepared to resist Home Rule by force.
The situation thus created might have been handled by the
British Government in either of two ways, according to its
judgment of Ulster : if Ulster was serious and sober in its oppo-
sition, then it might behoove the Government to withdraw the
Home Rule Bill altogether and seek some other means of dealing
with the Irish question; or, if Ulster was merely factious and
unreasonable, then it would seem to be the Government's duty
^ Premier Salandra, as the result of an adverse vote in the Italian Chamber of
Deputies, resigned in June, 19 16, and a new coalition ministry was formed under
Paolo Boselli with Baron Sonnino still in charge of foreign affairs.
2 It was a curious coincidence that just as the Crown Prince Frederick William
of Germany commanded the offensive against Verdun, so the offensive in the Tren-
tino was directed by the heir-apparent to the Austro-Hungarian crown — the
' Archduke Charles.
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 159
promptly to arrest Sir Edward Carson, the Ulster leader, and to
crush the opposition. Mr. Asquith's Government did neither.
It allowed Ulster to raise and discipline a highly efficient army,
and it went on with its Home Rule Bill. The Nationalists very
naturally claimed the same right to arm and drill their people,
and the National Volunteers came into being. The result was
that in July, 19 14, Ireland was split up into two armed camps,
and the Government halted between two resolutions : on the one
hand, the Home Rule Bill must be enacted ; on the other hand,
*' Ulster must not be coerced."
When the Great War actually came, the Home Rule Bill was
placed on the statute-book, but its operation was suspended ;
and temporarily Ulsterite and Nationalist leaders vied with one
another in pledging Ireland's loyal support to the Allied cause.
As time went, on, however, the old distrust and misunderstanding
reawoke. The Ulsterites became more outspoken that the
Home Rule Act must never be put in operation, while the Nation-
alists grew more impatient of delay. When in May, 191 5, Mr.
Asquith admitted to his cabinet several Unionists, including Sir
Edward Carson, it was apparent that the English Liberals were
no longer dependent on Irish Nationalists and that Home Rule
had been pushed into the limbo of forgotten dreams. Henceforth
the bulk of the Irish people began to lose interest in mere limited
autonomy and faith in their Parliamentary party ; gradually they
transferred their interest to demands for full independence and
their faith to a hitherto unimportant faction — Sinn Fein.
Sinn Fein — which means "Ourselves" — was a body founded
in 1905 for purposes not unlike those of the Gaelic League which
preceded it by a few years. The central idea of the society was
that the Irish people should recover and assert their nationality
in every possible way, in language, in dress, and in the develop-
ment of Irish resources and industries. But unlike the Gaelic
League, whose program was exclusively educational, the scope
of the Sinn Fein was political as well. It opposed Irish repre-
sentation in the British Parliament and attacked alike the
Unionists and the Nationalists, accusing the latter of being tools
of the English Liberal Party. It had no patience with the Home
Rule plan. It held that Ireland should not wait for Home Rule
as a gift from the British Parliament, but should start measures
of republican independence on her own account. Self-reliance
was the Sinn Fein's motto. At the outset it had been a harmless
academic movement, much frowned upon by Nationalist leaders
like Redmond and Devlin, and drawing its strength chiefly from
i6o A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
the enthusiasts of Irish art and poetry, but its prestige had in-
creased in 1913 through its activity in recruiting volunteers for de-
fense against the Ulsterites, and the seeming collapse of the Home
Rule project in 191 5 furthered its popularity. As the Ulsterites ob-
tained a preponderant voice in the councils of the British Govern-
ment disappointment and disaffection flourished in other parts of
Ireland ; and as the Nationalists lost hope, Sinn Fein gained faith
and followers.
Sinn Fein was frankly revolutionary, and, though not strictly
pro-German, was quite as willing to make an alliance with
Germany as with any other country if thereby an independent
republic might be established in Ireland. Throughout 191 5
negotiations of a somewhat obscure character were carried on
between Germany and Sinn Fein agents, in Germany and also
in the United States; funds were collected and military plans
discussed. Sir Roger Casement, formerly a British consular
agent and now a devoted disciple of the Sinn Fein, spent several
months in Germany, visiting prisoners' camps in an attempt
(for the most part unsuccessful) to form an Irish Brigade, and
concerting measures with the German Government for abetting
a revolt in Ireland. It was arranged that German submarines
should transport Casement and a goodly store of arms and muni-
tions to the Irish coast and that, simultaneously with their land-
ing, the Sinn Fein leaders at Dublin should proclaim the republic
and mobilize the Irish Volunteers; other German submarines
would do their best to prevent England from reenforcing her
garrison in Ireland, and German propagandists along the Western
Front would strive to secure desertion of Irish soldiers from
British regiments. It may have been a wild gambler's chance
from the German standpoint, but in any event Germany had
nothing to lose by Irish failure, and by Irish success Great
Britain might lose heavily.
On the evening of April 20, 191 6, a German vessel, disguised
as a Dutch trader and laden with arms, together with a German
submarine, arrived off the Kerry coast of Ireland, not far from
Tralee. Detected by the British patrol, the vessel was sunk and
its crew captured. Meanwhile Sir Roger Casement and two
companions were put ashore from the submarine in a collap-
sible boat, but, without arms and unmet by the local Sinn Feiners,
Casement was arrested early on Good Friday morning, April
21, and taken to England.^
^ He was subsequently tried for high treason and condemned to death, and was
executed on August 3.
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 161
The capture of Casement confused the Sinn Feiners. General
MacNeill, their mihtary chief, hastily canceled the projected
Easter manoeuvers of the Irish Volunteers, and the leaders at
Dublin were thus deprived of immediate effective aid. Never-
theless the standard of revolt was raised. On Easter Monday,
April 24, armed bands seized St. Stephen's Green, the post office,
and other places in the center of Dublin. At the same time a
proclamation was issued asserting the right of Ireland to national
existence and announcing the establishment of a republic, based
on adult suffrage and complete civil and religious Hberty,
equality, and fraternity. The flag of the new state — green
and gold — was unfurled, and a provisional government was
set up under Padraic Pearse as president and James Connolly as
commandant.
After a sharp struggle in which many were killed and wounded,
including a considerable number of civilians, the British forces,
under General Sir John Maxwell, who had formerly commanded
in Egypt, succeeded in overpowering the rebels, though not until
artillery and machine-guns had been brought into action. On
April 29, Provisional President Pearse ordered unconditional
surrender, in order to prevent useless slaughter, and on the next
day the rebels laid down their arms. In Dublin 300 Irish had
been killed and 1800 made prisoners. The British troops suf-
fered 521 casualties. The punishment inflicted by the British
authorities was extremely severe. Pearse and fourteen others
were tried by court-martial and shot; more were condemned to
long terms in prison ; several hundred were deported to England
and gathered in detention-camps; and as many as 3000 were
arrested.
Germany gained nothing by the abortive Irish rebellion, and
Great Britain was not vitally handicapped in her prosecution of
the war. The Irish Nationalists disavowed the Sinn Feiners as
promptly and as fully as did the Ulsterites, and there was no seri-
ous disaffection among Irish troops in France. Subsequently,
the severity meted out to the rebels by the British Government
reacted in favor of the Sinn Fein, and the inability or unwill-
ingness of the coalition ministry to govern Ireland except at the
point of the bayonet deflected many British troops from France.
But these developments were too late to alter in any respect the
solemn fact that in 1916 Germany was failing to obtain a mil-
itary decision.
i62 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
DIFFICULTIES AT SEA : THE GRAND FLEET AND THE UNITED
STATES GOVERNMENT
In addition to the military difficulties which the Teutons
encountered in the spring of 191 6 at Verdun and in the Tren-
tino, there was the ever-present difficulty inherent in Allied
mastery of the seas. Unable to foment serious rebellion within
the British Empire or to meet the British fleet on equal terms,
the Germans had to sit more or less idly by while Britain carried
on her vast commerce and transported great numbers of men and
huge quantities of munitions.
Such weapons as Germany might employ against British mari-
time supremacy were pitifully inadequate, and her naval exploits
were largely of the spectacular sort. A few commerce-raiders
still managed to elude the British blockade and to prey upon
Allied shipping. Thus, the Moewe returned to Germany early
in March, 1916, after capturing one French, one Belgian, and
thirteen British merchantmen together with two hundred pris-
oners and one million marks in gold. But so long as the British
Grand Fleet kept the German battleships in home waters, Ger-
man raiders were pretty certain sooner or later to fall victims
to the Allies.
There remained the submarine. But the submarine, while it
had destroyed a considerable amount of Allied commerce during
191 5 and might be depended upon to destroy a larger amount in
1 91 6, had already raised most embarrassing points in inter-
national law and would be likely in the future, if pushed to
extreme use, to alienate neutral Powers and force them to take
common action with the Allies for mutual protection of trade.
That this was no baseless apprehension was evidenced by the
entry of Portugal into the Great War in March, 1916.
Portugal had long been in intimate trade-relationship with
Great Britain, and an old treaty of alliance bound her to give
military aid to Britain if requested. In accordance with this
treaty, Portugal in 1914 signified her willingness to assist her
ally, but she was not called upon to take action until the progress
of the German submarine-campaign had caused hardship to the
Portuguese people and had threatened a shortage of Allied
shipping. Then it was, in February, 1916, that Sir Edward
Grey, the British foreign secretary, requested the Portuguese
Government to commandeer all German merchant vessels in
Portuguese waters. As soon as the request was granted, Ger-
many declared war against Portugal, March 9, and Austria-
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 163
Hungary followed suit on March 15. The intervention of Por-
tugal was of small military advantage to the Entente, but it
enabled the Allies to add to their common merchant marine some
forty Austrian and German ships seized by Portugal.
Far more serious than the entry of Portugal into the war was
the rising opposition of the United States to submarine warfare
as conducted by Germany. Portugal was a small Power, and
to declare war on her would cost Germany not very much more
than the paper on which the declaration was written. But the
United States was a Great Power whose enmity might be bought
too dearly. It was worth while to think before one leaped into
war with the United States.
There was undoubtedly a general feeling in Germany that the
United States was naturally quite pacific; the Americans were
reputed to be as adept at keeping out of European entangle-
ments as at ''chasing the almighty dollar," and the patience and
forbearance of their government for almost a year after the sink-
ing of the Lusitania were interpreted as signs of convinced pac-
ifism if not of unmanly fear. At any rate, Admiral von Tirpitz,
as director of Germany's maritime policies, was determined to
utilize his submarines to the full, even if thereby the United
States should be drawn into the hostile coalition. It was the one
chance of breaking England's control of the seas, and the one
chance must not be thrown away because of uncertainty as to
what the United States might, or might not, do. All the jingo-
istic elements in Germany backed von Tirpitz and insisted vehe-
mently upon an extension of submarine warfare as the only
effective means of retaliation against Great Britain's effort to
"starve" Germany.
Since by arming their merchantmen the Allies had endeavored
to combat the growing submarine menace, the Central Powers
announced on February 8, 1916, that beginning on March i
their submarines would be instructed to attack without warning
any enemy merchantman mounting cannon. Armed merchant-
men were to be treated virtually as belligerent warships, and
neutral Powers were to warn their subjects not to travel on
armed merchantmen of belligerent nationality. Among the
neutral Powers, Sweden complied with the Austro- German
request, but the United States, after some hesitation, returned
a flat refusal. Nevertheless, the Central Powers persisted in
their intention, and in March a number of merchantmen were
torpedoed without warning.
On March 24, 1916, the Sussex, an English Channel boat, was
i64 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
struck by a torpedo from a German submarine : about fifty per-
sons lost their lives, and three American citizens were injured.
A wave of indignation swept over the United States, which was
soon swelled by lame attempts of the German Government to
disclaim responsibility. The obvious anger of the American
people and the now insistent demands of President Wilson
tended to change the current of German opinion about the United
States. Possibly the Americans were courageous after all;
possibly they might join England in forceful manner; possibly,
in this event, the situation created by unrestricted submarine
warfare would be worse than the existing British blockade. It
might pay to be conciliatory — at least for a time.
To a more discreet attitude in the matter Germany was turned
by the retirement of Admiral von Tirpitz and by the succession,
as secretary of state for the navy, of Vice- Admiral von Capelle.
Von Capelle and Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg worked to-
gether to quiet Tirpitz and other jingoistic Germans and to
effect a settlement with the United States. At length, on May
4, 191 6, the German Government promised that henceforth no
merchantman would be sunk without warning and without due
provision for the security of passengers' lives except when a
merchantman attempted flight or resistance. Thereby Germany
formally repudiated " ruthlessness " in submarine warfare and in
so doing apparently abandoned the Tirpitz hope of bringing
British mastery of the seas quickly to an end.
A more gradual ending of British naval dominance was the
hope of Bethmann-Hollweg and the purpose of his seemingly
conciliatory policy toward America. He intimated in his note
of May 4 that in return for his concession he would expect the
United States to aid Germany, at least diplomatically, in light-
ening the British blockade. But Bethmann-Hollweg was dis-
appointed as well as Tirpitz, for on May 8 President Wilson
declared in unequivocal words that the American Government
'' cannot for a moment entertain, much less discuss, the sugges-
tion that respect by the German naval authorities for the right
of citizens of the United States upon the high seas should in any
way, or in the slightest degree, be made contingent upon the con-
duct of any other government as affecting the rights of neutrals
and non-combatants. The responsibility in such matters is
single not joint, absolute not relative." It was obvious that the
United States would be no catspaw for Germany. It was a bit
alarming, and Germany decided for the present to hold her
submarines in leash.
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 165
Foiled in the effective use of commerce-raiders by the British
Grand Fleet and in the ruthless use of submarines by the United
States Government, the German naval authorities decided, as a
last resort, to take as heavy toll as possible of the British block-
ading squadrons by risking their own high-seas fleet in a naval
battle. The resulting battle, the only really important naval
engagement of the Great War, was fought in the North Sea, off
Jutland, on May 31, 19 16. The German forces consisted of five
battle-cruisers, three battle-squadrons (comprising seventeen
dreadnoughts and eight pre-dreadnoughts) , a number of fast
light cruisers, and several destroyer flotillas ; the battle-cruiser
squadron was commanded by Vice-Admiral von Hipper, and the
major part of the whole fleet by Vice-Admiral von Scheer. The
British force, which at the time was making one of its periodical
sweeps through the North Sea, consisted of : (a) sl squadron of six
swift battle-cruisers under Vice-Admiral Sir David Beatty, the
''fifth" battle squadron of four fast battleships under Rear-
Admiral Thomas, and several speedy light cruisers and flotillas of
destroyers; (b) the main fleet under Admiral Sir John Jellicoe,
composed of twenty-five dreadnoughts and a large number of
subsidiary craft.
On the afternoon of May 31, Vice-Admiral Beatty with his
command was scouting ahead of the main fleet and about fifty
miles south of it, when suddenly the smoke of enemy ships was
spied to the southeastward. Thinking he was in the vicinity of
only a raiding squadron, he engaged von Hipper's fast battle-
cruisers and was drawn on by them northeastwards until his
squadron, now supported by that of Rear-Admiral Thomas, came
into the range of the major portion of the German high-seas
fleet. Being separated from the slower British forces under
Jellicoe, the squadrons of Beatty and Thomas were severely
punished and obliged to reverse their course, pursued by the
whole German force. It was only when evening came, with a
heavy mist, that the Germans were stayed by the arrival of the
British Grand Fleet. During the night Jellicoe manoeuvered
to keep along the coast between the Germans and their base, but
in the darkness the Germans managed to elude him, and in the
afternoon of the following day the British squadrons left Jutland
for their respective bases.
The battle of Jutland took a rather heavy toll of British sea-
men and ships. The British lost at least 113,000 tons, including
the battle-cruisers Queen Mary (27,000 tons), Indefatigable (18,750
tons), and Invincible (17,250 tons). But the Germans lost pro-
i66 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
portionately more, and they had absolutely failed to shake
Britain's mastery of the seas.
Shortly after the battle of Jutland, the British armored
cruiser Hampshire, carrying Lord Kitchener on a secret mission
to Russia, was sunk off the coast of Scotland (June 6) , and Eng-
land's war minister and foremost soldier lost his life.^ A month
later the Deutschland, an unarmed German ''merchant sub-
marine," successfully eluded vigilant Allied warships and made
a voyage across the Atlantic to the United States and back
again. These exploits were spectacular and sensational, but
they were devoid of larger significance. They served merely to
emphasize the prosaic fact that Germany was being slowly
strangled by the sea power of Great Britain.
At the beginning of 191 6 Germany optimistically had expected
to obtain a victorious peace before autumn. By midsummer,
however, very practical difficulties stood in Germany's way —
the heroic French at Verdun, the gallant Italians above Vicenza,
the dogged British off Jutland, the insistence of the President of
neutral America — and these difficulties gave rise to a wave of
domestic fault-finding which disturbed the serenity of German
optimists. The Social Democratic Party split into two factions
in the spring of 1916, one faction — the Majority, under Scheide-
mann — still supporting the government, but the other — the
Minority, under Haase and Ledebour — uniting their voices
with the formerly lone voices of Karl Liebknecht and Rosa
Luxemburg in bitter invective against the war and its German
authors. At the other extreme, certain Conservatives and
National Liberals, forming the Fatherland Party, devoted their
energies to vehement denunciation of the "conciliatory" poli-
cies and temperamental ''softness" of Bethmann-Hollweg.
Verily, it was no longer a perfectly united Germany on which
the fortunes of Mittel-Europa would depend. Henceforth the
German Government must conduct the war not only with atten-
tion to strictly military strategy against the Entente but also
with an eye to political strategy at home.
So in 1 91 6 Bethmann-Hollweg began seriously to talk about
"peace." It must be a victorious peace — that was demanded
by the Fatherland Party. It must be a peace of conciliation —
that was demanded by many Socialists. And the patent in-
* Lord Kitchener was succeeded as British war minister by David Lloyd George.
About the same time General Gallieni died; he had already been succeeded as
French war minister by General Roques.
GERMANY FAILS TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 167
sincerity of the Chancellor's peace proposals in 1916 was not so
much the outcome of weakness in his own character as the
inevitable result of his efforts to reconcile irreconcilable popular
demands. What he set out to do was to convince the Socialists
that the Allies — and the Allies alone — were inimical to any
peace of conciliation, and thereby to commit the Socialists to
support the demands of the Pan- Germans. If seemingly honest
endeavors at compromise were thwarted by the Entente, then
Germany must fight on, cost what it might, to a victorious
peace. On May 22, 1916, Bethmann-HoUweg declared that the
Allies rather than the Central Powers were guilty of "militarism"
and that they must "come down to a basis of real facts" and
" take the war situation as every war map shows it to be." And
early in June he announced that, if the Allies persisted in shutting
their eyes to the war-map, "then we shall and must fight on to
final victory." "We did what we could," the Chancellor asserted
"to pave the way for peace, but our enemies repelled us with
scorn; consequently, all further talk of peace initiated by us
becomes futile and evil."
As a matter of fact, the Allies in the first half of 191 6 had re-
pelled the Teutons with something more effective than scorn.
They had repelled them with blood and iron. And in measure
as the German hope of obtaining a military decision in 191 6
receded, that of the Entente increased. In June, 1916, Lloyd
George wrote that "only a crushing military victory will bring
the peace for which the Allies are fighting," and Aristide Briand,
the French premier, stated that peace "can come only out of
our victory." German failure promised Allied success. The
Allies set out in the summer of 1916 to obtain a military decision
before the new year.
CHAPTER IX
THE ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916
ATTEMPTED COORDINATION OF ALLIED PLANS
By midsummer of 1916, it was apparent that Germany would
not obtain an immediate military decision. It was less appar-
ent, but quite as real, that Germany, though still tactically
on the offensive, was already strategically on the defensive.
Mittel-Europa was a vast fortress, but one besieged on all sides,
and for its safety the territory held by it mattered far less than
its relative man-power and economic resources.
It was generally recognized that what military superiority
the Central Empires had demonstrated to date was due not to
any absolute excess of man-power and economic resources, for
in these respects the Entente Powers enjoyed remarkable supe-
riority, but rather to greater efhciency and discretion in their
use. What had most handicapped the Allies for two years was,
first, a shortage of munitions, and secondly, a lack of unity in
planning and conducting campaigns on all fronts.
For the AlHes the situation was improved by the summer
of 191 6. The lessons of the unsuccessful drives on the West-
ern Front in 191 5 and of the Russian retreat had been taken
to heart. In munitionment the change was amazing. France
was now amply provided for, Russia had a supply at least four
times greater than she had ever known, and Great Britain was
manufacturing and issuing to the Western Front weekly as much
as the whole pre-war stock of land-service ammunition in the
country. Even more significant, the Allies were now seeking
to coordinate their several military and economic efforts against
the common foe.
Only by a long series of discouraging defeats were the Allies
brought face to face with the stern necessity of cooperation.
After Russia's field armies had been routed by Hindenburg;
after the Anglo-French offensive of September-October, 191 5,
had proved to be merely another ''nibble" at the German Kne;
after Serbia had been conquered; after Gallipoli had been
168
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 169
ingloriously evacuated ; after Townshend had been surrounded
at Kut-el-Amara ; after the French Hnes north and east of
Verdun had been battered back from village to village and from
hill to hill by the German Crown Prince's terrific attacks ; only
then did the Allies clearly perceive their greatest need. Only
then did the Allies lose faith in the precepts of the old inter-
national anarchy and evince a willingness to abandon, at least
temporarily, some of their individual sovereign rights for the
sake of creating an effective league of nations against imperial-
istic Germany.
On March 27-28, 1916, the first general war council of the
Entente Powers ^ was held in Paris. France, Great Britain,
Italy, Belgium, Serbia, Russia, Japan, Montenegro, and Por-
tugal were represented, the first five by their premiers and foreign
ministers, and the others by diplomatic agents ; Joffre, Castelnau,
Kitchener, Robertson, Cadorna, and Gihnsky (aid-de-camp
to the Tsar) attended in person to give authoritative military
information ; while Lloyd George and Albert Thomas, ministers
of munitions respectively for Great Britain and France, reported
on the vital subject of army materiel. Not only was the diplo-
matic unity of the Entente reaffirmed by the War Council, but
military agreements were concluded among the general staffs
of the various nations represented, and plans were laid for con-
certed attacks, during the summer of 19 16, on the Western, the
Eastern, the Italian, and the Balkan Fronts. As for economic
cooperation, the War Council decided (a) to establish in Paris
a permanent committee, representing all the AlHes, to strengthen
the blockade of the Central Powers, {h) to take common action
through the Central Bureau of Freights in London for the reduc-
tion of exorbitant freight rates and for a more equitable appor-
tionment of the burdens of maritime transport, and (c) to partici-
pate in an Economic Conference to be held shortly in Paris.
In April an AlHed inter-parhamentary conference met in Paris,
and in June the Economic Conference convened. The latter,
during its brief three days' session, agreed upon a far-reaching
scheme of economic solidarity, which not only would enhance
the effect of the Allied blockade during the war, but would also
prolong the commercial struggle after the war by enforcing a
partial exclusion of German manufactures from Entente coun-
tries and by estabhshing within the Entente a uniform system
of laws respecting patents, corporations, bankruptcy, etc. In
fine, the Entente Powers were to consolidate themselves into a
^ An Anglo-French War Council had been created in November, 1915.
I70 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
huge economic coalition, a formidable engine of trade- war even
in time of peace.^
In order that the war against German trade might be pushed
with the utmost effect, it was urgently necessary that Italy
be induced to abandon her absurd pretense of remaining at
peace with Germany while being at war with Austria-Hungary.
Italy's delay in declaring war against Germany had given rise
in some quarters to a suspicion that her Government was play-
ing false. In February, however, the Allies had persuaded
the Italian Government to prohibit the exportation of German
or Austrian merchandise through Italy as well as the transit
through Italy of commodities for Germany or Austria-Hungary,
and to requisition the thirty-four German merchant steamers
interned in Italian ports. After the Allied War Council and
the Economic Conference, Italy finally, on August 28, 1916,
declared war against the German Empire, on the ground that
Germany was aiding Italy's enemies, Austria-Hungary and
Turkey.
Already economic conditions within the Central Empires
were causing grave concern to the Teutonic authorities. Due
to the pressure of the AlHed blockade, the food situation was
becoming alarming in Austria-Hungary and in Germany, and
naturally it was the civiKan population which in both countries
suffered most. As early as May, 1916, what amounted to a
food dictatorship had been established in Germany under Herr
von Batocki, who received wide discretionary powers to regulate
the supply, consumption, and sale of foodstuffs.
In June and July there were frequent reports of food difficulties.
Riots occurred in Munich and in Essen. It appeared as though
Mittel-Europa was on the verge of starvation and perhaps of
revolution.
Time seemed to be ripe for the AlHes to strike powerful blows
on all fronts, in France, in Russia, on the Isonzo, in Macedo-
nia, in Mesopotamia. The Central Empires, weakened by the
economic blockade and by famine, would be unable to withstand
concerted military pressure against their frontiers. Defeat
on battlefields must surely be followed by revolution at home,
and in that event Teutonic collapse would be inevitable and
speedy — perhaps before the end of 1916.
^ Shortly after the Economic Conference of June, 191 6, the Entente Powers pro-
ceeded formally to repudiate the Declaration of London as a code of international
law for maritime warfare, and Great Britain even went so far as to draw up an
ofi&cial "blacklist" of neutral firms with German affiliations. American protests
against this action of Great Britain were fruitless.
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 171
SIMULTANEOUS ALLIED DRIVES : THE SOMME, THE ISONZO,
AND THE SERETH
The first of the series of great offensives planned by the Allies
for the summer of 191 6 was the Russian drive, which began on
June 4 and continued for about ten weeks. Though Russia
had suffered grievously in 191 5 and had been compelled to evacu-
ate GaHcia, Bukowina, Poland, and considerable parts of Lithu-
ania and Courland, she had utihzed the respite afforded her by
Teutonic concentrations on other fronts — in the Balkans,
against Verdun, and in the Trentino — in order to reform her
lines, replenish her stores of ammunition, and reorganize her
command. In the winter of 191 5-19 16 she had gallantly and
brilHantly defended Riga against German attacks by land and
sea; in March, 1916, she had contested enemy positions north
and south of Dvinsk and had thereby prevented the Germans
from sending additional reenforcements to Verdun from the
East ; and by June, she held in unexpected strength a long line
from west of Riga past Dvinsk, Smorgon, the Pripet marshes,
Rovno, and Tarnapol, to the northern border of Rumania.
The Russians elected to deliver their attack on the southern
third of the Eastern Front. In the middle sector, which extended
north from the Pripet marshes across the Lithuanian plain to
the lake region northeast of Vilna, the opposing line was held
too strongly by hardened German veterans for the Russian
commander, General Ewarts, to attempt an offensive there with
his raw recruits. Nor was an offensive practicable along the
northern third of the Russian front ; even if General Kuropatkin,
commander of the Russian armies of the north, had the courage
and genius to try conclusions with the master-strategist of Ger-
many, Field Marshal von Hindenburg, the network of lakes and
rivers and the broad stream of the Diina would impede a Russian
drive just as effectively as they had blocked Hindenburg's ad-
vance toward Riga and Dvinsk. On the southern sector, how-
ever, between the Pripet marshes and the Russo-Rumanian
border, a Russian offensive would be both more feasible from a
military point of view and more desirable from a political stand-
point, since that portion of the hostile line was manned mainly
by a miscellaneous assortment of Austro-Hungarian nationahties,
rather than by the invincible Prussians, and since a successful
drive against Austria-Hungary would certainly relieve pressure
on Italy and perhaps induce Rumania to enter the war on the
side of the Entente.
172
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
General Brussilov, the commander of the Russian southern
sector, was by all odds the best man who could have been selected
for the conduct of a great offensive. Energetic, aggressive,
indefatigable, Brussilov had splendidly led one of the Russian
armies in the first invasion of Galicia, in 1914; in April, 1916,
he had been selected to succeed General Ivanov in supreme
The Russian Drive on the Styr, 1916
command of the southern army-group. Against the scant
700,000 men with whom the Austrian Archduke Frederick op-
posed him, Brussilov could muster more than a million, with
another million of half-trained recruits to draw upon for later
reenforcements.
Brussilov's drive began most auspiciously. Military critics
were no less surprised than the Austro-Hungarian trenchmen
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 173
were dismayed at the immense quantities of high explosive
shells with which the Russian artillery accurately and thoroughly
bombarded the Austrian defenses. Following the artillery
preparation, Brussilov on June 4 launched simultaneous infantry
attacks at innumerable points all along the 250-mile front from
KEY
^ ^^1 Russian Front In M,ay, 1916 /^\)°'
^m^mmmRuaslan Front In Sept., 79/5./Poianai^
SCALE OF MILES ^^^Tibt^^^/^
5 10 20 30 BORGO PAS§\.
The Russian Drive on the Sereth, 191 6
the Pripet to the Pruth, rudely interrupting the festivities with
which at that very moment the Archduke Frederick's sixtieth
birthday was being celebrated behind the Austrian Knes. In
Volhynia the Russians advancing from Rovno speedily captured
the fortresses of Dubno and Lutsk and occupied an important
stretch of territory west of the Styr River. At the same time
174 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
in eastern Galicia they crossed the Sereth River and captured
Buczacz on the Strypa. Still farther south, they forced the
crossing of the Pruth on June i6 and on the following day entered
Czernowitz, the capital of Bukowina.
After the first fortnight, the Teutonic lines in Volhynia and
Galicia began to stiffen, as German reenforcements arrived.
At least four divisions were brought from France ; others came
from Hindenburg's northern armies ; the Austrians, also, with
frantic haste, recalled several divisions from Italy. Neverthe-
less, by the end of June the greater part of Bukowina was in
Russian hands and Russian cavalry were ''approaching the
Transylvanian passes"; and during July Brussilov made some
further gains west of the Dniester and west of the Styr. The
drive expired about the middle of August simply because the
Russians had then exhausted their supply of shells and worn
out their howitzers and field guns.
The results of the Russian drive were appreciable. The
supposedly impregnable Austro-German lines along the Styr
and the Sereth had been carried on the whole front of 250 miles
to a depth varying from twenty to fifty miles, north of the Dnies-
ter, and over sixty miles south of the Dniester. The entire
province of Bukowina had been conquered. Altogether, between
June 4 and August 12, some 350,000 men, 400 guns, and 1300
machine-guns had been captured. Most important of all, Russia
had demonstrated to the world that she was still in the war and
still capable of contributing her share to the grinding of Ger-
many between upper and nether millstones. Her sudden rise,
phoenix-Uke, from the disastrous fire and flame of the preceding
autumn reassured all the Allies and incidentally conferred on
her Balkan neighbor, Rumania, a new faith in the cause and the
prowess of the Entente.
Brussilov's Drive on the Eastern Front was closely articulated
with efforts of General Cadorna on the Italian Front. It was
mainly the Russian offensive which enabled the Italians to check
the Austrian invasion from the Trentino and to inaugurate a
vindictive counter-offensive not only in the Trentino but along
the Isonzo.
In the face of Cadorna's assaults, the Austrians about June
25 began a retreat on the Trentino front, evacuating in turn
Asiago, Arsiero, and Posina. The Austrian retirement was
planned and executed with such skill that very few prisoners
and almost no guns were lost; nevertheless, it removed any
immediate danger from northern Italy, and in this way amounted
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 175
to an important Italian victory. Throughout July, Cadorna
exerted pressure against the Trentino front, but his principal
blow was reserved for the Isonzo.
Heavy mortars and howitzers, transferred from the Trentino,
opened fire along the Isonzo front on August 4, just before the
conclusion of the Russian drive. The first day's attack, directed
f'ONTArEL
i'Mr.Gleres
MoGGlb ■ .'^ W. ^ ^'O^-)
Racco^ana
Malborometto
Res.iulla^"':
/AOATirt-:'";-^
i)TARCENTO
The Italian Campaign against Gorizia
against hills east of Monfalcone, was really a feint to draw the
Austrian reserves toward the southern wing. The frontal
attack delivered two days later along an eight-mile line opposite
Gorizia was in deadly earnest. The Austrian trenches were
pulverized by nine-hours' continuous bombardment. The Ital-
ian infantry, believing that the hour of victory had at last arrived,
charged with unexampled impetuosity. The heights on the
176 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
western bank of the Isonzo, overlooking Gorizia across the
stream, were carried the first day, as were also the heights farther
north. South of Gorizia, on the left bank of the Isonzo, the
Itahans stormed the summit of Monte San Michele, the key
of the Gorizia position, for which they had striven for fourteen
months. The Austrians resisted with stubborn courage. Iso-
lated groups held out to the bitter end, in grottoes, in dugouts,
or on inaccessible hilltops. General Boroevic, the Croatian
commander of the Austrian army of the Isonzo, urged his troops
to '' repulse the attack in such a way that none of the enemy shall
escape." Nevertheless, after two days' battle, all the heights
west of the Isonzo were carried ; and on August 9, 19 16, Italian
infantry escorted King Victor Emmanuel into Gorizia.
After the conquest of Gorizia, formidable obstacles had to
be surmounted before the Italians could hope to *' emancipate"
Trieste. East of Gorizia were frowning hills, bristling with
Austrian guns. South of Gorizia, directly barring the way to
Trieste, lay the Carso plateau, the surface of which, naturally
scarred by innumerable caverns and crater-Hke depressions, had
been covered by the Austrians with a veritable labyrinth of
entrenchments, blasted in the solid rock and connected by subter-
ranean tunnels. In a region such as this, no offensive could
make rapid progress; and the shght Italian advance beyond
Gorizia was achieved only by dint of the hardest kind of fight-
ing. But at least Gorizia was won and with it a foothold on
the Carso. The loss inflicted on the Austrians by the whole
Italian offensive in the first two weeks of August was estimated
at 65,000 ; the Italians announced that 18,750 prisoners, 30 guns,
62 trench mortars, 92 machine-^uns, 60,000 grenades, and other
booty, had fallen into their hands.
Cadorna's drive on the Isonzo and Brussilov's on the Styr
and the Sereth were hardly expected by the Allies to be decisive.
They were intended primarily to divert the energies and forces
of the Central Empires from the Anglo-French line on the Somme,
where the Allies willed to make their major effort. A month
after the Russians inaugurated their offensive on the Eastern
Front and a month before the Italian offensive reached its height,
the French and British struck furiously against the Germans
on the Western Front.
The Anglo-French attack of July, 1916, was delivered on
a front of thirty miles from Gommecourt to Estrees, on both
flanks of the Somme River. The Somme, as a glance at the
map will show, cut the Western Front at a point about eighty
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 177
miles north of Paris and the same distance south of the Belgian
coast. It was significant that the theater selected for the major
1 91 6 offensive was thirty-five miles south of the Loos-Vimy
sector, which had been attacked in September, 191 5, and forty-
five miles south of Neuve Chapelle, the scene of the first British
drive, in March, 191 5. The southward gravitation of successive
Anglo-French offensives proved that the Allies, temporarily
at least, had abandoned hope of reconquering the rich coal
and iron fields of Flanders and Artois. The new drive was
launched, not among mines and slagheaps, but among the smiling
agricultural villages of Picardy.
The obvious objective for the British, who fought on the
northern side of the Somme, was the town of Bapaume, nine
miles northeast of the front; for the French, who held a mile
of the front on the northern bank and four (later, ten) miles
south of the river, Peronne, seven miles east of the French line
and twelve miles southeast of Bapaume, was the natural goal.
Midway between Peronne and Bapaume, the less important
town of Combles, three miles from the front, might constitute
a preHminary objective. Sanguine ^'military experts" declared
that once the British took Bapaume they would speedily advance
to Cambrai and Douai, two of the most important strategic
centers behind the German lines, and that the French, by press-
ing on beyond Peronne to St. Quentin, would make the German
position at Noyon so dangerous a salient that it would have to
be evacuated.
In the technique of attack the Allies this time had many sur-
prises in store for the Germans. Hundreds of airmen in battle-
planes of an improved type, darting back and forth across the
German lines just before the attack, drove the German air-scouts
to cover, dropped ''fire-balls" on the German observation-bal-
loons, and carried back wonderfully clear photographs of the
German trenches, so that the Anglo-French artillery could
accurately place its high-explosive shells precisely where they
would do the most damage. The British, on Sir Douglas Haig's
own admission, had learned a lesson from the enemy and had
''developed and perfected" the art of using poisonous gas and
liquid fire. An original British contribution to the science of
trench-warfare was the "tank, " ^ a heavy motor-truck encased
in invulnerable steel armor-plate and cumbrously moved on
caterpillar treads. With machine-guns spitting murderously
1 The "tank" was first used in the second phase of the Somme drive, in Septem-
ber, 1916.
N
178 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
from apertures on either side, a ''tank" could lumber across
^'no man's land" to the enemy's trenches, unscathed by ordinary
rifle or machine-gun fire ; it could brush aside barbed-wire en-
tanglements as though they were cobwebs ; it could even crawl
across trenches and shell-craters and spread confusion and panic
behind the enemy's lines.
Most promising of all was the improvement of British and
French artillery. France now had a very large number of heavy
guns, including some 1 6-inch mortars ; and many mihtary critics
regarded the French howitzers, as well as the 3 -inch field gun
(the famous ''75")? s-s distinctly superior to their German coun-
terparts. British arsenals, likewise, were now turning out
howitzers of the largest caliber, and the weekly production of
high explosives was 11,000 times as great as the total output
in the whole month of September, 19 14. It was upon their
tremendously powerful artillery that the Allies chiefly relied
to blast a way through the wire entanglements, to plow up the
intricate German entrenchments, to silence the German machine-
guns before the infantry charge, and to cut off German counter-
attacks by a ^'curtain of fire."
When on the night of June 30- July i, 191 6, the artillery ^'prep-
aration" of the Somme drive reached its climax, "parapets
crumbled beneath the impact of the shells, cover hitherto thought
bomb-proof was crushed and destroyed, and the garrisons of
the enemy's works, sorely shattered in morale, were driven down
into the deepest dugouts to seek shelter from the pitiless hail
of projectiles." Early in the morning of July i there came a
lull in the thunder of the howitzers, as the gunners lengthened
the range, and the infantry leaped forward from AlHed trenches,
with cheers, to charge the German lines.
Every inch of Allied advance was stubbornly contested by the
Germans, and it soon became apparent that the Somme drive
would not immediately menace Cambrai, Douai, or St. Quentin.
In the first fortnight of the battle, July 1-14, the French took
12,200 prisoners, pushed forward their line on a front of eleven
miles to a maximum depth of six miles and conquered thirty
square miles of territory. In the same period the British ad-
vanced on a ten-mile front to a maximum depth of three miles
and made 10,000 prisoners.
Badly battered, but not broken, the German fine stiffened
perceptibly after the first fortnight. The French were brought
to an abrupt halt a mile from Peronne ; and furious German
counter-attacks stayed the British. After a month of the great
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 179
drive, the British found themselves in possession of twenty-four
square miles of conquered territory, but blocked by strong Ger-
man positions along the hilly ridge north of the Somme from
Thiepval to Saillisel. Until this ridge could be carried, it would
be impossible to take Bapaume.
During the long pause, lasting through the entire month of
August, in which the Anglo-French drive came practically to
Railways
I -. i i Roads
Shaded portion represents
occupied by British
Battle of the Somme
a standstill, gaining at the most a few hundred yards here and
there, the French and British guns were being moved forward
to new positions, to blast open the path for a new advance.
A terrific bombardment on the night of September 2, 1916,
gave notice that the second phase of the battle of the Somme
had begun. At noon on September 3 the infantry charged,
with renewed confidence and dash. The decisive struggle for
the town of Combles and for the ridge, between Thiepval and
Saillisel, now ensued.
i8o A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Gallant Irish troops, bearing the brunt of the battle on the
heights northwest of Combles, expelled the enemy at the point
of the bayonet and repelled ferocious counter-attacks. British
''tanks" appearing for the first time, smashed their way through
the German trenches and were followed by infantry with hand-
grenades. The artillery thundered with ''unheard-of violence."
By September 25 the whole German line between Thiepval and
Combles was pushed over the ridge ; only Thiepval, at the north-
western end, and Combles, on the southeast, held out. But
Combles was already enveloped from the south and east by the
army of the French General Fayolle. At the very last moment,
on September 26, the German garrison evacuated Combles,
fighting as it went, and retired through a ravine to the north-
east under cross-fire from both sides. On the same day, at the
opposite end of the ridge, Thiepval was stormed and captured,
and in the center the British line was pushed more than a mile
north of the crest. The prisoners taken at Combles and Thiepval
swelled the total, for the French, to 35,000; for the British, to
26,000.
Torrential rains and weeks of cloudy weather hindered the
further progress of the Anglo-French drive, by making it almost
impossible to move the heavy guns forward, over muddy roads,
or to direct artillery fire by airplane observations. The French
infantry, to be sure, in October fought its way into Sailly and
Saillisel, but was repeatedly thrown back and did not completely
occupy SailHsel until November 12. On their right wing, the
French got close to Chaulnes ; and during the same period the
British extended their successes at some points north of the
Thiepval-Combles ridge to within four miles of Bapaume.
Measured in terms of territory, the results of the Anglo-
French drive on the Somme were small. Nowhere had the
advance been more than seven miles. The total area conquered
was approximately 120 square miles, only slightly greater than
the area won by the Germans at Verdun. Neither Bapaume
nor Peronne had been attained, and neither Cambrai nor the
German salient at Noyon had been threatened. Nevertheless
the drive had achieved three purposes : (i) it had relieved Verdun
and transferred the offensive in France from the Germans to
the AUies ; (2) by holding the bulk of the German army on the
Western Front, it had condemned Austria-Hungary to stand
pretty much alone and therefore unsuccessful against the Rus-
sians on the Styr and the Sereth and against the Italians on the
Isonzo ; and (3) it had worn down the German forces.
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 181
By way of comment on the third point it may be noted that
the German casualty hst as added up by the British War Office
showed a grand total of 3,920,000 (since the beginning of the
war) on December i, 1916, as compared with about 3,130,000
on July I ; the difference, 790,000, represented the total German
losses in killed, disabled, and captured, on all fronts during the
five months from July to November, 1916. Allowing 90,000
for losses in the East, the German loss in the battle of the Somme
could not have been less than 700,000. The British loss was
announced as approximately 450,000, and that of the French
was estimated at 225,000. But the AlKes could afford higher
losses than the Central Empires. In the very year when Great
Britain instituted compulsory military service and prepared
to double her armed strength, the forces of Germany and Austria-
Hungary, already passing their numerical maximum, were
wasting rapidly — the Austro-Hungarians on the Russian and
Itahan fronts, the Germans at Verdun and on the Somme.
In an endurance test such as the Great War was proving itself
to be, relative wastage of man-power and economic resources
was destined to become the decisive factor.
If none of the AlHed drives in 19 16 — Russian, Italian, or
Anglo-French — had succeeded in obtaining an immediate
mihtary decision, all of them together had demonstrated the
great advantage of simultaneous efforts on all fronts in wearing
down Teutonic defense and wasting Teutonic strength. How-
ever, they had been too exhausting to the Allies themselves to
enable the democratic nations at that time to perceive in them
an augury of ultimate triumph for the AlHed cause. Allied
discouragement was not immediately remedied. AlHed gloom
was not immediately dispelled.
But the simultaneous drives did produce one immediate result.
They brought Rumania into the war on the side of the Entente,
and little Rumania, in the circumstances, might suffice to tip
the balance of armed power and to bring Austria-Hungary and
perhaps Germany to terms.
THE PARTICIPATION AND DEFEAT OF RUMANIA
Before the war Rumania had been associated with the Triple
Alliance, on the basis of commercial and defensive agreements,
but since the Balkan Wars ofi9i2-i9i3 she had shown a marked
leaning toward Serbia and the Triple Entente, and since the
outbreak of the Great War the Entente diplomatists had strained
I«2
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
every nerve to enlist Rumania's support. During the first
two years of the struggle, however, Rumania had remained
neutral, whether because King Ferdinand ^ was a Hohenzollern,
or because Russia refused to offer Bessarabia as part of the price
of Rumania's aid, or because the Rumanian War Office feared
to try conclusions with the conquerors of Poland and Serbia,
or because Rumanian landlords found it too profitable to sell
their grain to the Central Empires. At any rate, Rumania
wavered and hesitated.
In April, 191 6, when Teutonic fortunes appeared most favor-
able, the Rumanian minister at Berlin signed a convention with
Germany, providing for free interchange of domestic products,
and for a time the Allies feared lest Rumania should follow Bul-
garia into the embrace of Mittel-Europa. But subsequent mili-
tary events changed the aspect of affairs fundamentally. By
August, 1916, Russia had displayed unexpected signs of renewed
strength and power by conquering Bukowina and threatening
Transylvania — provinces ardently coveted by Rumanian irre-
dentists; and the ItaHan conquest of Gorizia on August 9,
together with the German failure at Verdun and the Anglo-
French victories on the Somme in July, seemed to indicate that
the Teutonic armies were no longer able to hold their own.
Furthermore, the situation in the Balkans was less disturbing
to Rumania in August, 1916, than it had been in the preceding
winter. So long as Rumania was to be assailed not only by
determined Hungarian armies on the west but also by numerous
Teutonic-Bulgarian-Turkish forces along her extended southern
frontier, she prudently refrained from espousing the Allied
cause and from thereby inviting certain disaster. But by August,
1 91 6, her Danubian boundary did not seem to be directly en-
dangered. Exigencies on other fronts had led to the withdrawal
of the greater part of Mackensen's Teutonic army from the
Balkans. The Turks were beginning to find their freed Gallipoli
army inadequate for the defense of Asiatic Turkey against
Russian attacks in Armenia and British pressure in Mesopotamia
and against uprisings of Arab chieftains. In fact, the Russians
under the Grand Duke Nicholas on July 25 captured the impor-
tant city of Erzingian, over a hundred miles west of Erzerum,
and in August General Sir Stanley Maude took command of
the British forces in Mesopotamia, reorganized and reenforced
^ Ferdinand had succeeded his uncle, Charles I, in October, 1914, and was
thought to be less devoted to his Hohenzollern relatives in Germany than his
predecessor had been.
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 183
them, and prepared to retrieve Townshend's reverses. Bagdad
was again menaced. To add to the uneasiness and alarm of the
Turks, the British began the construction, across the Sinai
desert, of a railway over which an expeditionary force might
readily be transported from Egypt for an invasion of Palestine,
and already on June 9 the Sherif of Hedjaz, the most powerful
Turkish vassal of western and central Arabia, had proclaimed
from sacred Mecca his independence of the Ottoman Empire.
Obviously Rumania now had little or nothing to fear from Tur-
key. Turkey had need of all of her available forces for the
defense of her own lands; she could ill afford to spare troops
from her hard-pressed Asiatic ironts to back Bulgaria's imperial-
istic ambitions in Europe.
Turkish and Teutonic military necessities seemingly left
Bulgaria almost alone to bear the burden of Mittel-Europa in
the Balkans. And a growing burden it was. Not only was
the AlHed expeditionary force at Salonica steadily augmented
by British and French reenforcements, but there came also a
detachment from Russia, contingents from Albania and Italy,
and a force of some 120,000 Serbians who had been assembled
and organized on the island of Corfu. Altogether by August,
1916, General Sarrail, the Allied commander at Salonica, had
at his disposal a formidable army-group of 700,000 men. These
troops were flung out on a fan-shaped front in Greek Macedonia
north of Salonica : the left flank was close to the Serbian frontier
in the mountains south of Monastir; the center was pushed
up the Vardar valley to the border towns of Gievgheli and Doiran,
forty miles north of Salonica ; and the right wing rested on the
Struma River and Lake Tahynos, with outposts even farther
to the northeast. On August 21, 19 16, the French War Office an-
nounced that General Sarrail's forces " were taking the offensive
on the entire Macedonian front." In that event, the Bulgarians
would be obliged to devote all their efforts to the defense of their
recent conquests in southern Serbia ; they would be in no posi-
tion to cross the Danube and assail Rumania. Rumania hesi-
tated no longer.
Negotiations between Rumania and the Entente had already
reached fruition in a secret treaty signed on August 17, 191 6.
By this treaty Rumania agreed to break off all economic rela-
tions with Mittel-Europa and to declare war and begin offensive
operations in ten days ; in return, France, Great Britain, Italy,
and Russia assured Rumania of the special assistance both of
Russian armies and of General Sarrail's army at Salonica, and
1 84 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
promised to reward her with Bukowina, Transylvania, and the
Banat of Temesvar. On August 27, true to its word, the Govern-
ment of King Ferdinand declared war against Austria-Hungary.
To the press the Government explained that, although Rumania
had formerly been in defensive alliance with the Dual Monarchy,
altered circumstances constrained her to resume full Hberty of
action and to join the Entente Powers in order to safeguard her
national interests and to emancipate the three milHon Rumans
resident in Austria-Hungary. Germany, Turkey, and Bulgaria,
as allies of Austria-Hungary, promptly declared war against
Rumania.
For the Central Powers, the participation of Rumania in the
war on the side of their adversaries was the culminating point
in a period of bitter disappointment. The tremendous German
effort at Verdun (February- July, 191 6) had won a few ruined
forts and desolated villages, but not victory; after July i,
when the Anglo-French drive on the Somme began, the Ger-
mans seemed unable even to hold their own on the Western
Front; the Austrians, likewise, after attempting an offensive
(May) against Italy, had been thrown back on the defensive
and had been driven out of Gorizia (August 9) ; the Eastern
Front, weakened to supply men for the Teutonic thrusts against
Italy and France, had been seriously dented by the Russians
(June- August) ; and now at the close of August the intervention
of Rumania added 600,000 bayonets to the ''ring of steel''
surrounding the Central Powers and 900 miles to the front
which the Central Powers had to defend. It was natural, if
not wholly fair, that these disasters should popularly be ascribed
to the strategy pursued during the first half of the year 191 6 by
General Erich von Falkenhayn, chief of the German General Staff.
The dismissal of Falkenhayn on August 29 — two days after
Rumania's declaration of war — betokened a desperate resolve
on the part of the German Government to stem the tide of
reverses. The most popular of German field commanders,
Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg, hero of Tannenberg,
conqueror of Russian Poland, and commander-in-chief of the
German armies on the Eastern Front, was chosen to succeed
Falkenhayn as chief of the general staff. Ludendorff, who had
formerly been Hindenburg's chief of staff on the Russian front,
now became quartermaster-general and was recognized as Hin-
denburg's " right-hand man."
The effects of Hindenburg's appointment were soon apparent.
The command of the armies on the Western Front was reorgan-
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 185
ized, with Field Marshal Duke Albrecht of Wurttemberg as
commander of the northern army group, Crown Prince Rup-
precht of Bavaria as commander of the central group (including
the region of the Somme), and the Prussian Crown Prince
Frederick WilHam in charge of the Verdun army group. On
the Russian Front, Prince Leopold of Bavaria and the Austrian
Archduke Charles Francis were the titular commanders of army
groups, but operations were really directed by trusted German
staff officers. In conferences held at German Headquarters
behind the Eastern Front in September, 1916, it was decided
to concentrate the energies of Mittel-Europa for the present upon
a great offensive against Rumania. The crushing of Rumania
would be not only a highly spectacular achievement but an
object-lesson to neutral Powers such as Greece and the United
States and a source of renewed morale to the citizens of the Cen-
tral Empires.
To crush Rumania, Hindenburg collected a composite Bulgar-
Turco-Teutonic army. Teutons were brought from the Eastern
and Western Fronts. Hindenburg, knowing that the Russians
had already exhausted their surplus of munitions, beHeved
that his eastern lines could be securely held by somewhat dimin-
ished numbers. Feeling, moreover, that the protracted battle
of the Somme was gradually exhausting Anglo-French reserves
of men and materiel, he was wilHng to run the risk of drawing
off a few German defenders from that area, even if thereby he
must forego in the near future another Teutonic offensive on
the Western Front. The Austro-Hungarians could rely on the
rocky heights east of Gorizia and the naturally impregnable
Carso plateau to halt the Italian offensive ; they, too, could
now spare men for a campaign against Rumania. Besides,
Hindenburg prevailed upon Turkey to overlook her own needs
in Asia and upon Bulgaria to weaken the Macedonian front.
If the latter should be obliged to yield some ground to General
Sarrail's Salonica army, she was assured of Teutonic aid in recov-
ering it as soon as Rumania should be crushed. Incidentally,
Bulgaria had not forgotten Rumania's hostility to her in the
second Balkan War; she had a territorial dispute of her own
with Rumania.
Meanwhile, the Rumanian General Staff, counting upon
General Sarrail in Macedonia to engage the attention of Bul-
garia and upon Russia's formal promise to inaugurate a violent
offensive in Bukowina and thereby prevent the shifting of Austro-
German troops from Poland and Galicia, threw the bulk of its
i86 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
available forces into Transylvania, with little regard to the
possibility of counter-attacks. The Ruman-speaking prin-
cipality of Transylvania, for many years an integral part of the
Kingdom of Hungary, lay in the acute angle between the Car-
pathians and the Transylvanian Alps, half surrounded to the
east and west by Rumania. In fact, Rumania bore some re-
semblance to the open jaws of a pair of gigantic pincers —
Moldavia forming the upper jaw, Wallachia the lower — with
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 187
Transylvania caught in between them. It was the purpose
of the Rumanian General Staff that Transylvania should be
wrested from Hungary by the simultaneous pressure of both
jaws. Accordingly, the Rumanians pressed heavily on both
the Wallachian and the Moldavian fronts. From Moldavia
they swiftly penetrated the chief passes leading through the
Carpathians into eastern Transylvania, and within a fortnight
they had reached the valley of the upper Maros and the upper
Aluta about twenty miles inside the frontier. At the same time
they advanced from Wallachia, passed the "Iron Gates" of the
Danube, took Orsova, and marched northward along the rail-
way to Mehadia. Other forces penetrated the mountain passes
between these extreme flanks of the Rumanian front and de-
scended into the valleys of Transylvania.
Within three weeks of Rumania's declaration of war, one-fourth
of Transylvania was "delivered" from Magyar rule, and some
7000 prisoners were captured. But while the Rumanians,
flushed with victory, were still deep in Transylvania, signs were
at hand of an impending counter-stroke. Germany had sent
two of her ablest strategists, Mackensen and Falkenhayn,
to the Rumanian front, and had the Rumanian air-scouts ven-
tured far behind the Austrian lines they would have seen, at
Temesvar and other Hungarian railway centers, grim howitzers
and immense stores of munitions accumulating ominously.
Or, could the same air-scouts have perceived the deadly prep-
arations going forward simultaneously in Bulgaria, they would
have wondered at the temerity and rashness of Rumania's par-
ticipation in the Great War.
Field Marshal von Mackensen, who had cooperated with Hin-
denburg in the great German invasion of Russia in 19 15 and
had subsequently superintended the conquest of Serbia in Octo-
ber and November, 191 5, unexpectedly appeared in the second
week of September, 191 6, as commander of a formidable Bulgar-
Teu tonic army ready, to pounce upon the exposed and poorly
defended southern border of Rumania, while General von Falken-
hayn took command of a powerful Austro- German army in
Transylvania. The German General Staff had evolved a mas-
terful plan of strategy. Falkenhayn would press the main
Rumanian armies so hard that no considerable portion of them
could be dispatched from Transylvania to the Dobrudja; and
Mackensen, encountering little armed opposition, would invade
the Dobrudja and cut off the retreat of the Rumanians from
Transylvania. In this fashion, Rumania would be ground to
1 88 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
bits between the jaws of Falkenhayn and Mackensen; her
army would be destroyed and her complete conquest assured.
Mackensen's army advanced in the Dobrudja so quickly
that in a few days it was fifty miles north of the Bulgarian fron-
tier and within ten miles of the very important Constanza-
Chernavoda railway which connects Bucharest with Constanza,
the chief Rumanian port on the Black Sea. While Russian
troops were being rushed to the assistance of the hard-pressed
Rumanians in the Dobrudja, General von Falkenhayn dealt
the Rumanian invaders of Transylvania a series of hard blows.
The cities of Hermannstadt, Schassburg, and Kronstadt were
in turn relieved, and the Rumanian columns in eastern Transyl-
vania were soon in headlong flight toward the Rumanian frontier.
By the middle of October the Rumanians had been driven back
all along the hne ; Transylvania had been cleared, and the Austro-
German armies were gaining footholds on Rumanian soil.
By this time Mackensen had brought up a sufficient number
of big guns to break through the Russo-Rumanian fines south
of the Chernavoda-Constanza railway ; Constanza fell on Octo-
ber 2 2 — just eight weeks after Rumania's entry into the war.
In vain Russia sent one of her ablest generals, Vladimir Sakharov,
with reenforcements to stiffen the Dobrudja line ; the Constanza-
Chernavoda railway was irretrievably lost, and the best Sakharov
could do was to reorganize the shattered Russo-Rumanian army
in northern Dobrudja.
No aid was forthcoming to the Rumanians in the west. There
Falkenhayn captured Vulcan Pass on October 25, defeated the
Rumanians in a bloody battle, and on November 21 captured
Craiova, seventy-five miles south of the frontier. By this bold
stroke Falkenhayn won the western third of Wallachia. The
Rumanian force operating in the extreme west, finding itself
completely cut off from the other Rumanian armies, hastily
evacuated Orsova and Turnu-Severin and retired into near-by
mountains, but was soon compelled to surrender.
With frantic haste General Averescu, the Rumanian com-
mander-in-chief, endeavored to marshal his demoralized army
behind the Aluta River, ninety miles west of Bucharest. But
the line of the Aluta was turned on both flanks. From the
north, Austro-German troops advanced down the slopes of the
Transylvanian Alps into the Wallachian plain, behind the Aluta.
On the south, Mackensen flung strong forces across the Danube
and by November 27 reached Alexandria. With both flanks
crumpling, the Aluta line was no longer tenable, and General
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 189
Averescu fell back to his last line of defense, the Arges River,
less than ten miles west of Bucharest. Again Mackensen and
Falkenhayn resorted to their flanking tactics, from the south
and from the north respectively ; and the Arges line too had to
be abandoned.
With its supposedly invulnerable cincture of nineteen armored
forts and redoubts, constructed by the famous Belgian engineer,
Brialmont, Bucharest was one of the most formidable fortresses
in Europe, but the Rumanians made no serious attempt to defend
their capital against Mackensen's heavy howitzers. On Decem-
ber 6, — his birthday, — Mackensen entered Bucharest in
triumph. On the same day the city of Ploechti, thirty miles
north of Bucharest, and the whole line of the Bucharest-Kron-
stadt railway fell into the invader's hand. In three weeks'
campaign, November 15-December 6, Falkenhayn and Macken-
sen had routed the Rumanian army, taken over 80,000 prisoners,
and conquered the greater part of Wallachia, including the
capital city of Bucharest.
Violent Russian counter-attacks in the Carpathians failed
to stay the enemy. By the middle of January, 191 7, the Ru-
manians had lost all Wallachia, all the Dobrudja, and a portion
of southern Moldavia ; their king was at Jassy and their armed
remnants, supported by Russians, were standing at bay along
the Sereth River from Galatz westwards.
The collapse of Rumania was due in large part to the failure
of General Sarrail to exert sufficient pressure on the Macedonian
front. General Sarrail, it will be recalled, had announced on
August 20 that he was taking the offensive, with his 700,000
Allied troops, against the Bulgarians. But this /'offensive"
was either a sham or a fiasco. Instead of driving northward
into Serbia and Bulgaria, Sarrail actually lost ground. His
left wing was beaten back from Fiorina, and the Bulgarians in
this sector occupied Koritza and Kastoria. At the same time,
on Sarrail's right wing, Bulgarian troops seized the railway
between Drama, Seres, and Demir-Hissar, and on September
12 occupied the Greek port of Kavala.
The months of October, November, and December, — so
disastrous for Rumania, — witnessed no significant operations
either on the right wing or in the center of Sarrail's line ; only
on the left wing was anything achieved. Here the reorganized
Serbian army of 120,000 men unrelentingly fought its way, mile
by mile, northward toward Monastir. After two months'
plodding and pushing over bleak hills and across dreary ravines
IQO A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
the Serbians at length on November 19, 1916, reentered Monastir.
It was exactly four years since Monastir had been captured from
Turkey by the Serbs, and almost one year since it had been
occupied by the Bulgarians.
Despite this Serbian achievement, the fact remained that
the Bulgarians not only had been able to transfer troops and
guns from Macedonia to Dobrudja in order to assist in the Austro-
German conquest of Rumania, but also had prevented the Allied
force at Salonica from inflicting any grave injury on their weak-
ened Macedonian front; if they had lost Monastir, they had
gained Kavala. Of General Sarrail's seeming inactivity in this
crisis there were two explanations. In the first place, his army
was heterogeneous, and as yet badly discipHned and poorly
equipped and munitioned. In the second place, he did not
dare move his forces far forward so long as a hostile Greek army
might assail him from the rear.
It was the Greek King Constantine again who paralyzed
AlHed plans to relieve a Balkan state hard-pressed by Teutonic-
Bulgarian invaders. When Rumania entered the war in August,
191 6, confident of an easy triumph, Constantine exultingly
predicted that she would speedily be conquered by German
arms. The event confirmed the Greek king's prophecy and
strengthened at once his devotion to Germany and his contempt
for the AUies. Even the seizure of the Greek port of Kavala by
the Bulgarians in September — the very port whose peaceful
cession to Bulgaria had been advocated by Venizelos and vehe-
mently resisted by the king only the year before — was now
viewed most complacently by Constantine. It appeared as
if Constantine had some sort of formal agreement with the Cen-
tral Empires and only awaited a favorable opportunity to assail
the Allies as suddenly and as theatrically as King Ferdinand
of Bulgaria had done.
Until Rumania entered the war, the Allies had labored chiefly
by diplomacy to enlist the support, or at least the benevolent
neutrality, of King Constantine and his succession of puppet
premiers. Thereafter they resorted to coercion. In September
Greece was compelled to surrender her telegraphs and postal
system to Anglo-French authorities. In October the French
Admiral du Fournet seized the Greek navy ; all German, Austro-
Hungarian, Turkish, and Bulgarian diplomatic representatives
were unceremoniously expelled from Greece; Athenian news-
papers were subjected to French censorship; Anglo-French
marines were landed at Piraeus and on Greek islands in the
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 191
JEgesin ; an Anglo-French fleet trained its guns on Athens ; the
coast of Greece was blockaded; and in December Constantine
was forced not only to transfer his troops to the southernmost
districts of Greece but also to turn over to the Allies a consid-
erable part of the munitions and artillery of the Greek army.
These measures, necessary as they were from the Allied point
of view, served to render King Constantine still more truculent
and to divide the Greek people into two hostile camps. On the
one hand, Venizelos applauded the drastic measures of the
Allies and formally repudiated the king; he established a pro-
visional government in Crete and Macedonia and on his own
account issued a declaration of war against Bulgaria (November
28, 19 1 6). On the other hand, the Greek army chiefs, with a
sizable popular following, espoused the cause of the king and
denounced the '^treason" of Venizelos and the ''hypocrisy"
of the Allies ; they were intent on aiding the Germans and em-
barrassing General Sarrail at Salonica. Early in December
there were riotous demonstrations in Athens against the Allies,
and hundreds of Venizelists were clubbed or imprisoned. Only
the landing of Anglo-French marines restored order.
Because of the disquieting situation in Greece and because of
the disorganized condition of Sarrail's motley forces in Mace-
donia, no Anglo-French aid was forthcoming to Rumania. Rus-
sia, it is true, sent troops into Moldavia and the Dobrudja, but
they were too few in number and too ill munitioned to stay the
oncoming rush of Teutonic-Bulgarian invaders. Besides, it
was subsequently disclosed that the Tsar's government at the
time of Rumania's direst need was playing a double game.
Russia, for the sake of retaining Bessarabia and making Rumania
an object of her own imperialistic ambition, did not desire her
southern neighbor to acquire too great prestige by a decisive
victory over Austria-Hungary, and therefore neglected to assist
her until too late. Struck in the face by Germany and in the
side by Bulgaria, and stabbed in the back by Russia, Rumania
collapsed barely three months after her participation in the
Great War.
STALEMATE AND THE TEUTONIC PEACE DRIVE
The Allies, hopeful in midsummer of 19 16 that their fortunes
were at last in the ascendant, had counted upon Rumania's
intervention as the last straw which would break the back of
Germanized Mittel-Europa. At the close of 19 16, however, it
192 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
was obvious that the net result of Rumania's participation in
the Great War had been favorable to the Central Empires.
German prestige and Austro-Hungarian confidence, shaken
by the failures at Verdun, on the Somme, in Volhynia, in Galicia,
in Bukowina, and on the Isonzo, were restored by the spectacular
campaign in Rumania. To be sure, the battle-front was now
approximately two hundred miles longer than before Rumania's
intervention, but actually fewer men would be required to oppose,
or to pursue, the shattered fragments of the Rumanian field
army, which had lost at least two-thirds of its effectives, than
had previously been required to guard nine hundred miles of
frontier with Rumania's long-delayed intervention a standing
menace. Moreover, a large quantity of Rumanian wheat,
which British agents had purchased to prevent its exportation
to the Central Powers, was now in possession of the Teutons;
and the fertile grain-fields of Wallachia, scientifically cultivated
under the supervision of German agricultural experts, might
relieve the shortage of foodstuffs in Austria-Hungary and Ger-
many, in case the war should be prolonged over another harvest
season. Nor should it be forgotten that in capturing the Ru-
manian city of Ploechti, in the Prahova valley, the Germans
won the center of Europe's richest oil-fields, although the oil-
wells were found in flames and the oil- tanks destroyed. The
economic results of the campaign of Mackensen and Falkenhayn
were as important as its strategy was brilliant.
The only Allied success in the autumn of 1916, which in any
way could offset the Teutonic conquest of Rumania, was a French
counter-stroke at Verdun. In late October and early November,
General Nivelle launched a furious attack on the east bank of
the Meuse,^ north of Verdun, broke through the German line
on a four-mile front to a depth of two miles, and recovered Forts
Douaumont and Vaux and the village of Damloup. In mid-
December, a second French assault carried German trenches
on a front of six miles and took several other villages, with 11,000
prisoners. Although the territory regained by these two French
counter-strokes represented only a small part of what had been
lost in the vicinity of Verdun between February and July, never-
theless the significance of the French exploit was very real.
With trifling sacrifice of men, the French had easily regained
the most important strategic positions on the east bank of the
Meuse — positions which the Prussian Crown Prince had cap-
* The French operations, under the general command of Nivelle^ were actually
conducted by General Mangin.
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 193
tured only after desperate, protracted, and frightfully sanguinary
battles. The moral of which was that while the Germans might
still win sensational victories on other fronts — for example,
over little Rumania — the Allies were gradually gaining military
superiority on the substantial and all-important Western Front.
Nevertheless, for the moment, Mackensen's spectacular
exploits in Rumania loomed larger in popular imagination than
Nivelle's counter-attack at Verdun. If the Germans had failed
to obtain a final military decision in 191 6, it was equally true
that the Allies had failed too. And the result was bitter disap-
pointment and depression within each of the Entente Powers.
In Great Britain, Lord Northcliffe, the proprietor of the
London Times and of several other influential newspapers,
assailed Mr. Asquith's Government and sowed serious dissension
between the premier and David Lloyd George. Early in Decem-
ber, 1 91 6, Lord Northcliffe's journalistic campaign received
sufficient approbation throughout the country and in parlia-
ment to lead to the resignation of the Asquith cabinet. After
the refusal of Andrew Bonar Law, the Unionist leader, to become
prime minister, David Lloyd George was invited to form a minis-
try and his acceptance was announced on December 6. The
Lloyd George cabinet, like the most recent Asquith cabinet, was
a coalition affair, representing the Liberal, Unionist, and Labor
parties, but with the exception of the premiership itself the
most important posts in the new ministry were assigned to Union-
ists rather than to Liberals; Arthur J. Balfour succeeded Sir
Edward Grey ^ as foreign secretary ; Bonar Law became chan-
cellor of the exchequer and leader of the House of Commons;
and the ''war cabinet," a steering committee of five members
newly created from within the ministry, comprised the premier,
Bonar Law, Lord Milner, Earl Curzon, and Arthur Henderson,
— one Liberal, three Unionists, and one Laborite.
In France, Premier Briand managed to retain office and the
confidence of a majority of his countrymen by constituting,
like Lloyd George, a special centralizing ''war committee''
within his cabinet. The French war committee, as announced
on December 12, comprised, in addition to the premier, Alex-
andre Ribot, General Lyautey,^ Admiral Lacaze, and Albert
Thomas, ministers respectively of finance, war, marine, and
munitions. Shortly afterwards, General Joffre was made a
^ Viscount Grey of Falloden.
2 General Hubert Lyautey, who had made a name for himself in Morocco, was
just succeeding General Roques as minister of war.
194 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Marshal of France and retired from active command of the French
forces, his successor being General Robert Nivelle, the leader
of the recently successful counter-attack at Verdun.
In Russia, affairs were going from bad to worse. At the
very time when the army was recovering from its defeats and
demoralization of 191 5 and becoming once more a potential
weapon of offense against the Teutons, the Tsar and his entourage
were willfully blinding their eyes to the signs of economic dis-
tress throughout the empire and persistently closing their
ears to popular demands for political reform. Boris Stiirmer,
who served as premier during the greater part of the critical
year 191 6, was a confirmed reactionary and was suspected of
pro- German leanings. He muzzled the press, forced the able
and loyally pro-Entente Sazonov out of the ministry of foreign
affairs (August, 191 6), appointed ultra-conservatives to office,
suspended the Duma from July to November, executed obnoxious
autocratic decrees, and endeavored to repress altogether popular
organizations, such as the All-Russian Union of Zemstvos, the
Union of Municipalities, and the War Industries Committee,
formed for the twofold purpose of advocating democratic reform
and supporting the government in the vigorous prosecution of
the war. In October, Stiirmer placed all meetings of these popu-
lar organizations under police supervision; and, to cap the
climax, he appointed as minister of the interior M. Protopopov,
who was the most zealous prosecutor of liberals in all Russia and
who was known to cherish German sympathies.
These and other causes of complaint united nearly all Russian
factions against the government. But when at length, in Novem-
ber, 1916, Stiirmer resigned, the Tsar apparently had still
learned no lesson, for he promptly raised to the premiership
Alexander Trepov, a reactionary of the same faith and outlook
as Stiirmer and Protopopov. The year 191 6 closed in Russia
with a stormy session of the Duma in which Professor Paul
Milyukov, leader of the Constitutional Democrats, indicted
the government and was followed by several speakers who re-
ported sensational instances of criminal negligence in the prose-
cution of the war. The Duma passed a resolution affirming
that certain *'dark forces" were tending to paralyze the nation's
energies and to cause disorganization in all departments. Russia
was rapidly becoming volcanic, but the weak Tsar, the ''little
father," was hopelessly deaf and blind.
As for the Central Empires, the common people were tempo-
rarily reassured by the surprisingly speedy conquest of Rumania
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 195
and were therefore less critical of their civil and military authori-
ties. In Austria-Hungary, the death of the aged Emperor-
King Francis Joseph on November 21, 191 6, which should have
been, according to Allied forecasts, the signal for the dissolution
of the Dual Monarchy, was succeeded quietly, and apparently
with cordial popular acquiescence, by the coronation of the
Archduke Charles, Francis Joseph's grand-nephew, as emperor
of Austria and king of Hungary. In Germany, a ''Patriotic
Auxiliary Service Act," passed by the Reichstag on December
2, subjected all males between sixteen and sixty years of age
not yet called to the colors to auxiliary war work, such as service
in war industries, agriculture, and nursing the sick; it was a
kind of levee en masse and represented the closest sort of coopera-
tion between the German government and the German people
in a supreme endeavor to win the war.
Meanwhile, the Teutons were doing everything in their power
to strengthen and consolidate Mittel-Europa. Laborers were
being deported in large numbers from Belgium and from the
conquered districts of France and Rumania for work in Ger-
man factories and fields. Encouragement was being given to
the "national aspirations" of the Belgian Flemings and more
especially of the Russian Poles.
In glaring contrast to the failure of Russia to establish and
maintain autonomy in Poland, the Teutons after driving the
Russians out of the country set about elaborating measures
of self-government for the Poles. On November 5, 1916, the
German and Austrian emperors conjointly published a proclama-
tion promising to create an ''independent" Kingdom of Poland,
"a national state with an hereditary monarch and a constitu-
tional government," in "intimate relations" with Austria-Hun-
gary and Germany. This proclamation was read publicly at
Lublin and at Warsaw, in the Polish language, and was followed
by the hoisting of Polish flags while Teutonic military bands
played the Polish national anthem. A Regency was set up,
and elections were instituted for the State Council, or upper
house, of the future Polish Parliament. The Polish Jews,
moreover, were conciliated by the grant of special religious and
social privileges.
It soon became apparent that the "independent kingdom of
Poland in intimate relations with Austria-Hungary and Ger-
many" was not intended to be a national state for all Polish
people ; the Polish provinces of Prussia were to remain Prussian
as before, and Polish Galicia, while securing a larger measure
196 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
of autonomy within the Dual Monarchy, was not to be united
with independent Poland. Austro- German magnanimity was
to be displayed only in Russian Poland, and even there it was
most properly suspected when proclamations were issued by
the German Governor- General von Beseler at Warsaw exhorting
the Poles to volunteer for service in the Polish army which *^ would
join in the struggle against Russia."
Russia then did grudgingly in defeat what she might have done
with better grace during the preceding year. She issued a coun-
ter-proclamation, denouncing the Austro-German manifesto
as illegal and insincere, threatening to treat as traitors rather
than as prisoners of war any Russian Poles captured from the
new Polish army, and promising to create a unified and autono-
mous Poland on an ethnographical basis (which would mean the
inclusion of Prussian Poland and Austrian Galicia as well as
Russian Poland), under the sovereignty of the Tsar, after the
war. The French and British premiers congratulated Russia
upon her *' generous initiative" and associated themselves with
Russia's plans.
The Poles had no cause to be pro- German ; they were, in fact,
almost to a man anti-German. But many of them were also,
quite naturally, anti-Russian, and these Poles perceived in Rus-
sia's promises as much hypocrisy as in the Teutons'. On the
assumption that "a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush,"
they were willing to accept the German pronouncement at face-
value and to help the Teutons put Russia out of the way. Their
day of reckoning with the Germans would come later. Such was
the reasoning of the leaders of an important political party among
the Poles, — the Committee of National Defense (popularly
called, from the initials of its Polish name, the K. O. N.), — whose
most conspicuous representative, General Pilsudski, a truly
national hero, at once raised a Polish army and put it at the
disposal of the Austrians. Pilsudski's course was all the more
popular with his compatriots since a proposal of the United States,
in the spring of 1916, to organize relief for the battle-scarred and
famished country of Russian Poland had been brought to naught,
so Germany made it appear, by the malice and meanness of
Russia and her allies.^
^ The United States, on February 21, 1916, asked Great Britain for permission
to send some 40,000 tons of foodstuffs to be distributed by an American Commis-
sion among the civilian inhabitants of certain districts of Russian Poland and Lithu-
ania, on condition that the remainder be cared for by Germany and that imported
foodstuffs be used solely for the need of civilians. Russia would agree to the pro-
posal only on the further condition that the Central Empires provide relief for
i
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 197
Yet despite the seeming attachment of Poland to MiUel-Europa
and the sensational conquest of Rumania, the military authori-
ties of Germany must have recognized in the winter of 191 6-
191 7 that they were still far from winning the war. Tem-
porarily Allied offensives had come to a standstill — the Anglo-
French on the Somme and at Verdun, the Italian at Gorizia
and on the Carso, the Russian in Volhynia and Bukowina, —
but it was only a question of time when they would be renewed
and when, with waxing man-power and increased unity and
efficiency, they would be pressed more decisively against Ger-
many already utilizing her resources to the full. No longer,
apparently, could the Central Empires conduct a sustained and
overpowering drive against any one of their great enemies, such
as they had conducted in France in 19 14 or in Russia in 191 5.
Perhaps, after all, the winning of the Great War would require
astute appeals from civilians as well as sledge-hammer blows
from the military. A drive for peace, at the psychological
moment, might bring its victory no less renowned than the war-
drive of a Hindenburg or a Mackensen. To forward the new
policy, Gottlieb von Jagow, who had been foreign secretary of
Germany since 191 2, was succeeded in December, 1916, by
Alfred Zimmermann.
It was the ^'psychological moment" for a Teutonic peace
drive. The collapse of Rumania meant little to the strictly
military fortunes of the rival armed coalitions, but it signified
much to civilian morale among the belligerents. A curiously
unjustified optimism possessed the Teutons, while an oddly
unwarranted pessimism seized the Allied nations. It was re-
markable, on the one hand, how loyally the subjects of the Dual
Monarchy acclaimed their new Emperor-King Charles and how
universally the Germans supported the levee en masse, and, on
the other hand, how bitterly the influential Northcliffe journals
assailed Asquith's British government, how irritably the So-
cialists and Radicals in France grumbled at the governmental
authorities, and how profoundly Russia was stirred by unrest
and rumblings of revolution. Undoubtedly there was a growing
war-weariness everywhere. ''We behold," said Pope Benedict
XV in an allocution to his cardinals on December 4, 1916, "in
one place the vile treatment inflicted on sacred things and on
Serbia, Montenegro, and Albania ; and Great Britain indorsed the Russian demand
on May 10. Ten days later Germany rejected the Russo-British stipulations.
To subsequent humanitarian appeals of the United States, Germany constantly
afl&rmed that "owing to the cruel British blockade policy" nothing could be
done.
198 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
ministers of religion, even of high dignity, although both should
be inviolable by divine law and the law of nations ; in another,
numerous peaceful citizens taken away from their homes amid
tears of mothers, wives, and children; in another, open cities
and undefended populations made victims especially of aerial
raids ; everywhere on land and on sea such misdeeds perpetrated
as fill the soul with horror and anguish."
On December 12, 1916, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bul-
garia, and Turkey simultaneously submitted almost identical
notes to the diplomatic representatives of Spain, Switzerland,
and the United States, as well as to other neutral Powers and to
the Vatican, proposing ^'to enter forthwith into peace negotia-
tions." No concrete terms were offered by the Central Powers,
but the AlHes were invited to discuss *'an appropriate basis for
the establishment of a lasting peace," and apparently the inten-
tion was to hold pourparlers at The Hague during the winter,
while hostilities continued. The notes were forwarded to the
Entente Powers without comment by the neutral intermediaries.
Immediately the Russian foreign minister, with the emphatic
approval of the Duma, denounced the Teutonic peace offer and
declared Russia's unwilHngness to enter into any peace negotia-
tions whatsoever. The Tsar, in a proclamation to his armies,
stated that ''the time has not yet arrived. The enemy has not
yet been driven out of the provinces he has occupied. Russia's
attainment of the tasks created by the war — regarding Con-
stantinople and the Dardanelles, and the estab'Hshment of a free
Poland embracing all three of her racial districts — has not yet
been guaranteed." Foreign Minister Sonnino of Italy and
Premier Briand of France likewise disclaimed any intention of
concluding a premature peace. In behalf of Great Britain,
Lloyd George declared that while the Allies would wait to hear
what terms Germany had to offer, little could be expected of
peace negotiations at the moment ; ''the very appeal for peace,"
he said, "was deHvered ostentatiously from the triumphal
chariot of Prussian militarism." It would be a "cruel folly"
not to stop Germany from "swashbuckling through the streets
of Europe."
On December 30, a formal answer to the peace-note of Mittel-
Europa was returned signed by Russia, France, Great Britain,
Japan, Italy, Belgium, Montenegro, Portugal, and Rumania.
It declared that "no peace is possible so long as the Allies have
not secured reparation for violated rights and liberties, recogni-
tion of the principle of nationality and of the free existence of
ALLIES FAIL TO OBTAIN A DECISION IN 1916 199
small states ; so long as they have not brought about a settle-
ment calculated to end, once and for all, causes which have
constituted a perpetual menace to the nations, and to afford
the only effective guarantees for the future security of the
world."
Beyond these references to ^'reparation" and *' guarantees,"
the Allied governments did not indicate the terms on which
they would consent to make peace. Evidently they were con-
vinced of their own ultimate power to dictate peace, or they
were determined to elicit a clear statement of the war aims of
the Central Powers. They certainly knew, with the war map
as it was and with the people of the Central Powers confident
of success, that the responsible authorities of Mittel-Europa
would hardly hazard a frank, pubHc confession of war aims.
For if, contrary to expectations, these authorities should suggest
terms of peace conciliatory enough to merit serious discussion
by the Allies, the German people would be most painfully dis-
illusioned as to the invincible prowess of Teutonic arms, and
their morale would be destroyed ; and if, more naturally, these
same authorities should announce specific terms in keeping
with the spirit of braggadocio with which the populace of Cen-
tral Europe had been inspired, the Allied nations would then
understand perfectly what the AlKed governments had repeatedly
declared — that peace with militarized victorious Germany
would mean a Germanized Europe and a Germanized world.
In the latter case. Allied morale would be enormously strength-
ened, and the Allied nations would put forth military efforts
such as they had never put forth before.
The governments of Mittel-Europa escaped the dilemma by
maintaining a terrible silence as to the precise terms of peace
which they would offer. They pretended to be sad and grieved
that the wicked Allies would not discuss *' peace" with them,
and they actually duped the bulk of their subjects into believ-
ing that it was the Allies alone who persisted in war and blood-
shed. This effect, at least, the Teutonic peace drive of Decem-
ber, 1916, had, that it temporarily consolidated public opinion
in Mittel-Europa in support of any measures, no matter how
jdrastic or ruthless, which the military authorities might take.
For the time being, too, the Teutonic peace drive served to
reawaken pacifist agitation in Entente countries. In radical
circles the Allied governments were criticized for not making
clear their own war aims ; and from this criticism sprang up the
curious movement known as defeatism, a movement which
200 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
reached its greatest growth in 191 7 and which will require our
attention in a subsequent chapter.^
The Teutonic peace drive had succeeded in 19 16 scarcely
better than the year's military exploits. Neither Germany
nor the Allies had obtained a decision in the Great War. In
negotiations for peace as well as in mihtary campaigns the year
19 16 closed with an apparent stalemate between the gamesters
of the hostile coalitions.
In certain respects the failure of the peace drive in December,
191 6, marked the end of a period of the Great War. For two
years and a half, Germany had tried by force of arms to master
the Continent of Europe — in vain. For two years and a half,
France, Russia, and Great Britain had attempted to smash
German imperialism — in vain. Now, however, Russia was on
the brink of revolution, and the United States was on the point
of intervention. There would be something of a new alignment
and of a new emphasis, and the Great War would enter upon a
new period.
^ See below, pp. 287-298.
CHAPTER X
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES
THE STAKES: ISOLATION OR A LEAGUE OF NATIONS?
By January, 191 7, the Great War had been in progress two
years and a half. In this respect it was in marked contrast to the
international conflicts of the preceding century. The war of 1859
between France and Austria had lasted less than three months;
the war of 1866 between Prussia and Austria, only seven weeks;
the war of 1870-1871 between France and Germany, scarcely
seven months; the Balkans Wars together, only a few months;
and the Russo-Japanese War, less than eighteen months. In
each of these conflicts, one side or the other had obtained almost
at the outset a distinct military advantage which had been pressed
to a speedy, favorable decision. In the Great War, on the other
hand, Germany with all her preparedness and her efficiency had
failed to obtain a military decision, and the Allies likewise, de-
spite their superior man power and economic resources, had failed
to win a decisive victory. The Great War was protracted and
indecisive ; it was becoming obviously an endurance test.
The Great War had been occasioned by pretty strictly Euro-
pean disputes — disputes between Austria-Hungary and Serbia,
and the long-standing feud between France and Germany over
Alsace-Lorraine. It had been undertaken by Germany in the
spirit of international anarchy — in the spirit which would sacri-
fice the small to the great, the weak to the strong, right to might.
It represented an attempt on the part of a single Great Power —
Germany — to impose its will and its Kultur by force upon the
European state-system and upon European peoples. If Ger-
many should win the war, it would mean a Germanized Europel
and perhaps a Germanized world ; nay more, it would mean the!
signal exaltation of one state and one nation and thereby the
submergence of the idea that the world's progress depends upon
friendly and respectful cooperation between independent and
sovereign communities. A German triumph would menace the
whole world.
201
202 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
I That the world menace of German victory was not clearly
/perceived in neutral countries in 191 6 should occasion no surprise.
/The Great War, as yet, was viewed essentially as a European
/war. And to many neutrals it was doubtful whether Allied vic-
' tory would not, almost equally with German victory, furnish a
grave menace to world peace and world security. Englishmen
and Frenchmen and Italians were suspected of imperialistic am-
bitions, and in this particular the Tsar's government was more
than suspect. So long as autocratic Russia and oligarchical
Japan were influential allies of democratic France, Italy, and
Britain, it was difficult to interpret the struggle as one for liberty
and democracy or as one for setting limits to imperialism.
Nor was there as yet any well-defined alternative to the inter-
national anarchy which Germany championed and which, if she
were victorious, she would fasten more or less permanently upon
the world. Each of the Allies had entered the war primarily to
serve its own ends, and for long the chief weakness of the Allies
had lain in their inability to cooperate effectually with one an-
other and in their unwillingness to subordinate any individual
interests to the good of their common cause. Beyond defeating
Germany they appeared to have no common cause. And if they
were unwilling or unable, in the stress of the Great War, to depart
from theories and practices of international anarchy and adopt
some sort of enduring covenant among themselves, what guar-
antee would there be against an endless succession of Great Wars ?
Perhaps on the morrow of German defeat, Russia would arise and,
with a band of confederates, essay to re-play the role of Germany.
Or it might be Japan, or some other proud sovereign state. In
this fashion even Allied triumph might be but a prelude to still
vaster wars in which European civilization would be utterly anni-
hilated. History taught only too well that mere alliances were
quite kaleidoscopic, and that a ^'balance of power" was perpet-
ually getting out of equilibrium.
Germany stood for international anarchy, for isolation from
the needs and interests of other states and other peoples ; she
relied upon her sword to gain what she desired of this world's
glory and this world's goods. For what did the Allies stand?
Simply to break the German sword, meanwhile sharpening the
sword of a Russia or a Japan ? It was a question asked in that
reflective winter of 1916-1917 in France and Great Britain as well
as in neutral countries. And out of the searching of Allied con-
science emerged a new conviction — a new purpose — that the
Great War must be ended by the crushing not alone of Germany
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES 203
but of that spirit of international anarchy which Germany in-
carnated. Isolation and self-sufficiency of sovereign states had
had their day ; tried in the balance, they had been found wanting.
As the Great War progressed, its stakes were becoming clearer.
On the one hand were isolation, international anarchy, and dom-
ination of the world by a militaristic and autocratic Great Power ;
on the other hand were cooperation, a league of free nations, and a
partnership among democratic and peace-loving governments in
assuming the responsibilities as well as the profits of world man-
agement. The two most fateful factors in clarifying the stakes
of the Great War early in 191 7 were the Russian revolution and
the intervention of the United States. These two events, trans-
piring simultaneously, are treated in the present and next follow-
ing chapters.
Six of the Great Powers — Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia,
France, Great Britain, and Japan — had entered the war in 19 14,
and from such a supreme test of strength the remaining European
Great Power, Italy, could not long hold aloof. Only one Great
Power — the United States of America — preserved neutrality
throughout 191 5 and 191 6. The unique position of the United
States during those years was due less to lack of interest in world-
affairs than to geographical situation and historical traditions.
The United States was separated from the chief centers of
military operations by two or three thousand miles of ocean.
Because of her vast territorial extent on the American continent
and the abundance of her natural resources, she was not depend-
ent, as were certain European countries, upon foreign trade for
adequate supplies of food, fuel, and clothing. Rendered eco-
nomically self-sufficing by her geographical situation, she adhered
by tradition to political isolation.
Once upon a time, almost a century and a half ago, the United
States had been in formal alliance with France, but this alliance
had been made for the definite purpose of assuring American in-
dependence, and once the purpose was achieved the alliance
lapsed. To be sure, Americans still had a lively sympathy —
in the abstract — for the land which had given them a Lafayette
and a Rochambeau in their hour of direst need ; but there was an
ail-too prevalent notion in the United States, on the eve of the
Great War, that modern Frenchmen were unworthy and de-
generate descendants of illustrious sires.
For more than a century Americans had almost superstitiously
heeded the letter of Washington's admonitions against ^*en-
204 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
tangling alliances," and their insistent aloofness from world-re-
sponsibilities had fostered among them a notable provinciality.
It was natural that many of them should maintain a traditional
dislike and hatred of England ; George III meant more to them
than George V, and the ''patriotic" school-book accounts of the
Revolutionary War and the War of 1812 tended to obscure the
cultural bonds which united all the English-speaking peoples and
to keep Americans in ignorance of the amazing democratic de-
velopments in England during the nineteenth and twentieth cen-
turies. To the traditional American opinion of Great Britain,
the host of Irish immigrants gave confirmation.
Moreover, on the eve of the Great War, Germany was held in
high esteem in the United States. The sudden rise of imperial
Germany, with her marvelous achievements in science and in-
dustry, was likened to the mighty progress of republican America.
Americans praised the splendid qualities of sobriety and thrift
and domesticity which seemed to characterize their numerous
fellow-citizens of German origin. And between New World Amer-
ica and the Germany of the Old World, conspicuous citizens of
the United States — public officials, college-presidents, and phil-
anthropical capitalists — sought to forge intellectual and spiritual
chains. German literature was taught and admired in the United
States as was no other foreign literature. German music was
rendered and appreciated as was no other. German scholarship
was prized and patterned as was no other.
America's political isolation served to confirm popular misap-
prehensions about foreign peoples and at the same time to
strengthen popular devotion to the traditional foreign policies
of the United States Government. These policies may be stated
as three. In the first place, there was the ''Monroe Doctrine,"
the constant refusal of the United States to interfere in European
disputes or to be entangled in any foreign alliance, her chief ex-
ternal interest being to keep the New World free from European
aggression. Secondly, there was "arbitration," the repeated
attempts of the United States to substitute a judicial for a mili-
tary settlement of international differences. Thirdly, there was
the "freedom of the seas," for which the United States Govern-
ment had persistently contended; save during the Civil War,
America had espoused the doctrine of the inviolability of private
property at sea, a generous free list, and a narrow definition of
contraband, and in urging the acceptance of this doctrine by
European governments she had been led into frequent diplomatic
clashes with Great Britain.
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES 205
Under these circumstances none of the belligerents in 19 14 ex-
pected the United States actively to intervene in the Great War.
And in America there was no considerable movement at the out-
set in behalf of intervention on either side. In fact, as the war
progressed, the American Government and the bulk of the Amer-
ican people seemed to think that if the United States adhered
loyally to the Monroe Doctrine, she must hold aloof from the
conflict in Europe, and, if she held aloof, she would be in a better
position impartially to advocate arbitration and freedom of the
seas, and eventually to assume leadership in rebuilding a ruined
world and healing the wounds of the nations. America's part
in the Great War should be curative, not punitive.
But those persons who thought the United States, in the long
run, could hold aloof from the Great War were quite mistaken.
Despite traditional political isolation and apparent economic self-
sufficiency, the United States, was drawn irresistibly, willy-nilly,
into the world maelstrom. For the world of the twentieth cen-
tury was very different from that world of the eighteenth cen-
tury in which American independence and American traditions,
were implanted. Between the eighteenth and twentieth cen-
turies had occurred a series of events in the common, workaday!
life of mankind so amazing and epochal as to justify its descrip-j
tion as an '' Industrial Revolution." It was this Industrial Revo- '
lution which girdled the globe with railways, steamship lines,
telegraph and telephone wires, and drew all sorts of men together.
It was this Industrial Revolution which brought the chief nations
of the world in closer contact with one another than were the!
original thirteen English-speaking American colonies. It was'
this Industrial Revolution which created a world-market for
capital, raw materials, finished products, labor, and ideas, and
which, by breaking down the real barriers of local isolation
and self-sufhciency, laid deep and broad, if imperceptibly, the
economic foundations for a political superstructure of interna-
tionalism.
No longer could there be exclusively European questions or
narrowly American problems. The cultures and the interests of
America and Europe were now so inextricably intertangled that
any important armed conflict on either hemisphere would cer-
tainly affect seriously all neutrals the world over. If signs of the
times were read aright, the Great War would be a war not only
in Europe but on all the seas, and in all dominions beyond the
seas, and passing strange would that state be which could pre-
serve an undisturbed neutrality in such a cataclysm.
2o6 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
How the United States underwent a transformation in thought
and policy from aloofness and strict neutrality and fancied secur-
ity, in August, 1 9 14, to belligerency and juncture with the AlHes
in Europe, in April, 191 7, is a long story, only a few of whose
episodes can be mentioned here. Early in the war, the splendid
stand of the French armies at the Marne and the flocking to
Britain's standard of Canadians and Australians and East In-
dians gave America new ideas about French character and British
loyalty and a notable respect for the Allied cause, just as the
initial atrocities of the Germans in Belgium and France opened
American eyes to the fact that the much-vaunted Teuton had
other and less desirable assets than literature, music, and scholar-
ship. Gradually the notion grew prevalent in America that im-
perial and militaristic Germany was a horrible menace to civili-
zation, and that France and Great Britain were fighting for some-
thing vastly more significant than Alsace-Lorraine and German
colonies : they were fighting in defense of civilization itself. For
this reason the majority of Americans became sympathizers with
the Allies, but between sympathy and active participation there
was still a wide gulf.
It was not long before the United States as a neutral was drawn
into diplomatic conflicts with the belligerents over rights at sea.
American pride was especially wounded by insistent representa-
tions of the German Government that the United States had no
right to trade in munitions with the Allies. And American feel-
ings were outraged by the sinking of the Lusitania in May, 191 5,
and by the preposterous German demands that American citizens
should surrender their right of free travel by sea. The protracted
diplomatic negotiations on the subject of ruthless submarine war-
fare sorely tried the patience of the American people. And the
loud-mouthed expressions of sympathy for the German cause on
the part of many German-Americans, as well as the manifest in-
sincerity and procrastination of the German diplomatists, only
stimulated fresh outbursts of popular anger in the United States.
It was not until May 4, 1916, — a year after the sinking of the
Lusitania, — that the German Government promised henceforth
not to sink merchant vessels without warning and without due
provision for the safety of passengers, but even then the promise
was faltering and conditional.
That Germany's protestations of friendship for the United
States were essentially insincere, was proved by a continuous
campaign of German espionage and outrage in the New World.
Throughout 191 5 and 1916 diplomatic agents of the Central Em-
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES 207
pires organized and supported a staff of conspirators against the
laws of the United States; they stirred up strikes in munition
plants ; they manufactured bombs for the destruction of factories
and ships; they perpetrated passport frauds. In September,
191 5, the United States had to request the recall of the Austro-
Hungarian ambassador, Dr. Constantine Dumba, because of his
systematic instigation of labor difficulties. In November, 191 5,
the German ambassador. Count Bernstorff, was informed that
his military and naval attaches. Captains von Papen and Boy-Ed,
were ''no longer acceptable or personae gratae to this Govern-
ment," and their recall was demanded because "of what this
Government considers improper activities in military and naval
matters."
But Germany, after the recall of Dumba, Papen, and Boy-Ed,
continued her machinations in America. As the Committee on
Public Information of the United States Government subse-
quently said: "In this country official agents of the Central
Powers — protected from criminal prosecution by diplomatic
immunity — conspired against our internal peace, placed spies
and agents provocateurs throughout the length and breadth of
our land, and even in high positions of trust in departments of
our Government. While expressing a cordial friendship for the
people of the United States, the Government of Germany had its
agents at work both in Latin America and in Japan. They bought
and subsidized papers and supported speakers there to arouse
feehngs of bitterness and distrust against us in those friendly
nations in order to embroil us in war. They were inciting insurrec-
tion in Cuba, in Haiti, and in San Domingo ; their hostile hand
was stretched out to take the Danish Islands ; and everywhere
they were abroad sowing the seeds of dissension, trying to stir
up one nation against another, and all against the United States.
In their sum these various operations amounted to direct assault
of the Monroe Doctrine."
There were persons, of course, who were only too anxious to
utilize the sinister activities of German provocateurs in order to
inflame the Americans against Germany and to secure for the
Allies the active aid of the United States. The Entente Powers
countenanced and encouraged widespread propaganda in their
own behalf ; with one hand they cut off German postal and tele-
graphic communications, while with the other they poured into
America a flood of books, pamphlets, and newspapers, favorable
to their own cause. Distinguished Frenchmen made lecture-
tours throughout the country. And the British resorted to every
208 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
I known device of propaganda from employing secret-service agents
I in New York to maintaining at Washington the great journalist,
' Lord NorthcHfTe, with a host of assistants, as a pubHcity director.
With these official or semi-oj6&cial propagandists of the Entente
cooperated, whether for economic or for sentimental motives, a
considerable number of influential Americans, such as bankers
who made loans to the Allied Governments or acted as purchas-
ing agents for the Allies, manufacturers of munitions and other
war materiel who sold their goods to the AlHes, and college pro-
fessors who had been educated in France or England or who from
their studies and researches had developed a special admiration
for the Uterature and learning of one or another of the Allied
countries. Entente propaganda in the United States was even
more general than that of the Teutons ; it was also more adroit,
more sympathetic, and more conformable to American prejudices
and American wishes.
During 191 6 two currents of opinion were steadily growing in
the United States. On the one hand was the conviction of such
men as Ex-President Roosevelt and EKhu Root that the Great
War was in very truth America's war, that the Allies were fight-
ing for America's interests, the greatest of which was the main-
tenance of the pubKc right. On the other hand was the desire,
cherished by such leaders as President Wilson and Ex-President
Taft, that the Great War should be the last war fought under the
old bad conditions of international isolation and that America
should take an important part at the right moment in the estab-
lishment of a League to Enforce Peace. President Wilson, in
accepting renomination in 1916, declared : *' No nation can any
longer remain neutral as against any willful destruction of the
peace of the world. . . . The nations of the world must unite
in joint guarantee that whatever is done to disturb the whole
world's Hfe must be tested in the court of the whole world's opin-
ion before it is attempted."
For a time in the autumn of 191 6 American interest was ab-
sorbed in the electoral campaign for the presidency. In the ranks
of both the Democratic and the Repubhcan parties were German
sympathizers and also strong advocates of the Allies. Mr. Hughes,
the Republican candidate, contented himself with general criti-
cism of Wilson's policy towards Mexico and Germany, and took
no clear stand on the question of intervention. The slogan that
''Wilson kept us out of the war" undoubtedly drew votes from
American pacifists and traditionalists for the Democratic can-
didate ; and President Wilson was reelected by a small majority.
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES 209
Woodrow Wilson could properly interpret his reelection in
November, 19 16, as a warrant from the American people to keep
the United States at peace and to endeavor to secure international
reform. At any rate he speedily urged on the belligerents the
formation of a League of Nations, the while giving no indication
that he would take sides with either coalition. On December 18,
1916, he addressed to each of the militant Powers a remarkable
note which had been prepared quite independently of the Teu-
tonic Peace Drive then in full swing.
The American note of December 18 called attention to striking
similarities in the generally professed war aims of the Allies and
of the Central Powers. ''Each side desires to make the rights
and privileges of weak peoples and small states as secure against
aggression and denial in the future as the rights and privileges
of the great and powerful states now at war. Each wishes itself
to be made secure in the future, along with all other nations and
peoples, against the recurrence of wars like this, and against op-
pression and selfish interference of any kind. Each would be
jealous of the formation of any more rival leagues to preserve an
uncertain balance of power against multiplying suspicions ; but
each is ready to consider the formation of a League of Nations
to insure peace and justice throughout the world." The note
then went on to beg the belligerents to state their special war-
aims more expHcitly, and ended with the significant words : *' The
President is not proposing peace ; he is not even offering media-
tion. He is merely proposing that soundings be taken in order
that we may learn, the neutral nations with the beUigerents, how
near the haven of peace may be for which all mankind longs with
an intense and increasing longing."
The replies of Germany and Austria-Hungary, on December
26, 19 1 6, were essentially the same and equally vague and un-
satisfactory. Germany, for example, suggested ''the speedy
assembly, on neutral ground, of delegates of the warring states"
and a direct exchange of views, but declared that plans for the
prevention of future wars could not be taken up until the end
''of the present conflict of exhaustion"; only then would Ger-
many be ready "to cooperate with the United States in this sub-
lime task."
The Allies, replying to President Wilson on January 10, 191 7,
explained that they could not formulate their war-aims in detail
until the hour for negotiations arrived, but they associated them-
selves with the projects of a League of Nations and stated some
of their objects quite specifically. "The civilized world knows
2IO A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
that they imply, necessarily and first of all, the restoration of
Belgium, Serbia, and Montenegro, with the compensation due to
them; the evacuation of the invaded territories in France, in
Russia, in Rumania, with just reparation; the reorganization
of Europe, guaranteed by a stable regime and based at once on
respect for nationalities and on the right to full security and liberty
of economic development possessed by all peoples, small and great,
and at the same time upon territorial conventions and interna-
tional settlements such as to guarantee land and sea frontiers
against unjustified attack ; the restoration of provinces formerly
torn from the Allies by force and against the wish of their in-
habitants; the Hberation of the Italians, as also of the Slavs,
Rumanians, and Czechoslovaks from foreign domination; the
setting free of populations subject to the bloody tyranny of the
Turks ; and the turning out of Europe of the Ottoman Empire
as decidedly foreign to Western civilization."
The obvious contrast between the candid answer of the Allies
and the ambiguous replies of the Central Powers served to deepen
those currents of public opinion which had been gathering head-
way in America throughout 19 16. It now seemed as though the
AlHes could be counted upon to cooperate with the United States
in abolishing international isolation and in fashioning a League
of Nations, and, whether such a league should prove permanently
effective or not, it now became patent to a majority of Americans
that the Allies were fighting at least indirectly for the United
States, that a Germany emerging triumphant from the Great
War could not long be restrained from forcing her Kultur on the
New World.
UtiHzing the replies to his note of December 18, and the state
of public opinion throughout the country. President Wilson ap-
peared before the United States Senate on January 22, 191 7, and
delivered a remarkable discourse. The peace that would end
the war, he said, must be followed by a '^ definite concert of Powers"
which would ^'make it virtually impossible that any such catas-
trophe should ever overwhelm us again." In that the United
States must play a part. It was right before such a settlement
was reached that the American Government should frankly state
conditions on which it would feel justified in asking the American
people ''to approve its formal and solemn adherence to a League
of Peace." He had come to state those conditions :
"No peace can last, or ought to last, which does not (i) recog-
nize and accept the principle that governments derive all their
just powers from the consent of the governed, and that no right
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES 211
anywhere exists to hand people about from sovereignty to sover-
eignty as if they were property. . . .
*'I am proposing, as it were, that the nations should with one
accord adopt the doctrine of President Monroe as the doctrine
of the world : that no nation should seek to extend its policy over
any other nation or people but that every people should be left
free to determine its own policy, its own way of development,
unhindered, unthreatened, unafraid, the little along with the
great and powerful.
^'I am proposing (2) that all nations henceforth avoid entan-
gling alliances which would draw them into competitions of power,
catch them in a net of intrigue and selfish rivalry, and disturb
their own affairs with influences intruded from without. There
is no entangling alHance in a concert of power. When all unite
to act in the same sense and with the same purpose, all act in the
common interest and are free to Hve their own Hves under a com-
mon protection.
^'I am proposing ... (3) that freedom of the seas which in
international conference after conference representatives of the
United States have urged with the eloquence of those who
are the convinced disciples of liberty; and (4) that modera-
tion of armaments which make of armies and navies a power
for order merely, not an instrument of aggression or of selfish
violence.
^'(5) Mere agreements may not make peace secure. It will
be absolutely necessary that a force be created as a guarantee of
the permanency of the settlement so much greater than the force
of any nation now engaged or any alliance hitherto formed or
projected that no nation, no probable combination of nations,
could face or withstand it. If the peace presently to be made is
to endure, it must be a peace made secure by the organized major
force of mankind."
Thus President Wilson cleared the ground for the building of
a League of Nations to supplant the international anarchy which,
according to him, was the prime cause of the Great War and the
chief danger to the future peace of the world. That the President
still thought it possible and desirable for the United States to
preserve neutrality was evinced by his declaration in the same
discourse of January 22, that the peace about to be negotiated
must be a ^' peace without victory," that is, a peace not dictated
by a victor to a loser, leaving a heritage of resentment. By im-
plication it meant that the AUies must not seek to destroy and
dismember Germany, and, on the other hand, that Germany
212 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
must abandon any project of mastering other European countries
or of dominating the world.
Though many citizens of the Entente states misunderstood
the phrase *' peace without victory " and grumbled at its utterance
by the president of a prosperous neutral which was supposed to
know nothing of the sacrifice and hardships of the belligerents,
the AUied Governments promptly repudiated the suggestion that
they might be seeking the annihilation or enslavement of Ger-
many. On the whole, the President's proposals met with an
unexpectedly favorable reception in the Entente countries.
Promptly the AlHes redoubled their efforts to draw America
actively into the war. The second half of the year 19 16, as we
have seen,^ had not been particularly advantageous to them:
Rumania had collapsed; Russia was faltering; and neither on
the ItaHan nor on the Western Front, nor in Macedonia, had any
brilliant success been achieved. Pacifism and defeatism ^ were ap-
pearing in France and Italy ; war- weariness was growing through-
out all the Entente countries. If the energetic assistance of the
one remaining neutral Great Power could not immediately be
secured, AUied morale might completely disappear and Germany
might win a speedy victory. It was a dark hour in the history
of the Entente and of the world. Only the United States could
dispel the darkness, and to this end English and French and Ital-
ian propagandists brought all sorts of pressure to bear upon the
American Government and the American people. They pressed
the argument that America's welfare and safety all along had
depended upon their success and that now their success depended
upon America's direct aid. They called loudly to the United
States.
Germany herself was responsible for the suddenness and ease
with which the United States heard and heeded the Allied call.
The German Government had failed to respond frankly and sin-
cerely to the President's note of December 18, or to his address
of January 22. While it was endeavoring to create a pacifist
sentiment in the Entente countries, it was girding itself and en-
couraging its own people to undertake another campaign for the
mastery of Europe and the domination of the world. This time
Germany would not drive furiously with her armies against France
or Russia or Italy or against a Serbia or a Rumania ; rather, she
would hit at Great Britain, the brain and sinew of the hostile
coaUtion ; she would challenge the mistress of the seas ruthlessly
by a campaign of unrestricted submarine warfare.
* See above, p. 193. "^ See below, pp. 287-298.
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES 213
THE OCCASION: UNRESTRICTED SUBMARINE WARFARE
It has already been explained that the chief weapon of any
German counter-offensive against Great Britain was the sub-
marine, but that this weapon would be ineffectual unless its use
were unrestricted. Unrestricted use of the submarine, though
absolutely at variance with recognized rules of international con-
duct, had always been advocated by Tirpitz, Reventlow, and other
Pan- Germans who viewed England as the main stumbKng-block
to Teutonic victory ; it had actually been attempted in the spring
of 191 5 and had been abandoned definitely in May, 191 6, only be-
cause of the threatening expostulations of the United States and
other neutral Powers and because of a conviction in the minds of
more moderate German statesmen, such as the Chancellor Beth-
mann-Hollweg, that there were other and less perilous means of
bringing Britain to terms.
From May, 1916, to January, 191 7, Bethmann-HoUweg, hold-
ing the German submarines in leading strings, pursued in turn
two poHcies which were calculated to disrupt the Entente and
bring a German peace. The one was the smashing of the Allied
fronts on the continent of Europe — the military drives against
Verdun, against Vicenza, and into Rumania. The other was the
diplomatic peace drive, culminating in the Teutonic peace-note
of December, 191 6. But both policies miscarried. The Teutons
failed to obtain a miHtary decision ; they failed likewise to make
the Allies sue for peace. And meanwhile the Allies were tighten-
ing their economic strangle-hold on Mittel-Europa.
Tirpitz had been forced out of the German naval office in the
spring of 191 6, but from his retirement he had never ceased to
berate Bethmann-Hollweg for what he deemed a cowardly sur-
render of the best German weapons to the susceptibilities of
"mercenary" America; and as Bethmann-Hollweg's alternative
policies went wrong, the popular following of Tirpitz in Germany
grew noisier and more numerous. Eventually there was a veri-
table clamor for the resumption of unrestricted submarine war-
fare, cost what it might. Even the more moderate elements in
German public life were won over, by the failure of their peace-
drive, to espouse a campaign of ruthlessness. Germany had
already risked much in pursuit of world dominion; Bethmann-
Hollweg was now willing to risk everything.
On January 31, 191 7, the German Government officially noti-
fied the United States that inasmuch as the AlHes had rejected
Germany's peace offer, and inasmuch as the Entente Powers, led
214 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
by England, had sought for two and a half years to starve Ger-
many into submission, *' a new situation has thus been created
which forces Germany to new decisions," and that therefore Ger-
many would exercise the freedom of action which she reserved to
herself in her note of May 4, 1916. Accordingly, announcement
was made that from February i, 191 7, all sea traffic within cer-
tain zones adjoining Great Britain, France, and Italy, and in the
eastern Mediterranean, would, "without further notice, be pre-
vented by all weapons." This meant that German submarines
German "War Zone" of February i, 191 7
proposed to sink at sight within these areas all vessels whether
neutral or belHgerent.
The German note of January 31, 191 7, reopened the whole sub-
marine question not only, but further outraged American pride
(and, it must be said, touched at an ironical point the American
sense of humor) by laying down hard and fast rules for United
States shipping. ''Sailing of regular American passenger steam-
ships," stated a condescending memorandum which accompanied
the German note, *'may continue undisturbed after February i,
1917, if — (a) the port of destination is Falmouth; (b) sailing
to, or coming from, that port, course is taken via the Scilly Islands
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES 215
and a point 50° N., 20° W. ; (c) the steamships are marked in
the following way, which must not be allowed to other vessels in
American ports — on ship's hull and superstructure three ver-
tical stripes, one meter wide each, to be painted alternately white
and red; each mast should show a large flag checkered white
and red, and the stern the American national flag ; care should
be taken that, during dark, national flag and painted marks are
easily recognizable from a distance, and that the boats are well
lighted throughout; (d) one steamship a week sails in each di-
rection, with arrival at Falmouth on Sunday and departure from
Falmouth on Wednesday; (e) the United States Government
guarantees that no contraband (according to German contra-
band Hst) is carried by those steamships."
Every right to the freedom of the seas for which the United
States had ever contended was violated by the brusque German
declaration of January 31, and all those emotions of dislike, fear,
and hatred of Germany, which had been steadily heightened in
the United States by adroit AlUed propaganda, were instanta-
neously welded into resolute hostility. On February 3, the Ger-
man ambassador at Washington, Count Bernstorff , was handed
his passports, and the American ambassador at Berlin, James
Gerard, was summoned home. On the same day President Wil-
son told Congress that he still could not believe the German
Government meant ^' to do in fact what they have warned us they
feel at liberty to do," and that only ''actual overt acts" would
convince him of their hostile purpose. But he ended with the
solemn announcement that if American ships were sunk and
American lives were lost, he would come again to Congress and
ask for power to take the necessary steps for the protection of
American rights.
The rupture of diplomatic relations between the United States
and Germany did not necessarily mean war, though it pointed in
that direction. Undoubtedly a majority of the American people
still cherished the idea expressed by the President that Germany
would not venture to put her threats into effect. Nevertheless
the mere threats of Germany sufficed to deter American ships
from sailing for Europe, with the result that powerful economic
interests in America increased the clamor against Germany, the
excitement being particularly acute in New England and in the
Middle Atlantic States.
On February 26, 191 7, President Wilson again addressed Con-
gress, pointing out that Germany had placed a practical embargo
on American shipping, and urging that the United States resort
2i6 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
to ''armed neutrality," a measure just short of war. On March i
the House of Representatives voted ''armed neutraUty" by 403
to 13, but in the Senate the measure was defeated by a " fiHbuster "
of a handful of "willful men," who prolonged the debate until
the expiration of the congressional session, on March 4.
In the meantime, on February 28, the Associated Press pub-
Hshed an order which had been issued on January 16 by Herr
Zimmermann, German Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, to
the German minister in Mexico, and which had fallen into the
hands of the United States Government. The "Zimmermann
Note" instructed the German minister to form an alliance with
Mexico in the event of war between Germany and the United
States, and to offer as a bribe the states of Texas, New Mexico,
and Arizona ; it also suggested that efforts might be made to
seduce Japan from the Allies and bring her into partnership with
Mexico and Germany. From the date of the note — January
16 — it was obvious that the German Government had been
planning the resumption of ruthless submarine warfare at the
very time when it was pretending to be most friendly to the United
States, and from the contents it was apparent that Germany
would go to any length in opposing American rights. The result
of the disclosure was increased resentment against Germany,
especially in the southwestern states and on the Pacific coast.
The whole United States was being rapidly galvanized into war-
activity.
Woodrow Wilson, in his inaugural address, on March 5, said:
"We stand firm in armed neutrality, since it seems that in no
other way we can demonstrate what it is we insist upon and can-
not forego. We may be drawn on by circumstances, not by our
own purpose or desire, to a more active assertion of our rights as
we see them and a more immediate association with the great
struggle itself." One week later he issued formal orders to arm
American merchant vessels against submarines. And within
another week the "actual overt acts" of which he had warned
in his speech before Congress on February 3 were committed.
On March 16-17 three homeward-bound ships, ^ — American-
built, American-owned, and American-manned, — were sunk by
German submarines. German defiance of the United States was
now flagrant and unmistakable.
Not only was the case against Germany perfectly plain, but
an event had just occurred which now made it easier for the
United States to intervene in the Great War on the side of the
1 The Vigilancia, the City of Memphis, and the Illinois.
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES 217
Allies. It was in March, 191 7, that the Russian Revolution
broke out ; the Tsar abdicated ; a provisional democratic govern-
ment was proclaimed; and on March 21, the United States led
all the nations of the world in according recognition to the new
regime at Petrograd. The destruction of autocracy in Russia
signified that the lines were now drawn quite distinctly between
isolated, militaristic, oligarchical Mittel-Europa, on the one hand,
and a league of peace-loving, democratic nations, on the other.
So long as Russia retained a reactionary absolutism, the United
States might well adhere to a policy of ''armed neutrahty," but
as soon as Russia patterned her political institutions after those
of democratic France, Britain, and Italy, then the United States
saw the way clear to a juncture with the Allies and to a fight to
the finish with Germany. The Great War would no longer be
in any respect a conflict between dynasties; it would be ''the
eternal war of Uberty and despotism."
On April 2, 191 7, President Wilson came before Congress and
asked for a declaration of war against Germany. His address
on that occasion, one of the greatest of America's famous docu-
ments, was in part as follows: "With a profound sense of the
solemn and even tragical character of the step I am taking and
of the grave responsibilities which it involves, but in unhesitating
obedience to what I deem my constitutional duty, I advise that
the Congress declare the recent course of the Imperial German
Government to be in fact nothing less than war against the Gov-
ernment and people of the United States ; that it formally accept
the status of belligerent which has thus been thrust upon it ; and
that it take immediate steps not only to put the country in a more
thorough state of defense but also to exert aU its power and em-
ploy all its resources to bring the Government of the German
Empire to terms and end the war. ... It will involve the ut-
most practicable cooperation in counsel and action with the Gov-
ernments now at war with Germany. . . .
"A steadfast concert of peace can never be maintained except
by a partnership of democratic nations. No autocratic Govern-
ment could be trusted to keep faith within it or to observe its
covenants. It must be a league of honor, a partnersWp of opin-
ion .... Only free peoples can hold their purpose and their
honor steady to a common end and prefer the interests of man-
kind to any narrow interest of their own. . . .
"The world must be made safe for democracy. Its peace must
be planted upon the tested foundations of poHtical liberty. We
have no selfish ends to serve. We desire no conquest, no doroin-
2i8 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
ion. We seek no indemnities for ourselves, no material com-
pensation for the sacrifices we shall freely make. We are but
one of the champions of the rights of mankind. We shall be
satisfied when those rights have been made as secure as the faith
and the freedom of nations can make them. . . .
^'It is a fearful thing to lead this great, peaceful people into
war, into the most terrible and disastrous of all wars, civilization
itself seeming to be in the balance. But the right is more pre-
cious than peace, and we shall fight for the things which we have
always carried nearest our hearts — for democracy, for the right
of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own
Governments, for the rights and Hberties of small nations, for a
universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as
shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world
itself at last free.
^'To such a task we can dedicate our lives and our fortunes,
everything that we are and everything that we have, with the
pride of those who know that the day has come when America
is privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles
that gave her birth and happiness and the peace which she has
treasured. God helping her, she can do no other."
On April 4, the Senate adopted a declaration of war by 82 votes
to 6, and on the next day the House, by 373 votes to 50. And
on April 6, 191 7, the President issued a proclamation declaring
that "si state of war exists between the United States and the
Imperial German Government." Two days later the United
States broke off diplomatic relations with Austria-Hungary, al-
though a declaration of war against the Dual Monarchy was de-
layed until December 7.
Thus by April, 191 7, the resumption of unrestricted submarine
warfare by Germany had brought, the United States, the last of
the world's Great Powers, into the war on the side of the Allies.
Furthermore, German ruthlessness now stirred up a wave of pro-
Ally sentiment among the remaining neutrals, and protests against
submarine warfare and barred zones were speedily filed at Berlin
by Spain, Holland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, China, and the
republics of Latin America. Within a week of America's declara-
tion of war, Brazil and Bolivia severed diplomatic relations with
Germany, and Cuba and Panama formally joined the Allies.
The intervention of the United States was a godsend to the
Entente, for at the time, as subsequently was generally admitted,
the Entente was on its ''last legs." Russia was soon to quit the
war altogether, and France and Italy were alike suffering from
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES 219
bad cases of '' nerves." Now, however, the United States could
put at the disposal of the Entente her rich metals, her copious
foodstuffs, her numerous shipyards, her powerful fleet, her vast
man power, and, most significant of all, her fresh enthusiasm and
her unselfish ideaHsm. The character of the Great War in popu-
lar imagination was changed for the better, and the chances of
victory for the public right were enormously increased. Ger-
many, already inferior to the Allies in natural resources and stay-
ing power, would soon be rendered hopelessly inferior. For this
denouement Germany had only her own ruthlessness to blame.
THE PROBLEM: PREPAREDNESS
Germany had staked everything on the success of her subma-
rine warfare, and the intervention of the United States did not
swerve her from her purpose. She realized that the United States
was ill prepared for immediate active participation in the struggle
in Europe. No matter how energetic the American Government
might be, it would certainly take the whole year 191 7 for the
United States to raise, train, equip, and transport to Europe an
army large enough to have any appreciable effect upon the for-
tunes of the war. Food, munitions, and shipping, in addition
to men, would have to be supplied in enormous quantities not
only for an American Expeditionary Force but for the Allies also,
and as yet America was not ready to fulfill these obhgations. It
would be the spring of 1 918, at the earhest, before Germany need
reckon seriously with the United States.
In the meantime Germany would vigorously prosecute her
submarine warfare against Great Britain. Ruthlessly would she
seek to destroy every merchant vessel endeavoring to enter or
leave a British port, and in this way she would destroy Allied
shipping, put a practical embargo on British industry and trade,
deprive the Allied armies of munitions and supplies, and starve
out the civilian population of the United Kingdom. If all went
well for the Germans, Great Britain would be brought to terms;
and once Great Britain submitted, France and Italy and Russia
would have to sue for peace. And with Allied shipping destroyed
and with the Allies submitting to the inevitable, there would be
neither means nor purpose of transporting an American Expedi-
tionary Force to Europe. American intervention, Germany
thought, could not be effective before the spring of 191 8, and then
it would be too late. Perhaps Germany was again over-opti-
mistic, but at any rate the Allies themselves were worried. They
220 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
trembled when they tried to face the question. Could the United
States complete preparedness before Germany had succeeded in
her unrestricted submarine warfare?
No sooner had the United States declared war against Germany
than special missions visited America from England and France
— the British mission headed by Foreign Secretary Balfour, and
the French by Ex-Premier Viviani and Marshal Joffre. These
missions explained the dire situation confronting the Allies and
the urgent need for the United States not only to dispatch sup-
plies of all sorts to their countries and to assist in averting the
submarine danger but to rush large armies to France, if not im-
mediately to engage in the actual fighting, at least to reassure the
Allied troops that the United States was really in the war and
thus to strengthen their morale. The response was sympathetic
and enthusiastic.
It is perhaps regrettable that the American Government did
not take advantage of the exigencies of the AlHes and the visit
of the foreign missions to make full participation of the United
States in the war conditional upon the formal repudiation by the
Entente of all existing ^'secret treaties." If this had been done,
most probably the ''secret treaties" would have been thrown
overboard, the Great War in its subsequent phases would have
been waged more distinctly in harmony with the spirit that im-
pelled American intervention, and certain very troublesome prob-
lems which later confronted the Peace Congress would never have
arisen or would have been solved more equitably. As it was,
however, the visiting missions carefully concealed from President
Wilson the existence of numerous secret international engage-
ments by which they were bound, notably the pledges made Japan
in February, 191 7, in respect of the German rights in the Chinese
province of Shantung and the German Pacific islands north of
the equator. That the United States made no such conditions
or reservations was a tribute to American unselfishness and like-
wise to the naive faith of the American Government that all other
Powers arrayed against Germany were equally unselfish. At any
rate America was resolved to show the faith that was in her not
alone by words but also by deeds.
It was none too soon. Even before the formal resumption of
unrestricted submarine warfare on February i, 191 7, Germany
had made noteworthy progress in destroying AlHed shipping and
in hampering AlHed commerce. Since August, 1914, every month
had witnessed the sinking of hundreds of thousands of tons of
belHgerent and neutral merchant vessels. In 19 14 nearly 700,000
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES 221
tons of British and Allied and neutral shipping had been destroyed ;
in 1915 the amount increased to 1,700,000 tons; and in 1916 it
soared to 2,800,000 tons. Apparently, as time went on, the Ger-
man submarines were becoming more numerous, more daring,
and more experienced. By February, 191 7, submarine warfare
had passed its trial stage and was to be put to the supreme test.
And just as the German navy yards completed a host of new sub-
marines and German factories equipped them with powerful tor-
pedoes for their deadly work, the German Government laid aside
all pretense of observing international law in their use and pro-
claimed the ruthless orders of February i.
The German campaign of sea-ruthlessness started off with
spirit and dash. From January to June, 191 7, German sub-
marines sank 2,275,000 tons of British shipping and 1,580,000
tons of alHed and neutral shipping, — an aggregate loss to the
Entente of nearly four milHon tons in six months. If this huge
total could be doubled in the second half of 191 7, German hopes
and Allied fears might be justified.
As a matter of fact, however, the spirit and dash which char-
acterized the submarine campaign of Germany in the first half
of 191 7 were not sustained in the second half of the year, for the
Allies were finding means of lessening the menace. Merchant
vessels began to sail under convoy, guarded above by dirigible
balloons and hydroplanes, and on the surface by a fleet of patrol
boats. Close watch was kept of the movements of submarines,
either by means of lookouts on patrol boats or by means of wire-
less operators who detected messages passing between the sub-
marines and the German naval bases. The camouflaging of
Allied ships, moreover, proved a useful deception; "the war
brought no stranger spectacle than that of a convoy of steamships
plowing along through the middle of the ocean streaked and be-
spotted indiscriminately with every color of the rainbow in a way
more bizarre than the wildest dreams of a sailor's first night ashore. ' '
Gradually, Allied naval commanders were enabled to trap and
destroy, or capture, German submarines; and the German au-
thorities found it increasingly difficult to repair and replenish
their submarines and to make their sailors undertake joyfully
the new hazards of Hfe in a periscope. Though the losses to
AlHed shipping continued heavy throughout 191 7 and far into
191 8, the turn of the tide was reached in the midsummer of 191 7.
In the second half of 191 7 the destruction of Allied and neutral
shipping amounted in the aggregate to two and three-fourths
milHon tons, as against nearly four millions in the first half of the
222 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
year. It was obvious that Germany had miscalculated the suc-
cess of unrestricted submarine warfare and that Great Britain
would not be brought to terms by the spring of 1918.
It became obvious, too, that Germany had miscalculated the
time required for the United States to intervene actively in the
war. For the United States, after declaring war on April 6, 191 7,
lost no time in collecting vast sums of money, in gathering and
training a large army, and in mobilizing industries and resources.
Immediately German ships in American harbors were seized, and
the navy and the small standing army were mobilized. A Coun-
cil of National Defense was formed, comprising the secretaries
of war, navy, interior, agriculture, commerce, and labor, with an
advisory commission of seven men drawn from civil life, and
with a host of affihated local boards and committees throughout
the country to assist in coordinating America's war efforts. To
arouse an intelligent popular enthusiasm for the war, a Committee
on Public Information was created under the chairmanship of
George Creel. There was some natural and inevitable *'mud-
dUng" in transforming America suddenly from a peace footing
to a war basis, but, considering the manifold difficulties and handi-
caps, the task as a whole was achieved with surprising efficiency
and dispatch.
A Selective Service Act, passed in May, authorized the Presi-
dent to increase the regular army, by voluntary enlistment, to
287,000 men, the maximum strength provided by existing law;
to draft into service all members of the National Guard ; and to
raise by selective draft an additional force of 500,000 men, and
another 500,000 at his discretion. The age limits for drafted
men were twenty-one and thirty years, and all male persons be-
tween these ages were required to register ''in accordance with
regulations to be prescribed by the President." On June 5,
'' registration day," some nine and one-half million young Ameri-
cans enrolled, and the drawing of the 625,000 men to form the
first selective army took place at Washington on July 15. In
July the National Guard was mobilized, and in September the
mobilization of the new national army began.
Meanwhile Congress was enacting a series of important war
measures : two liberty loan acts (April and September) ; an es-
pionage act, in June ; an aviation act, in July ; food control and
shipping acts, in August ; and in September, a revenue act im-
posing war taxes on income and excess profits, a trading- with-
the-enemy act, and a soldiers' and sailors' insurance act. During
the congressional session which closed in October, 191 7, appro-
THE UNITED STATES INTERVENES 223
priations were made totaling nearly nineteen billion dollars, of
which seven bilHons were to cover loans to the Allies. In July
Mr. Herbert Hoover became ''food dictator," and in August Mr.
Garfield was appointed ''fuel administrator." In December the
Government took over the management and operation of the
railways. Every possible step was taken to expedite the pro-
duction of munitions and other war supplies, including foodstuffs,
and to transport all these commodities to American seaports on
the Atlantic coast and thence to Europe for the rehef alike of the
armed forces and of the civilian population, of the nations now
associated with the United States in the Great War. To place
American grain, meat, munitions, and money so promptly and so
effectively at the disposal of the Allies was of itself no mean con-
tribution of the United States to the eventual defeat of Germany.
But the United States Government was resolved to go much
farther and to put American troops in front-line trenches along-
side those Allied troops who for two years and a half had borne
the heat and burden of the greatest war in history. On June 13,
General John J. Pershing, who had been designated to command
the projected American Expeditionary Force abroad, arrived in
Paris, and the first contingent of American troops reached France
on June 25. The first American shots from European trenches
were fired on October 27, and the first trench fighting of Ameri-
cans occurred a week later. By December, 1917, about 250,000
American troops had been safely landed in France ; and towards
the end of January, 1918, the War Department at Washington
let it be known that United States soldiers were occupying front-
line trenches "in a certain sector."
Against American preparations the German submarine war-
fare made little headway. It is true that during the first year
of unrestricted submarine warfare, ending January 31, 1918,
some sixty-nine American vessels, representing a gross tonnage
of 170,000, were sunk by submarines, mines, or raiders. On the
other hand, it should be remembered that enemy merchant ships
were seized by the United States to the number of 107, with an
aggregate tonnage of nearly 700,000, and that many of these
former German and Austrian liners were promptly repaired and
used to carry American troops and supplies to France. Besides,
the United States Government inaugurated a shipbuilding pro-
gram of huge dimensions, so that by the first anniversary of
America's participation in the war the United States had put in
commission 1275 vessels of every sort of service — mine-sweep-
ing, mine-laying, transport, patrol, and submarine-chasing. By
224 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
the same date the personnel of the American navy had grown from
its original number of 4800 officers and 102,000 men to 20,600
officers and 330,000 men, and the navy itself with great speed and
small loss was conducting the most amazing ferrying business on
record.
Before the spring of 191 8 had rolled around, the problem of
American preparedness was solved, and it was solved in manner
wholly disconcerting to the Teutons. At the beginning of 191 7
Germany had, with mad imprecations, unloosed the ruthless sub-
marines in order to bring Great Britain to terms. At the close
of 191 7, despite the submarines and the fierce invectives of Ger-
many, Great Britain was still resolutely hostile. Nay, more,
at the close of 191 7, because of those same submarines and in-
vectives, the United States was an active associate of the Entente,
pouring out to Britain and France and Italy vast streams of food
and minerals and treasures and, most startHng of all, her own
man power. Verily it was a new stage of the Great War which
the intervention of the United States marked, and one ominous
to Germany's vaulting ambitions and likewise to any perpetu-
ation of international anarchy.
CHAPTER XI
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE"
DESTRUCTION OF RUSSIAN AUTOCRACY: THE MARCH
(1917) REVOLUTION
Autocracy of the Russian variety proved itself absolutely
unfit to meet the supreme test of the Great War. Such was
its corruption and inefficiency that rather early in the struggle
Russia had lost to the foreign foe more men and more territory
than any other Great Power. And such was the obtuseness of
the Russian autocracy that it would learn no lesson from military
defeat and would brook no honest criticism of its own conduct.
In fact, as time went on, the court and the bureaucracy appeared
to think less and less of how to defeat Germany and more and
more of how to ward off domestic revolution.
Throughout the winter of 1916-1917 popular disaffection
overspread Russia. Army officers complained of the lack of
governmental energy in prosecuting the war. The middle classes
complained of absurd governmental restrictions on trade and
industry. Landlords complained of silly governmental restric-
tions on the export of grain from one district to another. Peasants
groaned under an intolerable system of economic and political
abuses. Workingmen in the towns suffered from a shortage
of food and a general paralysis of business. Against the bureau-
cracy were arrayed all popular bodies — the Union of Zemstvos,
the Union of MunicipaHties, the War Industries Committee,
the Imperial Duma, and even the conservative Council of the
Empire. In Petrograd and Moscow, strike followed strike.
Yet the autocracy adhered to its traditions of secrecy, sus-
picion, repression, and intrigue. The Tsar Nicholas II himself
was naturally clement and well-meaning, but he was hopelessly
dominated by his wife, the Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna;
and this ambitious and neurotic woman surrounded herself with
fools and hypocrites and charlatans, chief among whom was the
notorious Gregory Rasputin. Rasputin, a curious compound
of shrewd peasant, avaricious pohtician, erotic maniac, and re-
Q 225
226 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
ligious fanatic, acted as oiS&cial "medicine man" to a super-
stitious court and gave tone and character to the blind, perverse
autocracy. Rasputin was said, on good authority, to have been
responsible for the dismissal of the Grand Duke Nicholas from
supreme command of the Russian armies in 191 5; certainly
Rasputin was a friend of the reactionary premiers Goremykin
and Stiirmer, of the traitorous War Secretary Soukhomlinov, and
especially of Protopopov, the generally hated and feared minister
of the interior.
In November, 1916, the Duma had held a stormy session, but
its attacks on the administration had produced no important
results. Boris Stiirmer, it is true, had been replaced in the
premiership by Alexander Trepov, but Trepov was either un-
willing or unable to persuade the Tsar to dismiss Protopopov or
to break the spell of Rasputin. To the popular Russian mind
it was becoming ever more patent that court circles were con-
trolled by ''dark influences" and that any premier acceptable
to the court, whether a Stiirmer or a Trepov, was capable of
betraying the country to the Germans if thereby autocracy
might be strengthened in Russia. To the confirmed bureaucrats
the Romanov dynasty seemed to have much more in common
with the dynasties of the Hohenzollerns and Habsburgs than
with the democracies of France and Great Britain. Treason
to the Allied cause was becoming the highest object of states-
manship on the part of the Russian Government. At the same
time the Russian Government was pursuing such an unpopular
course that its domestic enemies openly charged it with aiming
to provoke a futile rebelhon, to suppress the rebelHon by force,
to quell by terrorism any agitation for reform, and to intrench
Russian autocracy anew in power for another century.
Under these circumstances a conspiracy was formed by several
prominent Russian liberals against Rasputin, and at the end of
December, 1916, the sinister monk was assassinated. The
popular rejoicing which greeted the news of this bloody deed
was unmistakable proof of the wide divergence of the sentiments
and feelings of the nation from those of the court. But still
the court was deaf, dumb, and bHnd to popular feelings. Ras-
putin dead exercised upon the mind of the Tsarina — and,
through her, upon the Tsar — even a greater influence than when
he was alive. Though Trepov was dismissed from the premier-
ship he was replaced by Prince GoHtzin, a typical bureaucrat
of compressed brains and elastic conscience. And while Prince
Golitzin kept postponing the assembling of the Duma through-
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE" 227
out January and February, 191 7, the fanatical Protopopov,
with a superabundance of misplaced energy, was suppressing
newspapers, breaking up meetings, and filling the prisons with
political offenders and suspects.
In the meantime many Russian people were hungry. The
winter of 1916-1917 was bitterly cold, with heavy snowfalls;
and, although there was enough grain in Russia, if properly
distributed, to satisfy all, nevertheless the enormous demands
of the army strained the transport machinery to its utmost,
and a situation naturally bad was rendered incalculably worse
by the mismanagement and corruption of the Government. At
the very time when bread lines were becoming a daily occurrence
in the larger cities and when the Government appeared to have
no remedy for the food shortage, the Duma at last reassembled
in Petrograd on February 27, 191 7, — amid bodyguards of
Protopopov's police.
Thus it happened that early in March the national representa-
tives in the Duma assailed the Government more vehemently
than ever, while in Petrograd the workers went on a strike and
participated in street demonstrations and riots. No concession,
however, was forthcoming. The Government was plainly de-
termined to overawe workers and parliamentarians alike. On
Sunday, March 11, Prince Golitzin formally prorogued the
Duma, and the military governor of Petrograd solemnly ordered
the strikers to keep the peace and return to work. But the
workers simply refused to obey, and the Duma decHned to be
prorogued, declaring that it was now the sole constitutional au-
thority in Russia. The supreme test of Russian autocracy had
come. Could the Government enforce its will ?
To enforce its will the Government must command the loyalty
and obedience, not only of the police, but also of the soldiers, and
it was a disquieting symptom that some soldiers in Petrograd
when directed on March 11 to fire on the crowd had mutinied.
On that evening a Committee of Workmen set itself up in the
city with the twofold purpose of organizing the lower classes
for revolutionary purposes and of winning the soldiers to their
cause; it was intent upon destroying autocracy, root and
branch, and building some sort of radical republic. At once it
obtained a great influence over the troops pouring into Petrograd.
The activities and threats of the Petrograd workingmen
alarmed the more moderate Duma and made the parHamentary
leaders all the more anxious to wring speedy and sweeping con-
cessions from the Government. On the evening of March 11,
228 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Rodzianko, the conservative president of the Duma, telegraphed
the Tsar: *'The situation is grave. Anarchy reigns in the
capital. The transport of provisions and fuel is completely
disorganized. General dissatisfaction is growing. Irregular
rifle-firing is occurring in the streets. It is necessary to charge
immediately some persons enjoying the confidence of the people
to form a new government. It is impossible to linger. Any
delay means death. Let us pray to God that the responsibility
in this hour will not fall upon a crowned head."
The next day — March 12 — was decisive. The bulk of the
troops, both the Petrograd garrison and the reenforcements
brought into the city, responded to the appeals of the Council
of Workmen's Deputies and engaged in free-for-all fights with
their officers and with the police. In the afternoon the great
prison fortress of Saint Peter and Saint Paul surrendered to the
revolutionaries; and with the fall of the Bastille of the old
regime, the organs of autocracy ceased to function. Some of
the old bureaucrats were arrested ; others made their escape.
So far the revolution was confined to Petrograd, and there
was much uncertainty both in the Duma and in the Council of
Workmen's Deputies as to whether the Tsar could or would turn
his huge field armies against the capital. Attempts of the Tsar
and of General Ivanov to reach Petrograd were frustrated by
revolutionary railway-employees, who for two critical days wil-
fully sidetracked or blocked their trains. Meanwhile the armies
of Brussilov and Ruzsky declared their adherence to the Revolu-
tion, and at Moscow and other important places in the interior
of the empire similar declarations were made. The Russian
autocracy of the Romanovs and of the bureaucrats collapsed
universally and suddenly.
As a result of negotiations between leaders of the Duma and
the Council of Workmen's Deputies at Petrograd — now styled
the Council of Workmen's and Soldiers' Deputies, or Soviet —
Professor Milyukov, the chief of the Constitutional Democratic
party in the Duma, was able to announce on the afternoon of
March 15 that an agreement had been reached: that it had
been decided to depose the Tsar, to constitute immediately a
provisional government composed of representatives of all
parties and groups, and to arrange for the convocation of a
Constituent Assembly at an early date to determine the form of
a permanent democratic government for Russia. Earlier on
the same day, the Tsar had been waited upon in his railway
train at Pskov and his abdication had been counseled by Rod-
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE" 229
zianko, Alexeiev, Brussilov, Ruzsky, and the Grand Duke
Nicholas. There was only one thing for the well-meaning, weak-
kneed Nicholas II to do and that was to abdicate. Abdicate
he did in graceful language and in deep emotion ; and, hoping
against hope that at least the dynasty might be saved, he ab-
dicated in favor of his brother, the Grand Duke Michael.
The Grand Duke Michael dared not essay to play the imperial
role. On March 16, the day after his brother's abdication, he
issued a statement in which he said :
"This heavy responsibiHty has come to me at the voluntary
request of my brother, who has transferred the imperial throne
to me during a period of warfare which is accompanied by un-
precedented popular disturbances. Moved by the thought,
which is in the minds of the entire people, that the good of the
country is paramount, I have adopted the firm resolution to
accept the supreme power only if this be the will of our great
people, who, by a plebiscite organized by their representatives
in a Constituent Assembly, shall estabhsh a form of government
and new fundamental laws for the Russian state.
" Consequently, invoking the benediction of our Lord, I urge
all citizens of Russia to submit to the Provisional Government,
estabHshed upon the initiative of the Duma and invested with
full plenary powers, until such time which will follow with as
little delay as possible, as the Constituent Assembly, on a basis
of universal, direct, equal, and secret suffrage, shall, by its de-
cision as to the new form of government, express the will of the
people."
It is not likely that the Grand Duke Michael entertained any
idea that he would ever become the Tsar of All the Russias by
vote of a Constituent Assembly or otherwise. He must have
known, what the revolutionaries now thoroughly understood,
that the Romanov dynasty was permanently retired to private
life and that the autocracy which it had enshrined for three
centuries and the bureaucracy with which it had been served
were henceforth forever doomed.
The Provisional Government, as organized on March 15,
191 7, consisted of a ministry selected from, and responsible to,
the Duma. It represented a coalition of the parties and groups
of the Center and Left Center, and was essentially bourgeois
and respectable. The popular elements throughout the country,
on which it counted most, were the professional classes, business
men, and country gentlemen. Its head, at once premier and
minister of the interior, was Prince George Lvov, president of
230 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
the Union of Zemztvos, member of the Constitutional Demo-
cratic Party, a specialist in local government, and an eminently
practical man. The important ministry of war and marine
was assigned to Guchkov, a moderate conservative of the Octo-
brist faction; that of finance, to Terestchenko, a wealthy em-
ployer and a sort of Tory democrat ; that of justice, to Alexander
Kerensky, a leader of the radical peasant party — the so-called
Socialist Revolutionaries, — easily the most radical member
of the new government; and the ministries of foreign affairs
and agriculture, respectively to Professor Milyukov and to
Shingarev, both doctrinaire liberals belonging to the Constitu-
tional Democratic Party. Altogether in the Provisional Gov-
ernment there were eight Constitutional Democrats, three
Octobrists, and one Sociahst Revolutionary.
By the end of March, 191 7, the Russian Revolution was an
accomplished fact. The autocracy had fallen. The Tsar had
been deposed. The bureaucrats were in prison or in exile. The
Provisional Government, representing a coaHtion of the liberal
groups of the Duma and championing a thoroughly democratic
regime for revolutionized Russia, had been accorded formal
recognition by the United States, Great Britain, France, Italy,
and Japan, and had apparently obtained the support of the vast
majority of Russian people. Already thousands of political
prisoners had been liberated and brought back from Siberia.
Freedom of association, of the press, and of religion had been
proclaimed. Finland had been given back her constitution
(March 20). And on March 30 the Provisional Government
declared: ''The Pohsh nation, liberated and unified, will settle
for itself the nature of its own government, expressing its will
by means of a Constituent Assembly convoked on the basis of
universal suffrage in the capital of Poland." Not only was the
autocracy dead, but its policies were being reversed as rapidly
as possible.
What promised to assure the permanence of democratic
Russia was the speedy acceptance of the Revolution by the
principal army generals. Alexeiev, as generalissimo ; Ruzsky,
commander of the northern army group ; Brussilov, commander
of the southern army group; Kornilov, in command of the
Petrograd garrison, — all swore loyalty to the Provisional Govern-
ment. Only General Ewarts, commander of the central army
group, opposed the new regime; and there was no difficulty in
replacing him with General Gourko, an able soldier and a friend
of the Revolution. The attitude of these generals promised
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE" 231
even more than the permanence of democratic Russia ; it prom-
ised the continued participation of Russia in the Great War and
the heartiest and most effective cooperation of Russia with her
sister democracies of France, Great Britain, Italy, and the United
States, against the menace of Teuton imperiaKsm. There was
gayety in Russia. There was rejoicing and there was feting of the
Russian Revolution in Rome, in Paris, in London, in New York,
and in San Francisco. There was despair in old Russian court
circles, as temporarily there was gloom in Vienna and in Berlin.
DISINTEGRATION OF DEMOCRACY: POLITICAL AND MILI-
TARY EXPERIMENTS
To expect the transformation of Russia, within a month,
from autocracy to democracy was to believe in miracles and
magic. Russia was a huge, heterogeneous empire, in which
national ambitions of Finns, Poles, Letts, Lithuanians, Ukrain-
ians, Jews, and Georgians were bound to interfere with the suc-
cessful operation of democratic institutions, if not to constitute
disruptive forces. Russia, moreover, was politically and eco-
nomically the most backward country in Europe; unlike the
peoples of France and Great Britain, the population of the
Russian Empire had had no thorough training or long experience
in poHtical democracy; unlike the democracies of western Eu-
rope, the Russian revolutionary government would have to base
itself less upon an electorate of educated bourgeois and prosperous
inedpendent farmers than upon a mass of illiterate, poverty-
stricken peasants and upon noisy groups of ill-disciplined urban
workers. For a democratic harvest in Russia, neither the field
was favorable nor the seed fertile.
For many years "government" in the abstract had meant
to the bulk of the Russian people the concrete government of
the tsars; and the protracted popular protests and agitations
against the tsars' autocracy and bureaucracy had bred in the
Russian masses a natural repugnance to government in general
rather than any particular devotion to untried democracy.
Consequently, when the Revolution occurred in March, 191 7,
and the government of the Tsar ceased to function, Russia be-
came "democratic" only in the minds of the Duma leaders and
other Russian doctrinaires and of foreigners. What Russia
really became was anarchical. Extreme individualism sup-
planted despotism. The collective duties and responsibilities
of freedom were quite lost sight of in the frenzied joy of individual
232 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
emancipation. Enthusiasm was centered in blind destruction
of the old rather than in farsighted construction of the new.
Liberty was truly license.
Like children the Russian people utilized their newly won
freedom. In large numbers they stopped work and took holi-
days. They talked and harangued. In the country districts
they withheld rents and taxes. In the towns they destroyed
machinery and drove out employers and inspectors. In the
army the common soldiers proceeded to choose their own officers
and to debate plans of campaign. The police were gone, and
the armies were rapidly degenerating into chaos.
No single authority gained the assent of the Russian people
at large. The Provisional Government of Prince Lvov claimed
sole authority, but it really represented only certain middle-
class groups in a Duma which had been elected by a very re-
stricted suffrage under the auspices of the discredited and fallen
autocracy. More representative of the bulk of the Russian
people than the bourgeois Provisional Government were the
extra-legal Soviets of Workmen's, Soldiers', and Peasants'
Deputies, which, following the example of the Petrograd workers,
hastily sprang up throughout the length and breadth of the
country and even in the army. The Soviets were organized
locally, on something like a town-meeting basis, and they un-
doubtedly performed very important services in satisfying vital
local needs and in spreading and applying the principles of the
revolution locally. But the Soviets were too numerous, too
diverse, and too irresponsible to admit of unification and of
effective direction of constructive policies for all Russia. Be-
sides, the Soviets, being dominated largely by Socialist Revo-
lutionaries and Social Democrats, were out of sympathy with
the more moderate parties of Constitutional Democrats and
Octobrists which controlled the Provisional Government. The
latter were seemingly content to interpret the March Revolution
merely as a political change from autocracy to middle-class
political democracy, while the former were intent upon pushing
it further so that all the institutions of the old regime — social
as well as political — would be utterly annihilated. The Soviets
acted on the supposition that the overthrowing of the Romanovs
should be the signal for economic and social changes so radical
as to make the political program of the Provisional Government
appear paltry and ridiculous. The Soviets distrusted the Pro-
visional Government, and the Provisional Government feared
the Soviets.
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE'* 233
It was on the question of war aims that the first significant
cleavage appeared between the Provisional Government and
the Soviets. Milyukov, the minister of foreign affairs, and
Guchkov, the war minister, were particularly zealous imperial-
ists ; they prevailed upon the Provisional Government to cham-
pion most of the traditional foreign policies of the old autocracy
— a strongly unified Russian state, a close secret alliance with
France, ambitious designs on Constantinople and Armenia,
and an unyielding attitude toward Rumania and the Balkan
states. On the other hand, the Soviets reflected the war weari-
ness of the Russian masses. Russia had already suffered more
serious losses than any other Great Power; and the Russian
people were sick and tired of a struggle into which they had
blindly been led by the Tsar and whose. stakes had been less the
preservation of Russia from German dominion than the ex-
tension of Russian imperialism and the aggrandizement of the
autocratic regime. Now that the Tsar was deposed, the ma-
jority of the Russian people felt instinctively that all his policies
— foreign as well as domestic — were discredited, and that the
political revolution should carry with it a revolution in war
aims. ''Self-determination" was now the all-important ob-
jective of the Russians; it should be the common objective of
all the belligerent nations. Hitherto the Great War had been
a struggle between governing classes of different countries for
imperialistic purposes; henceforth it must be a popular con-
test for the assurance of self-determination, and of that kind
of self-determination expressed in the simple formula "no an-
nexations and no indemnities."
Such was the purport of resolutions adopted by the first AU-
Russian Congress of Soviets, which met in Moscow on April 13,
191 7. The delegates, it is true, declared themselves in favor
of the continuation of the war, provided it was waged on their
terms, and expressed themselves as willing to exclude from the
formula of "no annexations and no indemnities" the questions
of Belgium, Poland, Serbia, and Armenia. But in all other
respects they insisted upon their principles and demanded the
assent of the Allies to their formula.
There was little likelihood of Allied acceptance of the demands
of the Russian Soviets. For if perad venture they should be
accepted, Italy and Japan would gain absolutely nothing from
the war; France would have to renounce Alsace-Lorraine for-
ever ; and Great Britain would still be confronted by a German
Fmpire mighty in resources, in colonies, in industry, and in
234 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
shipping. Nor were the Soviets' demands attractive to the
Russian Foreign Minister Milyukov, who had set his heart on
strict adherence to the secret treaties negotiated by the Tsar's
Government with the several Entente Powers and who hoped
thereby to win for democratic Russia the rich prize of Con-
stantinople, which for centuries had been fondly contended for
by autocratic Russia. Accordingly, early in May, 191 7,
Milyukov addressed a joint note to the Allied Governments,
proclaiming the firm resolution of Russia to conclude no separate
peace with the Central Empires, but to carry the war to a vic-
torious conclusion in conformity with Russia's past engagements.
Milyukov's note was as distasteful to the Soviets as it was
pleasing to the Allies. The Soviets were plainly annoyed.
There were open demonstrations against the Foreign Minister.
There were mutinous outbreaks in the army. On May 13,
Guchkov resigned as minister of war and navy, and Milyukov
soon followed him into retirement. The Provisional Govern-
ment of Prince Lvov was breaking down. Real power was
passing rapidly from the middle classes to the workers and
peasants, from the Duma to the Soviets.
The swing of the revolutionary pendulum toward social radi-
calism was registered in the reconstruction of Prince Lvov's
Provisional Government, on May 16, 191 7. This reconstruction
was largely the work of Tcheidze, a Social Democrat and the
commanding figure in the Petrograd Soviet, and Alexander
Kerensky, the only member of the first Provisional Government
who sympathized fully with the aims of the Soviets. In the
new ministry, Kerensky himself became minister of war and
navy; Tchernov, the leader of the Socialist Revolutionaries,
took the portfolio of agriculture ; another Socialist Revolutionary
succeeded Kerensky as minister of justice; Social Democrats,
Skobelev and Tseretelli, became ministers respectively of labor
and of posts and telegraphs. Although the moderate Con-
stitutional Democratic Party was allowed to retain the portfolio
of foreign affairs, the new incumbent, Terestchenko, was not
such a zealous imperialist as Milyukov. Altogether, in the
reconstructed Provisional Government, there were seven Con-
stitutional Democrats, two Octobrists, three Socialist Revolu-
tionaries, and three Social Democrats. The Soviets now had
several able representatives in the Provisional Government.
On the crucial question of war aims, a manifesto, drafted in
conference between the ministry and the Soviets, was issued
three days after the reconstruction of the Provisional Govern-
. RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE" 235
ment: "The Provisional Government, reorganized and re-
enforced by representatives of the Revolutionary Democracy,
declares that it will energetically carry into effect the ideas of
liberty, equality, and fraternity, beneath the standards of which
the great Russian Revolution came to birth. ... In its foreign
policy the Provisional Government, rejecting, in concert with
the entire people, all thought of a separate peace, adopts openly
as its aim the reestablishment of a general peace which shall
not tend towards domination over other nations or the seizure
of their national possessions or the violent usurpation of their
territories — a peace without annexations or indemnities and
based on the right of nations to decide their own affairs. In
the firm conviction that the fall of the regime of Tsardom in
Russia and the consolidation of democratic principles in our
internal and external policy will create in the Allied democracies
new aspirations towards a stable peace and the brotherhood of
nations, the Provisional Government will take steps towards
bringing about a new agreement with the Allies. ..."
The new Government grappled with the prodigious problems
of reconstructing and regenerating Russia with determination
and pluck. Energetic efforts were made to put manufacturing
plants again in operation, to get the peasants to augment their
crops, and to improve the transport system. To secure the
assistance of foreign capital and of foreign technical advisers,
as well as to enlighten the Russian people about the theories
and practices of political democracy, especially its duties and
responsibilities, foreign missions were welcomed and afforded
every opportunity to travel and to lecture throughout the
country ; and eloquent were the appeals addressed to the Russian
people by the American mission under Elihu Root, the French
under Albert Thomas, the Belgian under Emile Vandervelde,
and the British under Arthur Henderson.
Meanwhile the Government was negotiating with the Entente
Powers for the summoning of an Inter-Allied Conference which
should revise the past secret treaties in harmony with the Russian
manifesto of May 19; and at the same time, Kerensky, with
fiery enthusiasm, was exerting himself to the utmost to restore
some discipline in the army and to prepare Russia for a re-
sumption of the offensive against Germany and Austria-Hungary.
It was an impossible task. The Allied Governments cer-
tainly applauded the deposition of the Tsar and wished the
revolutionaries well, but for the present they were naturally
far more concerned that Russia should give full military assistance
236 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
to their war aims than that Russia should set her own house
in order. The AlHes, intent upon winning the war, feared lest
the Russians should become so absorbed in developing their
revolution and in effecting radical social readjustments at home
as to lose interest in the war abroad. The Russian people, on
the other hand, felt quite as naturally that for the present the
completion of their own domestic revolution was infinitely more
important than the prosecution of the foreign war along lines
determined by bourgeois statesmen in Paris, London, and Rome ;
they could not comprehend why, if the Allies were sincere in
their good wishes for the Russian Revolution, favorable response
was not immediately forthcoming to the request for a radical
revision of war aims ; they began to distrust the political de-
mocracies of western Europe, and to imagine that France, Italy,
and Great Britain were addicted, almost as much as Germany
and Austria-Hungary, to the vice of greedy imperialism. A
fissure was appearing in the rock of Entente solidarity. The
Russian people were perceptibly separating from the other
Allied nations.
Anxiously the Government of Prince Lvov sought to prevent
the fissure from becoming a chasm. They tried to explain to
the Russian people that so long as Germany was undefeated the
Revolution was not safe. They attempted to make clear to
the Allies that until the Revolution was assured Russia could
not give her chief attention to the defeat of Germany. The
more they urged the Allies to adopt a conciliatory peace program
the more fearful grew the Allies of radical socialistic tendencies
in Russia. The more the Provisional Government begged the
Russian people to continue the war at any cost, the more un-
popular they became in Russia and the more susceptible were
the Russians to radical socialistic and pacifistic propaganda.
The relation of revolutionized Russia to the Entente was only
one aspect of the insoluble problem before the Provisional
Government. The Provisional Government itself was es-
sentially unstable; it comprised representatives of a shadowy
Duma which had ceased to function and 0/ informal and ir-
regular Soviets which were in state of constant flux ; it embraced
leaders of such diverse and naturally quarrelsome parties as
the bourgeois Octobrist and Constitutional Democratic, the
peasants' Socialist Revolutionary, and the proletarian Social
Democratic ; it was a compromise, and as a compromise it
pleased no strict partisans. By virtue of its composite personnel,
the Provisional Government could not hope to carry out any
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES ^' PEACE " 237
consistent policy of political or social reconstruction. Yet
thoroughgoing reconstruction was what Russia most needed.
Reconstruction of the vast Russian Empire, with its divergent
nationalities, its illiterate masses, its extremes of poverty and
affluence, and its long record of political corruption and tyranny
under the scepter of the tsars, would have been enormously
difficult in normal times of peace. It was rendered well-nigh
impossible in 191 7 by reason of the fact that Russia was a party
to the greatest war in human annals and was peculiarly open
to five forms of insidious propaganda.
In the first place, there was the propaganda of reactionary
elements in Russia. At first these elements were confined pretty
much to the bureaucrats of the old regime and to certain dis-
gruntled landlords and manufacturers; and their propaganda,
beginning under Stiirmer and Protopopov, was directed toward
peace with the Central Empires, to the end that the autocracy
might be restored and likewise the social distinctions and privi-
leges of the old regime. These elements were not numerous or
outspoken, but they had wealth and a talent for intrigue.
Secondly, there was the propaganda of those Russians who,
while supporting the Revolution in its earliest stages, denounced
subsequent developments as evil or inexpedient. The more
radical the Provisional Government became and the more it
catered to the social demands of the Soviets, the noisier and more
numerous grew these conservative revolutionaries, until by
June, 191 7, they included not only the Nationalists but im-
portant groups of Octobrists and Constitutional Democrats.
They were still too few to dominate the country or any con-
siderable part of it, but they were sufficiently brilliant and
eloquent to embarrass the Provisional Government. They in-
sisted upon war at any price and denounced the attempts of the
Government to obtain a restatement of Allied war-aims. They
misled the Allies into thinking that they represented the Russian
people ; and their propaganda did much to give the Allies false
hopes and the masses in Russia groundless alarms. Uncon-
sciously and indirectly they contributed potently to widening
the breach between Russia and the Allied democracies.
Thirdly, there was a movement of various lesser nationalities
within the Russian Empire toward political independence or
autonomy. Poles and Finns were determined to utilize the
destruction of the tsardom in order to free themselves entirely
from union with Russia. In April, 191 7, a congress of Little
Russians (Ruthenians) met at Kiev and demanded complete
238 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
autonomy for a Ukrainia which should reach from the Pripet
River on the north to the Black Sea and Kuban River on the
south and from the Don on the east to the Dniester and Bug
on the west. In July a national assembly of Esthonians met at
Reval and formed a provisional government. In August a
conference of the Letts of Courland and Livonia, convened in
Riga, demanded ^'a, united, politically autonomous Lettland
(Latvia) within the Russian Republic." Similar demands were
made by Lithuanians and by Georgians of the Caucasus. And
all these national committees and "provisional governments"
engaged actively in propaganda which threatened to disrupt the
Russian Empire not only, but to stimulate the counter-agitation
of Russian conservatives and to serve the cause of Germany.
Fourthly, there was out-and-out German propaganda. Be-
fore the Revolution a goodly number of German agents had been
at work in Russia intriguing with old-regime bureaucrats for a
separate peace. After the Revolution the unsettled political
and social conditions in Russia enabled the Teutons to widen
and deepen their efforts to secure by intrigue what they had
failed to obtain by force of arms. The German agents were
now all things to all Russians. To reactionaries, they were
apostles of a counter-revolution which could be achieved only
by the cessation of war. To extreme revolutionaries, they were
devotees of the doctrine that the revolution could be completed
only if the existing Provisional Government, which sought to
continue the war, were overthrown. The separatist propaganda
among the lesser nationalities within Russia they aided and
abetted. But principally they devoted their energies to under-
mining the morale of the Russian field- armies. With the fall of
autocracy, discipline in the Russian armies rapidly decHned;
privates left the ranks and went home without leave ; officers
who tried to do their duty were arrested by the men ; fighting
ceased; and Russian and German soldiers began to fraternize.
Taking advantage of this situation, German agents went about
in the Russian lines trying to persuade the troops to demand a
separate peace or at least an armistice. The French and British
were accused of the grossest imperialism and of a desire needlessly
to prolong the carnage and bloodshed in order to further their
own selfish ambitions ; and the Teutons were represented as
angelic victims of the jealousy and greed of others and as con-
firmed friends of a just and durable peace. The German agents
insisted that the Central Empires were willing and anxious to
conclude peace but that the Entente was not.
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES ''PEACE'' 239
Finally, most directly menacing to the unity and permanence
of the Provisional Government was the propaganda of the
Russian revolutionaries of the extreme Left. These ultra-
revolutionaries assailed the members of the Socialist Revolu-
tionary and Social Democratic parties who had accepted port-
folios in a ''bourgeois" government, charging them with
sacrificing the social revolution to the poHtical exigencies of
war. Gradually, by means of this kind of propaganda, a con-
siderable number of revolutionary peasants were weaned away
from the leadership of Tchernov and Kerensky, and a large
proportion of urban workers transferred their loyalty from
Tseretelli and Tcheidze to still more radical Social Democrats.
Gradually many Soviets passed from moderate Socialism to
extreme Socialism. And the leaders of extreme SociaHsm in
Russia stood quite outside of organized government ; they were
as anxious to rid Russia of Prince Lvov's provisional middle-
class democracy as they were to have done once and for all with
the Tsar Nicholas's divine-right autocracy.
Russian SociaHsm in the twentieth century comprised two
major movements. The one, essentially indigenous, extolled
Russian national customs and aimed at expropriating great
landowners and establishing a kind of peasant proprietorship
with cooperative features ; it appealed to the agricultural lower
classes and was crystallized into the SociaHst Revolutionary
Party. The other, an imported product, took its faith and works
from Karl Marx and his doctrinaire disciples in western Europe;
it emphasized the '' class-struggle," the eventually inevitable
rout of capitalism by a class-conscious proletariat, and all the
other tenets of international Socialism ; it spread among urban
workers and found expression in the Social Democratic Party.
But the Social Democratic Party, since its second congress,
in 1903, had been divided into two wings, the Bolsheviki, or
'' majority," and the Mensheviki, or "minority." At first the
two wings differed merely on matters of party organization, but
in course of time their separation and mutual antagonism were
increased by divergent views as to party tactics. The Bolsheviki
cherished the strict Marxist precepts, including the idea that
the Socialist state of the future would be ushered in by an over-
whelming cataclysm, sudden, proletarian, and international.
The Mensheviki, on the other hand, were '' reformist," in the
sense in which that word was used in Germany and France;
they beHeved that Russia could be Socialized only through the
cooperation of Social Democrats with other radicals, through
240 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
gradual political and economic reforms, and through the slow
education of the masses. In practice the Mensheviki were the
moderates, and the Bolsheviki the extremists. Despite the fact
that the extremists constituted a minority of Russian SociaHsts,
the appellation of Bolsheviki, or *' majority," still stuck to them.
In the reconstructed Provisional Government of Prince Lvov,
the Socialist Revolutionaries had three representatives including
Tchernov and Kerensky, and the Mensheviki had three. The
Bolsheviki, alone of the SociaHst groups, were not represented ;
they were too extreme for the comfort and safety of the moderate
revolutionaries, and besides, their strict principles forbade them
to accept office in a "bourgeois" government even if they were
invited. Relieved of all responsibihty of dealing with the actual
problems then confronting the Provisional Government, the
Bolsheviki were free to make the most bitter attacks upon the
government and at the same time to make the most extravagant
promises to ignorant workers and peasants concerning the
millennium which they would inaugurate if they had the chance.
For conducting this highly subversive and destructive propa-
ganda the Bolsheviki had two remarkable leaders and agitators
in Lenin and Trotsky.
Vladimir Ulyanov, better known under his pen-name of
Nikolai Lenin, belonged by birth and training to the Russian
nobility, but as a young man he had become a revolutionary
and in 1899 had published an important book on "The Develop-
ment of Capitalism in Russia." A doctrinaire Socialist of the
most dogmatic type, he had lived in exile in Switzerland almost
continuously from 1900 until the Revolution of March, 191 7,
when the German Government permitted him to return to Russia.
He accepted German assistance and German gold, but he had
as little love for the Hohenzollerns as for the Romanovs.
Leon Trotsky, a Moscow Jew whose name was really Bronstein,
belonged to the middle class. Becoming a radical socialist,
he had been imprisoned for poHtical offenses and transported to
Siberia. Escaping thence, he had Hved several years in Vienna
and in Paris. Expelled from France in 191 6, he arrived in New
York in the following January, but in May managed to reach
Russia.
The Bolshevist program of Lenin and Trotsky in the spring
of 1917 was as follows: (i) the Soviets of Workmen, Soldiers,
and Peasants, to constitute themselves the actual revolutionary
government and exercise the dictatorship of the proletariat ;
(2) immediate confiscation of landed estates without compensa-
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES ''PEACE" 241
tion and without waiting for legal forms, the peasants organizing
into Soviets ; (3) control of production and distribution by the
revolutionary government, nationalization of monopolies, and
repudiation of the national debt; (4) the workmen to take
possession of factories and operate them in conjunction with
technical experts; (5) refusal by the Soviets to recognize any
treaties made by the governments either of the Tsar or of the
bourgeoisie, and the immediate pubHcation of all such treaties ;
(6) the workers to propose at once and pubHcly an immediate
armistice, and negotiations for peace to be carried out by the
proletariat and not by the bourgeoisie ; and (7) bourgeois war
debts to be paid exclusively by the capitalists. Lenin himself
proposed further ''that universal, equal, direct, and secret
suffrage be frankly abandoned, and that only the industrial
proletariat and the poorest section of the peasantry be permitted
to vote at all."
In repudiating political democracy and in demanding im-
mediate peace, the Bolsheviki arrayed themselves squarely
against the Mensheviki and SociaHst Revolutionaries as well as
against the bourgeois parties. Manifestly the whole Provisional
Government was menaced by Bolshevist propaganda.
In June, the All-Russia Congress of Soviets assembled in
Petrograd under the presidency of the Menshevist leader
Tcheidze. A furious attack by Lenin on the Coalition Govern-
ment, especially on Kerensky, was successfully answered by
Tseretelli and other Mensheviki, and for the time being the
moderates, the friends of law and order, triumphed. Late in
June an attempted uprising of Bolsheviki in Petrograd fell flat.
Apparently there was still a large measure of popular faith in
the Provisional Government.
The Provisional Government was staking everything on the
outcome of the military measures which at that very time it
was taking. Kerensky, the war minister, had reached the con-
clusion that an advance of the Russian armies against the
Teutons, even if trifling in itself, would do incalculable good to
the Provisional Government by offsetting subversive propaganda
ahke of the Germans and of the Bolsheviki, by reenforcing the
faith of the Allies in the Revolution, and by reinvigorating the
morale of Russia both mihtary and civilian.
Supreme efforts were put forth by Kerensky in June to prepare
the Russian field-armies for a resumption of the offensive. With
his burning eyes and hoarse voice and with restless energy the
war-minister visited the several commands at the front and went
242 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
among the common soldiers, urging upon all the paramount
duty of acting loyally together and of fighting the Teutons to
the last ditch. Supplies and reenforcements were rushed up,
and important changes were made in the General Staff. Generals
Alexeiev and Gourko were dismissed because of their increasingly
unsympathetic attitude toward Kerensky, and were succeeded
respectively as generalissimo and commander of the central
army group by Generals Brussilov and Denikin.
At this time the Teutonic armies on the Eastern Front em-
braced three groups: (i) the northern group, under Prince
Leopold of Bavaria, extending from the Baltic to a point just
south of Brzezany; (2) the central group, under Archduke
Joseph Frederick, extending thence to the Rumanian frontier;
and (3) the southern group, under Field Marshal von Mackensen,
arrayed against the Russo-Rumanians along the Sereth. It
was against the right wing of the northern group, under Boehm-
Ermolli, and the left wing of the central group, under Count
Bothmer, that General Brussilov, the new Russian Chief of
Staff, decided to launch the offensive. He would seize Brzezany,
Halicz, and Stryj, and thence advance on Lemberg.
Russian artillery preparations began in the early morning of
June 29, 191 7, and on July i, the infantry leaped from their
trenches and charged the Teutons. To the southeast of Lemberg
unexpected success crowned the Russian offensive. The Lomnica
River, the last natural defense in front of Stryj, was gallantly
crossed; and simultaneously with this attack south of the
Dniester, the Russians started a drive on the Dniester itself,
capturing Halicz on July 10. Within ten days the Russians
had taken 50,000 prisoners and vast quantities of war material
and had driven a wedge twenty miles long and ten miles deep
into the Austro-German lines. But this was the high tide of
Russian success.
Sudden, heavy rainfall swelled the Galician streams and
rendered them difficult to ford ; Teutonic reserves were hurried
to threatened positions on the Eastern Front ; and in the Russian
ranks the revolutionary lack of discipline soon received most
painful illustration. Russian regiments in the vicinity of
Brzezany, under General Erdelli, abandoned their posts and
threw down their arms, and during the last week of July their
mutinous spirit was communicated to other commands, with
most disastrous results. The tragic facts were recorded in a
telegram sent to Kerensky by General Erdelli :
^' A fatal crisis has occurred in the morale of the troops recently
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE" 243
sent forward against the enemy. Most of the miUtary are in a
state of complete disorganization. Their spirit for an offensive
has utterly disappeared ; they no longer listen to the orders of
their leaders, and they neglect all the exhortations of their com-
rades, even replying to them by threats and shots. Some ele-
ments voluntarily evacuate their positions without even waiting
for the approach of the enemy. Cases are on record in which
an order to proceed with all haste to such and such a spot to
assist hard-pressed comrades has been discussed for several
hours at meetings, and the reenforcements consequently de-
layed for several hours. . . . For a distance of several hundred
versts long files of deserters, both armed and unarmed men, who
are in good health and robust, but who have utterly lost all
shame, are proceeding to the rear of the army. Frequently
entire units desert in this manner. . . . Orders have been
given to-day to fire upon deserters and runaways. Let the
Government find courage to shoot those who by their cowardice
are selling Russia and the Revolution."
Appeals from officers at the front and appeals from the Pro-
visional Government could not stay the rout. The whole
Russian line in Galicia was now in flight, and all the gains of
191 6 were wiped out in a day. The Germans, with their Austrian
allies, occupied Halicz, Tarnopol, Stanislau, Czernowitz, and
Kolomea, and drove the fugitive Russians across their own border
and entirely out of Galicia and Bukowina. General Erdelli was
assassinated, and on August 2,1917, Kornilov succeeded Brussilov
in nominal command of the disorganized Russian armies.
To the south, the Rumanians assailed Mackensen's army-
group in order to save the Russian retreat from becoming a
final disaster. Though unable to make much headway against
the Austro-Germans, the Rumanians acquitted themselves
most admirably and at least prevented Mackensen from in-
flicting serious counter-attacks upon them. The last effort of
the Teutons to cross the Sereth met with decisive failure on
August 19.
While the southern army-group of the Teutons was held in
check at the Sereth and the central army-group rested near the
Russo-Galician frontier, the northern group in August utilized
Russian demoralization in order to carry German invasion
further into the Baltic Provinces. Late in August, German
forces under General von Hutier, reached the River Aa and
attacked at Keckau, ten miles south of Riga. On September 2,
they cut the Dvinsk railway five miles east of the Dlina River.
244 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
On the following day the Russians evacuated Riga and the
Germans entered in triumph. On September 23, Hutier cap-
tured Jacobs tadt, seventy miles up the Duna from Riga. In
October, following some naval fighting, the Germans occupied
the islands at the mouth of the Gulf of Riga, and threatened the
chief Russian naval-base at Reval.
Meanwhile the fate of the Provisional Government was sealed.
Having risked everything on a military offensive, the moderate
Revolutionaries, in the turn of the war-tide, had lost everything.
On one hand, the militarists and patriots redoubled their at-
tacks upon the Government, blaming it for the destruction of
military discipline. On the other hand, the Bolsheviki put all
the blame upon the "militaristic" policies and ambitions of a
Government dominated by the bourgeoisie.
On July 17, 191 7, Prince Lvov and other Constitutional Demo-
cratic members of the Provisional Government resigned, and on
the same day the Bolsheviki in Petrograd, led by Lenin and
Trotsky, attempted to seize the reins of government. The
Bolsheviki were supported by Kronstadt sailors and by various
disaffected elements in the garrison. But Kerensky threw him-
self with ardor into the struggle against them, and, with the
assistance of the Petrograd Soviet, which was still under Menshe-
vist influence, he succeeded in putting down the insurrection.
Kerensky, however, in his moment of victory, declined to disarm
the workmen and dared not punish the Bolshevist leaders. On
July 20, the war minister became head of the Provisional Gov-
ernment and assumed a practical dictatorship.
It was Kerensky's hope that by arranging for an early as-
sembling of the Inter-Allied Conference, at which the war-aims
would be restated in terms similar to those which President
Wilson had employed, and by definitely fixing the date for elec-
tions to a Constituent Assembly, September 30, and at the same
time by sternly repressing the Bolsheviki, it might be possible
to save Russia. Alexander Kerensky doubtless knew that his
was a forlorn hope. At any rate, despite his almost super-
human efforts, and the loyal support of the great majority of the
Soviets, his eventual defeat was only a question of time. Day
after day conditions grew worse. The military situation went
rapidly from bad to worse. Finances were in chaos. Re-
ationaries, at one extreme, and Bolsheviki, at the other, waxed
more wroth and violent. The Allies kept postponing their
conference and obscuring their war-aims. The separatist
tendencies of lesser nationalities within Russia became more
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE" 245
pronounced. And above all, German propaganda everywhere
took root and flourished and bore fruit in increasing abundance.
The Great Russian Revolution was not leading immediately
to orderly democratic government and to more effective par-
ticipation in the war ; rather, it was now heading straight toward
anarchy and full confession of national defeat and disgrace.
Late in August, an Extraordinary National Conference met
in Moscow, representing all classes and all parties. For three
days the great assembly debated and listened to speeches from
leading revolutionaries : Kerensky, Tseretelli, Tcheidze, Kropot-
kin, and Madame Breshkovskaya spoke for the workers ; Generals
Kornilov and Kaledine, for the army ; and Milyukov, Guchkov,
and others, for the bourgeoisie. Strangely enough, there was
an apparent agreement among the great majority of the dele-
gates on three vital points — (i) the reform of the army and the
restoration of its discipline, (2) the continuance of the war, and
(3) the reconciliation of party quarrels. But with most the
first two were merely pious wishes, and the third was irony.
The breaches had not been closed. The Radicals insisted upon
the ultimate control of the Government by the Soviets, which
the Moderates bitterly opposed. Three-fourths of Russia out-
side of the Conference had no inclination for the sacrifice and
discipline which a continuance of the war demanded. "The
gulf between the soldiers and the dreamers had been made
visible to all, and across it straddled Kerensky, a hopeless Colos-
sus, who must soon make his election and leap to one side, or
fall into the chasm."
At first Kerensky leaned toward the soldiers. He postponed
the elections to the National Constituent Assembly from Septem-
ber 30 to November 25. He strengthened military discipline
by decreeing the restoration of the death-penalty. And early
in September he seems to have concerted plans with General
Kornilov for the establishment of a military dictatorship. At
any rate, Kornilov drew up a scheme for a Council of National
Defense, with himself as president and with Kerensky as vice-
president.
Then suddenly Kerensky veered toward the radicals. Fearful
of the effect of a military dictatorship, he ordered Kornilov's
removal. Kornilov, on his side, dispatched a division of troops,
drawn from the front, against Petrograd. This revolt was
crushed without much trouble and with very little bloodshed,
Kornilov being arrested and Kerensky assuming the supreme
command of the Russian armies.
246 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
But the Russian armies were already in process of rapid dis-
solution. Without loyal troops no military dictator, whether a
Kornilov or a Kerensky, could long maintain himself. In vain
Kerensky leaned further toward the extremists. A National
Democratic Conference convened on September 27 and con-
tented itself with summoning a "Preliminary Parliament,"
which met on October 8 and wasted time in idle debate. Neither
of these consultative bodies had any cohesion or dignity. All
political groups and all social classes which had at any time sup-
ported the Provisional Government or Kerensky, were, like the
Russian armies, in process of disintegration. Moderate political
democracy had failed in Russia. Military dictatorship had
likewise failed.
What was left was one extreme political faction — the Bol-
sheviki. And the Bolsheviki were resolutely determined to
create a class-dictatorship. They were already well organized
and now they were in a position to make capital out of the mani-
fest failures of Lvov, Milyukov, Kornilov, and Kerensky. The
overthrow of the political tsardom in March, 191 7, was to be sup-
plemented in November by the destruction of Russian society.
DICTATORSHIP OF THE BOLSHEVIKI: THE NOVEMBER
(1917) REVOLUTION
One of the chief reasons why Kerensky lost the support of
the army and of the Russian people was the failure on the part
of his Government to persuade the Allies to restate their war-
aims in accordance with the peace formula of the Soviets. Time
and again Kerensky had assured the Soviets that the Allies were
about to hold a conference to revise their war-aims, but time
and again the date of the conference had been postponed. At
last, on November i, Kerensky in despair served notice on the
Allies that Russia was exhausted and that the other members
of the Entente would thereafter have to shoulder the burden.
Although on this occasion be added that his warning did not
imply the withdrawal of Russia from the war, nevertheless the
Allies took fright and announced that their long-deferred con-
ference would be held in Paris late in November.
But the hope that the Paris Conference would satisfy the
longing in Russia for an early peace was not realized. Mr.
Bonar Law, speaking in the House of Commons in behalf of
the British Government, declared that the conference would not
deal with "political" matters, that is, with the revision of war-
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES ''PEACE" 247
aims, but would concern itself simply with the discussion of
more effective means of prosecuting the war.
This statement caused bitter disappointment in Russia and
furnished the Bolsheviki with a potent means of completing the
undermining of Kerensky's Government. Under Kerensky,
they pointed out, Russia could not wage war or make peace;
under a dictatorship of their own, Russia could and immediately
would make peace. And the masses of war-weary Russian peas-
ants and workmen were now quite willing to acquiesce in any
dictatorship, provided only that it would bring peace. To the
ignorant masses the Bolsheviki promised peace not only, but the
millennium besides.
The drift of popular opinion in Russia was clearly observable
in the new elections to the Congress of Soviets, which had been
called to convene on November 7. Of nearly seven hundred
delegates elected, a large majority adhered to Bolshevism. To
be sure, certain Soviets refused to send delegates and others
were intimidated by Bolshevist partisans. But the fact re-
mained that for the first time, in November, 191 7, the Bolsheviki
apparently had a majority in a working-class convention.
Already the Bolshevist Trotsky had succeeded the Menshevist
Tcheidze in the presidency of the Petrograd Soviet. With this
support Trotsky and his associates now set to work to prepare a
kind of General Staff, called the Military Revolutionary Com-
mittee, which should coordinate the Bolshevist elements in
the army and navy and in the industrial communities and or-
ganize bands of ''Red Guards." Time seemed ripe for a Bol-
shevist Revolution and for the establishment of the dictatorship
of the proletariat.
On the night of November 6, a few hours before the convoca-
tion of the Congress of Soviets, the Bolsheviki struck the de-
cisive blow. Red Guards occupied the principal government
buildings in Petrograd ; part of the local garrison joined them,
the other part simply refusing to do anything. On the morn-
ing of November 7, the members of the Provisional Govern-
ment were placed under arrest in the Winter Palace, Kerensky
alone managing to escape.
On November 8, the All-Russian Congress of Soviets ratified
the Bolshevist coup d'etat and formally entrusted the conduct
of affairs to a body styled the Council of People's Commissioners,
with Lenin as premier, Trotsky as people's commissioner for
foreign affairs, and General Krylenko as commander-in-chief
of the armies.
248 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Of the Bolshevist regime, two or three aspects are worthy of
emphasis at the present time. In the first place, it was based
on force and violence rather than upon the mandate of a popular
majority. It originated in a coup d^etat, and it was maintained
by methods which savored of the old Tsardom. Its enemies —
whether reactionaries, or moderates such as Octobrists and
Constitutional Democrats, or radicals such as Socialist Revo-
lutionaries and Mensheviki — were put under surveillance.
Opposition newspapers were suppressed. Terrorism was in-
voked and increasingly practiced.
Secondly, the new regime was essentially a dictatorship in
the interest of certain classes in the community. Its internal
policy was directed toward effecting a complete social revolution.
Aristocracy and bourgeoisie must go; the rights of property
were no longer to be respected. One of the first decrees of the
Bolshevist Government empowered municipal authorities to
seize any houses whether inhabited or not and to allow citizens
who possessed no adequate dwelling to occupy them. Another
decreed the transfer of all factories into the hands of the work-
men. But the chief of these early measures was the decree which
undertook to solve the land problem : private ownership being
abolished, the land was to be nationalized and to be turned over
to the people who cultivated it ; local committees were to dis-
pose of all large holdings and all lands belonging to state and
church; mines, waterways, and forests of national importance,
were to be expropriated by the state ; and smaller forests and
waterways were to become the property of the village com-
munities.^
Thirdly, the Bolshevist regime was not a step forward in the
direction of political democracy, at least of ''political democracy"
as that phrase had been interpreted in western Europe, in the
United States, and by the preceding Provisional Government of
Russia. The Bolsheviki themselves constituted a minority —
a very small minority — of the Russian people ; and when the
elections to the National Constituent Assembly, which was
conducted in November, 191 7, on the democratic basis of equal,
direct, universal, and secret suffrage, returned a large majority
of Socialist Revolutionaries stanchly opposed to the Bolsheviki,
the Council of People's Commissioners became convinced that
the only way in which it could maintain itself in power was to
^ Subsequent decrees disestablished the Russian Church, repudiated most of the
national debt, and transferred the seat of government from Petrograd to Moscow
(February, 191 8).
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE" 249
repudiate political democracy. At first, it merely postponed the
opening of the National Assembly from December 12, 191 7, to
January 18, 1918. Subsequently, it charged the Assembly with
being a counter-revolutionary body, and the Socialist Revolu-
tionary Party with being a traitorous party *' directing the fight
of the bourgeoisie against the workers' revolution." Not only
was the National Constituent Assembly suppressed,- but local
Soviets which could not be controlled by the Bolsheviki were
likewise dissolved and many of their leaders were imprisoned
or exiled. Proletarian dictatorship — not political democracy
— was the end and aim of the Bolshevist regime. In this re-
spect their government, strictly speaking, was not a champion of
either Anarchism or Marxian Socialism — it represented rather an
attempt to achieve communism by methods essentially tsar-like.
To secure "popular" support for the "proletarian dictator-
ship," care was taken by the Council of People's Commissioners
to purge the Soviets of non-Bolshevists and then to federate the
"purified" Soviets into a Congress which would faithfully
ratify the decrees of the Council. By provision of the Con-
stitution of the "Russian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic"
the following categories were expressly denied the right to vote
or to hold ofhce : " (i) Persons who employ hired labor in order
to obtain an increase of profits ; (2) Persons who have an income
without doing any work, such as interest from capital, receipts
from property, etc.; (3) Private merchants and commercial
brokers ; (4) Monks and clergy of all denominations ; (5) Em-
ployees and agents of the former police, the gendarme corps,
and the Tsar's secret service, also members of the former reign-
ing dynasty; (6) Persons who have legally been declared in-
sane or mentally deficient, and also persons under guardianship ;
and (7) Persons who have been deprived by a Soviet of their
rights of citizenship because of selfish or dishonorable offenses,
for the period fixed by the sentence."
Furthermore the Bolshevist Government created an All-
Russian Extraordinary Commission, which in turn created
Provincial and District Extraordinary Commissions. These
bodies — the local not less than the national — were empowered
to make arrests and even to decree and carry out capital sen-
tences. There was no appeal from their decisions ; they were
merely required to "report afterward." From this systematic
terrorism only professed Bolsheviki were immune.
Whither the Bolshevist regime in Russia was tending, what
was its goal and what were its policies, may perhaps be best
250 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
indicated by reproducing in full the "Declaration of the Rights
of the Toiling and Exploited People," a document which Lenin
and Trotsky had prepared and which was presented to the
National Constituent Assembly in January, 1918 : ^
I
"i. Russia is to be declared a Republic of the Workmen's,
Soldiers', and Peasants' Soviets. All power in the cities and in
the country belongs to the Soviets.
"2. The Russian Soviet Republic is based on the free federa-
tion of free peoples, on the federation of national Soviet republics.
II
"Assuming as its duty the destruction of all exploitation of
the workers, the complete abolition of the class system of society,
and the placing of society upon a socialistic basis, and the ulti-
mate bringing about of victory for Socialism in every country,
the Constituent Assembly further decides :
"i. That the socialization of land be realized, private owner-
ship of land be abolished, all the land be proclaimed common
property of the people and turned over to the toihng masses,
without compensation, on the basis of equal right to the use of
land;
"(All forests, and waters which are of social importance, as
well as all living, and other forms of property, and all agri-
cultural enterprises, are declared national property) ;
"2. To confirm the decree of the Soviets concerning the in-
spection of working conditions, the highest department of
national economy, which is the first step in achieving the owner-
ship, by the Soviets, of the factories, mines, and means of pro-
duction and transportation ;
"3. To confirm the decree of the Soviets transferring all banks
to the ownership of the Soviet Republic, as one of the steps in
the freeing of the toiling masses from the yoke of capitalism ;
"4. To enforce general compulsory labor, in order to destroy
the class parasites, and to reorganize the economic Hfe.
"In order to make the power of the toiling masses secure and
to prevent the restoration of the rule of the exploiters, the toil-
ing masses will be armed and a Red Guard formed of workers
and peasants, and the exploiting classes shall be disarmed.
^ The "Declaration" was rejected by the Assembly by a large majority, but it
was subsequently utilized as the basis of the Constitution of Bolshevist Russia.
The document is in John Spargo, Bolshevism (19 19), pp. 242 sqq.
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE
251
III
"i. Declaring its firm determination to make society free
from the chaos of capitaHsm and imperialism, which has drenched
the country in blood in the most criminal war of all wars, the
Constituent Assembly accepts completely the policy of the
Soviets, whose duty it is to publish all secret treaties, to organize
the most extensive fraternization between the workers and
peasants of warring armies, and by revolutionary methods to
bring about a democratic peace among the belligerent nations
without annexations and indemnities, on the basis of the free
self-determination of nations — at any price.
"2. For this purpose the Constituent Assembly declares its
complete separation from the brutal policy of the bourgeoisie,
which furthers the well-being of the exploiters in a few selected
nations by enslaving hundreds of millions of the toihng peoples
of the colonies and the small nations generally.
''The Constituent Assembly accepts the policy of the Council
of People's Commissioners in giving complete independence to
Finland, in beginning the withdrawal of troops from Persia,
and in declaring for Armenia the right of self-determination.
''A blow at international financial capital is the Soviet decree
which annuls foreign loans made by the governments of the
Tsar, the landowners, and the bourgeoisie. The Soviet govern-
ment is to continue firmly on this road until final victory from
the yoke of capitalism is won through international workers'
revolt.
''As the Constituent Assembly was elected on the basis of
lists of candidates nominated before the November Revolution,
when the people as a whole could not yet rise against their ex-
ploiters, and did not know how powerful would be the strength
of the exploiters in defending their privileges, and had not yet
begun to create a Socialist society, the Constituent Assembly
considers it, even from a formal point of view, unjust to oppose
the Soviet power. The Constituent Assembly is of the opinion
that at this moment, in the decisive hour of the struggle of the
people against their exploiters, the exploiters must not have a
seat in any government organization or institution. The power
completely and without exception belongs to the people and
their authorized representatives — the Workmen's, Soldiers',
and Peasants' Soviets.
"Supporting the Soviet rule and accepting the orders of the
Council of People's Commissioners, the Constituent Assembly
252 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
acknowledges its duty to outline a form for the reorganization
of society.
^'Striving at the same time to organize a free and voluntary,
and thereby also a complete and strong, union among the toiling
classes of all Russian nations, the Constituent Assembly limits
itself to outHning the basis of the federation of Russian Soviet
Republics, leaving to the people, to the workers and soldiers, to
decide for themselves, in their own Soviet meetings, if they are
wilHng, and on what conditions they prefer, to join the federated
government and other federations of Soviet enterprise.
*' These general principles are to be pubhshed without delay,
and the official representatives of the Soviets are required to
read them at the opening of the Constituent Assembly."
DEFECTION OF RUSSIA: THE TREATY OF BREST-LITOVSK
One of the chief reasons why the Tsar was deposed and divine-
right autocracy came to an end in Russia in March, 191 7, was
the inability of the old-regime government, on account of its
corruption and inefficiency, to obtain a mihtary victory over
Germany. A major reason why the Provisional Government
was overthrown and Russian poHtical democracy was transformed
into a proletarian dictatorship of the Bolsheviki, in November,
191 7, was the inability of the moderate revolutionaries — Lvov
and Kerensky — to terminate the war with a favorable peace.
Behind both the March and the November phases of the Great
Russian Revolution was the war weariness of vast masses of
the Russian people. Ever since the disastrous defeats and re-
treats of 191 5, Russian morale had steadily been declining. In
the chaotic social and political conditions of 191 7, already
sketched, it was destroyed utterly.
What the Bolsheviki would do in the internal affairs of the
Russian Empire, once they were in power, was largely con-
jectural. What they would do in foreign policy admitted of
no doubt whatsoever. On the first day following his advent to
the premiership, Lenin telegraphed to all the belligerent Powers,
proposing a three months' armistice for the discussion of peace-
terms. Receiving no formal responses from the AlHes, Trotsky,
the Bolshevist foreign minister, then pubhshed the ''secret
treaties" which had been made among the members of the
Entente in earlier periods of the war. According to the ''secret
treaties" Russia was to acquire the Dardanelles, Constantinople,
the west shore of the Bosphorus, and certain defined areas in Asia
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE'* 253
Minor ; Arabia was to be placed under an independent Mussul-
man government ; Russia agreed to permit France and Great Brit-
ain to draw the western boundaries of Germany, and Russia was
given a free hand to delimit the eastern frontiers of Germany;
Italy, in return for joining the Entente, was to receive the
Trentino, southern Tyrol, Trieste, Istria, and Dalmatia, to
exercise a protectorate over Albania, to obtain certain con-
cessions in Asia Minor, and to acquire additional holdings in
Africa if France and Great Britain should increase their terri-
torial possessions there; and Greece, if she should join the
Allies, was to take part of Albania and some Turkish territory
in Asia Minor. Trotsky stated that his purpose in publishing
these documents was to disclose to the people of all nations the
arrangements effected by *' financiers and traders through their
parliamentary and diplomatic agents." At the same time he
warned Germany that ''when the German proletariat by means
of revolution secures access to their chancelleries they will find
documents which will appear in no better light."
The publication of the secret treaties produced a deep im-
pression on the Russian pubKc and made it easier for the Bol-
shevist Government to open separate peace-negotiations with
the Teutons. Early in December, Trotsky demanded of the
Allies that they restate their war-aims within seven days. But
the Allies, who had not recognized the Bolshevist Government
and who were now doubly incensed at it because it had published
the secret treaties and because it had already suspended hos-
tilities along the Eastern front and encouraged the fraterniza-
tion of Russian and German troops, paid no heed to Trotsky's
ultimatum. Whereupon, the Bolshevist Government informed
the Russian people that the AlHes would not restate their aims
because their aims were really "imperialistic" and that there-
fore Russia was fully justified in breaking with the AlHes and in
making immediately a separate peace with Mittel-Europa.
Following a conference at the army headquarters of Prince
Leopold of Bavaria, at Brest-Li to vsk, attended by representa-
tives of Russia, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey, and Bul-
garia, an armistice between these Powers was signed on Decem-
ber 15, 191 7, providing for a truce. The Germans bound them-
selves not to transfer troops from the Eastern to the Western
Front.i
1 This engagement was not observed by the Germans. It should be noted that
Rumania, left in the lurch by the impending Russian defection, had agreed to a
truce with the Central Powers, at Focsani, on December 9.
254 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
The Peace Conference itself was formally opened at Brest-
Li to vsk on Saturday, December 22, 191 7. The Central Em-
pires were represented by their respective foreign secretaries,
Richard von Kuhlmann of Germany, and Count Czernin of
Austria-Hungary. Both these men were personally incUned
to be ingratiating and even magnanimous, but Kiihlmann was
hopelessly dominated by von Ludendorff, the brusque military
master of the Teutons, and Czernin dared not break with Kiihl-
mann. In sharp contrast to the titled and pompous dignitaries
who represented the might of Mittel-Europa were the obscure
envoys of revolutionary Bolshevist Russia. The latter did every-
thing they could to ruffle the dignity of the august assembly.
They frankly disdained diplomacy and utiHzed the occasion for
spreading Socialist propaganda.
At the opening session of the Peace Conference, the Russians
made fifteen proposals as the bases of permanent peace : (i) evac-
uation of all Russian territory occupied by Germany, with
autonomy for Poland and for the Lithuanian and Lettish prov-
inces; (2) autonomy for Turkish Armenia; (3) settlement of
the Alsace-Lorraine question by a free plebiscite ; (4) restoration
of Belgium and indemnity through an international fund for
damages; (5) restoration of Serbia and Montenegro, with
similar indemnities, Serbia gaining access to the Adriatic, and
Bosnia-Herzegovina securing complete autonomy; (6) other
contested Balkan territory to be temporarily autonomous, pend-
ing plebiscites ; (7) restoration of Rumania, with autonomy for
the Dobrudja, and with enforcement of the Berlin Convention
of 1878 concerning equaHty of the Jews ; (8) autonomy for the
Italian population of Trent and Trieste, pending a plebiscite;
(9) restoration of the German colonies ; (10) restoration of Persia
and Greece; (11) neutrahzation of all maritime straits leading
to inland seas, including the canals of Suez and Panama, and
prohibition of the torpedoing of merchant vessels in time of war ;
(12) no indemnities to be paid, and war requisitions to be re-
turned; (13) economic boycotts after the war to be forbidden;
(14) final, general peace to be negotiated at a congress composed
of delegates chosen by the representative bodies of the several
nations, all secret treaties being declared null and void; and
(15) gradual disarmament on land and sea, and the substitution
of militia for standing armies.
With many of these proposals the delegates of Mittel-Europa
expressed their sympathy; but on the first they immediately
made a significant reservation. They were wilHng, they said,
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES ''PEACE" 255
to evacuate strictly Russian territory, but they must insist on
their right to deal separately with Poland, Lithuania, Courland,
and parts of Esthonia and Livonia. In other words, they were
resolved to make such disposition of conquered portions of the
Russian Empire as was pleasing to themselves alone.
It soon became obvious that Teutonic policy aimed at de-
taching various lesser nationalities from Russian allegiance and
constituting them semi-autonomous states dependent upon
Mittel-Europa. In this way, the federation of Mittel-Europa
would be enormously extended eastward, and most valuable
new resources of men, metals, and foodstuffs would be available
to Germany for an indefinite prolongation of the Great War
against the Powers of Western Europe and against the United
States. In this way, too, what remained of Russia could speedily
be brought politically and economically into the orbit of Teu-
tonic ambition. It was a menace to the future independence
of the whole Russian Empire; it was a most serious threat,
moreover, against the Entente.
The disintegration of the Russian Empire into small republics
was already making notable progress, thanks to the national
chaos which accompanied and followed the Bolshevist revolution
of November, 191 7, and thanks also to constant German propa-
ganda which adroitly abetted the separatist tendencies of the
smaller nationalities within the Russian Empire. The Rada,
or parliament, of the Little Russians at Kiev proclaimed the
independence of the ''Ukrainian People's Republic" on Novem-
ber 20, and sent representatives to Brest-Li to vsk. The same
important step was taken by Finland, which formally declared
its independence as a republic on December 4, and was recognized
by Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, as well as by the Central
Empires. Lithuanian freedom from Russia was proclaimed on
December 11. The Don Cossacks, representing a reactionary
movement against the Bolsheviki, declared a separate republic
with Rostov as its capital and with General Paul Kaledine as
first president and prime-minister. Separatist movements also
developed in the Baltic Provinces of Courland, Livonia, and
Esthonia, in the Caucasus, in Turkestan, among th'e Mussul-
mans and the Tartars, and in Siberia.
Taking advantage of a suspension of the Peace Conference,
which had been voted in order to enable the AlHes to participate
if they should so desire, the Bolshevist Government conducted
propaganda on its own account, with a view especially to inciting
the German people against the '' imperialistic aims" of the
256 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Teutonic diplomatists at Brest-Li to vsk. In an official statement,
made public on January 2, the Executive Committee of the
Soviets declared "that the Russian Revolution remains faithful
to the pohcy of internationalism. We defend the right of Po-
land, Lithuania, and Courland (Latvia) to dispose of their own
destiny actually and freely. Never will we recognize the justice
of imposing the will of a foreign nation on any other nations
whatsoever. . . . We say to the people of Germany, Austria-
Hungary, Turkey, and Bulgaria: 'Under your pressure your
Governments have been obliged to accept the motto of no an-
nexations and no indemnities, but recently they have been trying
to carry on their old poHcy of evasions. Remember, that the
conclusion of an immediate democratic peace will depend actually
and above all on you. All the people of Europe, exhausted and
bled by such a war as there never was before, look to you and
expect that you will not permit the Austro-German imperialists
to make war against revolutionary Russia for the subjection of
Poland, Lithuania, Courland, and Armenia ^^
The Bolsheviki were doomed to double disappointment. On
one hand they could not prevail upon the Allies to join them in
peace-negotiations, the Entente statesmen contenting them-
selves with renewals of their solemn protests to Russia against
a separate peace. On the other hand, far more significant, the
German people seemed peculiarly impervious to Bolshevist
propaganda; the only occasions on which the German people
ever appeared to doubt the all-wise and all-good character of
their Government were when their armies met sharp reverses,
and now, with Russia crumbling into chaos, no amount of
Russian propaganda could shake the faith of the German masses
in the providential guidance of Kiihlmann and Czernin. " Kame-
rad!" was shouted by the Teuton only when he was beaten;
when he was successful, his motto was "Woe to the vanquished ! "
Consequently when the Peace Conference was resumed at
Brest-Li tovsk on January 10, 191 8, the Teutonic envoys cate-
gorically refused to accede to the Russian suggestion to transfer
the negotiations to Stockholm or to agree to the evacuation of
occupied Russian territories. At the same time they protested
vehemently against the efforts of the Bolshevist leaders to appeal
to the German people over the heads of the Government's ac-
credited representatives. The result was an impasse. And on
January 14, the parleys at Brest-Litovsk broke up, the armistice
having been extended to February 12, but the conference itself
adjourning without fixing a day for reassembling.
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE" 257
Fighting had already occurred in Ukrainia between partisans
of the Bolsheviki and those of the so-called Ukrainian People^s
Republic. To the latter the Austro- Germans now gave their
moral support. Despite the protests of Trotsky and Lenin,
negotiations were continued throughout January between Ger-
many, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey, on one side,
and Ukrainia, on the other, leading finally to the signature of a
treaty on February 9, 1918, whereby southeastern Russia was
constituted the free and independent republic of Ukrainia,
comprising a territory of about 195,000 square miles and a popu-
lation of about forty-five millions.
On the following day, Trotsky, the Bolshevist foreign minister,
served notice on all the Powers that Russia, though unable to
sign a treaty of peace with Germany, was henceforth definitively
out of the war. Not at peace — not at war — such was the
remarkable import of the Russian declaration of February 10,
1918:
"The peace negotiations are at an end. The German capital-
ists, bankers, and landlords, supported by the silent cooperation
of the English and French bourgeoisie, submitted to our com-
rades, members of the peace delegations at Brest-Li to vsk, con-
ditions such as could not be subscribed to by the Russian Revo-
lution.
"The Governments of Germany and Austria are in possession
of countries and peoples vanquished by force of arms. To this
authority the Russian people, workmen and peasants, could not
give its acquiescence. We could not sign a peace which would
bring with it sadness, oppression, and suffering to millions of
workmen and peasants.
"But we also cannot, will not, and must not continue a war
begun by tsars and capitalists in alliance with tsars and capitalists.
We will not and we must not continue to be at war with the Ger-
mans and Austrians — workmen and peasants like ourselves.
"We are not signing a peace of landlords and capitahsts.
Let the German and Austrian soldiers know who are placing
them in the field of battle and let them know for what they are
struggling. Let them know also that we refuse to fight against
them.
"Our delegation, fully conscious of its responsibility before
the Russian people and the oppressed workers and peasants
of other countries, declared on February 10, in the name of the
Council of the People's Commissioners of the Government of
the Federal Russian Republic to the Governments of the peoples
258 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
involved in the war with us and of the neutral countries, that it
refused to sign an annexationist treaty. Russia, for its part,
declares the present war with Germany and Austria-Hungary,
Turkey, and Bulgaria, at an end.
^'Simultaneously, the Russian troops received an order for
complete demobilization on all fronts."
This ''no war, no peace" declaration of the Petrograd Govern-
ment was received in Germany with jeers. Obviously the
armistice was ended, but not the war. What the Teuton envoys
had failed to achieve at Brest-Li to vsk, could certainly be achieved
by a spectacular military thrust against disorganized and de-
mobilized Russia. So on February i8, the German armies on
the Eastern Front were again set in motion. Rapidly they ad-
vanced, capturing within a fortnight 7000 Russian officers,
57,000 men, 5000 machine guns, and enormous quantities of
munitions and supplies. Reval, Dorpat, and Narva were
occupied ; also Pskov, Polotzk, and Borissoff ; Kiev, the capital
of Ukrainia, was in German possession, as was almost all of
Russia lying west of a line drawn from Narva on the Gulf of
Finland, seventy miles west of Petrograd, to south of Kiev.
There were now under German domination the provinces of
Russian Poland, Lithuania, Courland, Esthonia, and Livonia,
and a large part of Ukrainia ; the islands in the Gulf of Finland
were later occupied.
On February 24, the Germans, through Foreign Secretary
Kiihlmann, announced their readiness to make a new offer of
peace, involving new and more drastic terms than the previous
offer, and added the condition that this offer must be accepted
within forty-eight hours. Premier Lenin, in urging the Execu-
tive Committee of the Soviets to accept the new peace terms,
said, ''Their knees are on our chest, and our position is hope-
less. . . . This peace must be accepted as a respite enabling
us to prepare a decisive resistance to the bourgeoisie and im-
perialists. The proletariat of the whole world will come to our
aid. Then we shall renew the fight." The Soviet Committee
accepted the German terms on the following day, by a vote of
112 to 84, with 22 .abstentions, and peace negotiations were
resumed at Brest-Li to vsk. All the Russian envoys could do was
to protest against Teutonic injustice — and this they did solemnly
and vigorously.
The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, signed on March 3, 1918, re-
duced the huge Russian Empire practically to the size of the
medieval Grand Duchy of Muscovy. The Bolsheviki promised
RUSSIA REVOLTS AND MAKES "PEACE'' 259
to evacuate Ukrainia, Esthonia, Livonia, Finland, and the
Aland islands, and to surrender the districts of Erivan, Kars,
and Batum to the Turks. All Bolshevist propaganda was to
be discontinued in Mittel-Europa and in the newly ceded terri-
tories. The unfavorable Russo-German commercial treaty of
1904 was revived. By these terms Russia lost a fourth of her
population, of her arable land, and of her railway system, a
third of her manufacturing industries, and three-fourths of her
total iron production and of her coal-fields. Russia was humbled
in the dust, but she was at ''peace."
Rumania, completely isolated by the collapse and defection
of Russia, felt obliged to sign a peace-treaty with the four Powers
of Mittel-Europa, at Bucharest, on March 7. By this humihating
Treaty of Bucharest,^ Rumania agreed to give up all Dobrudja,
the Petroseny coal basin, and the Carpathian passes, and to
promote Austro-German trade through Moldavia and Bessarabia
to Odessa on the Black Sea. Subsequently the Central Empires
consented to the incorporation of Bessarabia into Rumania,
which had been voted by a Bessarabian council on March 27.
On March 7, a peace- treaty was concluded between Finland
and Germany, whereby the latter recognized the independence
of the former. 2 A week later the German landlords of Cour-
land, meeting at Mittau, were inspired to petition for a union
of the "freed" Baltic Provinces under the crown of the "House
of Hohenzollern " ; and the emotional William II, stirred to
his very heart-depths, wired " God's blessing on your land, upon
which German fidelity, German courage, and German perse-
verance have made their impress." Everything seemed to be
progressing as auspiciously for Germany as unhappily for Russia.
Intrigues were being steadily prosecuted to secure scions of
princely German families as popular candidates for the new
thrones which had been rendered desirable and needful by Teu-
tonic military prowess in the East — in Finland, in the Baltic
Provinces, in Lithuania, in Ukrainia, and in Poland. What a
mighty Mittel-Europa was in process of construction ! Against
the treaties of Brest-Litovsk and Bucharest, the Governments
of Great Britain, France, and Italy formally protested on March
18, 1918.
The defection of Russia from the cause of the democratic
^ This treaty was ratified by the German Bundesrat on June 4, by the Rumanian
Chamber on June 28, and by the Rumanian Senate on July 4.
2 A treaty of amity between the " Finnish Social Republic of Workmen " and
the "Russian Federal Soviet Republic" had been signed on March i, 1918. Peace
between Finland and Austria-Hungary was concluded at Vienna on May 29.
26o A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Entente Allies should not be blamed upon the Revolution or
even upon the mischievous and short-sighted Bolsheviki so much
as upon the old tsardom whose tyranny and corruption had
made revolution necessary and temporary excessive radicalism
natural. For the time being, the defection of Russia was cer-
tainly a source of bitter disappointment to France, Great Britain,
Italy, and the United States; and the formal repudiation of
the Russian foreign debt in February, 191 8, served to accentuate
the bitterness felt in Alhed countries. Yet the Russians them-
selves were doomed to suffer more and worse from the Bolshevist
regime than were any foreign peoples. And, as events were to
prove, entry of the United States into the Great War in 191 7
was ample compensation to the Allies for the disintegration and
defection of Russia.
CHAPTER XII
THE ALLIES PAVE THE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY
ALLIED PLANS AND PROSPECTS IN 1917
The Great War entered a peculiarly critical stage in 191 7.
In the preceding year the Teutons and the Allies had failed in
turn to obtain military decisions. On the one hand, the Allies
had been unable to recover any appreciable portion of territories
formerly lost to them or to prevent the humiliation and subjuga-
tion of Rumania. On the other hand, the Teutons had failed
to capture Verdun or Vicenza, or to weaken the hostile resolu-
tion of any of the Great Powers arrayed against them. It was
obvious that the Great War was a tremendous endurance-test;
and, as had been pointed out repeatedly, such an endurance-
test was less promising, in the long run, to the Teutons than to
the Allies.
Early in 191 7, however, the resumption of unrestricted subma-
rine warfare by Germany and the resulting entrance of the
United States into the war on the side of the Allies served to
emphasize one aspect of the endurance-test to the exclusion of
others. The question then was whether the United States
Government, in the face of the threat of the wholesale destruc-
tion and paralysis of Allied shipping by German submarines,
would and could transport sufficient troops and supplies to
Europe to tip the balance of mihtary power in favor of the En-
tente. As we have already seen, this question was in a fair
way toward an answer by the second half of 191 7: ruthless
submarine warfare, though terribly destructive in the first
half of the year and still menacing, was now distinctly on the
decline; American foodstuffs, munitions, and other materiel
were flowing in streams to Britain, France, and Italy; and it
was apparent that a large American Expeditionary Force,
well trained and well equipped, would be ready to take the field
in 1 9 18 alongside the seasoned veterans of the Allies. The
unrestricted submarine warfare of the Germans was not accom-
plishing its purpose, and this aspect of the great endurance-
261
262 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
test between the Allies and the Central Empires was becoming
monthly more favorable to the former and less advantageous
to the latter. If only Russia could continue to press against
the extended Austro-German lines from the Sereth to the Baltic,
while the French and British forced offensives on the Western
Front, and the ItaKans on the Isonzo and the Carso, and General
Sarrail's motley hosts in Macedonia, it would be but a question
of time when MiUel-Europa must break and crumble.
But the situation in 191 7 was not so simple. For at the very
time when the Great War appeared to assume the character of
a speed-contest between German preparations for ruthless war-
fare on the high seas and American preparations for large-scale
campaigning on the Continent of Europe, one of the Great
Entente Powers — Russia — began to revolt and to upset many
AlHed calculations. The Russian Revolution introduced a
new and important element of uncertainty into the endurance-
test which the Great War had become.
In its earliest phases the Russian Revolution seemed to be an
asset to the Allied cause. The destruction of autocracy in Russia
was acclaimed in Paris, in London, in Rome, and in Washington,
as putting an end once for all to dangerous intrigues between
the courts of Petrograd and Berlin, as removing a too well-merited
reproach of Teutonic sympathizers and apologists, and as com-
pleting the alignment of democratic nations against the oligarchial
and militaristic states of Mittel-Europa. Thereby the political
stakes of the Great War were clarified and point was given to
President Wilson's celebrated phrase that the aim of the Allies
was ''to make the world safe for democracy."
If any confirmation were needed of the new democratic enthu-
siasm which overspread all the Entente Powers, it was provided
by a radical electoral reform in Great Britain, the bill for which,
introduced in the House of Commons on May 15, 191 7, and
passed in December, provided for the equal, direct suffrage of
all adult males and of most adult females. Great Britain not
only was adopting thoroughgoing democracy in the old sense
but was playing the role of pioneer among the Great Powers of
the world in the grant of the parliamentary franchise to women.
Moreover, Lloyd George, the British premier, announced in
May, 191 7, that his Government was prepared to recognize the
national aspirations of Ireland by- offering to the Irish people a
choice between the acceptance of immediate home rule for all
parts of the island, except the six counties of Ulster, and the
convocation of a constituent assembly which should represent
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 263
all factions and all faiths. The Irish Nationalists chose the
latter; and from July to December, 191 7, an Irish Conven-
tion was in session endeavoring to draft a constitution for the
country.^
High hopes were aroused in the Entente countries that the
Russian Revolution would occasion serious internal disorders
in the Central Empires. And events in the spring and summer
of 191 7 did not altogether belie these hopes. Austria-Hungary
was already in ferment, and the democratic and nationalistic
revolutions elsewhere brought into bold relief the glaring political
inequahties in the Dual Monarchy. In Austria itself, it should
be remembered, some ten milHon Germans dominated some
eighteen million Slavs — • Czechs, Poles, Ruthenians (Ukrainians),
and Jugoslavs (Slovenes, Croats, and Serbs), — while in Hun-
gary some ten million Magyars tyrannized over some ten million
Rumans, Slovaks, and Jugoslavs. Only the Germans of Austria
and the Magyars of Hungary accepted loyally the Prussian
hegemony in Mittel-Europa, and these dominant minority ele-
ments encountered ever greater difficulties in dealing with the
majority nationalities subject to them. There were frequent
conspiracies and executions of civilians, and mutinies of troops.
The Czechs of Austria and the Slovaks of Hungary — consti-
tuting in reality the single Czechoslovak nationality — were
on the verge of armed rebellion. The Slovenes, Croats, and
Serbs were becoming more conscious of their community of
race and interest with the peoples of Serbia and Montenegro
and were agitating in favor of separation from Austria and
Hungary and creation of an autonomous Jugoslavia. The
Rumans of Hungarian Transylvania were advocating union
with the kingdom of Rumania, and the Poles of Austrian Gahcia
were demanding union with a free and independent Poland.
The Ruthenians of eastern Gahcia, affected by the estabHshment
of an autonomous Ukrainia by their kinsfolk in Russia, were
hostile alike to the Poles and to the German Austrians. The
hodge-podge of nationalities within the Dual Monarchy raised
problems perplexing enough at any time, but now, in the face
of the Russian Revolution, doubly perplexing.
The Emperor Charles, who had succeeded the aged Francis
Joseph in November, 191 6, was reputed to be sincerely desirous
of undertaking a radical reformation of his ramshackle domin-
ions. It was gossiped that he planned to transform the Dual
^ The Report of the Irish Convention was published in April, 191 8, but was not
acted upon by the British Government. See below, pp. 310-312.
264 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Monarchy into a Quintuple Monarchy of which the constituent
states would be Austria, Hungary, Jugoslavia, Czechoslovakia,
and Poland. At any rate he had intrusted the important posts
of Austrian premier ^ and minister of foreign affairs in December,
19 1 6, respectively to Count Clam-Martini tz and to Count
Ottokar Czernin, two Germanized Czechs, who intrigued deli-
cately and spoke many fair words. But the task was too ardu-
ous for Czernin, Clam-Mar tinitz, or Charles. Any concession
to Czechs or Poles angered the Germans, and any strengthening
of the dominant position of the Germans exasperated the sub-
ject nationalities.
So long as an overwhelming majority of Austrian subjects
were bitterly hostile to the existing poUtical regime, democracy
could exist in Austria only in name ; and it was a notorious fact
that the Austrian parliament — the Reichsrat — had not been
convoked since the outbreak of the Great War in July, 19 14.
Now, however, after the Russian Revolution, the Emperor and
his ministers had to prove at home and abroad that Austria
was democratic in fact as well as in theory ; and thus it happened
that the Reichsrat, after a vacation of three years, was convened
in Vienna in May, 191 7. No sooner had the Reichsrat met
than the Czech and the Jugoslav deputies demanded the abohtion
of the dual system and the grant of independence and unity
to their respective nations. Unable to coerce or cajole these
deputies, Clam-Martinitz turned his attention to the Poles.
If the Polish deputies could be prevailed upon to support him,
they with the German Austrians would constitute a majority
of the Reichsrat capable of demonstrating the regularity and
orderliness of democratic government in Austria. But the
Poles claimed more favors than Clam-Martinitz could grant
and still retain the confidence of the German Austrians. To
the Polish demand for a united, independent Poland, including
Galicia and access to the Baltic, Clam-Martinitz ventured to
give only rambling and non-committal answers; and on June
16, 191 7, the Polish deputies resolved to join the Czechs and
Jugoslavs in voting against the budget. At the same time the
National Council of the Czechs prepared and issued a formal
indictment of the Habsburg Monarchy, accusing it of having
brought on the war without the consent of the Czech deputies
^ The Austrian premier since 191 1, Count Karl Stiirgkh, had been assassinated
on October 21, 1916, by a Socialist editor. From October to December, a
stop-gap ministry had been presided over by Ernst von Koerber, a zealous Pan-
German, who had been finance minister of the Dual Monarchy since February,
1915-
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 265
or of the Czech nation, of having shot Czech soldiers in masses,
interned hundreds of Czech civihans, and condemned Czech
deputies to death or imprisonment, of having suppressed or
gagged the Czech press, of having involved the Czech communi-
ties in ruin, and of having *' spent more than sixty billions on a
criminal war." Furthermore, on July 20, 191 7, the head of the
Jugoslav party, Dr. Anton Trumbitch, signed with Nikola
Pashitch, the premier of Serbia, the famous Declaration of
Corfu, whereby it was agreed to constitute an independent,
unified state of the five million Serbs of Serbia and Montenegro
and the seven million Jugoslav (Serb, Croat, and Slovene)
subjects of Austria-Hungary ; in the proposed state all reHgions
would be on an equal footing, the Gregorian calendar would be
adopted, and suffrage would be universal, secret, equal, and
direct.
Uncomfortably oppressed by the sensation of an ominous
rumbling that might betoken the nearness of earthquake and
volcanic eruptions. Count Clam-Mar tinitz retired from the
Austrian premiership late in June as gracefully as the circum-
stances would warrant. Dr. von Seidler, a typical bureaucrat,
then formed a stop-gap ministry, dissolved the Reichsrat, and
awaited developments.
Superficially the situation in Hungary was less critical. Count
Tisza, who had been in office since 1913 and had had a hand in
precipitating the Great War, was forced out of the premiership,
it is true, in May, 191 7, but he was forced out by fellow-Magyar
aristocrats rather than by non-Magyar nationalists. And
so accustomed to domination were the titled Magyars that they
experienced no serious difficulty in refusing popular demands
for much-needed constitutional reform and in exalting one of
their own number. Count Julius Andrassy, to succeed Count
Tisza.
Nevertheless, below the surface, there was seething discontent
in Hungary. And Austria, as we have seen, was on the verge
of revolution. Instinctively the Emperor Charles and Count
Czernin, his suave foreign minister, felt that the Dual Monarchy
could be saved and its complicated nationalistic problems safely
dealt with, not by indefinite prolongation of the war, but by
speedy conclusion of peace. The result was that throughout
the spring and summer of 191 7 Czernin and Charles were intrigu-
ing with the AlHes, especially with France, for the termination
of the war. Charles went so far as to state to the French Gov-
ernment through a confidential intermediary, — his cousin,
266 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Prince Sixtus of Bourbon, — that Austria-Hungary would sup-
port ''France's just claim relative to Alsace-Lorraine."^
That Austria-Hungary was longing ardently for peace and was
weakening in her attachment to Germany was no secret in the
midsummer of 191 7. And so long as there was open to the AlHes
the prospect of detaching the Dual Monarchy from Mittel-
Europa, British and French diplomatists evinced a remarkable
charity and kindliness toward the Habsburg Estate. The
United States, though at war with Germany since April, 191 7,
did not declare war against Austria-Hungary until the following
December.
The Russian Revolution occasioned political crises not only
in Austria-Hungary, but also in Germany ; and any event which
divided German counsels and weakened German morale was of
obvious advantage to the Allies, for Germany was the brain and
sinew of Mittel-Europa, In January, 191 7, before the upheaval
in Russia, the German Chancellor, Bethmann-Hollweg, had
seemingly won the enthusiastic approbation of the bulk of the
German people in espousing the Pan- German policy of ruth-
less submarine warfare. But as time went on and the Russian
Colossus was perceived to have feet of clay and the submarine
warfare did not bring a speedy suit for peace from the AlHes, a
growing reaction against Bethmann-Hollweg and his Govern-
ment was observable in Germany. With the Great War about
to enter upon its fourth year, even the most miHtaristic nation
could not wholly escape the general war weariness which affected
all the other belHgerents. In particular, there were pohtical
groups in Germany, such as the Socialists, the CathoHc Centrists,
the Radicals (Progressives), and the Poles, which had always
been by tradition and circumstance hostile to the imperial regime,
and which, though supporting the Emperor and his Chancellor
so long as autocratic Russia made common cause with democratic
France in arms against the integrity of the Fatherland, were
now prepared to quaKfy their support.
These Moderates in Germany were affected not only by the
Russian Revolution directly, which removed an important part
of the ''Slavic Peril," but also by the papal appeals for peace,
by the troubles and tribulations then brewing in Austria-Hun-
gary, by the eloquent appeals of President Wilson to the German
people against the German autocracy, and by the plain talking
^ The exposure of this Austrian duplicity in April, 19 18, led to the resignation
of Count Czernin, and to the restoration of Baron Burian to the Austro-Hungarian
ministry of foreign afifairs, which had been held by him from January, 1915, to
December, 19 16.
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 267
of foreign Socialists to Scheidemann and other German Socialist
leaders at an international conference in Stockholm in June.
In vain did Bethmann-Hollweg endeavor to conciHate the Cen-
trists and Poles by securing the repeal of the law against the
Jesuits and of the law forbidding the use of any language other
than German at pubHc meetings. Such liberal sops did not
satisfy the real hunger of German liberals.
On July 6, 191 7, a serious crisis was precipitated in Germany
by Mathias Erzberger, a conspicuous leader of the left wing of
the Catholic Center Party, who in a speech before the Main
Committee of the Reichstag assailed the Government with the
utmost candor and vehemence, criticising the conduct of the war,
especially the use of the submarines, and demanding radical
reforms in both domestic and foreign poHcy and a declaration
in favor of peace according to the formula of revolutionary Russia
— without annexations or indemnities. Straightway the Cen-
trists, Sociahsts, Radicals, and a sprinkling of National Liberals
formed an an ti- Government hloc, comprising a large majority
of the total membership of the Reichstag and pledged to uphold
democratic amendment of the Prussian Constitution, introduc-
tion of parliamentary government in the Empire, and a declara-
tion of war aims on lines laid down by Erzberger.
To accept the demands of the new hloc meant the alienation
of all the Conservatives and of a majority of the National Liberals
from the Government, and this meant a signal reverse for the
war party and perhaps an open confession of national defeat.
Bethmann-Hollweg, who had been chancellor continuously
since 1909 and as such had played a most significant part in
preparing for the present war, in precipitating it, and in assum-
ing responsibility for its conduct, could not bring himself to
cooperate with the hloc; after a week's disorder in the Reichstag,
Emperor Wilham II received and accepted, on July 14, 191 7,
the resignation of Bethmann-Hollweg.
Five days later the unruly Reichstag, against the strenuous
protests of Tirpitz, Reventlow, and all other fiery pan-Germans,
passed by a majority of more than one hundred a remarkable
peace resolution, that the object of the war was solely to defend
the liberty, independence, and territorial integrity of Germany,
that the Reichstag championed peace and understanding between
the belligerents, and that annexations and political and economic
oppression were contrary to such a peace. Thereby did a large
majority of the duly elected representatives of the German
nation put themselves squarely on record as opposed to the
268 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
war aims of the Kaiser, the militarists, the Junkers, and the
industrial magnates.
So used was the Reichstag, however, to limiting itself to
words, that in this crisis it had no single opinion as to what
legal methods it should employ to give effect to its resolution
and no courage to transcend the constitution and proclaim a
revolution. Fearful of their own vocal audacity, the leaders of
the hloc hesitated to invoke violence, and in hesitating they were
lost. The Emperor took no notice of the peace resolution and
calmly ignored the Reichstag in appointing Dr. George Michaelis
as successor to Bethmann-Hollweg.
Michaelis was a typical Prussian bureaucrat, sixty years old,
docile, and safe, of Conservative sentiments and sympathies,
who was known to the public almost exclusively by his recent
record as a fairly competent Food Administrator. Under Chan-
cellor Michaelis, Helfferich became vice chancellor and minister
of the interior, and Kiihlmann succeeded Zimmermann as foreign
minister. Michaelis was no intellectual giant, but he was clever
enough to befool the credulous hloc leaders in the Reichstag.
He declared himself ready to accept the peace resolution of
July 19, "as he understood it," announced that he would take
matters of political reform ''under consideration," and sent the
Reichstag home with a benediction.
Throughout August and September, Michaelis with the aid of
the more adroit Kiihlmann continued openly to profess his love
for peace while stealthily he abetted the propaganda actively
conducted by Pan- Germans in favor of the repudiation of the
Reichstag's peace resolution. It was hard for Michaelis, bungler
as he was, to labor for a German victory through peace, when
the simpler and more straightforward Conservatives could only
think of peace through a German victory. When, in October,
the Reichstag reassembled, it was in an electrical atmosphere.
The submarine warfare was failing. There were grave disorders,
even mutinies, in the fleet. The Independent SociaHsts were
growing more troublesome. The Conservatives and National
Liberals were annoyed that the Chancellor did not break com-
pletely with the Reichstag. The Centrists, Socialists, and
Radicals were furious that the Chancellor should give only lip-
service to their program of reform and their declaration of
war aims.
Delay on the part of the Reichstag in voting war credits and
attacks of the hloc leaders upon the Chancellor for his blunders
and shiftiness were sufficient to precipitate a second political
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 269
crisis in Germany. On October 21, 1917, Michaelis resigned;
and ten days later — the four hundredth anniversary of the
posting of Luther's theses upon the church-door at Wittenberg
— the Emperor designated as chancellor and minister-president
of Prussia the Catholic leader Count Hertling. Count Hertling,
a Bavarian by birth and latterly premier of his native state,
had spent most of his seventy-four years as professor at Bonn ;
he was a prominent member of the Center Party, a devout
Catholic, a profound student of philosophy, and a skillful parlia-
mentarian. His advent to the highest civil office in the Empire
and in Prussia was hailed at first as a signal triumph for the
Reichstag bloc and as a happy augury of a democratic reaction
in Germany against militaristic autocracy. Hertling's pro-
gram, elaborated in conference with the party leaders in the
Reichstag, included promises to carry out sweeping electoral
reforms in Prussia, to abolish or relax the political censorship
and the state of siege, and to direct peace negotiations in har-
mony with the resolution of July.
Only a week after Hertling's elevation to a leading position
in Germany occurred the Bolshevist Revolution in Russia (No-
vember 7, 191 7), which definitely deprived the Entente of one
of its most important members and at the same time put a stop,
at least temporarily, to the popular unrest and disquiet in Ger-
many and in Austria-Hungary. The Allies soon received full
confirmation of their fears that the Russian Revolution, as it
progressed, was becoming a liability, rather than an asset, to
their cause. Bolshevist Russia was concluding first an armistice
and then a separate peace with the Central Empires. Rumania,
left isolated and defenseless, was obliged to surrender. The
Teutons were organizing a series of dependent states out of the
wreckage in eastern Europe — a Finland, a Lettland (Latvia),
a Lithuania, a Poland, and a Ukrainia. On all of these states
as well as on what remained of Russia, Mittel-Europa was
strengthening her political and economic hold. She was prepar-
ing to draw from them vast stores of foodstuffs and war materiel.
She would be able before long to do away entirely with her
Eastern Front and to bring all her fighting strength to bear
on France, on Italy, and on Salonica. No wonder that Dr.
Seidler, the Austrian premier who had taken office in June in
fear and trembling, breathed quite easily in December. No
wonder that Count Hertling, the German Chancellor who had
appeared in October as a harbinger of democracy and early
peace, was transformed by the rapid course of events into an
270 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
exponent of domestic conservation and foreign annexation. The
immediate prospects of Mittel-Europa were too alluring to a
Seidler and a Hertling. They were compelling to a Czernin
and a Kiihlmann. They were satisfying even to the Teutonic
military chieftains — to Hindenburg, Ludendorff , and Mack-
ensen. The sceptical Emperor Charles was silenced, and the
grandiloquent Emperor William burst forth in hysterical paeans
to the Almighty.
Still the Allies had no reason to despair of ultimate victory.
With the Russian autocracy gone, their cause was now unques-
tionably the cause of democracy and civilization, and as such
it had a popular appeal infinitely more enthusiastic than that
of Mittel-Europa. Even with the defection of all Russia from
the alliance of free nations, the Entente was superior to the
Central Empires in man-power and in munitions and supplies
Besides, the political and economic conditions in Bolshevist
Russia were so chaotic that the Teutons could not hope to organ-
ize and utilize its natural resources in the near future ; and in
the meantime the full strength of the United States would be
available to the Allies. Moreover, the dependent states on which
the Teutons had counted for grateful and timely assistance
soon displayed signs of putting their own welfare above that of
Mittel-Europa, and some of them, notably Poland and Ukrainia,
fell to quarreling violently with each other, to the scandal and
chagrin of Vienna and Berlin. At the worst for the Allies, the
Russian Revolution merely injected a new element into the
endurance-test which the Great War had become ; it simply
postponed the ultimate victory of the Allies.
Less and less throughout the year 191 7 did the purpose of the
Allies appear to be merely the chastisement of Germany and
the parceling out of conquered territories ; more and more it
became the fashioning of a league of free nations which should
preserve a peace of justice and put an end to anarchy — to the
rule of force — in international relations. More and more the
whole world awoke to an understanding of the real stakes of the
Great War, and nation after nation entered the struggle on the
side of the Allies. The four Powers of Mittel-Europa — Ger-
many, Austria-Hungary, Turkey, and Bulgaria — remained
alone in 191 7 as they had in 191 5. On the other hand, the
Entente, though suffering the defection of Russia and of Rumania
in 191 7, could now count not only upon the former members —
France, Great Britain, Italy, Japan, Belgium, Serbia, Monte-
negro, and Portugal, — but also upon a considerable number
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 271
of fresh associates. The United States joined the Allies in April,
speedily followed by Cuba and Panama. China severed diplo-
matic relations with Germany on March 14; and then after
the suppression of a royalist uprising, the reconstructed republi-
can government under President Feng Kwo-Cheng declared
war on the Central Empires on August 14. Brazil, after sever-
ing diplomatic relations in April, formally went to war with
Germany on October 26. Siam declared war on the Central
Empires on July 22. Liberia declared war on Germany on
August 4. Greece, as we shall see in a subsequent section of this
chapter, united with the Allies on July 2.
Several states showed clearly their sympathies in the struggle
by severing diplomatic relations with Germany, though they
did not formally declare war. Such were Bolivia, Costa Rica,
Ecuador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, Peru, Santo
Domingo, and Uruguay.^ Feeling ran high in Argentina against
the German submarine ruthlessness, especially when it became
known that Count Luxburg, the German charge at Buenos
Aires, had telegraphed his government in May that if Argentine
vessels were destroyed, it should be done '' without a trace being
left" C'spurlosversenkt") ; and only a profuse apology from Ger-
many and a formal promise not to sink any more Argentine
ships, together with an unpopular insistence on the part of the
Argentine president, kept Argentina out of the war. Altogether,
at the close of 19 18, approximately half the sovereign states of
the world (and these by far the richest and most populous)
were banded together in a sort of league against the four Powers
of Germanized Mittel-Europa.
The better to coordinate their military operations, the prime
ministers and chiefs of staff of France, Great Britain, and Italy
conferred at Rapallo on November 9, 191 7, and agreed to create
a Supreme War Council, the organization and functions of which
were set forth as follows: ''The Supreme War Council is com-
posed of the prime minister and one other member of the govern-
ment of each of the Great Powers whose armies are fighting on
the Western Front ; it is to supervise the general conduct of the
war ; it prepares recommendations for the consideration of the
governments and keeps itself informed of their execution and
reports thereon to the several governments." The first act
of the Supreme War Council was the appointment of an Inter-
* Subsequently, in 1918, Costa Rica (May 23), Guatemala (April 22), Haiti
(July 15), Honduras (July 19), and Nicaragua (May 24) declared war against
Germany.
272 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Allied General Staff, consisting of Generals Foch (France),
Wilson (Great Britain), and Cadorna (Italy). Early in Decem-
ber an Inter- Allied Naval Board was created by the Supreme
War Council. It was obvious that at last the Allies were becom-
ing convinced of the imperative need of unity of counsel and
unity of action.
At the end of November, 191 7, the long deferred Allied Con-
ference met at Paris. Delegates were present from France,
Great Britain, Italy, the United States, and all the other allied
and associated states, except Russia, which was then in the midst
of negotiations with Germany for an armistice. No detailed
statement was made of the plans formulated, but it was indicated
that satisfactory agreements had been reached whereby a uni-
fied and vigorous prosecution of the war was made possible.
Allied prospects should have seemed bright. Russia, it is
true, was deserting the Allies, but the United States was coming
to take Russia's place. The ruthless submarine warfare was
weakening. There were signs of unrest and discomfort within
the Central Empires. The Allies were clarifying their war-aims,
husbanding their resources, and effecting a unity of purposes
and methods. As we shall discover in the next two sections of
this chapter, the Alhes in 191 7 were likewise gaining noteworthy
advantages in the fighting on the Western Front and were recov-
ering much of their prestige in the Near East.
THE LESSON OF THE HINDENBURG LINE
On the Western Front the year 191 7 marked the first significant
retirement of the Germans since the battle of the Marne in 1914,
and it also marked noteworthy progress in the war of attrition.
The Anglo-French offensive on the Somme in the autumn of
1 91 6 had failed to reach its chief objectives, — the towns of
Bapaume and Peronne, — but it had caused the enemy many
casualties and had badly dented his line; it had created an
awkward salient for him between Arras and Saillisel and an
even greater salient hardly less difficult between Arras and the
Aisne. Continued pressure of the British in the valley of the
Ancre throughout January and February of 191 7, increased the
awkwardness of the smaller German salient and endangered
Bapaume.
Early in March, 191 7, it became apparent that the German
General Staff was planning to evacuate not only the salient
between Arras and Saillisel but the larger salient between Arras
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 273
and the Aisne. For some time Field Marshal von Hindenburg,
the German Chief of Staff, had been directing the preparation
of an exceptionally strong defense system of trenches, officially
styled the "Siegfried Line'' but subsequently called by the
Allies the "Hindenburg Line," branching off from the old posi-
tion near Arras and thence running in a relatively straight line
southeastward through Queant and west of Cambrai, St. Quentin,
and La Fere, to the heights of the Aisne. Hindenburg employed
the same methods of defense during his general withdrawal to
the Siegfried Line as had been developed in the smaller retire-
ment from the Ancre valley. Machine-gun units were placed
The Western Front near Arras and on the Aisne
in selected strategic positions to delay the advance of the British
and French, while the bulk of the German soldiers, stealthily
quitting their former trenches, transported guns and ammuni-
tion to the rear and systematically devastated the territory
covered by their retreat.
When the British discovered on March 15 that a general with-
drawal was being carried out by the Germans, General Sir Doug-
las Haig gave orders for an immediate advance of his forces
along the whole line from Arras to Roye. Simultaneously, the
French under General Nivelle began to advance on the front
from Roye to Rheims. Chaulnes and Bapaume fell to the British
on March 17, and Peronne and Mont St. Quentin were occupied
the next day. At the same time the French entered Noyon,
and speedily reached Tergnier, a town less than two miles from
La Fere.
The reasons given for this German withdrawal in March, 191 7,
were many and varied. Reports from Berlin represented it as
a strategical retreat intended to shorten the German line, to
274 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
draw the Allies out into the open so that they could be defeated
in pitched battles, and to nullify the vast preparations which
the French and British had been making for a smashing offensive
in the summer of 191 7. On the other hand, Allied authorities
insisted that the withdrawal had been forced upon the Germans
and was in no way voluntary ; they pointed out that previous
Anglo-French gains in the valleys of the Somme and Ancre had
threatened the entire Noyon salient to such an extent that further
gains would have caused a gigantic German disaster. At any
rate the outstanding undisputed effects of the German retire-
ment were, first, that the Germans now stood on a shortened
line of great, perhaps impregnable, strength, and secondly,
that the Allies had recovered more than a thousand square
miles of French territory, including nearly four hundred towns
with a population, before the war, of approximately 200,000.
The territory abandoned by the Germans was a scene of horrible
desolation. Wanton destruction was visible everywhere. Of
the acts of barbarism and devastation committed by the retreat-
ing Teutons with calculated cunning, only a faint notion can be
given. As the official note of the French Government on the
subject stated: *'No motive of military necessity can justify
the systematic ruin of public monuments, artistic and historical,
and of public property, accompanied as it is by violence against
civilians. Cities and villages in their entirety have been pil-
laged, burned, and destroyed utterly ; private homes have been
stripped of all furniture, which the enemy has carried off ; fruit
trees have been torn up or blasted ; streams and wells have been
polluted. The inhabitants, comparatively few in number, who
have not been removed, have been left with a minimum of ra-
tions, while the enemy has seized stocks supplied by the neutral
food commission for the sustenance of the civil population. . . .
This concerns not acts designed to hinder the operations of our
armies but sheer devastation having for its sole purpose the ruin
for years to come of one of the most fertile regions of France.
The civilized world can only revolt against this conduct on the
part of a nation which wished to impose its KuUur on all man-
kind, but which now reveals itself once again as very close to
barbarism and which, in a rage of disappointed ambition, tram-
ples on the most sacred rights of humanity.''
By April, 191 7, the Germans were standing on the famous
Hindenburg Line. They were certain that they could ward off
frontal attacks against it, so splendid were both its natural and
its artificial defenses, but they were not so sure of the pivots
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 275
upon which it rested. These pivots were the positions about
Arras in the north, and those in the south around Laon. It
was near Arras and Laon that Generals Haig and Nivelle were
already aiming offensives respectively of the British and of the
French.
The Battle of Arras was opened Easter Monday (April 9) on
a front approximately forty-five miles long with Lens, the coal
city, as the British objective at one end, and with Queant, an
important point in the Hindenburg Line, as their objective at
the other end. If these immediate objectives were taken, the
way might then be open to the important cities of Douai and
Cambrai. At first the British offensive went like clock-work.
Aircraft, artillery, infantry, and tanks worked in perfect com-
bination. Within three days Vimy Ridge and some two miles
of the northern end of the Hindenburg Line had been carried
and 12,000 prisoners and 150 guns had been captured. Queant
was not yet reached, but Lens was inclosed in a dangerous
^'pocket."
On April 16, exactly a week after the beginning of the British
offensive in the vicinity of Arras, the French under General
Nivelle inaugurated the second battle of the Aisne by assailing
the southern pivot of the Hindenburg Line near Laon. Nivelle's
rapid rise in the French army from the rank of colonel in Septem-
ber, 1 9 14, to that of generalissimo, succeeding Marshal Joffre,
OBteud»^ P*^'^°F Miu s
The Heights of the Aisne
in December, 1916, had gone to his head. He had scant patience
with the tactics which the Allies had developed during the past
year on the Western Front — the advance by steady stages
to limited objectives and the gradual defeat of the Germans
through wastage of their man-power rather than by means of
decisive engagements. Nivelle 's aim was the *' decisive blow"
— not to weaken but to crush, not to ''wear down" but to ''break
276 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
through." With superb self-confidence he gathered his armies
for a supreme effort. He would force the heights of the Aisne
in one bold assault from west, south, and southeast; he would
simultaneously carry the Rheims heights from the north; and
at the same moment he would launch his main offensive through
the gap between the two into the plain of Laon. It was by far
the most ambitious attack planned in the West since the battle
of the Marne, and the divisions employed were three times those
used by Haig at Arras.
Valorously the French fought, and some progress they made.
They won all the banks of the Aisne from Soissons to Berry-au-
Bac and all the spurs of the Aisne heights, and they captured
21,000 prisoners and 175 guns. But the main German positions
were too strong and too stubbornly defended to be taken by open,
spectacular assault ; they firmly barred the way to Laon. The
major strategy of Nivelle failed completely.
The result was a pronounced popular reaction in France against
the audacious methods of Nivelle in favor of the more cautious
tactics previously exemplified by Petain and Foch. On April
28, the premier, Alexandre Ribot, and Paul Painleve, who had
recently succeeded General Lyautey as war minister, conferred
with Nivelle; and two days later it was announced that the
post of Chief of the General Staff at the Ministry of War had
been revived, and that Petain had been appointed to fill it.
This announcement proved to be only a precursor to a more
drastic change, for on May 15 Petain formally succeeded Nivelle
as commander-in-chief of the French armies in France while
General Foch became Chief of Staff in Paris.
Thus the French Government logically applied a fundamental
lesson learned in the battle of the Aisne. Foch and Petain were
just the men to comprehend that the Hindenburg Line could
not be "broken through" or turned on its pivots and that their
function was less to recover square miles of desolated territory
than to wear down the man-power of the Germans by cautious
but incessant offensives. With Petain and Foch the Allied
strategy on the Western Front returned to the patient, laborious,
and deadly methods which had been practiced on the Somme
in the autumn of 191 6 and which had compelled the German
withdrawal in March, 191 7, to the Hindenburg Line. This
was, in fact, the great lesson of the Hindenburg Line, and one
which, when taken to heart through the bitter experiences of
the battles of Arras and the Aisne, augured best for the ultimate
victory of the Allies.
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 277
Throughout the remainder of 191 7 both the French and the
British adhered to the poHcy of attrition, that is, wearing the
Germans down in man power, morale, and materiel. In sector
after sector along the Western Front they launched local offen-
sives against Hmited objectives, and every httle gain they made
was an irrefusable invitation to the Germans to undertake waste-
ful and costly counter-attacks. For the Allies it was the way
to ultimate victory, and the only way.
In May the British made a few further gains in the vicinity
of Arras, strengthening their hold on Vimy Ridge and increas-
ing their toll of prisoners for the entire battle of Arras to 20,000.
In the same month, the French took the village of Craonne,
ten miles southwest of Laon, and captured both ends of the
Chemin des Dames, a celebrated shaded road constructed by
Louis XV along the heights north of the Aisne. During the
summer months the German Crown Prince is estimated to have
lost more than 100,000 men in unsuccessful efforts to regain
the eastern and western ends of the Chemin des Dames. Alto-
gether the German losses along the Hindenburg Line and at the
pivots from April to September were not less than 350,000.
After a lull of several months, a renewal of the offensive on
the Aisne occurred in October. The French struck on a six-
mile front northeast of Soissons and in one of the most brilHant
operations of the war advanced to an average depth of a mile
and a half. The perfect cooperation between the artillery,
tanks, aircraft, and infantry was a tribute to General Pe tain's
foresight, energy, and organizing ability. The Germans soon
found their remaining positions on the Chemin des Dames
untenable, and consequently, by the end of the month, they fell
back across the Ailette river upon Laon. In this last thrust
the French regained nearly forty square miles of territory and
captured 12,000 prisoners and 200 guns; they now dominated
the valleys of the Ailette and the Aisne.
Meanwhile the French executed a significant movement, far
to the east of the Hindenburg Line, at Verdun. On August
20 they made a quick thrust, after a brief artillery preparation,
against the German positions on either side of the Meuse ; they
captured Avocourt Wood, Le Mort Homme (Dead Man's Hill),
Corbeaux, and Cumieres Woods, and 4000 prisoners. In the
next four days smashing blows were delivered which resulted in
the capture of Regneville, Samogneux, Cote de I'Oie (Goose
Ridge), and more than 15,000 prisoners. By the middle of Sep-
tember, the French had recovered more than one hundred of the
278 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
1 20 square miles of territory which the the Germans, under
Crown Prince Frederick WilHam, had seized in their mighty
and protracted offensive of 1916.
The same tactics employed by the French at Verdun and
on the Aisne were used by the British in Flanders. Following
the cessation of the battle of Arras in May, 191 7, Sir Douglas
Haig turned his attention northward. His first care was to
straighten the British lines between Ypres and Lens by driving
the Germans from their commanding salient on the Messines-
Wytschaete ridge. Under the principal German fortifications
on this ridge, British and colonial sappers had been digging for
over fifteen months until now they had placed nineteen mines
containing nearly five hundred tons of ammonite. Early in
the morning of June 7, 191 7, the mines were exploded by elec-
tricity, and a veritable man-made earthquake occurred. The
tops of the hills were blown off and the earth rocked like a ship
rolling at sea. The detonation could be heard within a radius
of 150 miles. Simultaneously with the explosion of the mines,
the artillery fire, which had been growing in intensity for two
weeks, reached its culmination. Then the infantry, composed
of English, Irish, Australian, and New Zealand units, swept
forward on a front extending from Observation Ridge, south
of Ypres, to Ploegsteert Wood, north of Armentieres, and within
a brief time captured German positions on a ten-mile front
including the villages of Messines and Wytschaete, and wiped
out the menacing German salient. Seven thousand prisoners
fell into British hands, and the estimated German casualties
were 30,000. The total British losses were under 10,000.'
With the Messines- Wytschaete Ridge in British possession, it
was now safe for the Allies to inaugurate an offensive from Ypres.
Of this offensive the immediate object was to gain the high
ground in front of Ypres, called Passchendaele Ridge ; the ulti-
mate objects were to compel the Germans to withdraw from the
Belgian coast and thus to surrender their submarine bases at
Ostend and Zeebrugge, and also to envelop the industrial
city of Lille and the railway-center at Roulers. From July
to November the conflict raged. British on the right and
French on the left pressed forward yard by yard. Frequent
torrential downpours of rain which repeatedly turned the low
flat terrain into a sea of mud, made progress slow and halting.
Yet the Allies, with the aid of vastly improved artillery, with
1 Conspicuous among the British dead on this occasion was Major William
Redmond, a member of Parliament and brother of the Irish NationaHst leader.
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 279
an apparently inexhaustible supply of ammunition, and with
grim determination, plodded on. The Germans, heavily reen-
forced from the Eastern Front, soon found that ordinary trenches
could not withstand either the rains or the enemy-guns; they
began to take refuge behind bags of sand and in what the British
soldiers called ^'pillboxes." These were concrete redoubts.
They were oftentimes some distance apart and were just about
level with the ground, making them in many cases invisible
J Former Allied
position ^ _ -^
■ Allied Front'lofS^
cndofl917 • "
SCALE OF MILES
V2 1
Battles of Messines Ridge and Ypres
to aviators. They fairly bristled with machine guns, and unless
they were destroyed by artillery fire, they were pecuHarly fatal
to attacking infantry.
Preliminary attacks were made by the Allies at the end of
July and in August, each resulting in expensive German counter-
attacks. Between the middle of September and the middle of
October the Allies deHvered five extremely heavy blows, which
won them an area of nearly twenty-three square miles and carried
28o A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
them to the Ypres-Roulers road on the northwest as well as
advancing them a mile astride of the Ypres-Menin road. British
artillery now commanded the Flanders plain, and guns of the
largest caHber could effectively shell Roulers, about five miles
distant. On October 30 the British entered Passchendaele,
but were almost immediately driven out by vigorous counter-
assaults. After a week of heavy bombardment, Canadian troops
retook the town and German positions 800 yards beyond and
held their gains in face of furious counter-attacks. Throughout
November the Allies fought successfully to consolidate their
new positions and to clear the sides of Passchendaele Ridge.
The political and economic results of the Battle of Flanders
were not advantageous to the Allies ; no sensational victory had
been achieved; the Germans were still profiting by their con-
trol of the Belgian coast and by their occupation of the important
industrial center of Lille. From a strictly military point of
view, however, the protracted conflict was advantageous. The
Allies had enormously strengthened their hold on Ypres and
had secured important new positions from which they might
direct a more decisive offensive in 1918 ; vastly more important,
they had inflicted upon Germany such serious losses as no party
to an endurance test could comfortably sustain.
On November 20 the British started a drive toward Cambrai,
which for a time threatened to smash the Hindenburg Line and
possibly put an end to the deadlock on the Western Front.
With scarcely any artillery preparation, the infantry, aided by
a large number of huge tanks, plunged forward on the Bapaume-
Cambrai road and toward the Scheldt Canal, capturing several
villages, securing a part of Bourlon Wood, and rendering Ger-
man occupation of Queant and Cambrai for a time most preca-
rious. On the last day of November, however, before the British
had been able to complete the consolidation of their newly won
positions, the Germans launched a counter-offensive on a sixteen-
mile front north, south, and east of the British wedge. On the
north and east they failed to gain, but on the south they made
such headway that the British were compelled to evacuate
Bourlon Wood and to retire to their original positions. The
battle of Cambrai ended on December 7, with honors — and
losses — about evenly divided. In one respect this battle
was enormously significant : it heralded the break-through and
the open warfare of the succeeding spring.
Over against all the numerous and varied offensives conducted
by the British and French during the year 191 7, — at Arras, on
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 281
the Aisne, at Verdun, and in Flanders, — only two offensives
were attempted by the Germans on the whole extended Western
Front. One of these was the counter-attack in the vicinity
of Cambrai, just described ; and the other was a little offensive
on the Yser, close to the Belgian coast, late in July. Here the
British were surprised and driven back across the river, with a
total loss of 3000 men. The very pettiness of the German
success on the Yser and of the German recovery at Cambrai,
when considered in conjunction with the large-scale German
12 3 4
• • • •Original British poeitlon
■■ ■■ Hi Furthest British advance
m^^^PositioD after British withdrsval
withdrawal to the Hindenburg Line and with the constant and
effective Anglo-French thrusts along the whole Front, indicated
to the world that the Allies not only were fully holding their own,
but could take the offensive whenever and wherever they wished.
The endurance test was beginning to tell heavily against Germany.
RECOVERY OF ALLIED PRESTIGE IN THE NEAR EAST
Until 191 7 the most uniformly inglorious scene of Allied oper-
ations had been the Near East. Beginning with the failure of
the naval attack upon the Dardanelles in March, 191 5, one dis-
aster after another had attended AlKed arms and Allied diplo-
macy. There were the failures in 191 5 to wrest the GallipoH
282 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
peninsula from the Turks, to reconstruct the Balkan League,
to prevent Bulgaria from joining Mittel-Europa, and to save
Serbia and Montenegro from conquest. In 1916 a large Allied
army in Macedonia, frightened by the Bulgarians and flouted
by a Greek king, had been helpless to succor Rumania ; and in
far-away Mesopotamia a British expedition for the capture of
Bagdad had ended in disaster. The Russians, it is true, had
wrested Old Armenia (just south of the Black Sea) from the
Turks, but their success was sHght compensation for the over-
whelming advantages which Germany had gained and still
retained in the Near East. To Berlin and Vienna were tied fast
by steel rails the cities of Belgrade, Sofia, and Constantinople;
and from the Bosphorus ran those Germanized trade-routes
across Asia Minor and thence, either through Mesopotamia
to Bagdad and the Persian Gulf, in the general direction of
India, or through Syria and Palestine to the Red Sea, in the
general direction of Egypt. The Near East had become an
aggregation of German satrapies. Mittel-Europa from the Baltic
to Bagdad was a fact and not a fiction, and as a fact it would
remain so long as Allied prestige was lacking in Turkey and in
the Balkans. The Allies might undertake many offensives
in France and in Flanders ; they would not shake the confidence
of the peoples of the Near East or of the German people them-
selves in the proud imperial destiny of the Hohenzollerns until
they had won significant military successes in the Near East
and recovered some of their own prestige.
In the latter half of 19 16 the British Government matured
plans to assure the security of India and Egypt against the
Mittel-Europa menace of the Turks. The expeditionary force
in Egypt was augmented and its commander. Sir Archibald
Murray, from his headquarters at Cairo, directed the building
of a railway eastward from Kantara across the Sinai desert,
whence a British invasion of Palestine might later be attempted.
This project was aided by an open revolt of the Arabs against
the Turks. Already predisposed to rebellion by the '' liberalism "
and scarcely concealed agnosticism of Enver Pasha and the
other Young Turks, and by the deliberate abrogation of pro-
visions of the Sacred Mohammedan Law laid down in the Koran
itself, the Arabs of Hedjaz, east of the Red Sea, now felt them-
selves provoked beyond endurance by the execution of some of
their leaders. On November 16, 1916, Husein, sherif of Mecca,
solemnly proclaimed the independence of Hedjaz with himself
as Sultan, and was promptly recognized by the Entente Powers.
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 283
The revolting Arabs, by their operations north of the Red Sea
and east of the Dead Sea, did much to render futile the Turco-
German advance against Egypt, thus enabling the British to
protect the Suez Canal and to construct the railway across the
Sinai desert. And meanwhile, as special protection to India,
the small expeditionary force at the head of the Persian Gulf
was strengthened by reenforcements from India and from
Great Britain and put under the command of Sir Stanley Maude
(August, 1916).
By February, 191 7, General Maude was ready to attempt
to retrieve General Townshend's disaster at Kut-el-Amara.
The transport system was working well ; several river monitors
had arrived to aid the projected offensive; and the weather
conditions were favorable to a renewal of fighting. As a result
of a series of local engagements and of manoeuvering for position,
the British, by the middle of February, established their lines
on both banks of the Tigris, where it formed a bend west of
Kut-el-Amara. On February 24 Sanna-i-yat and part of the
Shumran peninsula, the keys to Kut, were taken. The Turks
believed these positions to be impregnable, and made gallant
though costly efforts to defend them. Their fall compelled the
Turks to abandon Kut-el-Amara and retreat up the river.
In the pursuit the British gunboats on the Tigris wrought
considerable havoc among the Turks by getting ahead of them
and firing upon them as they approached. The Turkish boats
on the river were destroyed, and the monitors which had been
lost with the surrender of General Townshend's army were
recaptured. The British reached Aziziyeh, halfway to Bagdad,
on February 28, and early in March they forced the crossing of
the Diala. Then, attacking the Turks from both sides of the
Tigris, they drove them into Bagdad. In the night of March
10, 191 7, the Turks evacuated the city, leaving in the hands of
the British their own artillery, seized a year before at Kut-el-
Amara, and a large number of Turkish guns. The capture of
Bagdad was not of great strategic importance, but it had a re-
markable effect upon morale. It appealed to jaded imaginations
in England, France, and America; it alarmed the Central
Empires ; and in the Near East it gave shape and substance to
Allied prestige.
To secure Bagdad against counter-attacks. General Maude
pursued the fleeing Turks in three directions : his right wing
cleared the caravan route leading into Persia; his left wing
moved twenty-five miles up the Euphrates to the prepared
284 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Turkish position of Ramadie ; and his center, advancing up the
Tigris, took Samara on April 23 and thus gained control of the
Bagdad-Samara railway, which facihtated the bringing up of
supphes. Had it not been for the intense heat which began to
prevail at that season of the year in Mesopotamia and for the
Russian Revolution which simultaneously demoralized the Rus-
sian forces in Armenia, the Turkish armies might have been
caught between upper and nether millstones and ground to bits
on their nodal points at Mosul and Aleppo. As it was, the
better part of Mesopotamia was in Allied hands, and the Turks
had received a blow from which they could not recover.
Meanwhile, there were significant developments in the Greek
peninsula. For four months after the capture of Monastir
by the Serbs, in November, 191 6, the motley Allied Front in
Macedonia, under General Sarrail, had remained comparatively
inactive. In April, 191 7, a sHght forward movement was at-
tempted near Doiran and a few local gains were registered.
But Sarrail's force was not yet strong enough to crush the Bul-
garian and Austro-German armies facing it, especially since
behind it lurked, in the person of King Constantine of Greece,
a pro- German commander of a fairly large army which at any
moment might be thrown into the balance against the AlHes.
The weakening of Russia and Rumania in 191 7 and their ultimate
defection left the forces of Mittel-Europa in Macedonia quite
unhampered and thereby postponed indefinitely any decisive
offensive on the part of Sarrail. This was obviously of immediate
disadvantage to the Allies. On the other hand, the AlKes re-
covered enough prestige in the Near East as a result of General
Maude's successes in Mesopotamia to enable them fearlessly
and drastically to interfere in the internal affairs of Greece and
to deprive the dangerous, treacherous King Constantine of his
occupation as trouble-maker. And this promised, in the long
run, to be of the utmost advantage to the Allies.
During May the Allied authorities at Salonica did everything
they could to encourage Greeks to flock to the standard of revolt
which Venizelos had already raised. By the end of that month
Venizelos was estimated to have furnished nearly 60,000 Greek
soldiers to the AUied army in Macedonia. Then, on June 10,
191 7, French and British troops, entering Thessaly, occupied
Volo and Larissa, and on the following day a French force seized
the isthmus of Corinth.
On June 11, Charles Jonnart, formerly French governor of
Algeria and now named high commissioner of Greece, arrived
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 285
in Athens and demanded of the royalist premier, M. Zaimis/
the immediate abdication of King Constantine and the renuncia-
tion of the Crown Prince's right of succession. The king was
not in a position to fight, and Jonnart was peremptory. There
was only one thing to do. And so on June 12, 191 7, Constantine
abdicated the throne of Greece in favor of his second son, Prince
Alexander ; and on the next day the late sovereign and his
Hohenzollern wife sailed away from Hellas under escort of two
French destroyers. Under Jonnart's supervision, King Alex-
ander was duly proclaimed, several notoriously pro-German
Greek leaders were expelled from the country, and an accord
was reached between the partisans of Venizelos and those of
Zaimis. On June 25 Zaimis resigned and Venizelos became
prime minister of a united, pro-Ally Greece. On July 2 all
diplomatic relations between Greece and the Central Powers
were ruptured and the state of war which had hitherto existed
in Venizelos's jurisdiction was now extended to the whole coun-
try. On July 7 the Government convoked the Chamber which
had been elected in May, 191 5, but which had been dissolved
illegally by Constantine. At the end of July the Allied troops
of occupation were withdrawn. Greece was finally in the Great
War on the side of the Allies, and the entire Greek army, instead
of constituting a hostile threat in the rear of General Sarrail's
force, was now available in full strength for an AlHed offensive
in the Balkans. Throughout the remainder of 191 7 much atten-
tion was given to strengthening and reorganizing the Macedonian
Front ; and General Sarrail, whose reputation had been fatally
clouded for two years by a most unfortunate series of untoward
circumstances, was succeeded in the supreme command in Decem-
ber by the energetic and resourceful General Guillaumat.
Even more helpful to the recovery of Allied prestige in the
Near East than the revolution in Greece and the capture of Bag-
dad was the success which attended in 191 7 the British offensive
in Palestine. Under Sir Archibald Murray, British troops,
advancing from northern Egypt, had driven the Turkish forces
before them across the Sinai Desert ^ and had constructed a
railway from Kantara to Rafa on the southwestern edge of
Palestine. Thence they had moved northward along the coast,
but had been checked in two successive battles, in March and
* Zaimis had succeeded Lambros as King Constantine's prime minister on
May 4, 1917.
2 The Turkish forces, it should be remembered, were here engaged on two fronts :
the one, against the British advancing from Egj^t ; the other, against the Arabs of
Hedjaz.
286
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
in April, and prevented from occupying Gaza. It was then
that General Murray was recalled and succeeded by General
Edmund Allenby, a particularly brilHant British cavalry leader,
who devoted the hot summer months to improving the morale
and equipment of the expeditionary force.
In October the offensive was renewed. While the Arabs of
Hedjaz under their sultan kept large Turkish forces desperately
engaged east of the Dead Sea, Allenby took Beersheba in a
surprise attack and on November 6 captured Gaza. Contin-
uing his advance northward, with comparatively little opposi-
tion, General Allenby cut the Jaffa- Jerusalem railway at Ludd
and El Ramie and on November i6 occupied Jaffa. The British
then began a movement to encircle the city of Jerusalem, drawing
towards it from the northwest, west,, and south. All the Turkish
positions around the Holy City were taken by storm; and, as
the British closed in, it became apparent that the Turks would
not risk a siege. On December lo, 191 7, Jerusalem was sur-
rendered to the British army of General Allenby, and the Turkish
rule which had there endured for seven centuries came to an end.
The success of British arms in Palestine was loudly acclaimed
by the Christian populations of the Entente Powers as the final
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 287
achievement of the goal of the medieval Crusaders. It likewise
stimulated the aspirations of the Zionists for the reestablishment
of a Jewish state in Palestine and of the Mohammedan Arabs
for the construction of a ''Greater Arabia."
SEEMING OBSTACLES TO ALLIED VICTORY
From the preceding sections of this chapter one would be
justified in concluding that the Allies in 191 7 were clearly on
the way to ultimate certain victory. They were recovering
their prestige in the Near East. They were proving their supe-
riority on the Western Front. And if they were temporarily
weakened by the defection of Russia, they were strengthened
by the adherence of the United States to their cause. Of their
enemies, one after another was experiencing discomfort and
humiliation : Turkey was losing Mesopotamia and Palestine ;
Bulgaria was becoming cynical and indifferent; Austria-Hun-
gary was on the verge of revolution and disruption; and in
Germany there was ominous fault-finding. The submarine
warfare, on which the Teutons now chiefly relied, fell far short
in December of what in January had been expected; and the
governments of the Central Empires devoted less attention to
military campaigns than to ''peace drives."
Yet, curiously enough, the peoples of France, Italy, and Great
Britain did not perceive the signs of the time or did not read
them aright. Instead of realizing that the chances of their
ultimate victory were immeasurably improved by the events
of 191 7, they fell into a strange mood of poignant pessimism.
Like wanderers in a wilderness who, without knowing it, were
almost in sight of the promised land, they were more terrified
by the dangers and shadows through which they had passed
than elated by the prospect of sunshine and refreshment beyond.
Month after month, and year after year, the Great War had
dragged on ; and the Entente nations, who had borne its heat
and burden almost from the beginning, would not have been
human if they had not in their hearts grown sick and tired of
it by 191 7. In their natural war- weariness these peoples viewed
daily developments out of proper perspective. They magnified
the assistance which the defection of Russia would bestow upon
their enemies, and they mimimized the aid which they themselves
would obtain from the United States. It seemed as though
all the resources of Russia would be instantly at the command of
Germany, and as though American troops could never be trained
288 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
and equipped and transported to France and rendered really
serviceable. Barred by governmental censorship from exact
knowledge of the progress of the submarine warfare, they tended
to discount the official statements that it was failing of its pur-
pose. The battles along the Hindenburg Line, at Arras, on the
Aisne, at Verdun, and in Flanders, were too protracted, too
bitterly contested, too sanguinary, to establish Alhed mihtary
superiority as a demonstrated fact. And the deposition of a
Greek king and the capture of Bagdad and of Jerusalem, though
noisily acclaimed, were popularly deemed too insignificant in
themselves materially to affect the fortunes of the Great War.
Under these circumstances a movement gathered headway in
Alhed countries in 1917 in favor of a "negotiated peace," that
is, in favor of a ''peace without victory" as opposed to a ''peace
through victory." This so-called defeatist movement drew its
strength from quite diverse, even incompatible, elements. In
the first place, there were groups of Socialist and other ultra-
radical workingmen who, influenced largely by their Russian
brethren, accused their own governments of pursuing ''imperial-
istic" aims and themselves championed the principle of "no
annexations, no indemnities." Secondly, there were certain
bankers and industrial magnates who feared lest protraction
of the war might destroy national credit, drive all governments
into bankruptcy, and pave the way for the spread of sociaUstic
revolution throughout the world and for the demorahzation of
the whole capitaHstic structure of civilized society. Thirdly,
there were ecclesiastical groups who viewed with pity and chagrin
this most terrible war between professed Christian nations and
who felt instinctively that the Church should reassert its moral
leadership in the affairs of mankind. Fourthly, there were
groups of pacifists who, though pretty effectually silenced by
their warlike compatriots during the earlier years of the war,
now found expression for their conviction that war in general
is immoral and inexpedient and that peaceful negotiation and
arbitration are always preferable to organized slaughter. Fi-
nally, there were a few old-time diplomatists who, long deprived
of the exercise of their vocation, yearned to supplant the soldiers
in the limelight and to obtain if possible by intrigue what had
not been secured by force of arms.
Defeatism in AlHed countries was naturally encouraged by
Germany. The three successive chancellors — Bethmann-Holl-
weg, MichaeHs, and Hertling — constantly prated about their
desire for a negotiated peace and about the demoniacal victory-
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 289
lust of the Allied governments. At the same time they intrigued
more or less adroitly with every disaffected or discontented
element in Allied countries. For example, the German Govern-
ment was doubtless privy to the secret, informal conferences
which were held in Switzerland in the summer of 191 7 among
certain bankers of France, Great Britain, and Germany. There
were signs, moreover, that Bethmann-Hollweg backed the
efforts of the Socialists to hold an international conference at
Stockholm. And it was evident that MichaeHs and Hertling,
as well as Count Czernin of Austria, welcomed the papal proposals
for peace. Each of these intrigues promised to embarrass the
Allies and to weaken their morale.
It was natural that many SociaKsts should seek the early
ending of the Great War. The war was not of their making,
they insisted, and it was working havoc among them. Karl
Marx, the master mind of SociaHsm, had pointed seventy years
ago to the international soHdarity of all the world's workingmen
as the goal of his movement ; yet most of the progress made in
this direction in the sixty-seven years from 1848 to 19 14 appeared
to have been lost in the three years from 1914 to 1917. In
every belligerent country there was a cleavage in the national
SociaHst Party on the question of supporting, and cooperating
with, the bourgeois government, the Majority Socialists usually
sharing the popular enthusiasm for national victory, and the
Minority Socialists, or Independents, normally indulging in
carping criticism. Besides, as a general rule, the Socialists
of Mittel-Europa were on most unfriendly terms with the Social-
ists of the Entente Powers. The international organization
was moribund : conspicuous figures in it, like Scheidemann of
Germany, Guesde of France, and Vandervelde of Belgium,
were now whole-hearted champions of their respective national
causes; and what remained was a disjointed and dispirited
remnant in Holland and in the Scandinavian countries.
With the advent of the Russian Revolution, the Socialists
took heart. In May, 191 7, a group of Russian Socialists pub-
lished an appeal for the reassembling of the International and
for the calling of a peace congress, and a Dutch-Scandinavian
Committee, under the presidency of B ranting, the leader of the
Swedish Socialists, invited Socialist representatives of all nations
to meet at Stockholm. Almost simultaneously, Austrian and
German Socialists drew up a peace program, of which the
main points were : (i) no annexations ; (2) no indemnities ;
(3) autonomy for the subject nationalities of the Dual Mon-
290 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
archy ; (4) independence for Finland and Russian Poland ; (5)
restoration of commerce on land and sea, modification of the
productive system, completion of an international administra-
tion for all sea routes and interoceanic canals, and construction
and administration of railways under international auspices;
and (6) prohibition of the capture and of the arming of mer-
chant vessels. In Germany, the Majority Socialists set forth
a supplementary program including limitation of armaments,
compulsory arbitration, the ''open door" for colonies, free trade,
and democratic control of diplomacy ; while the Minority Social-
ists included in their special peace-aims the restoration of Bel-
gium and Serbia, an independent Poland, and a plebiscite for
Alsace-Lorraine. In June Socialist leaders arrived at Stock-
holm from Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Bulgaria ; and dis-
cussions began between them and Socialists of neutral states.
In most Allied countries the proposed Stockholm Conference
was viewed at first with disfavor and suspicion as a bit of subtle
German propaganda. But the Russian Government of Kerensky
endorsed the project so enthusiastically that gradually a majority
of the French Socialists and of the British Labor Party were
won over to its support. Nevertheless, the Governments of
France, Great Britain, and the United States withheld pass-
ports from Socialist delegates and prevented their countries
from being represented at Stockholm. One result was the
complete failure of the Stockholm Conference. Another result
was acrimonious discussion of the subject in AlKed countries
and increased opposition to the vigorous prosecution of the
war. In Great Britain, Arthur Henderson, the leader of the
Labor Party, resigned from the war cabinet on August 11, In
France, the Socialists withdrew from the cabinet in September.
Altogether, the opposition of the Allied Governments to the
Stockholm Conference opened a new and rich field for insidious
German propaganda.
From the Catholic Church, as well as from the Socialists,
came in 191 7 a special plea for peace. In a note dated August
I, Pope Benedict XV called upon all the belligerent Powers to
consider the possibilities of the cessation of war. The pope
outlined the general terms which he thought would assure ''a
just and lasting peace" : (i) the replacing of material force by
''the moral force of right"; (2) a "simultaneous and reciprocal
decrease of armaments"; (3) settlement of international dis-
putes by arbitration; (4) a guarantee of "true freedom and
community of the seas " ; (5) mutual renunciation of indemnities,
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 291
although allowing for exceptions which ''certain particular rea-
sons" would seem to justify; (6) evacuation and restoration of
all occupied territories; (7) an examination ''in a conciliatory
spirit" of rival territorial claims such as those of Alsace-Lor-
raine and the Trentino, taking into account "the aspirations of
the population." To this note President Wilson replied on
August 27. He pointed out that the actions of the existing
German Government rendered fruitless any negotiations with
it, and called upon the German people to repudiate their "irre-
sponsible" government. At the same time the President indi-
cated that it was no part of the plan of the United States to join
in a movement to crush the German people. He repudiated
the idea of "punitive damages, the dismemberment of empires,
the establishment of selfish and exclusive economic leagues"
as "inexpedient and in the end worse than futile." The Entente
Powers generally accepted President Wilson's statement as
embodying their own views, and made no detailed replies to the
Pope. On the other hand, the Central Empires, though pre-
serving a marvelous silence upon the vital questions of restora-
tion of conquered territory and the payment of indemnities, were
quite punctilious in flattering Pope Benedict and in assuring
him that they approved the limitation of armaments, the guar-
antee of the freedom of the seas, and the substitution of the
"moral power of right" for the "material power of arms." The
pope could hardly have been deceived by the Teutonic diplo-
matists, so wide was the gulf between their theory and their
practice, and certainly the great bulk of Catholics in Allied
countries continued, as before, to give the most loyal support
to their respective governments ; yet among the more ignorant
classes of Catholics, the papal peace effort was doubtless utilized
for purposes of German propaganda.
Enough has been said perhaps to indicate the bases of the
defeatist movement. There were echoes of it in Great Britain ^
and even in the United States, but it was in France that it reached
truly alarming proportions. In France, the scene of the most
heartrending combats of three years, there was naturally a
greater war-weariness than elsewhere, in measure as the sacrifices
and sufferings of France had been greater. There was in France,
moreover, an instinctive popular fear lest out of the war might
arise a military dictator, . — and France had had in the past too
1 British pacifists applauded the resignation of Arthur Henderson, the Labor
Party leader, from the War Cabinet and welcomed a plea put forward by Lord
Lansdowne, a distinguished Conservative diplomatist, in behalf of a "peace by
compromise."
292 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
many military dictators. These feelings led to the downfall
of the Briand cabinet in March, 191 7, and to the creation of a
more "moderate" ministry under Alexandre Ribot. Ribot was
an estimable gentleman, seventy-five years of age, who had had
much experience in public and private finance, but whose firm-
ness consisted in obstinacy and whom sluggishness led to repose
confidence in unworthy or inefficient subordinates. He angered
the French Socialists by refusing to allow their delegates to
proceed to Stockholm ; yet he clung tenaciously to his minister
of the interior, Louis Malvy, who actually encouraged Socialists
and pacifists to air their grievances and to agitate for a ''nego-
tiated peace." The weakness, if not corruption, of Malvy
combined with the depression which overspread France as the
result of General Nivelle's costly failure in the battle of the
Aisne to pave the way for the campaign of defeatism, championed
and in part financed by Germany.
Among the active agents of the defeatist movement in France
were a certain Duval, the manager of the newspaper Bonnet
Rouge; M. Humbert, a member of the Senate and the owner of
the Paris Journal; Bolo Pasha, a former French official of the
Egyptian khedive, a financier and an adventurer; and several
members of the Chamber of Deputies. These men accepted
large sums of German money, which they devoted to the creation
of a sentiment within France in behalf of an early peace with
the Central Empires. But the real head of the defeatist move-
ment was Joseph Caillaux, a wealthy banker, acknowledged
head of the anti-clerical Radical Party in France, and formerly
prime minister. Ever since the beginning of the war this dis-
tinguished ''grandmaster of the backstairs" had led a strange,
peripatetic life, and wherever he went mischief seemed to seed
and flourish. He was at heart a friend of Germany and an
enemy of England; he believed that Germany was certain to
win the war and that France should make terms with the inevi-
table victor before it was too late. He was determined to safe-
guard his own banking interests. He was thoroughly selfish
and absolutely unscrupulous. He associated with pro- German
pacifists, adventurers, and traitors. He conducted mysterious
intrigues in Spain, in Switzerland, and in Italy. Formerly a
professed pope-baiter, he now condescended to visit the Vatican
and endeavored to ensnare bishops and cardinals in the meshes
of his conspiracy. Formerly a stout proponent of capitalism,
he now hobnobbed with extreme Socialists and praised their
revolutionary aims.
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 293
Neither Malvy nor Ribot took any steps to counteract or
destroy the propaganda of defeatism, which grew steadily
throughout the summer of 191 7. But gradually voices were
raised by true French patriots alike against the defeatists for
their temerity and against the Government for its supineness.
Particularly strident rose the voice of that old war-horse of
French politics and patriotism, Georges Clemenceau. In his
Parisian newspaper he fairly lashed the Government and the
intriguers. He recognized that the hour was supremely critical
in French history and he was ready to dare anything to save
his beloved France from treason and dishonor.
So great was the patriotic outcry of Clemenceau and his
friends that Malvy resigned as minister of the interior on the last
day of August. In September the whole cabinet was recon-
structed, Painleve becoming premier, Ribot assuming the port-
folio of foreign affairs, and the Socialists dropping out. But
Painleve's ministry lasted only two months; an adverse vote
in the Chamber on the subject of the defeatist scandals occa-
sioned its resignation; and on November 16, 1917, Clemenceau
himself, the "Tiger" and the "breaker of cabinets," as he was
variously styled, became prime minister and minister of war.
Clemenceau, though seventy-six years of age, threw himself
with the zest and zeal of a young man into the task of destroying
defeatism and assuring "peace through victory." Stephen
Pichon became minister of foreign affairs; Jules Pams, of the
interior ; Louis Klotz, of finance ; Louis Loucheur, of muni-
tions; and Charles Jonnart, of blockade and invaded regions.
The small fry of defeatist intrigue, such as Bolo and his asso-
ciates, were promptly arrested, tried, and punished. Malvy
was exiled. And in January, 1918, Clemenceau dared to order
the arrest of the formidable Caillaux on the charge of having
endangered the security of the state. "It was probably the
most courageous political act of the war."
Clemenceau's brusque dealing with French defeatists came
none too early, for at that very moment the poison of defeatism
was bringing Italy to the point of national disaster. Taking
advantage of the spread of pacifism and of the spirit of unrest
and sedition in Italy,^ the Austro- Germans in October and No-
^ A secret campaign was conducted for months by German and Bolshevist agents
in Italy. Insidious appeals were addressed to ignorant Catholic peasants as well
as to the extreme Socialists of the cities. In August there were serious riots at
Turin and even more serious mutinies among troops sent to suppress the riots. Yet
despite the multiplication of signs of the weakening of popular morale, the Gov-
ernment of Premier Boselli remained strangely indifferent and unmoved.
294 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
vember, 191 7, hurled large armies against General Cadorna's
forces and succeeded in occupying four thousand square miles
of Italian territory and in capturing nearly 300,000 prisoners
and 2700 guns. Just as Serbia had been overcome in the autumn
of 191 5 and Rumania in the autumn of 191 6, so in the autumn
of 191 7 it was planned by Germany to put Italy out of the war.
Having prepared the ground by means of sinister defeatist
propaganda, Germany sought to complete the work of destruc-
tion by resort to a crushing military blow.
At the beginning of October, 191 7, the main Italian armies,
composed of seasoned veterans, were fighting the Austrians on
comparatively narrow fronts in the difficult country east of the
Isonzo river : one army was struggling for the mastery of the
Carso Plateau and the route to Trieste ; the other, based on
Gorizia and Cividale, was concentrating its attacks upon the
Bainsizza Plateau, farther north. Still farther north, on the
upper Isonzo east of Caporetto, was yet another Italian force;
but it, like the Italian armies along the peaks of the Carnic
Alps and on the Trentino Front, consisted chiefly of "terri-
torials," that is, of older men who in peace time were held in
reserve, with only a sprinkling of soldiers who had seen long and
active service.
Meanwhile Ludendorff, the actual director of Mittel-Europa's
General Staff, was preparing a great Austro-German offensive.
The growth of the pacifistic Bolshevist agitation in Russia
enabled him to transfer about 100,000 men and great quantities
of heavy artillery from the Eastern to the Italian Front. The
simultaneous development of defeatism in Italy led to an aston-
ishing fraternization of Austrian and Italian troops at certain
points on the Italian Front and resulted in a serious impairment
of the morale of various Italian military units. The stage was
set for another spectacular Teutonic offensive ; and for it Luden-
dorff's strategy was excellent. He planned to strike the chief
blow at the unseasoned and corrupted Italian troops on the
upper Isonzo, to break through, and then to cut the lines of
communication of the Bainsizza and Carso armies, thereby
causing their retirement, and perhaps their surrender, by out-
flanking them. Italian disaster would relieve Austria-Hun-
gary of fear for her western frontiers, just as the Bolshevist revo-
lution in Russia was ridding her of enemies on her eastern bor-
ders. Austria-Hungary could then breathe again quite freely,
and Mittel-Europa would be able to bring all its resources and
all its energies to bear upon the French Front.
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 295
On October 21 Austro-German batteries of heavy artillery
bombarded the Plezzo-Tolmino front and the northern edge of
the Bainsizza Plateau. As the Italian guns were greatly out-
ranged and outnumbered, the Teutons with little difficulty
broke through the defensive positions and crossed to the western
bank of the upper Isonzo. Two Italian corps threw down their
rifles and treasonably ran away or surrendered, thus uncovering
Caporetto and permitting the enemy promptly to outflank the
Italian armies to the south. The rapid advance of the Teutons
from Caporetto made the hasty retreat from the Bainsizza and
Carso plateaus westward across the Isonzo almost a rout. On
October 27 Berlin announced the capture in five days of 60,000
men and 500 guns. For a time it seemed as though General
Cadorna would be unable to extricate his menaced armies. On
The Austro-German Invasion of Italy
October 28 Cividale was taken, and on the same day Gorizia
was reoccupied by the Austrians. On October 30 Udine, the
seat of Italian general headquarters, fell ; and by November i
the Austro- Germans were on the Tagliamento river, well within
Italian territory, and in possession of 180,000 prisoners and
1500 captured guns. The forced withdrawal of the main Italian
armies from the Isonzo jeopardized the Italian troops guarding
the frontier in the Carnic Alps. These troops were consequently
obliged to abandon the mountain passes and to beat a precipitate
retreat down the streams running into the upper reaches of the
Piave and TagHamento rivers.
The Tagliamento did not suffice to hold the victorious
296 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Teutons, who threw pontoon bridges across it in scores of places
and drove the ItaHans back to the Livenza, the next river flow-
ing into the Gulf of Venice parallel to the Tagliamento. The
Livenza, too, proved inadequate for serious defense and was
frantically clung to merely to allow the completion of intrench-
ments along the line of the Piave River, ten to twenty miles
farther west.
At this juncture French and British infantry and artillery,
hurriedly dispatched from the Western Front, began to arrive.
General Diaz supplanted General Cadorna as commander-in-
chief of the Italian armies. And resistance to the Teutonic
offensive commenced to stiffen. The line of the lower Piave
held, despite a few temporary successes of the Austrians, notably
the capture of Zenson. Allied monitors were employed to shell
the southern extremity of the enemy line and thus, in a measure,
to protect Venice. A large area between Venice and the mouth
of the Piave was flooded to prevent a direct attack upon the
famous old city.
Finding all efforts to force a crossing of the lower Piave
futile, the Austro-Germans sought to outflank the new Italian
lines by striking at the Asiago Plateau and the range of moun-
tains between the upper courses of the Brenta and Piave rivers.
Masses of Austrians and Germans were hurled at the Italian
rock positions, but in vain. Their assaults were comparable
to those made by the Crown Prince during the great drive on
Verdun in 191 6. Although the Italians were forced to yield
some ground, the Austro- German attempt to reach the Venetian
plains from the north was foiled as effectually as was their attempt
to cross the lower Piave. In December, however, new anxiety
was caused the Allies by desperate assaults on the Asiago Plateau
and the upper reaches of the Brenta ; Monte Asolone was cap-
tured by the Teutons, and Hkewise the lower of the two summits
of Monte Tomba.
With the coming of the new year, Italian prospects brightened
perceptibly. On December 30 Monte Tomba was recovered,
and in January the Teutons were compelled to relinquish Monte
Asolone and the bridgehead on the Piave at Zenson. The Austro-
Germans rested from their labors and the Italians firmly estab-
lished themselves in their new Hues from the Asiago Plateau to
the mouth of the Piave. The retreat from the Isonzo had reached
its end ; it had taken heavy toll of Italy's strength, but it had
failed to eventuate in that decisive disaster which for some
weeks had seemed inevitable.
ALLIES PAVE WAY FOR ULTIMATE VICTORY 297
The retreat to the Piave, though not a disaster, was enough
of a misfortune to shock the ItaHan people profoundly. It
welded them into a closer union, and roused among them a more
fiercely patriotic spirit. It forced reforms in the army, and com-
pelled the Government to give special attention to the ^' civil
front," which had been weakened from neglect and treason. In
the midst of the reverses on the Isonzo, the Boselh ministry had
resigned, and a new and more energetic one had been formed
with Vittorio Orlando as premier and minister of the interior,
and Francesco Nitti as minister of the treasury, Baron Sidney
Sonnino retaining the portfolio of foreign affairs. Under Or-
lando's leadership, defeatism was stamped out of Italy.
The defeatist movement (with all which defeatism implied
in Italy and in France) was seemingly in 191 7 a very grave
obstacle to Allied victory. It was due, as has been pointed out,
to general war weariness and to specific discouragement result-
ing from the revolutionary defection of Russia and the unavoid-
able delay in America. Abetted and exploited by the Central
Empires, it might have proved fatal to the Allied cause had not
the Teutons overreached themselves. The military drive of
the Austro- Germans into Italy in the autumn of 191 7 and the
peace which they forced upon Russia at Brest-Li to vsk and
upon Rumania at Bucharest, sufficed to convince the bulk of
the Allied free nations, even many former pacifists and *' defeat-
ists" among them, that the Central Empires were thoroughly
dishonest in pretending to champion *' peace without victory."
Germany was obviously intent upon ''victory through peace."
And in this circumstance the only safe and sane motto for the
Allies was ''peace through victory." It took a long time and
bitter experience to commit the Alhed peoples to this view of
affairs, but it was a happy augury of the future that early in
1918 they were so committed. It was a happy augury, too, that
by that time the Allies were cooperating with one another loyally
and unselfishly and that presiding over the destinies of the chief
associated Powers were such resolute men as Clemenceau, Or-
lando, Lloyd George, and Woodrow Wilson.
It was also a happy augury of the future that at this very time,
when the patience of many persons had been exhausted in fruit-
less efforts to obtain any clear and concise statement of war
aims from the professional diplomatists of Mittel-Europa,
President Wilson should set forth succinctly and eloquently a
code of Allied war aims. Speaking before the American Congress
on January 8, 19 18, the President presented his views in fourteen
298 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
points: (i) open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, and no
secret diplomacy in the future ; (2) absolute freedom of navi-
gation in peace and war outside territorial waters, except where
seas may be closed by international action; (3) removal as far
as possible of all economic barriers; (4) adequate guarantees
for the reduction of national armaments; (5) an absolutely
impartial adjustment of all colonial claims, the interests of the
peoples concerned having equal weight with the equitable claim
of the Government whose title is to be determined ; (6) all Rus-
sian territory to be evacuated, and Russia given full oppor-
tunity for self-development, the Powers aiding; (7) complete
evacuation and restoration of Belgium, without any limit to
her sovereignty; (8) all French territory to be freed, invaded
portions restored, and the wrong done by Prussia in 187 1 in
the matter of Alsace-Lorraine righted; (9) readjustment of
Italian frontiers on lines of nationahty ; (10) peoples of Austria-
Hungary accorded an opportunity of autonomous development ;
(11) Rumania, Serbia, and Montenegro evacuated, Serbia given
access to the sea, and relations of Balkan States determined on
lines of allegiance and nationahty under international guaran-
tees; (12). Non-Turkish nationalities in the Ottoman Empire
assured of autonomous development, and the Dardanelles to
be permanently free to all ships; (13) an independent Polish
state, including territories inhabited by indisputably Pohsh
populations and having access to the sea; and (14) a general
association of nations must be formed under specific covenants
for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political inde-
pendence and territorial integrity to great and small states
alike.
The celebrated ''Fourteen Points" speedily became the charter
of AUied war aims. They constituted the goal throughout 1918
of that way which the AlHes, despite obstacles, had been paving
during 191 7 for ultimate victory.
CHAPTER XIII
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT
"WHOM THE GODS WOULD DESTROY"
Germany was possessed of madness. It was her delusions
of persecution and grandeur which had been the immediate
cause of the Great War in 19 14, and throughout its subsequent
course she had harbored in her disordered mind recurring halluci-
nations of victory. As a rule, striking feats such as the Drives
of Mackensen and Hindenburg into Russia and the conquest
of Serbia in 191 5 and of Rumania in 191 6 signified more to her
than the uprising of the whole world against her, more than the
mighty holding battles of the Marne, of Verdun, of the Somme,
and of Flanders, more than the very real loss of sea power, more
even than the increasingly frightful attrition and wastage of her
stores of men and munitions.
For a time in 191 7 Germany's madness took the form of
melancholia. She grew depressed and morose. To foreigners
it appeared as though she were about to put on sackcloth and
ashes. And in fact, had it not been for certain external stimuli
which recalled her earlier madness, she might conceivably have
passed from mania through temporary melancholia into a state
of mind approaching healthy sanity. There was a time in 191 7,
it should be remembered, when the majority of the German
people felt stirrings of reform and aspirations for peace, and when
the Government itself was coquetting with diplomacy and
making eyes at democracy. Late in 191 7, however, the Austro-
Germans.won a great military victory on the Isonzo and drove
the ItaHans far back to the Piave, and at the same time Russia's
descent to chaos became rapidly accelerated. German melan-
cholia speedily disappeared, and Germany lapsed once more
into acute megalomania. Every section of the country, except
the Minority Socialists, became converted to a *' German" peace,
and the journalists and the politicians shrieked as loudly for con-
quest as they had done in 19 14.
Domestic discontents of the summer of 191 7 were quelled by
299
300 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
March, 1918. By this time German eyes were bhnded to the
steadily disruptive tendencies in Austria-Hungary, to the cynical
indifference of Bulgaria, and to the actual dismemberment of the
Ottoman Empire; they still saw, or thought they saw, Mittel-
Europa stretching in majesty from the Baltic and North Seas to
the ^gean and on to Mesopotamia and Syria, united in aims,
rich in resources, and indomitable in arms. They perceived on
all sides vanquished and vassal states — Belgium, Luxemburg,
Poland, Serbia, Montenegro, Rumania, Finland, Lettland
(Latvia), Lithuania, and Ukrainia. They had just beheld the
signing of the treaties of Brest-Litovsk and Bucharest, which
formally acknowledged the subjugation of the whole Russian
Empire and abolished the entire Eastern Front. They reflected
that the submarine warfare was doing its work rapidly and
effectively, that the United States was despatching few troops
to Europe, and that England, starved and bleeding, would soon
sue for peace. They knew that Italy was defeated and on the
defensive. Only the Western Front remained an eyesore to the
Germans, and surely this one little spot on Europe's surface
could now be quickly cleaned up by those Teutonic demigods
who had conquered the rest of the world.
In February, 1918, Ludendorff and Hindenburg, the Thors of
modern German mythology, met the Reichstag in secret session
and explained their supreme plan. They would concentrate all
available forces immediately on the Western Front and inaugu-
rate a colossal drive against the French and British. Simulta-
neously the Bulgarians would press the Allied troops in Macedonia,
and the Austrians would launch another offensive against the
Italians ; but the Western Front would become the scene of the
final, decisive combat. Confession had to be made, in confidence,
that the submarine campaign during 191 7 had not done all that
had been expected of it and that American troops could and
would land in Europe in large numbers. But American troops
must come slowly, and once across the Atlantic they must under-
go thorough training before they would be fit to serve in front-
line trenches. During the next six months, therefore, the French
and British would have to fight their own battle. But the
British could add no new recruitment of any appreciable size to
their forces already in the field, — they were kept too busy
supplying materiel and circumventing submarines and coping
with Irish difficulties ; while the French were absolutely at the
end of their rope, so far as man power was concerned, and their
morale was thought to be at a very low ebb. On the other hand,
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 301
Germany could at once materially strengthen her armies on the
Western Front, she could add to them not only new recruits
from home and some divisions withdrawn from Italy and from
the Balkans, but also at least half a million seasoned veterans no
longer needed in the East. Furthermore, she could now effect
an enormous concentration of guns, what with captures from
Italy and Russia, and those either released from the defunct
Eastern Front, or loaned from Austria.
In view of these circumstances Ludendorff and Hindenburg
promised certain and complete victory before the autumn of
1918. Now, if ever, was the hour to strike. Matters should be
pushed. All the German armies should be set in motion to
overwhelm the Franco-British forces in the West, to capture the
channel ports and Paris, to put France out of the war, and, in a
word, to complete the task begun in 19 14, but interrupted at the
Battle of the Marne. It must be done in four months, — in six
months at the outside, — and it would be done. Hindenburg
and Ludendorff gave their word for it. To be sure, for such
a triumph a price must be paid. The army chiefs put it at a
million German casualties ; on reconsideration, they increased
their estimate to a million and a half.
To a nation gone mad with megalomania, losses of a million
and a half seemed cheap stakes for a peculiarly grand and glori-
ous gamble. The Reichstag applauded the plan. And when
news of the enterprise spread among the German people, a wave
of dehrious enthusiasm surged across the Fatherland. Editorials
in the patriotic press and speeches of Junkers and bureaucrats,
of chancellor and Emperor, assumed a new and fateful truculence.
So far as Ludendorff and Hindenburg were concerned, their
madness did not lack method. Assured of enthusiastic popular
sympathy with their purpose of making a supreme effort to
obtain a speedy military decision on the Western Front, they
proceeded to devise strategic plans with rare judgment and dis-
cernment. Their main plan was simplicity itself. They would
strike with all their might at what was assumed to be the weakest
spot in the Allied line, the valley of the Somme, where the British
forces under Field Marshal Haig joined the French forces under
General Retain. Breaking through at this pivotal point, they
would isolate the British army by rolling it up from its right and
pinning it to an intrenched camp between the Somme and the
Channel. This done, they would hold it with few troops, swing
round on the French, and put them out of action. If all went
well and fast, the Americans, by the time they were really ready
302 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
to assist the French and British, would find no British or French
to assist ; they would not fight Germany alone ; and they would
promptly come to terms.
In carrying out this major plan of strategy, the Germans in
March, 1918, possessed four advantages over the AlHes. In the
first place, they enjoyed numerical superiority, thanks to the
transfer of divisions from Russia, from Italy, and from the
Balkans. Secondly, since they occupied interior lines and since
the most intricate railway network of France was inside their
own front, they were in a better geographical position ; they
could concentrate at will in almost any angle of the huge salient
running from the sea to La Fere and from La Fere to Verdun,
and until they actually attacked they could keep the enemy in
ignorance as to which side of the salient they proposed to strike ;
simultaneously with the same force they could threaten the
French in Champagne and the British in Picardy. Thirdly, in
conducting the offensive the Germans were subject to a single
supreme authority, which could treat the whole front as a unit
and subordinate the needs of one sector to those of another,
whereas the Allies were still capable of that unfortunate fumbling
which must be a characteristic of the division of the supreme
command between equal and independent generals of different
nationality. Finally, the Germans had developed more per-
fectly than the AlHes the new tactics of surprise attack and
''infiltration," by means of which open warfare might be restored
and chances increased of winning an early decision.
Just what these new tactics were upon which Ludendorff relied
for the success of Germany's supreme effort, may best be gathered
from the interesting description of them by an acknowledged
expert and critic : ''The first point was the absence of any pre-
liminary massing of troops near the front of attack. Troops
were brought up by night marches only just before zero hour,
and secrecy was thus obtained for the assembly. In the second
place, there was no long artillery 'preparation' to alarm the
enemy. The attack was preceded by a sharp and intense bom-
bardment, and the enemy's back areas and support lines were
confused by a deluge of gas shells. The assault was made by
picked troops (Sturmtruppen), in open order, or rather in small
clusters, carrying light trench mortars and many machine guns,
with the field batteries close behind them in support. The
actual method of attack which the French called 'infiltrations'
may best be set forth by the analogy of a hand whose finger tips
are shod with steel, pushing its way into a soft substance. The
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 303
picked troops at the fingers' ends made gaps through which
others poured, till each section of the defense found itself out-
flanked and encircled. A system of flares and rockets enabled
the following troops to learn where the picked troops had made
the breach, and the artillery came close behind the infantry.
The troops had unlimited objectives, and carried iron rations for
several days. When one division had reached the end of its
strength another took its place, so that the advance resembled
an endless wheel or a continuous game of leap-frog.
*'This method, it will be seen, was the very opposite of the old
German massed attack, or a series of hammer blows on the one
section of the front. It was strictly the filtering of a great
army into a hostile position, so that each part was turned and the
whole front was first dislocated and then crumbled. The
crumbling might be achieved by inferior numbers ; the value of
the German numerical superiority was to insure a complete
victory by pushing far behind into unprotected areas. . . .
Ludendorff's confidence was not ill-founded, for to support his
strategical plan he had tactics which must come with deadly
effect upon an enemy prepared only to meet the old methods.
Their one drawback was that they involved the highest possible
training and discipline. Every detail — the preliminary as-
sembly, the attack, the supply and relief system during battle
— presupposed the most perfect mechanism, and great initiative
and resource in subordinate commanders. The German army
had now been definitely grouped into special troops of the best
quality, and a rank and file of very little. Unless decisive
success came at once, the tactics might remain, but men to use
them would have gone. A protracted battle would destroy the
corps d^ elite, and without that the tactics were futile." ^
Having worked out these new tactics and hit upon that
stragetic plan which admitted of the fullest utilization of Ger-
man advantages and Allied weaknesses, Ludendorff massed
seven powerful armies on the front from the North Sea to Rheims.
These armies were commanded and disposed as follows : (i) Gen-
eral Sixt von Arnim, from the Sea to the Lys ; (2) General von
Quast, from the Lys to Arras; (3) General Otto von Below,
from Arras to Cambrai ; (4) General von der Marwitz, from
Cambrai to St. Quentin ; (5) General Oskar von Hutier, from St.
Quentin to the Oise ; (6) General von Boehn, from the Oise to
Craonne ; and (7) General Fritz von Below, from Craonne to
Rheims. The first four were under the superior control of Prince
1 John Buchan, Nelson's History of the War, vol. xxii, p. 19.
304 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Rupprecht of Bavaria and the last three under that of the Crown
Prince Frederick WilHam.
Everything was in readiness for Germany's supreme effort.
It was to be the mightiest trial by battle that the world had ever
witnessed, the final test of the ReHgion of Valor. And so as not
to be entirely off stage in a modern production that promised
to surpass and consummate the epics and sagas of primitive
Teutonic folk-lore, the War Lord himself, the Emperor WilHam
II, prepared to betake his own anointed person to General
Headquarters at Spa and thence to communicate to the obsequi-
ously faithful staff of journalists who attended him, for the
edification of his subjects and of posterity, his own inspired
and ecstatic interpretations of the Apotheosis of Might.
But the histrionic Emperor appealed to popular imagination
in Germany far less than the burly Field Marshal von Hindenburg.
It was Hindenburg's presence on the Western Front which
silenced civilian critics and keyed up the morale of the soldiers.
Throughout the Fatherland there was everywhere expectancy
of big events. ^' Where is Hindenburg?" asked Vice- Chancellor
Helfferich in an address on March i6, 1918; ''he stands in the
West with our whole German manhood for the first time united
in a single theater of war, ready to strike with the strongest
army that the world has ever known."
THE DRIVE AGAINST THE BRITISH: THE BATTLE OF
PICARDY
On March 21, 1918, the Germans began the great battle
which military experts of both sides believed would decide the
Great War. They struck from points where the British lines,
owing to the uncompleted battles of Flanders and Cambrai and
the Allied failures at Lens, St. Quentin, and La Fere in 191 7,
were relatively weak or could be out-manceuvered with superior
force of men and munitions. And while they struck directly at
the British, they opened fire at long range on Paris. ^
The Germans took the Allies by surprise. Some attack in
force was of course expected; but General Petain imagined it
would be directed against the French armies in Champagne,
^ In heavy artillery the Germans now surpassed themselves. Three guns, each
weighing 400,000 pounds and capable of hurling 330-pound shells some seventy-
five miles, they emplaced twelve miles northeast of St. Gobain, and with these they
opened fire on Paris on March 23 and subsequently at fairly frequent intervals they
bombarded the French capital. The gigantic guns amazed the Allies but did actual
damage incomniensurate with the expense incurred, the total casualties in Paris,
after an expenditure of about four hundred shells, numbering only 196.
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 305
while Field Marshal Haig judged from the preliminary artillery
preparations that it would be delivered in the vicinity of Ypres.
The result was that neither Haig nor Petain felt it possible to
spare troops from the northern and eastern sectors to strengthen
the central sector from Arras to the Oise. This sector was held
from Arras to St. Quentin by the Third British Army under Sir
Julian Byng, and from St. Quentin to the Oise by the Fifth Army
under Sir Hubert Gough. Yet it was against this sector, particu-
3o6 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
larly between Cambrai and the Gise, that the Germans inaugu-
rated their herculean offensive.
The weather favored the Germans and their new ''infiltration"
tactics to a very high degree. The attack was launched by the
troops of Generals Otto von Below, von der Marwitz, and von
Hutier, a little before five o'clock on the morning of March 21
under cover of such a heavy mist and fog that it was impossible
to see more than a hundred feet ahead. The outpost line was
taken before the British were cognizant of the fact that the attack
had begun. The Germans with their carefully trained Sturmtrup-
pen and with their tremendous superiority of numbers soon forced
the British second line and rushed on to the third and last line of
defense. Here again the inequality of numbers ultimately told.
By the second day of the battle Gough's army, outnumbered
four to one, lost contact with the French on its right and gave
way at several vital points. Retreat soon became rout and
what had been a discipHned army was rapidly transformed into
a struggling mass of disorganized humanity. The Germans
were advancing from St. Quentin along direct routes west toward
Amiens and southwest toward Noyon ; it seemed almost certain
that they would succeed in driving a permanent wedge between
the French and the British armies. They took Peronne, Ham,
and Chauny on March 24, and crossed the Somme ; and on the
next day they occupied Barleux, Nesle, and Noyon. Meanwhile,
farther north, the army of Sir Julian Byng had been hpavily
engaged ; it had managed to hald its lines intact before Arras,
but its right wing, embarrassed by the rout of Gough's forces,
had been obliged to yield Bapaume and to uncover the road to
Albert.
March 26 was the decisive day of the German effort to isolate
the British, for this day witnessed the closing of the gap between
the British and the French. A French army under General
Fayolle came up and established itself along the Oise and the
Avre, joining the British at Moreuil, southeast of Amiens. At
the same time a new British army was improvised from sappers,
laborers, engineers, in fact anybody that could be found, and with
this curious array General Sandeman Carey faced the Germans
before Amiens for six days, fighting over unknown ground, and
with officers in charge of men whom they had never seen before.
Try as they might, the Germans could not capture Amiens.
Failure to capture Amiens left the Germans in a rather difficult
position. They had pushed a thirty-five-mile salient into the
Allied lines, but the salient, bounded roughly by the Ancre river on
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 307
the north and by the Avre on the south, was too narrow for com-
fort. It was with the hope of broadening the saHent that the
Germans repeatedly assailed the armies of General Byng and
General Fayolle. Byng lost Albert on March 27, and on the next
day Fayolle lost Montdidier. And during the first week of April
tremendous assaults were made from Albert against the Ancre
line on the north, and from Montdidier against the Avre line on
the south.
Although local successes were won by the Germans, they were
unable to achieve their immediate purpose of widening the
salient materially. The chief reason for this was the time element
which had permitted the British and French to bring up men
and guns and thus to stabilize their new lines. A contributory
reason was the fact that heavy rains turned the Somme battle-
field into a hopeless sea of mud and interfered seriously with the
Germans' transport system.
In the first phase of the battle of Picardy, the Germans had
regained nearly all the ground they held at the beginning of the
battle of the Somme in 1916 and besides had gained approxi-
mately 1 500 square miles. They had also taken 90,000 prisoners,
1300 guns, and 100 tanks. Though they had suffered griev-
ously themselves, they had probably inflicted even heavier
losses upon the British. But the main German plan was frus-
trated, at least temporarily : the French and British were not
separated and both still held strong defensive positions.
The Germans, as soon as they were checked before Amiens,
launched a second gigantic offensive against the British farther
north, between Arras and the high ground north of Ypres.
Instead of trying to separate the French from the British, the
plan here was to separate the British army at Ypres, commanded
by Sir Herbert Plumer, from that at Arras, under Sir Henry
Home. A successful thrust by the opposing armies of Generals
von Arnim and von Quast would throw back Home's forces
upon the British armies which had retreated to the Ancre and
would isolate Plumer's army. Apparently the Germans hoped
to create a gap in Home's command, as they had recently done
in Gough's army, and then pour through it and advance to the
Channel. An advance similar to that before Amiens would
result in the capture of Calais, one of the chief bases of supply
of the British armies. Should only half this distance be covered,
the town of Hazebrouck would fall, and with its fall Ypres
would become untenable and the entire railway system behind
the British and Belgian armies would be dislocated.
3o8 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
On April 9 the Germans attacked a small sector, held by a
Portuguese division, between Armentieres and La Bassee,
smashed it completely, and occupied Richebourg St. Vaast and
Lay en tie. A gap of about three miles was thus created in the
British lines, and through it poured German troops in ever-
increasing numbers. On the next day they crossed the river
Lys and occupied Armentieres and Estaires. On April 12 they
took Merville, only five miles from Hazebrouck. The serious-
ness of the British position was reflected by Sir Douglas Haig's
order of the day :''... Many among us are now tired. To
those I would say that victory will belong to the side which
holds out the longest. . . . Every position must be held to
the last man; there must be no retirement. With our backs
to the wall, and believing in the justice of our cause, each one of
us must fight on to the end. The safety of our homes and the
freedom of mankind depend alike upon the conduct of each one
of us at this critical moment."
The next few days witnessed the stabilizing of the British
lines southeast of Hazebrouck and the shifting of the chief
German efforts to points northeast of Hazebrouck. On April 14
the Germans took Neuve Eglise, close to Mont Kemmel, and
two days later they completed the conquest of Messines Ridge
by capturing Wytschaete.
German occupation of Messines Ridge and assaults on Mont
Kemmel placed the British at Ypres in a precarious position.
In order to prevent a serious catastrophe, Sir Douglas Haig
directed a withdrawal from Passchendaele Ridge, which had
been captured by the British at a tremendously heavy cost in
1917,^ and which constituted an exposed salient northeast of
Ypres. The surrender of Passchendaele Ridge was a terrible blow
to British pride, but subsequent events proved that the resultant
shortening of the British lines strengthened their general position.
On April 18-19 French reserves arrived, and the British lines,
both new and old, held against repeated German onsets.
Mont Kemmel was the scene of extremely bitter fighting for
three days, April 24-27. The Germans, prodigal of men as at
Verdun, made frontal and flank attacks on the position, until
by sheer weight of men and metal they compelled the British
and French to relinquish the height. Nevertheless the losses
suffered by General von Arnim's army were so great that he was
unable to reap the fruits of his victory : he could not secure
other hills that belonged to the same range as Mont Kemmel ;
^ See above, pp. 278-280,
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 309
he was unable further to endanger Ypres. In the meantime
renewed German assaults southeast of Hazebrouck, in the
vicinity of Bethune, not only failed, but were followed by Allied
counter-attacks which won back some ground. The struggle
on this front died down by the middle of May, 191 8.
3IO A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Thus ended the second great German thrust. The British
again had suffered grievously; they had lost Armentieres,
Merville, and the ridges of Messines and Passchendaele ; they
were now back to positions which they had held after the first
battle of Ypres in 19 14; of their holdings at the close of 191 7
the Germans now occupied approximately 800 square miles.
Yet the Germans, as in their first thrust toward Amiens, had
failed to achieve their real ends : they had not isolated any
British army, or plowed their way to the Channel Ports ; the
Allies still dominated the strategic railway lines centering in
Ypres, Hazebrouck, Bethune, Arras, and Amiens. Not even
the Belgian ports were longer available as bases for German
submarines, for, in the midst of Ludendorff's military efforts, a
British squadron in daring fashion had sunk ships at the entrance
to the harbors of Zeebrugge (April 23) and Ostend (May 10) and
had thus partially closed them.
In the midst of the great German drive against the British,
the Government at London took steps to make good its heavy
losses in men and to bolster up weakening English morale. On
April 8, a new military service bill was introduced in Parlia-
ment ; and its third reading was quickly carried by a majority of
198. Thereby military service was imposed on every British
subject who had been in Great Britain since 191 5 and who was
between the ages of eighteen and fifty-five; immunity for
ministers of religion was withdrawn ; and, unlike the service act
of 1916, this measure was specifically extended to Ireland.
Thus the German drive served to make British determi-
nation more dogged than ever. But at the same time it served
to render more difficult than ever the solution of the already
highly perplexing problem of Ireland. For Irishmen objected
to conscription — and with cause. It will be recalled that with
the sanction of the British Government an Irish Convention,
representing all factions of the unhappy island except the
Sinn Fein, had met at Dublin in July, 191 7, under the chair-
manship of Sir Horace Plunkett, in an endeavor to reach an
agreement on the home-rule question.^ The report of the Con-
vention's recommendations was made pubhc in April, 191 8, in
three separate documents : the proposals for a scheme of Irish
self-government, adopted by 44 to 29 ; a vehement dissenting
statement by nineteen Ulster Unionists ; and a minority report
of twenty-two Nationalists, who were unable to indorse the
majority's fiscal recommendations. The general scheme of
^ See above, pp. 262-263.
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 311
proposed home rule was accepted by practically all the National-
ists, all the Southern Unionists, and five out of seven Labor
delegates ; only the Ulster Unionists were intransigeant. Be-
cause of the attitude of the latter, however, the British Govern-
ment at once rejected the Convention's recommendations and
declared that it itself would proceed to fashion a new home-rule
instrument, in the meantime applying the service act to Ireland.
Immediately there was a hue and cry. The vast majority of
Irishmen felt that again they had been duped by the British
Government, that again they were at the mercy of English
Unionists and Sir Edward Carson's Ulster garrison, and that
again they were to be forced to fight for a Britain which per-
sisted in denying them rights enjoyed by Canadians and Austral-
ians and Boers. Nationalist members of the House of Commons
ostentatiously quit Parliament, and at a meeting in Dublin on
April 20 adopted a resolution affirming that the enforcement of
compulsory military service on a nation without its assent con-
stituted ''one of the most brutal acts of tyranny and oppression
of which any Government can be guilty." On the same day
fifteen hundred Labor representatives met in Dublin and pledged
their resistance to conscription. Two days earlier the Catholic
bishops at a meeting in Maynooth had condemned the injustice
of forcing conscription upon a people without that people's
sanction and, while warning against rebellion or violence, had
directed their priests to administer an anti-conscription oath to
the laity on Sunday, April 21. This oath was duly taken by all
classes of Catholic Ireland, including lawyers, bankers, and
merchants, as well as farmers and workmen. Thus it transpired
that all factions of Irishmen except the group of Ulster Unionists
were united on a common platform and that Catholic bishops,
Laborites, and Nationalists, — most of whom had been whole-
heartedly loyal to the cause of the Allies, — now stood shoulder
to shoulder with Sinn Feiners in opposing the increase, at Ire-
land's expense, of British armies on the Continent. John Dillon,
the new Nationalist leader, joined hands with Eamonn de
Valera, the leader of the Sinn Fein.
Faced by the imminence of rebellion, the British Government
by an order-in-council suspended indefinitely the application
of the Service Act to Ireland and at the same time postponed
the formulation of any scheme of home rule. The results were
painful and unfortunate in the extreme. Premier Lloyd George
stated on May 2 that "the difficulties have not been rendered
easier of settlement by the challenge to the supremacy of the
312 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
United Kingdom Parliament which recently was issued by the
Nationalist Party and the Roman Catholic Hierarchy in concert
with the leaders of the Sinn Fein"; and throughout England
the Irish were accused of base ingratitude and of treason to the
Allied cause. Taking their cue from the attitude of English
officials, the Ulster Unionists, under the guidance of Sir Edward
Carson, became more truculent than ever toward the grant of
home rule in any form. On the other hand, the bulk of Irish-
men were not mollified by the appointment, on May 5, of Field
Marshal Viscount French, a notorious Unionist and ''strong-
arm" man, as Lord Lieutenant of their country, nor by the
military and police coercion under which their administration was
now conducted ; from support of the moderate, pro-war National-
ists and a program of autonomy, they rapidly veered toward
support of the radical, anti-war Sinn Feiners and a program of
complete independence. Between England and Ireland, and
between Ulsterites and other Irishmen, the breach had been
widened and deepened.
The great German drive of March and April against the
British led, however, not only to an unhappy resuscitation of
Irish troubles, not only to courageous efforts on the part of
Englishmen, Scotchmen, and Welshmen to increase their own
man power at the front, but also to the taking of a step of the
utmost practical significance to all the Allies. It was the uni-
fication of the Allied command in France. That such a step
had long been highly desirable admitted of no doubt, but it was
difficult so long as British and French commanders — to say
nothing of Italian generals — were jealous of each other. Ever
since the United States had entered the war, President Wilson
had urged upon the Allies unity of command as well as the pool-
ing of resources, but beyond a meeting of the Inter-Allied Con-
ference and the creation in November, 191 7, of a Supreme War
Council, with strictly advisory functions, little in this direction
had been accomplished.
When the Germans launched their huge offensive in March,
1918, General Pershing promptly offered the American troops
then in France to the Allies for use in any way they saw fit,
either to be used as an independent unit, or to be broken up
and brigaded with the British or the French, or both. This
self-effacement of the American commander, coupled with the
defeat of General Gough's army and the resultant grave danger
to the whole Allied Front, finally overruled the last objection of
the British General Staff and the British public. On March 25,
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 313
1 91 8, Lord Milner and M. Clemenceau and Sir Henry Wilson met
Sir Douglas Haig and General Petain at DouUens, midway be-
tween Amiens and Arras. That conference, held amid the con-
fusion of retreat and under imminence of dire disaster, marked
in a real sense the turning-point of the Great War. The pro-
posal for a supreme commander-in-chief, for a generalissimo of
all the Allied forces, strongly put forward by Clemenceau and
Milner, was welcomed by Haig and Petain.
For the new post there could be but one choice — Ferdinand
Foch. He was by universal consent the master mind among the
Allied generals. He was the most learned and scientific soldier
in Europe, and his greatness in the field had been amply demon-
strated in the battles of the Marne and of Flanders in 19 14,
and in the battle of the Somme in 191 7. On March 26 it was
announced that this short, grizzled, deep-eyed man of sixty-five
had assumed supreme control of the Allied forces in the West.
Haig and Petain and Pershing became his lieutenants, and thence-
forth the Allied Front in France and Belgium could be treated
as a whole and reserves could be dispatched, regardless of
nationality, from one sector to another, whithersoever at the
moment they were most needed.
It was the unifying of the Allied command which contributed
potently to checking the German offensive against the British
both at Amiens and at Ypres and Hazebrouck and to preventing
Ludendorff from isolating the British from the French and forc-
ing the former back to the Channel. But the supreme test of
Foch's generalship was to come later.
THE DRI\TE AGAINST THE FRENCH: THE AISNE AND
THE OISE
Ludendorff had promised his fellow-countrymen that their
supreme effort on the Western Front would bring decisive victory
within four or six months. So far, in the two months from
March 21 to May 21, some progress had been made toward the
realization of his promise. A big salient had been driven into
the British lines between Arras and La Fere, and a smaller salient
had been made between Arras and Ypres. German casualties
in the offensive against the British already totaled half a million,
but these were only a half or third of what Ludendorff had indi-
cated as the price of victory. He still had numerical superiority
of effectives ; he was still operating on interior lines ; the advan-
tage of the offensive was still his. Just as he had devoted two
314 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
months to demoralizing the British and compelling the French
to weaken their own Unes in order to send reserves to a hard-
pressed ally, so now he would consecrate a month or two to
denting French defenses, destroying French morale, and driving
a big, broad salient into central France. Then, when all enemies
were reduced to impotence by his sudden, fearful thrusts, he
could easily crown a marvelous campaign by occupying Paris
and the Channel Ports. There was intense jubilation in Ger-
many as there was genuine alarm in Allied countries.
The terrain selected by Ludendorff as the starting-point for
his decisive drive against the French was the heights of the Aisne,
which had already been the scene of great battles in 19 14 and
1917.-^ This area was nearest to Paris; it was also the gate to
the Marne, and an advance beyond that river would cut the
Paris- Chalons railway and imperil the whole French front in
Champagne and in the Argonne. Accordingly, the armies of
General von Boehn and General Fritz von Below, lying between
Laon and Rheims, were rapidly raised in strength until they
comprised some forty divisions, twenty-five for the first wave
and fifteen in reserve. And a great concentration of guns and
munitions was effected.
Never, perhaps, during the whole campaign did the huge Ger-
man war machine move so noiselessly and so fast. On the
evening of Sunday, May 26, all was quiet in the menaced area.
Then at one o'clock on the morning of Monday, May 27, a
staccato bombardment began everywhere from the Ailette to
the suburbs of Rheims. At four o'clock the infantry advanced,
and in an hour or two had swept the French from the crest of the
ridge north of the Aisne. The odds were too desperate, and the
few French divisions, taken by surprise, had no choice but to
retreat. By nightfall General von Boehn's troops had crossed
the Aisne and reached the Vesle at Fismes. They had taken
large numbers of prisoners and an immense store of booty, and
in the center they had advanced twelve miles.
Yet there was danger in thrusting too narrow a salient into
the French lines ; and advantageous further advance of the Ger-
man center must depend upon the ability of the flanks to advance
also. Consequently, during the ensuing days the Germans
attempted to widen as well as deepen the saHent : General Foch,
^ There is evidence to show that Ludendorff himself was opposed to the drive
on the Aisne, preferring to press the offensive against Amiens. He seems to have
been persuaded by political factors to abandon his original plan and to strike
towards Paris.
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 315
on his side, hastily threw in reserves with a view not so much
to staying German progress south from Fismes as to strengthen-
ing the French positions at Rheims on the east and Soissons on
the west.
After a stubborn defense, Soissons fell on May 29; and the
German center rushed on from Fismes to the watershed between
the Vesle and the Ourcq and Marne. By the next day the Ger-
man center stood on the Marne from Chateau-Thierry to Dor-
mans, a distance of about ten miles, but to the northwest the
utmost difficulty was experienced by the right flank in debouch-
ing from Soissons, while to the northeast the left flank battered
in vain at the gates of Rheims.
Though they failed absolutely to widen the Marne salient
on the east, the Germans succeeded, after extremely bitter and
sanguinary fighting, in advancing some six miles down the Ourcq,
as far as the village of Troesnes; and they likewise enlarged
slightly their holdings west of Chateau-Thierry. Early in June,
however, French counter-attacks not only halted the German
drive westward but actually recovered some ground. On June 6,
American troops, cooperating with the French, gained two
miles on a three-mile front northwest of Chateau-Thierry ; at a
most critical moment these Americans appeared as a singularly
ill omen to Teutonic projects. Would they come in force before
Ludendorff could bring France and England to terms ?
Loudly the Germans acclaimed the achievement of their
latest drive. To date they had taken 55,000 prisoners and 650
guns ; they had occupied 650 square miles of territory and had
established another salient, this time at French expense, thirty
miles deep ; they had lessened the distance of their lines from
Paris from sixty-two miles to forty-four. But Ludendorff knew
that the salient from the Aisne to the Marne was highly pre-
carious ; it was peculiarly exposed to a flanking movement from
Compiegne ; and it simply had to be widened, strongly fortified,
or abandoned.
Consequently Ludendorff resorted to the plan of linking up
the Marne salient with the Amiens salient which in March he had
thrust into the British lines. If he could execute this plan, he
would wipe out the huge bulge in his own line and capture the
strategically important town of Compiegne; and the river
valleys of the Aisne, Oise, Marne, and Ourcq would then be
available for a final converging attack upon Paris, the nerve
center of France.
General von Hutier's army, concentrated between Montdidier
3i6 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
and Noyon, opened an intense bombardment in the early morning
of June 9, and at dawn attacked with fifteen divisions on a front
of twenty-five miles. On most of the front von Hutier failed,
for there was no element of surprise, and Foch was ready for him.
The total advance on the first day was three miles and was only
attained after frightful losses. On the next day the Germans
advanced about three miles farther and captured, after grave
losses, a few little villages. The Teuton penetration was now
about five or six miles, and this was approximately the depth of
their entire advance. The struggle was one of dogged resistance
on the part of the French, and, for the Germans, the slowest
and costliest progress, very different from the Aisne offensive a
fortnight earlier. By June 13 von Hutier 's effort on the Oise
practically ceased.
In the meantime, American troops had been very active in
the neighborhood of Chateau-Thierry. On June 10 they moved
forward in the Belleau Wood and by the next day had captured
all of it. They also crossed the Marne at Chateau-Thierry on
scouting expeditions.
After von Hutier had failed to reach Compiegne and thus to
widen the Marne salient on the west, General Fritz von Below
on June 18 made a desperate assault upon the defenses of Rheims,
hoping thereby to enlarge the sahent to the east. Though en-
circled by assailants on three sides, Rheims held out most stoutly
during the engagement, much aided by the fact that the French
held the great massif of the Montague de Rheims to the south
and southwest.
For the better part of a month after the unsuccessful attack
upon Rheims, comparative silence fell upon the Western Front.
It was obvious that Ludendorff was preparing still another
mighty blow. It was obvious too that the Alhes were utiUzing
their respite to the full : their armies were growing daily as the
Americans came into fine, and their commanders were concert-
ing strategy and tactics wherewith they hoped soon to transfer
the initiative from the Teutons to themselves. Already the
German casualties were mounting fast to the limit which Luden-
dorff had named as the price of victory ; already three months
had passed by of the four which he had set as a time-limit.
The next drive would in all probabiHty be the last for the
Germans. Meanwhile, the Austrians would make their ulti-
mate drive against the Italians.
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 317
THE DRIVE AGAINST THE ITALIANS: THE PIAVE
Externally the condition of Austria-Hungary seemed auspi-
cious in the spring of 19 18. Her own territories were free of
foreign invaders not only, but she was in military possession of
Montenegro, a large part of Serbia and Albania, and a liberal
slice of northeastern Italy, and the treaties of Brest-Litovsk
and Bucharest had relieved her of the necessity of maintaining
a battle-front in Russia and Rumania. But internally the
situation was growing steadily worse. Austria-Hungary had
never had any true national unity, and the separatist ambitions
of her subject peoples had been waxing as the central authority
waned. Mihtary and diplomatic successes had not served to
feed the hungry or to save the starving, and large sections of the
population of the Dual Monarchy were on the verge of starvation.
Allied propaganda was doing its work: there were frequent
mutinies among Czechoslovak and Jugoslav regiments; there
were daily desertions both at the front and on the march.
One hope remained to the Emperor Charles and his Govern-
ment. It was that the Great War might be ended before de-
moraHzation should find its sequel in disintegration and ruin.
For a time in 191 7 the Emperor, supported by Count Czernin,
his crafty foreign minister, had hoped to end the war and save his
dominion by means of separate, stealthy negotiations with the
Entente. His duplicity having been discovered at Berlin, how-
ever, he was compelled to part with Czernin in April, 19 18, and to
reappoint as foreign minister the more strenuously pro- German
Baron Burian. And lest the Entente might continue to cherish
the notion that the Dual Monarchy was weakening in her loyalty
to Germany, the Emperor Charles was obKged further to humble
himself, to pay an ostentatious visit to the Emperor William II,
and to conclude with him on May 12 a renewal and extension
of the alliance between their countries. Henceforth Austria-
Hungary was even more dependent than formerly on the good
graces and mihtary might of Germany ; with anxiety the govern-
ing classes at Vienna and Budapest now watched the progress of
Ludendorff's supreme effort in France.
But Ludendorff had told the Austrian authorities in no un-
certain terms that, while he strained every nerve to overwhelm
the British and the French, they themselves would be expected
to put Italy out of the war. This they must do unaided, be-
cause he needed all German troops in the West; but this they
could do, because they now enjoyed the great prestige and the
3i8
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
advantage of position which had been acquired as results of the
successful Teutonic drive of the preceding November from the
Isonzo to the Piave, and because they were now unhampered by
miUtary exigencies on any other frontier. If they could vanquish
the ItaUans finally, they would confer inestimable favors upon
the cause of Mittel-Europa and they would be promoting im-
measurably the stability of the Dual Monarchy.
So the Austrians set to work preparing a supreme offensive
against Italy. They brought reenforcements from the East
and collected a large store of guns and material. They mem-
orized and rehearsed the new German tactics of ''surprise" and
*' infiltration." And they worked out an admirable plan of
strategy : Field Marshal von Hoetzendorf , commanding in the
Tyrol, was to break through the AlHed positions on the Asiago
Plateau, and at Monte Grappa and Monte Tomba, and then
march down the Brenta valley, and take the Italian armies along
the Piave on the flank or in the rear ; simultaneously, General
Boroevic was to seize the hill called the Montello, which lay
roughly at the angle between the north and northeastern sectors,
where the Piave leaves the mountainous country for the Venetian
plain, and to *' infiltrate" among the Italian defenders of the
Piave, thereby directly menacing Venice.
On June 15, 1918, at three o'clock in the morning, the Austrian
*' preparation" began on the whole front, and at seven o'clock
the infantry charged, principally in two areas — in the plains
on the twenty-five mile line between the Montello and San Dona
di Piave, and in the hills on the eighteen miles between Monte
Grappa and Canove. But Diaz, the Italian commander, was
not *' surprised " ; his troops were ready and also his reserves;
and it soon became apparent that the Austrian generals knew
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 319
the theory of ''infiltration" better than their soldiers knew its
practice. Hoetzendorf's advance was checked almost at the
outset, and within two days the ItaUans, with .the aid of French
and British detachments, had recovered all the ground lost in
the mountains and some besides.
Boroevic was a little more successful along the Piave. His
troops effected crossings of the river at several points and seized
the eastern end of the Montello, while lower down the Piave, in
the vicinity of San Dona, they advanced five miles west of the
river. On June 18, however, two events occurred of great im-
portance. One was the arrival of Diaz's reenforcements and the
resultant halting of the Austrian advance. The other was a
heavy downpour of rain which rendered the Piave a swollen
flood and thus cut off the Austrians on the western bank of the
river and at the same time enabled Itahan monitors of light
draft to go up the river and shell the Austro-Hungarian positions.
Five days later General Diaz inaugurated against the isolated
Austrians a counter-offensive, which resulted in the capture of
4500 prisoners. By the first week in July, the Italians not only
had driven General Boroevic's forces back to their old positions,
but, in some places, had secured ground which had been lost in
191 7, notably the delta at the mouth of the Piave.
The result of the drive against the Italians was that the
Austrians had gained nothing. Actually they had been com-
pelled to yield ground, and this with a loss to themselves of
some 20,000 prisoners, seventy-five guns, and at least 150,000
casualties. They had failed grotesquely, and their offensive
power was at an end. Their morale was hopelessly lowered, and
domestic revolt threatened. More than ever was Germany
left to continue the struggle alone.
On the other hand the Italians were jubilant. They had
avenged the disastrous defeat of the preceding year, and their
achievement strengthened their own morale not only, but of
their allies also. Allied faith needed a sign, for at this very
moment Ludendorff 's Final Drive was impending.
Despite Austrian failure, the Germans had not yet lost faith
in Ludendorff's abihty to obtain a mihtary decision. Only
Richard von Kiihlmann, the German Foreign Secretary, ex-
pressed doubt ; *' the end of the war," he said before the Reichs-
tag, on June 24, '' can hardly be expected through purely military
decisions alone, and without recourse to diplomatic negotiations."
For such faint-heartedness Kiihlmann was scathingly assailed
by the Pan- Germans and Junkers ; he resigned on July 9, and
320
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
was succeeded by Admiral von Hintze. Jove-like Ludendorff
was not to be hindered by cringing diplomatists from hurling his
last mighty thunder-bolt.
THE FINAL GERMAN DRIVE: THE SECOND BATTLE OF
THE MARNE
At midnight on Sunday, July 14, 1918, the anniversary of the
fall of the Bastille, Parisians heard the booming of great guns.
At first they thought it another air raid, but the blaze in the
eastern sky showed that business was afoot on the battlefield.
Then they knew that the last phase had begun of the struggle
for Teutonic domination of their city and of their country.
For a month and more, ever since the cessation of the drives
from the Aisne and the Gise, Ludendorff had been making final
preparations to achieve the victory which he had promised the
German people. He had collected every reserve from every
front on which there were German troops. He had overworked
his whole transport system in a desperate attempt to bring up all
available guns and munitions. His plan was to strike out from
the uncomfortable salient in which von Boehn had been en-
trapped, press across the Marne, and cut the important lateral
railway from Paris to Nancy. Simultaneously von Mudra
(who had succeeded Fritz von Below) and von Einen, with
their armies, were to advance east of Rheims between Prunay
and the Argonne. In this way Rheims would be enveloped and
the French front would be broken beyond hope of repair. While
von Mudra and von Einen, with the aid of German armies in
Lorraine and in Alsace, ground the eastern forces of the French
to bits on the fortresses along the Meuse, von Boehn would
march on Paris down the valley of the Marne. At the right
moment, when the fate of the capital hung in the balance, von
Hutier and von der Marwitz would break through the Amiens-
Montdidier lines and descend on Paris from the north. Then
would Haig be finally separated from Petain, and Petain's
armies would be severed, and Foch, the generalissimo of a lost
cause, would be faced by defeat complete and cataclysmic, and a
German peace would be imposed on the AlHes. To this end,
the coming struggle was popularly styled in Germany the
Friedensturm, the ''peace offensive " ; the Crown Prince Frederick
WiUiam was put in nominal charge of it, and afar off the Emperor
WiUiam II assumed a most theatrical pose. Everything was
in readiness to resume the Battle of the Marne where it had been
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 321
broken off in September, 19 14. Ludendorff was a better strate-
gist than Moltke had been, and the Germans had learned many
valuable lessons in four years ; on the other hand it was assumed
that most of the French reserves had already been exhausted,
and that what few Americans had arrived were too untrained
to be dangerous.
At dawn on July 15, 19 18, the German infantry advanced
to the attack. Von Boehn was immediately successful. His
troops crossed the Marne at various points between Chateau-
Thierry and Dormans, reached the heights on the south bank,
and in the course of the day gained one to three miles on a front
of twenty-two. Yet they failed to widen the salient:, on the
southeast an ItaUan corps effectually barred the way to Epernay ;
on the southwest, in the vicinity of Chateau-Thierry, American
soldiers stubbornly contested the ground. These Americans,
constituting the right wing of the French army of General
Degoutte, first checked the German wave at Vaux and Fossoy,
and then rolled it back, clearing that part of the south bank of
the Marne and taking 600 prisoners. Such American behavior
was ominous.
East of Rheims von Mudra and von Einen encountered un-
expected opposition from the French under General Gouraud.
Gouraud's counter-bombardment dislocated the German attack
before it began, and his swift counter-attacks checked their
*' infiltration" before it could be set going. By dint of the ut-
most effort the Germans occupied the towns of Prunay, Auberive,
and Tahure ; further they could not go ; Rheims they could not
capture or isolate. By the third day of the offensive, von Einen
and von Mudra were utterly exhausted.
South of the Marne and southwest of Rheims, von Boehn on
July 16 and 17 pushed hard toward Epernay. Yet he too used
up his reserves in vain. At the farthest point his advance was
only six miles beyond his original position. On July 18 the
aspect of the whole front was altered, when the French and
Americans began an offensive on their own account from the
Marne to the Aisne, which was highly successful, and which
changed a dangerous situation for the Allies into a more dangerous
one for the Germans.
Before Ludendorff had launched the final German drive, on
July 15, General Foch was considering a scheme of counter-
attack drawn up by General Retain in conference with Generals
Mangin, Fayolle, and Degoutte. It was planned to take advan-
tage of the narrowness of the German salient on the Marne, and,
Y
322 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
while von Boehn was struggling to widen it to the east, to assail
it from the west between Soissons and Chateau-Thierry. For
this purpose vast quantities of suppHes were stored up in the
Villers Cotterets Forest, and a great reserve army, the possibiHties
of which the Germans had scarcely foreseen, was gathered to-
gether.
The chief factor in General Foch's decision to inaugurate a
counter-offensive at once was the unexpectedly prompt arrival
and efficient training of American troops. At first the Allies as
well as the Germans had been prone to overestimate the obstacles
in the way of the early, active participation of the United States
in the war. It was hoped by the Germans, and feared by the
Allies, that the ruthless submarine warfare would hamper seri-
ously the transportation of American troops to France and that
such troops as might reach Europe could not be relied upon for
front-line fighting because of their notorious lack of training and
experience. As a matter of fact the submarine warfare was at
no time insurmountable, and in 1918, thanks to the Anglo-
American sea patrol and to German discouragement, it was be-
coming rapidly less effective : against losses to Allied and neutral
shipping in the second quarter of 191 7 totaling two and a quarter
million tons must be set the combined losses of 1,150,000 tons in
the first quarter of 1918, and 950,000 in the quarter from April
to June, 1 9 18, while during the same period the shipbuilding
programs of Great Britain and the United States steadily
grew until in 1918 the merchant vessels launched far exceeded
in tonnage those destroyed. Moreover, Europe was astonished
by the speed and safety with which American troops were trans-
ported across the Atlantic. During the seven months of 191 7,
from June to December, the number of American soldiers arriving
in Europe averaged 27,000 a month; from January to March,
1918, the average was 60,000 ; and as soon as Germany put forth
her supreme effort against the British and French, the United
States performed almost a miracle in rushing men to the defense
of the Allies — -117,000 came in April, 244,000 in May, and
276,000 in June. By July, 1918, more than a million American
troops were in France.
No less astounding than the speedy arrival of the Americans
was the quickness with which they proved themselves real
warriors. Training begun in the United States was completed
in Europe ; and in April, 191 8, the First Division had manned a
sector of the front northwest of Montdidier. On May 28 this
division had signalized the first American military success in the
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 323
Great War, by capturing the village of Cantigny ; and in June
the Second Division by their effective work in the Belleau Woods
and near Chateau-Thierry had aided materially in checking the
Teutonic drive from the Aisne to the Oise. Even these successes,
however, did not fully convince the AlHed generals that the bulk
of the American troops were yet fit for major operations, and it
was not until the supreme effort of the Germans on the Marne in
July, when the French were in dire need of reenforcements and
when General Pershing insisted that his soldiers could and must
be used, that General Foch, relying upon the Americans as well
as upon French and British, ordered the counter-offensive.
On July 18, Franco- American troops, under the command of
Generals Mangin and Degoutte, attacked on a twenty-eight mile
front from a point west of Soissons to Chateau-Thierry on the
Marne. The assault was made without artillery preparation, the
Scene of the Last German Offensive : the Second Battle of the Marne
advancing infantry being protected by large numbers of tanks
and a creeping barrage. It took the Germans by surprise, and,
as a result of it, General Mangin's forces between the Aisne and
the Ourcq advanced five miles and reached the heights south
of Soissons, while General Degoutte's army, between the Ourcq
and the Marne, captured Torcy and threatened Chateau-Thierry.
Chateau-Thierry was evacuated on July 21, and on the same
day Franco-American troops crossed the Marne and advanced
324 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
three or four miles toward the Ourcq. The Germans were in
retreat but they were fighting stubbornly as they went. On
July 28 the AlHes crossed the Ourcq and took Fere-en-Tardenois.
Most bitterly did the Prussian Guards contest further advance
north of the Ourcq : Sergy and Seringes changed hands several
times before remaining in the possession of the victorious Ameri-
cans. On August 3 the French reentered Soissons in triumph,
and on the next day the AlHes recovered more than fifty villages,
including Fismes. The Germans were now completely behind
the Aisne-Vesle line. Their supreme effort had been a gigantic
failure. In two weeks the AlHes had recovered the districts of
Valois and Tardenois and taken more than 40,000 prisoners. On
August 6, 1918, General Foch was named a marshal of France,
''in order to consecrate for the future," said Premier Clemenceau,
*' the authority of the great soldier who is called to lead the armies
of the Entente to final victory."
The Second Battle of the Marne, like the First, was a great
AlHed victory. In both combats the Germans had made des-
perate attempts to overwhelm and crush the French armies and
to occupy Paris ; in both they had been decisively beaten. But
to the Teutons the Second battle, in 1918, was far more disastrous
than the First battle, in 1914. In September, 19 14, the AlHes
were so exhausted that they could not press their advantage;
the Germans could intrench themselves on the heights of the
Aisne and hold their lines intact in France and Belgium while
they proceeded to punish Russia. And the Allies, short of men
and short of munitions, had to resign themselves unwillingly to a
four years' vigil along a far-flung battle front. Now, however,
in August, 1918, the Germans had shot their last bolt. They had
suffered terrible losses ; they had no more reenforcements to
bring on from Russia or any other place; they were at last,
thanks to their foolhardiness in bringing the United States into
the war, outnumbered and outmanoeuvered. Their munitions
were of inferior quality ; their air service, at least on the British
front, was distinctly inferior ; their supply system was in con-
fusion ; their generals were discredited. Henceforth there could
be no more German offensives. It was, in fact, very doubtful
whether the Germans could make a defensive stand.
The Allies, flushed with victory, did not rest from their labors
when they had checked Ludendorff's last drive and had turned
it back across the Marne. They did not stop short even with the
recovery of what they had lost in his earHer drive from the Aisne.
The offensive, of which they had been deprived from March to
GERMANY MAKES THE SUPREME EFFORT 325
July, 19 18, they would now resume, and they would press it
until Mittel-Europa sued for peace. In AlHed countries defeat-
ism disappeared and martial enthusiasm ran high. In the Cen-
tral Empires, on the other hand, popular morale decHned rapidly,
for people who had been assured of a triumphant peace within
four months had now to face the prospect of a peace imposed
not by them upon their enemies but by their enemies upon them.
It was a prospect hitherto almost inconceivable to the German
mind. Yet such was the amazing turn of fortune in July, 19 18,
that whereas four months earlier Ludendorff had appeared as
the dictator of Europe, four months later he and his Hohenzollern
master were to be dishonored fugitives even from the Fatherland.
The Second Battle of the Marne was the beginning of the end.
They that had taken the sword were about to perish by the
sword.
CHAPTER XIV
THE ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS
ALLIED VICTORIES IN THE WEST
With the wiping out of the German sahent from the Marne to
the Aisne in July and early August, 1918, Marshal Foch had
reaped the first fruits of the Allied offensive, but it was not his
plan to allow any rest or respite to the harassed and discouraged
Germans. On August 8 he struck his second great blow in an
endeavor to ''pinch" the extended German salient in Picardy,
reaching out toward Amiens. First the British under General
Rawlinson and the French under General Debeney attacked the
Germans on the southern side of the salient, just south of the
Somme river, and in three days drove them back fifteen miles
in some places and an average of ten miles along the entire line.
Montdidier was. retaken on August 10, and before the end of the
month Roye and Noyon were recovered. In the meantime, the
French under General Mangin assailed the Germans on the line
from the Gise, near Ribecourt, to the Aisne, near Soissons, while
the British under General Byng successfully struck the northern
side of the Picardy salient, making notable gains and inflicting
heavy losses upon the enemy. Bapaume was regained on
August 29, and Peronne on September i. Farther north, in
Flanders, the British army of General Plumer launched an offen-
sive in August against the salient between Arras and Ypres and
crowned its efforts on the first day of September by compelHng
the Germans to evacuate Mont Kemmel.
By the end of August the results of Marshal Foch's energetic
offensive were already appreciable. Since the middle of July the
Allies had captured 130,000 prisoners, 2000 heavy guns, and
14,000 machine guns, and had wrested from the Germans the
greater part of the territory conquered by the latter in the sen-
sational and sanguinary drives of the spring. The Teutons
were now in most places back on the Hindenburg Line, and their
morale had suffered a blow from which it was destined not to
recover. That 300,000 fresh American troops were pouring into
326
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 327
France every month was the chief of the fateful factors in Ger-
man defeat and AlHed triumph.
The German Government was fully alive to the situation and
thoroughly alarmed. A secret conference of civil and miUtary
officials, held at General Headquarters at Spa on August 14,
under the presidency of Emperor William II, concluded from
clear evidence at hand that, contrary to Ludendorff's earlier
«7^^A!:::}rr
SCALE OF MILES
Si& 50 100
^MEDITERRANEAN SEA
WHS.EN6.C0.,N.y.
Principal Changes in Western Front from August, 19 14, to November,
1918
assurances, Germany could no longer hope to win the war ; she
must initiate peace negotiations with the Entente Powers. It
would take time to formulate new peace proposals, to secure
the sanction of Austria-Hungary, to present them through a
neutral Power to the Allies, and to obtain final acceptance.
During this delay attempts must be made, by means of false
statements and high-flown proclamations, to buoy up the soldiers
at the front and the civiHans at home, for otherwise there would
be real danger of a poHtical and social revolution in Germany.
328 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
To keep the armies intact and in possession of a large part of
their former conquests in Belgium and France seemed to be the
best guarantees against revolution at home and against a dis-
astrous and crushing peace abroad. On this point Field Marshal
von Hindenburg, Chancellor von HertHng, and the Emperor
himself were agreed. Ludendorff himself was inclined to be
panicky.
The AUies were at this time in ignorance of the conference
at Spa and of its momentous decisions. But they were in no
frame of mind to help the Teutonic authorities stave off revolu-
tion and obtain more favorable peace terms. And Marshal
Foch was not the man to give an enemy any rest. What had
been in July and August mere drives against German saKents
were enlarged under his direction, in September, into a vast
battle covering the whole Western Front from the North Sea to
the Meuse River. It was his purpose, by means of numerous
offensives at various points, to force the Teutons to evacuate the
line which they had spent years in intrenching and fortifying and
which, comprising successive positions that depended on one
another, extended from Dixmude, through Lens, Queant, Cam-
brai, St. Quentin, La Fere, north of Rheims, and across Cham-
pagne and the Argonne, to the Meuse, and was supported in the
rear by the three mighty camps of Lille, Laon, and Metz.
The first days of September were utilized by the French,
British, and American armies in pressing the pursuit of the
Germans and in liberating the territory up to the Hindenburg
Line, in Picardy, between the Oise and the Aisne, and south of
the Aisne. At the same time British troops under General
Home, east of Arras, vigorously assailed the lines between
Drocourt and Queant which constituted one of the most for-
midable sectors of the German front. After some of the bit-
terest fighting of the war, the British broke the line and pene-
trated six miles along a front of more than twenty. Queant was
taken by storm, together with a dozen towns and villages. In
this operation alone more than 10,000 prisoners were captured.
Lens was evacuated by the Germans on September 4, and the
British settled down to a slow but steady advance toward
Cambrai.
Then quickly, at the opposite end of the long battlefield, east
of the Meuse in the plain of the Woevre, began an American
offensive movement against the St. Mihiel salient, which was a
relic of German successes in the early months of the war. On
September 12, after four hours' bombardment, American infantry
AIXIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 329
under General Pershing assailed the southern and western flanks
of the saUent. The chief resistance was in the west, where the
German positions were defended by the heights on the edge of the
Woevre. Nevertheless so impetuous and so unflinching was the
attack, that on the second day the forces advancing from the
330 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
south and from the west met at VigneuUes, and the St. Mihiel
salient was no more. By this blow seventy villages were de-
Hvered and nearly 175 square miles of territory; 16,000 prisoners
were taken, and 450 guns ; the great French railway system
running through Verdun, Toul, and Nancy was freed ; a stra-
tegically important position was obtained from which subse-
quently an offensive might be launched against Metz and the
iron fields of Briey ; and the Germans were shown in most dis-
quieting manner that the American Expeditionary Force had
reached a stage of development where it could be depended upon
by the Allies to take full and decisive share in the war.
Ever bolder and more determined and more varied grew the
Allied offensives. The Germans could no longer risk the trans-
fer of troops from one sector to another ; everywhere they were
worn out and exhausted. Hardly had the St. Mihiel salient
fallen when the Teutons found themselves assailed simultane-
ously on five main sectors: (i) on September 18, the British
army of General Rawlinson and the French army of General
Debeney, under the superior command of Field Marshal Haig,
inaugurated an offensive against St. Quentin, which resulted in
the capture of that town on October i ; (2) on September 27, the
British Generals Byng and Home moved against Cambrai,
occupying it on October 9 ; (3) on September 28, King Albert
and his Belgians, aided by a French army under General De-
goutte and the British army of General Plumer, struck out
between Dixmude and Ypres, and while the Belgians got close to
Roulers, the British recovered Passchendaele, advanced on
Menin, and threatened Lille ; (4) on September 28, the French
army of General Mangin pushed back the Germans between the
Oise and the Aisne and regained the Chemin des Dames ; and (5)
on September 26 an offensive of the utmost significance was
begun on both sides of the Argonne, from the Meuse to Rheims,
American troops attacking east of the Argonne and in the valley
of the Meuse, and French forces under Generals Gouraud and
Berthelot cooperating with them to the west, in Champagne.
In all these sectors the Allies made rapid progress despite
stubborn resistance and repeated counter-attacks on the part
of the Teutons. By the end of September the Allied armies had
captured from the Germans, since the turn of fortune on the
Marne (July 18), 5500 officers and almost a quarter of a million
men, besides enormous quantities of guns and munitions and
stores. On September 30 the demoralization of Germany was
strikingly manifested by the resignation of Hertling as Imperial
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 331
Chancellor and prime minister of Prussia and by the succession
to his important positions two days later of Prince Maximilian
of Baden who had been a Liberal critic of recent governmental
policies. Under Prince Max, Dr. W. S. Solf, the colonial secre-
tary, was named foreign secretary, and a coalition ministry was
formed of which two Socialist deputies, Scheidemann and Bauer,
and two Centrist deputies, Groeber and Erzberger, were mem-
bers. In an address to the Reichstag, the new chancellor set
forth his program as foUows : adherence to the principles set
forth in the reply to the Pope's note of August i, 1917 ; a dec-
laration that Germany is ready to join a league of nations if it
comprises all states and is based on the idea of equality ; a clear
statement of purpose to restore Belgium; repudiation of peace
treaties already concluded, if necessary to effect a general peace ;
Alsace-Lorraine to be an autonomous state within the Empire;
radical electoral reform to be carried out immediately in Prussia ;
strict observance of ministerial responsibility to the duly elected
representatives of the nation; the rules as to the state of siege
to be amended in order to assure freedom of meeting and of
press as well as all other personal liberties.
In October the new Government of Prince Max appealed
direct to President Wilson for a cessation of hostilities. In this
course it was heartened by an address delivered by the American
president at New York on September 27, in which the purposes of
the war had been restated and five principles laid down for
the foundation of a League of Nations :
^' First, the impartial justice meted out must involve no
discrimination between those to whom we wish to be just and
those to whom we do not wish to be just. It must be a justice
that plays no favorites and knows no standard but the equal
rights of the several peoples concerned ;
*' Second, no special or separate interest of any single nation
or any group of nations can be made the basis of any part of the
settlement which is not consistent with the common interest of all ;
"Third, there can be no leagues or alliances or special cove-
nants or understandings within the general and common family
of the League of Nations ;
"Fourth, and more Specifically, there can be no special, selfish
economic combinations within the League and no employment
of any form of economic boycott or exclusion except as the power
of economic penalty by exclusion from the markets of the world
may be vested in the League of Nations itself as a means of
discipline and control ;
332 A BRIEF HISTORY OP THE GREAT WAR
''Fifth, all international agreements and treaties of every kind
must be made known in their entirety to the rest of the world."
Throughout October a series of diplomatic notes was ex-
changed between the United States and Germany, the latter
being gradually led to perceive that no cessation of hostilities
would be recommended by President Wilson to the Entente
Powers until its Government had agreed unreservedly to accept
the ''Fourteen Points" of the President's address of January 8,
1918, as well as his address of September 27, to put a stop to
unrestricted submarine and other ruthless warfare, to evacuate
occupied foreign territories, and to guarantee the destruction of
autocracy and militarism in Germany.
It was both President Wilson's diplomacy and Marshal Foch's
continuous military blows that eventually caused Germany to
yield to the inevitable. Throughout October, while negotia-
tions were proceeding between the American president and the
German chancellor, the Allied armies forged steadily ahead and
the Teutonic forces reeled back before their onsets. In Flanders
the group of Belgo-Franco-British armies renewed their attacks
on October 14 on a vast front from Dixmude to the Lys and in
the next few days took Roulers, Menin, and Courtrai, thereby
obliging the Germans to evacuate Douai, Lille, and, soon after-
wards, Tourcoing and Roubaix. In Belgium the progress of
King Albert's victorious soldiers continued : Ostend and Bruges
were reentered, then Zeebrugge ; the suburbs of Ghent and the
Dutch frontier were reached ; the Lys was crossed. On October
21 the British assailed the Germans east of Denain and cap-
tured Valenciennes on November 2 and Landrecies two days
later. Maubeuge fell on November 9, and on November 11,
the last day of fighting, the British gained Mons, the scene of
their defeat and retreat in August, 19 14.
In the meantime, farther south the French under General
Mangin had broken the strong "Hunding Line" of the Germans
between the Oise, the Serre, and the Aisne, and by November 8
they were at the outskirts of Mezieres on the Franco-Belgian
frontier, while east of the Argonne Forest the Americans smashed
their way through the supposedly impregnable "Kriemhilde
Line," which extended across the Meuse from Grand Pre to
Damvillers, and reached Sedan on November 6. At the same
time General Gouraud, west of the Argonne, advanced through
Champagne, capturing Vouziers and Rethel, and effecting a
juncture with the forces of General Mangin near Mezieres on
November 11.
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 333
The Franco-American advance in the Champagne-Argonne-
Meuse region threatened to cut the main line of communications
between Germany and her armies in Belgium and northern
France, so that even if the Allied armies had elsewhere been less
successful than they actually were, Germany would have been
doomed to decisive defeat in a very short time. The Germans
thoroughly understood the strategic importance of the Meuse
valley, and in this valley occurred during October and early
November some of the fiercest fighting of the war. Much of the
fighting was hand to hand, and the nature of the ground, with
jc/ur o^ MiLti
The Franco-American Offensive on the Meuse and in the Argonne
its ravines and gullies and woods, made it necessary to wipe out
machine-gun nests with infantry rather than with artillery.
Yet the Americans, as well as the French, acquitted themselves
most admirably in this difficult, last campaign of the Great War.
The Americans captured 26,000 prisoners and 468 guns; the
French took about 30,000 prisoners and 700 guns. It is esti-
mated that the Germans, in their unsuccessful efforts to defend
their main line of communications, lost 150,000 men.
From July 18 to November 11, 191 8, Allied arms were uni-
formly and continuously victorious in all parts of the Western
Front. The Teutons were crowded almost completely out of
334 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
France and deprived of a considerable portion of Belgium. The
Great War was practically at an end, for by November all other
fronts — the Italian, the Macedonian, the Turkish, and the
Russian — had crumbled, and Germany's partners in the enter-
prise of Mittel-Europa had surrendered unconditionally to the
triumphant Allies. Germany had staked everything on the
Western Front, and Germany had lost.
ALLIED INTERVENTION IN RUSSIA
Germany, it will be recalled, had concluded the peace of
Brest-Litovsk with the Bolshevist Government of Russia in
March, 1918. At that time the treaty was advantageous to
Germany in three ways. First, it enabled her to transfer the
bulk of her armed forces from the Eastern Front and to make her
supreme effort in the West. Second, it promised to supply her
in the not too distant future with much needed foodstuffs and
with raw materials and markets for her manufactures. Third,
it afforded her the opportunity to draw into the orbit of Mittel-
Europa a number of new quasi-independent states, such as
Ukrainia, Lithuania, Esthonia, Latvia, and Finland, from which
she hoped to conscript reserves of soldiers as well as to obtain
economic support and political prestige.
Consequently, from March to July, 1918, while the German
General Staff was devoting its chief attention and energy to pre-
paring and launching successive mighty offensives on the Western
Front against the British and the French, the German Govern-
ment was not altogether unmindful of the situation in the East.
In the name of upholding and enforcing the treaty of Brest-
Litovsk German troops remained on Russian soil, cooperating
now with the Ukrainians, now with the Lithuanians, now with
the White Guards in Finland, now with the Turks in the Cau-
casus and the region north of the Black Sea.
In Ukrainia German soldiers backed Skoropadsky's dicta-
torial regime with bayonets and suppressed peasants' revolts
against it. In Latvia and Esthonia, German landlords were
encouraged to declare the independence of the Baltic provinces
and then to beg Germany's ^'protection." In May Emperor
William II formally recognized Lithuania as a free and sovereign
state on the basis of the action of a provisional government
which in the preceding December had proclaimed ^'the restora-
tion of Lithuania as an independent state, alHed to the German
Empire by an eternal, steadfast alliance, and by conventions
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 335
chiefly regarding military matters, traffic, customs, and coinage,"
but William's declaration significantly assumed that Lithuania
would ''participate in the war burdens of Germany, which se-
cured her liberation." In June German officers took charge of
the Finnish army and, after deposing General Mannerheim, the
patriotic Finnish commander of the White Guards, and sup-
pressing insurrection and imprisoning numerous socialists and
radicals, prepared to transform Finland into a monarchy under a
German prince and in close alHance with the German Empire.
Moreover, German army officers proceeded to collect Austrian
and German ex-prisoners of war, recently released from prison-
camps in Russia, and to utiHze them in overrunning parts of
Russia in which, according to the letter of the treaty of Brest-
Litovsk, Germany had no right whatsoever to interfere. Thus,
in the spring of 1918, Germans in cooperation with the Turks
were rendering the Black Sea an interior lake of Mittel-Europa :
the Turks occupied Russian Armenia, Georgia, and other dis-
tricts of the Caucasus, inflicting unspeakable atrocities upon the
population, while the Teutons seized the ports on the northern
shore of the Black Sea and a large strip of territory adjacent
thereto. And far away, in Siberia, bands of Teuton ex-pris-
oners were possessing themselves of the railways and other trade
routes and Hkewise of valuable stores of munitions and food-
stuffs.
Against these flagrant aggressions the Russian Soviet Govern-
ment at Moscow protested bitterly and repeatedly, but in vain.
By playing the lamb at Brest-Litovsk the Bolsheviki had not
tamed the Hon ; and when the lamb attempted to lie down with
the lion, a not unusual fate overtook the lamb. Germany was
devouring Russia, and Russia was helpless. The Bolsheviki
were confronted by chaos at home as well as in foreign relations.
By their repudiation of the Russian debt, by their radical social-
istic ventures, and by their separate peace with the Central
Empires, they had flouted and alienated the Entente Powers,
so that from the AlKes they could expect little aid or sympathy
in their hour of need. And constituting as they did but a
minority of the Russian people, they could hope to bring order
out of chaos and still maintain themselves in power only if they
accepted a partnership with the Germans. The Bolshevist
leaders "recognized that their sycophancy to Germany invited
counter-attacks upon them by the Allies, but for the present the
results of German hostility appeared more real and more men-
acing. As Lenin stated before the Central Executive Com-
336 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
mittee of the Soviets in May : *' We shall do the little we can, all
that diplomacy can do, to put off the moment of attack. . . .
We shall not defend the secret agreements which we have pub-
lished to the world; we shall not defend a 'Great Power,' for
there is nothing of Russia left but Great Russia, and no national
interests, because for us the interests of the world's socialism
stand higher than national interests. We stand for the defense
of the socialistic fatherland." Lenin professed belief that the
defense of Soviet Russia was facilitated by what he termed *'the
profound schism dividing the capitalistic governments," by
the fact that ''the German bandits" were pitted against ^'the
EngHsh bandits," and that there were economic rivalries between
''the American bourgeoisie" and "the Japanese bourgeoisie."
"The situation is," he explained, "that the stormy waves of im-
perialistic reaction, which seem ready at any moment to over-
whelm the little island of the Soviet SociaKst RepubKc, are
broken one against another."
For the present, however, Lenin had to swallow his pride and
restrain his rhetoric. The Germans were still conquering ter-
ritories in France, and in Russia they were still sitting squarely
in the saddle. Against the potent spurs of the All-Highest
German Kaiser, mere diplomacy was exceedingly thin protection
to the Bolshevist brute. Under Teutonic direction and dom-
ination, and chiefly to Teutonic advantage, the Soviet Govern-
ment was forced in June to sign humihating treaties with Ukrai-
nia and Finland. Lenin even had to acquiesce in the "self-
determination" of White Russia, a few of whose people, in an
assembly controlled by German agents, proclaimed (May 24,
1918) an "independent repubhc" in federal union with Lithu-
ania and under the protection of the German Empire.
Yet Germany was not altogether successful in her efforts to
exploit Russia politically and economically. The former empire of
the Tsar was too extensive and too varied, and the Revolution had
already introduced too much chaos into Russian politics and
Russian industry, to admit of speedy and simple exploitation
by any foreign Power. The Soviet Government might promise,
under German pressure, to perform valuable services, but it was
one thing to promise and another thing to perform ; and with a
steadily diminishing production of soil and mill and mine, the
Bolsheviki had the utmost difficulty in supplying the needy
population of Great Russia with the bare necessities of life, to
say nothing of exporting supplies to the hateful Teutons. Be-
sides, there were considerable groups of persons and even sizable
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 337
forces of armed men in Russia who opposed both the Teutons
and the Bolsheviki ; this opposition would have to be overcome
before Germany could expect to reap the full fruits of the peace
of Brest-Litovsk.
In May, 1918, the Central Committee of the Russian So-
cialist Revolutionary party formally denounced the Bolshevist
regime and called for a national uprising against the Germans ;
and in June the Central Committee of the Constitutional Dem-
ocratic Party did likewise. That popular feeling throughout
Russia was inflamed against the Teutons was evidenced by the
assassination of Count von Mirbach, the German ambassador at
Moscow, on July 6, and of Field Marshal von Eichhorn, the
German commandant in Ukrainia, on July 30. About the same
time, the Cossacks of the Don took the field against the Soviet
Government, as did also the forces of the *' Provisional Govern-
ment of the Caucasus"; and in Siberia several Conservative
officers, such as General Alexeiev, General Semenov, Admiral
Kolchak, and Colonel Orlov, organized loyalist bands and inaugu-
rated counter-revolutionary movements. As early as February
a ^'Temporary Government of Autonomous Siberia" had been
proclaimed at Tomsk, but subsequently when this town was
captured by Bolsheviki and Teutonic ex-prisoners, the seat of
the Temporary Siberian Government was transferred to Harbin,
in Manchuria, and then to Vladivostok. To add to the com-
plications, General Horvath, vice-president of the Chinese
Eastern Railway, in July set up an independent anti-Bolshevist
government in eastern Siberia.
But the most effective check to Teutons and Bolsheviki alike
was provided by a free-lance expeditionary body of Czecho-
slovaks. At the time of the Bolshevist coup d'etat, in November,
191 7, there were in Ukrainia and southern Russia some 100,000
Czech and Slovak soldiers who originally had been in the service
of Austria-Hungary, but who had gone over to the Russians in
the hope of fighting for their national independence on the side
of the Allies. Upon the conclusion of the treaty of Brest-
Litovsk, an agreement was reached with the Soviet military
authorities whereby these Czechoslovak troops would be allowed
to proceed unmolested across European Russia and Siberia to
Vladivostok, whence they would sail to join the Allies in France
or Italy. At first the Czechoslovaks preserved a strict neutrality
in the internal politics of Russia, and some of them actually
made the journey over the Trans-Siberian railway to Vladi-
vostok. But before their transportation had progressed far,
338 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
friction developed between them and the Bolsheviki and turned
to open hostility ; and Trotsky, yielding to German representa-
tions, sought to disarm them and to prevent them from aiding
the AlUes.
Armed conflict began on May 26, 191 8. The Czechoslovaks
opened operations against forces of Bolsheviki and Teutonic ex-
prisoners simultaneously in the region of the Volga and in
Siberia. In Siberia, they defeated and ousted the pro-Germans
from Irkutsk and Vladivostok, occupied several towns on the
Amur river, and by the middle of July were in possession of
1300 miles of the Trans-Siberian railway west of Tomsk. In the
meantime, in June, they had captured Samara, Simbirsk, and
Kasan on the Volga, had advanced to Ufa in the Ural Moun-
tains, and had gained control of the chief grain routes and de-
prived European Russia of the Siberian food supply.^ The
Czechoslovaks thus did heroic work in preventing the consum-
mation of Teutonic designs on Russia and in arousing national
opposition to the Bolshevist regime, but they could not hope
with their slender forces to retain their hold on such a vast terri-
tory unless they received active assistance from the Allies.
For several months the Allies had been discussing the advisa-
bility and practicability of armed intervention in Russia, with a
view to reconstructing the Eastern Front and thereby lessening
the force of Teutonic attacks in the West. But from a military
standpoint the task was at any time difficult enough, and at the
very moment when every available AUied soldier was needed to
stay supreme German offensives on the Western Front it was
peculiarly hazardous. Besides, from the political standpoint
intervention in Russia was beset with difficulties, for the Allies
were not at war with Russia and there were influential groups
in Great Britain, and especially in the United States, who would
bitterly resent any attempt to interfere in the domestic affairs of
a presumably friendly Power.
Nevertheless the spectacular exploits of the Czechoslovaks and
the increasingly obvious interdependence of the Germans and the
1 The death of the Tsar Nicholas II was a curious and sorry incident of the
fighting between the Russian Bolsheviki and the Czechoslovaks. The ex-tsar,
who had been taken in August, 191 7, from his palace of Tsarskoe-Selo to Tobolsk,
in Siberia, and thence transferred in May, 1918, to Ekaterinburg, was killed at the
latter town on July 16, 191 8. The official statement issued on the subject by the
Soviet Government said : "Ekaterinburg was seriously threatened by the approach
of Czechoslovak bands, and a counter-revolutionary conspiracy was discovered
which had as its object the wresting of the ex-tsar from the hands of the Soviet ;
consequently the president of the Ural Regional Soviet decided to shoot the ex-
tsar, and the decision was carried out on July 16."
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS
339
Bolsheviki finally caused the Allied Governments to reach a
tentative accord on the question of intervention. It was decided
to dispatch two expeditionary forces to Russia : the one would
be landed on the Murman coast and at Archangel in order to
defend the Murman railway ^ from Finnish- German attacks,
prevent the estabHshment of submarine bases on the Arctic, and
keep the large stores of munitions and supplies which had been
purchased by the old Russian regime but never paid for, from
falling into enemy hands ; the other would be sent to Vladivostok
in order to police the Trans-Siberian railway and support the
Czechoslovaks. The former would comprise British troops,
with detachments of French and Americans ; the latter would
consist of Japanese troops, with smaller contingents of Amer-
icans, French, British, Chinese, and Italians. The United
States Government, in embarking upon the enterprise, declared
it did so ''not for interference in internal affairs of Russia and not
to distract from the Western Front," but ''to protect the Czecho-
slovaks against the armed Austrian and German prisoners who
are attacking them and to steady any efforts at self-government
or self-defense in which the Russians themselves may be willing
to accept assistance. Whether from Vladivostok or from Mur-
mansk and Archangel, the only present object for which Amer-
ican troops will be employed will be to guard military stores
which may subsequently be needed by Russian forces."
1 The Murman railway had been built in 191 6 from the ice-free port of Mur-
mansk on the Arctic to Petrograd, in order to provide means of importing war
supplies into Russia from Great Britain, France, and the United States.
340 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
A naval landing had been effected by the British in March,
1 918, at Murmansk, the single ice-free port on the Arctic and
the terminus of the recently constructed railway to Petrograd.
Hither in June arrived the small AlHed expedition, under the
British General Poole, which proceeded to occupy the railway
as far as Kem on the White Sea and to declare the Murman
coast to be '^Russian territory under AlHed protection." On
August 2 General Poole took Archangel, and five days later he
organized, from among anti-Bolshevist Russian refugees, a
regional '' provisional government," headed by Nicholas Tchai-
kovsky. These activities of the Allies in northern Russia served
alike to embitter the Bolsheviki and defeat German schemes.
Finland's enthusiasm for conquest of the Arctic littoral grad-
ually waned and Germany's increasing preoccupation elsewhere
made her aid negligible. By the second half of September Gen-
eral Poole had advanced from Archangel fifty miles southward
along the Dvina river, but farther he could not get. His
forces were too few and his lines of communication too preca-
rious. Merely to feed the starving population in the Hberated
region overtaxed his resources.
In the Far East the Allied Expeditionary Force, under the
Japanese General Otani, landed at Vladivostok in August, 1918,
and within a month cleared the regions to the north, along the
Ussuri and Amur rivers, and Hkewise the Trans-Siberian rail-
way as far as Lake Baikal where a juncture was effected with the
Czechoslovaks operating to the westward. Communication was
thus opened between Vladivostok and the Volga, and the enemy
in Siberia virtually collapsed. Yet the comparative smallness
of the AlHed forces, their lack of unity, and their endless civil
difficulties about railway control and the recognition of *' pro-
visional" Russian Governments, which sprang up in their wake
Hke mushrooms, prevented them from utiHzing their successes
in Siberia for a decisive drive against the Bolsheviki in European
Russia. In particular, there was dislike of the Japanese, who
constituted a large majority of the whole expeditionary force and
who not only treated all Manchuria and eastern Siberia as their
pecuHar ^'sphere of influence" but also blocked for several
months the project of the other Allies to intrust the repair and
operation of the Trans-Siberian railway to a staff of experienced
American engineers headed by John R. Stevens. It was not
until the signing of the armistice on the Western Front, in
November, 1918, that Japan, responding to American repre-
sentations, consented to reduce her army in Siberia from 73,000
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 341
to 25,000 and to turn over the whole Trans-Siberian railway to
the American engineers.
Ever since Allied intervention at Archangel and at Vladi-
vostok, in August, what amounted to a state of war had existed
between the Entente Powers and the Bolshevist Government
of Russia. That Moscow and Berlin were coming nearer to
conciliation and united action was evidenced by the signing on
August 27 of three special agreements supplementary to the
treaty of Brest-Li to vsk. By the terms of these agreements,
Germany conceded to the Soviet Government full Hberty to
nationalize Russian industry ; the Baltic states of Esthonia and
Livonia were declared independent of Russia, though Russia was
given free harbor zones in the Baltic ports of Reval, Riga, and
Windau ; Baku (in the Caucasus) with its rich naphtha deposits,
was left to Russia with the understanding that a portion of the
naphtha should be at the disposal of Germany; the Bolsheviki
promised to employ all the means at their disposal to expel the
Entente forces from northern Russia, while Germany guaranteed
Russia against attacks by or through Finland ; and Russia agreed
to pay Germany an indemnity of one and one-half billion dollars,
a small part of which would be assumed by Finland and Ukrainia.
As the Bolshevist Government leaned more and more toward
Germany, the AlHes redoubled their efforts to coordinate and
unify the anti-Bolshevist factions and '' governments" in Russia.
In September anti-Bolshevist members of the Constituent
Assembly which had been elected in the autumn of 191 7, held a
National Convention at Ufa and set up a new * 'All-Russian
Government," with Nicholas Avksentiev as president and Peter
Vologodsky as premier. With this government were gradually
consolidated the Temporary Siberian Government, the Pro-
visional Government of Northern Russia, and the regional ad-
ministrations of the Urals and the Don, so that early in Novem-
ber its authority extended over the greater part of Siberia and
over portions of the provinces of Samara, Orenburg, Ufa, Ural,
and Archangel, and its seat seemed securely estabHshed at Omsk.
On November 18, however, a counter-revolutionary coup d'etat
was executed at Omsk by Admiral Kolchak, the minister of war
and marine in the All-Russian Government; President Avk-
sentiev was ''taken to an unknown place," several influential
radical leaders, such as Victor Tchernov, minister under Keren-
sky, were imprisoned, and Admiral Kolchak assumed a dicta-
torship. Obviously the same factional wrangUngs and dissen-
sions which had ruined Kerensky in the autumn of 191 7 were
342 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
disgracing and paralyzing the anti-Bolshevists in Russia in the
autumn of 1918.
Nevertheless, in spite of manifold difficulties, Allied inter-
vention in Russia, combined with the chaos in Bolshevist Russia
and with the nationahstic strivings of lesser nationalities within
the former empire of the tsars, effectually prevented Germany
and Austria-Hungary from reaping the full fruits of the peace
of Brest-Li to vsk. Russia as a whole did not become a Teutonic
satrapy or supply-station. And by the time that German arms
were defeated on the Western Front German prestige had been
quite lost in the East. Had it not been for the continued chaos
in Russia to which probably the Czechoslovaks and the Allies
contributed, it might have been possible for Germany to have
exploited the East politically and economically and thereby to
have strengthened her resistance in the West and postponed the
collapse of Mittel-Europa. As it was. Allied intervention in
Russia hastened the inevitable.
Nor should the role of the Bolsheviki in the final drama of
Germany's downfall be passed over in silence. Whatever
criminal deeds these fanatics were guilty of — and their
guilt was certainly considerable — they at any rate indirectly
were of great service to the Allies in paving the way for the
destruction of German morale and for the overthrow of the
Kaiser. If they were at times pro- German in deed, they were
always in thought and word anti-Kaiser and anti-Ludendorff.
From the moment of their assumption of power, in November,
191 7, they had never wearied of spreading propaganda in Ger-
many, as well as in Russia, against Teutonic militarism and
imperiaHsm. To this end they availed themselves of the nego-
tiations at Brest-Litovsk and of their ''friendly" contact with the
Germans throughout the summer and autumn of 19 18. Their
embassy in BerHn became a center of revolutionary agitation as
sinister to the Imperial German Government as it was timely to
the AlHes. The Teutonic crash in November, 1918, was due
primarily, of course, to German military disaster in the West,
but secondarily (and a little ironically) it might be traced to the
Bolshevist Revolution and German ''successes" in the East.
ALLIED TRIUMPH IN THE NEAR EAST: SURRENDER OF
BULGARIA AND TURKEY
At the very time, in the spring of 191 8, when Germany was
making her supreme effort on the Western Front, her Near
i
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAI. EUROPE REVOLTS 343
Eastern confederates — Bulgaria and Turkey — were engaged
in diplomatic controversies that were undignified and annoying.
The greedy and grasping King Ferdinand was insisting that the
whole region of the Dobrudja, recently surrendered by Rumania,
should be added to Bulgaria. The Young Turk regime at Con-
stantinople, on the other hand, was stoutly maintaining that, if
Bulgaria secured Dobrudja, Turkey must have compensations
not only in the Caucasus, as a charge upon Russia, but also in
Thrace, at Bulgaria's expense. King Ferdinand would not agree
to another rectification of the Turco-Bulgar frontier, and con-
sequently the governments of Germany and Austria-Hungary, so
as not to offend the sensitive Young Turks, decided not to hand
over the Dobrudja to Bulgaria but to administer it themselves
''pending final adjustment." To patriotic Bulgars this was
interpreted as a threat by the Central Empires ; and the rela-
tions between Sofia and Berhn were not made more cordial by
the aid which the Teutons rendered the Turks in the Caucasus
or by the backing which the Turks gave the Teutons in southern
Russia and in the Dobrudja. The Black Sea might become an
interior lake of Mittel-Europa, but the Bulgars feared it would
become a lake dominated by a close Turco-Teutonic alliance.
Bulgaria had entered the Great War three years ago, not in order
to subject herself to an overlordship of sultan and kaiser, but
simply to establish her own hegemony in the Near East.
And now in the spring of 1918 the Bulgarian army faced alone
the Allied forces in Macedonia. The Austro- German divisions
which had buttressed it from 1915 to 1917 had been called away
to participate in the mighty offensives on the Western Front.
There was still, indeed, the so-called Eleventh German Army,
but its staff officers alone were German; the troops were Bul-
garian. In Albania a few Austrian battalions were opposing
the Italians. But the entire Macedonian Front from Lake
Ochrida to the iF^gean was held by the Bulgars with sixteen
divisions, or about 400,000 men. The prolonged inaction of the
Allies at Salonica, who had made only partial and limited attacks
in the vicinity of Monastir, the bend of the Tcherna, and Lake
Doiran, kept the Bulgars under the illusion that the war would
end in reciprocal lassitude and that they would be able to retain
their sensational conquests of 191 5.
As a matter of fact, however, Bulgaria was rotting from within.
The common people had had enough of the war ; they were hungry,
weary, and restless. King Ferdinand was growing unpopular.
German influence was decreasing in proportion as the divisions
344 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
lent for the victories of 191 5 and 1916 decreased. And the army
itself, worn out by war, by insufficient food, and by long inaction,
would probably be unable to resist an unexpected and sweeping
attack. Perhaps the new government of Premier Malinoff,
which in June replaced the pro- German ministry of Radoslavoff
at Sofia, was quite willing, before intrusting itself to the good-
will of the Entente, that such an attack should come. A defeat
would justify a separate and much desired peace.
AUied confidence waxed as that of the Bulgarians waned.
The composite Army of the East, better known as the Expedi-
tionary Force at Salonica, grew ever more formidable. In the
beginning it had been formed of French and British divisions
from Gallipoli, and, although its effectives had been gradually
increased from 1915 to 1917 and it had been further reenforced
by Italian troops and by Serbian divisions which had escaped the
frightful retreat of the winter of 191 5-1 9 16, it had not become
strong enough to break through the Bulgarian front and join
with Rumania when that nation entered into the conflict in the
autumn of 191 6.
Later, however, in the winter of 1916-1917, Venizelos, having
broken with the pro- German government of King Cons tan tine,
added three divisions of Greek soldiers who had ralHed to his
banner; and, after the deposition of Constantine, in June, 1917,
the Greek army increased steadily to ten divisions, creating odds
that would permit the AlHes to undertake a great offensive
movement in Macedonia. In July, 191 8, the Army of the East
comprised some twenty-nine divisions — eight French, four
British, six Serbian, ten Greek, and one ItaHan — or about
725,000 men.
In July and August, 191 8, Marshal Foch, while raining blows
on the badly shaken armies of Ludendorff in the West, did not
lose sight of the Near East and of the effect which the elimina-
tion of the Bulgars and Turks would have upon the decision of
the war. With that clairvoyance and measured audacity which
characterized his method of forcing victory, he planned a double
operation in Macedonia and Syria, synchronizing precisely with
his own smashing blows in France and Belgium, and intrusted
its execution to two leaders — Allenby and Franchet d'Esperey
— whose aggressive spirit he could trust.
General Franchet d'Esperey, who arrived at Salonica in July,
first obtained from his predecessor, General Guillaumat, precise
information regarding the situation of the Bulgars, and then set
to work preparing for victory. On September 14, 1918, the
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 345
Bulgarian lines were heavily bombarded, and on the two suc-
ceeding days infantry attacked, — British and Greek troops in the
vicinity of Lake Doiran, on the right of the Macedonian Front ;
French and Serbian forces, in the center, along the Vardar and
the Tcherna ; and the Italians, on the extreme left, in Albania.
So great was the AlHed success, especially in the center, that
within a week the Serbians advanced forty miles and threatened
to isolate the Bulgarians operating north of Monastir. On
September 24, French cavalry entered Prilep and found huge
quantities of abandoned stores. The next day witnessed the
capture of Babuna Pass and Ishtip, and the opening of the way
for a quick advance upon Veles and Uskub. Meanwhile, the
Greeks and British had overcome peculiarly stubborn resistance
Macedonian Front at Time of Bulgaria's Surrender
near Lake Doiran, and on September 27 they seized the Bul-
garian town of Strumnitza. The road to Sofia was opened to the
triumphant Allies.
Then suddenly Bulgaria sued for an armistice and promptly
agreed to an unconditional surrender. The armistice, signed at
Salonica on September 30, provided: that the Bulgarian army
should immediately be demobilized and its arms and equipment
placed in AUied custody; that all Greek and Serbian territory
still occupied by Bulgaria should at once be evacuated ; that all
Bulgarian means of transport, including railways and ships on
the Danube, should be put at the Allies' disposal ; that her terri-
tory should be available for their operations ; and that strategic
points in Bulgaria should be occupied by British, French, or
Italian troops. The bubble of Bulgarian pretension was pricked,
and its bursting brought consternation to the Central Empires
and to Turkey.
On October 4, tricky King Ferdinand, despised alike by the
Teutons and the AUies and threatened by his own people whom
he had misled and deceived, abdicated in favor of his son, the
346 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Crown Prince Boris, and withdrew to his private estates in
Hungary. AlUed forces proceeded in triumph to the Danube,
meeting with no resistance except from broken Austro- German
fragments. On October 12 the Serbians entered Nish, their
ancient capital. There had been a brilKant naval raid on
Durazzo by Italian and British warships on October 2 ; on
October 7 the Italians occupied El Bassan, and a week later they
took Durazzo. On October 19, only about a month after the
launching of the Macedonian offensive, the Allies reached the
shore of the Danube. Late in October Montenegro was cleared
of Austrians and Bosnia was invaded; and early in November
Belgrade was reoccupied.
The liberation of the Balkan states south of the Danube had
immediate consequences of far-reaching importance. It en-
couraged the Rumanians to disregard the peace of Bucharest
which their government had concluded in March with the
Central Empires and to reenter the war on the side of the AlUes.
It enabled General Franchet d'Esperey to carry the contest into
Rumania and southern Russia not only, but also to menace the
now exposed southern border of Austria-Hungary. In this way
the subject nationaHties of the Dual Monarchy were put in a
new position of vantage in their struggle for independence.
From the signing of the armistice at Salonica, the old Habs-
burg Empire was doomed; Austrian aggression against Serbia
was transformed by the act of Austria's confederate, as by a sort
of poetic justice, into Serbian triumph over Austria.
Bulgaria's surrender menaced the integrity of Austria-Hungary
indirectly; directly it threatened the speedy downfall and dis-
solution of the Ottoman Empire. For the Balkan link in the
Berlin-Bagdad Railway was now in Allied hands; Turkey was
isolated from Mittel-Europa; and General Franchet d'Esperey
was in a position to make a direct and unhampered attack by
land upon Constantinople.
Already the Ottoman Empire was in extremis. Ever since the
loss of Bagdad in March, 191 7, Turkish morale had been steadily
declining. Unfortunately General Allenby was unable immedi-
ately to follow up his capture of Jerusalem, in December, 191 7,
with a decisive campaign, by reason of the fact that his expedi-
tionary force was depleted by withdrawal of British and French
troops to reenforce the Allied lines in France which, as we have
seen, were mightily assailed by Ludendorff in the spring of 19 18.
However, the Turks, fully engaged with the Arabs of Hedjaz,
were powerless to take advantage of the temporary weakness
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 347
of their most dangerous enemy ; and Allenby utilized the respite
afforded him by capturing Jericho and the Une of the Jordan and
by strengthening otherwise his hold upon Palestine.
With the turn of fortune on the Western Front and with the
arrival of reenforcements from India, and at almost the same
moment as General Franchet d'Esperey drove against the Bul-
gars, General Allenby resumed the offensive against the Turks.
On September 19, 1918, he struck on a sixteen-mile front between
Rafat and the seacoast, and cleared the ground for a sensational
cavalry dash, which within thirty-six hours reached Beisan and
;#^'
Progress of British and Arab Offensive in Turkey, October, 191 8
Nazareth, far to the north, and broke up the Turkish armies
between the Jordan and the Mediterranean. Haifa and Acre
were seized on September 23, and three days later the British
arrived at the Sea of Galilee and occupied Tiberias. Turkish
forces east of the Jordan were meanwhile being driven by the
Arabs in a southerly direction and were thus hopelessly separated
from their comrades west of the Jordan who were fleeing north in
a mad rout.
Allenby's advance was now a rapid pursuit, without any
frontal fighting on the part of the Turks. The British general,
accompanied by the son of the Sultan of Hedjaz, entered Damas-
cus on October i ; and Rayak, Beirut, Tripoli, and Homs fell
in quick succession. On October 26 Aleppo was captured, and
the German General Liman von Sanders, with the Turkish Gen-
eral Staff in his baggage train, fled to Alexandretta. In five
weeks the Allies in Palestine and Syria had moved their front
three hundred miles to the northward ; they had taken 8o,ocx)
348 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
prisoners and 350 guns; they had destroyed whole Turkish
armies ; and they had cut the much prized Bagdad Railway.
To cap the climax of Turkish disaster, the British in Meso-
potamia now moved irresistibly upon Mosul, while the Allies
in Macedonia threatened Adrianople and even Constantinople
itself. The *' Sick Man of the East" was in his last throes. The
Sultan Mohammed V had died on July 3, and his successor,
Mohammed VI, now accepted (October 10) the resignations of
Enver Pasha, Talaat Pasha, and the other Young Turks who by
espousing the Teutonic cause had brought their country to ruin,
and consented to sue for peace. On October 14 the Porte
appealed to President Wilson to use his influence to secure an
armistice. Receiving no reply from the United States, the
Turkish Government released General Townshend, who had
been captured at Kut-el-Amara, and sent him to the head-
quarters of Admiral Calthorpe, commanding the British naval
forces in the ^gean, to ask that negotiations should be imme-
diately opened for an armistice. Admiral Calthorpe outlined
the conditions on which the request would be granted, and
during the last week of October Turkish plenipotentiaries arrived
under safe conduct at Mudros on the island of Lemnos.
Here, on October 30, was signed an armistice which went into
effect on the following day. Its main terms were the opening of
the Dardanelles, Bosphorus, and Black Sea, the prompt repatri-
ation of Allied prisoners, the demobilization of the Turkish army,
the severing of all relations with the Central Powers, and the
placing of Turkish territory at the disposal of the Allies for
military purposes.
German mastery of the Near East had lasted only three years.
Throughout the Near East, in Syria, in Mesopotamia, in Persia,
in Armenia, in Asia Minor, in all the Balkan states, and in Con-
stantinople, the Allies were now masters. The solution of the
Near Eastern problems rested henceforth not with the Central
Empires but with the Entente Powers. For the unconditional
surrender of Bulgaria and Turkey was followed straightway by the
complete collapse of that keystone of Mittel-Europa, that Power
which in 19 14 had precipitated the Great War — Austria-Hungary.
THE COLLAPSE OF AUSTRIA-HUNGARY: RESURGENCE OF
OPPRESSED NATIONALITIES
Long before the surrender of Bulgaria and Turkey, long before
the German defeat on the Western Front, the Dual Monarchy
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 349
faced disaster. Unlike her confederates, Austria-Hungary suf-
fered less from foreign prowess than from internal weakness.
Ever since the Russian Revolution, in March, 191 7, the task of
dominating a majority of Slavs by a minority of Magyars and
German-Austrians, under any theory of democracy or national
self-determination, had become utterly hopeless.
At first each of the subject nationalities, — Czechoslovaks,
Jugoslavs, Poles, Ruthenians (Ukrainians), and Rumans, —
clamored for autonomy within the Dual Monarchy, but as time
went on they all demanded complete separation from German
Austria and from Hungary. Each of the subject nationaHties
developed remarkable soHdarity, the clergy and the university
professors vying as a rule with the business-men, the peasants,
and the artisans, in the furtherance of national interests. Sep-
aratist propaganda was carried on in the open and by stealth.
Loyalty to the Habsburgs was undermined. In such cities as
Prague, Agram, Laibach, Cracow, and Lemberg there were
increasingly frequent riots and demonstrations. Mutinies in the
Austro-Hungarian army were everyday occurrences ; and many
Czechoslovak, Jugoslav, and PoHsh troops deserted to the AlHes
and served the AlHed cause in Russia or on the Western Front or
in Italy. ^'National Councils" of the several subject nation-
alities were organized in Paris, or London, or Rome, or Wash-
ington; and these ''provisional governments" not only fanned
the flame of sedition within Austria-Hungary but strove to se-
cure active Allied assistance in their efforts to disintegrate the
Dual Monarchy.
In 191 7 "disloyal" agitation had been less prevalent among
Poles than among Czechoslovaks and Jugoslavs. The Poles
of Galicia had always been treated rather liberally by the Habs-
burgs, and the erection of a kingdom of Poland by Austro-Ger-
man decree of November 5, 191 6, had temporarily appeased the
Austrian Poles and enabled Premier von Seidler to control a
majority of votes in the Austrian Reichsrat. But in the winter
of 1917-1918 Austria lost the support of her Poles, for she was
obHged to agree to Germany's poHcy respecting Poland, and
Germany's poHcy was to strengthen Ukrainia at Poland's ex-
pense. Thus the PoHsh province of Cholm was incorporated
into the new Ukrainian state, despite the vehement protests of
the German-appointed PoHsh Regency at Warsaw (February
14, 1918) and the bitter imprecations of the Austrian Poles in
Galicia. Thenceforth the Poles, as well as the Jugoslavs and
the Czechoslovaks, were openly hostile to the Dual Monarchy.
350 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
General Joseph Pilsudski, a great national hero and formerly
quite pro-Austrian, directed such an agitation in Poland against
the Teutons that for the safety of Mittel-Europa he was arrested
and deported to Germany. Joseph Haller, a colonel in the
Austrian army, deserted after the treaty of Brest-Litovsk, with
his Polish regiment, and, after joining the Czechoslovaks in
Russia, made his way to Paris, where he assumed supreme com-
mand of a Polish army fighting for the Allies in France. And
when the Polish deputies in the Austrian Reichsrat united with
the already numerous opposition of Czech and Jugoslav depu-
ties, parliamentary government in Austria became impossible.
The only session of the Reichsrat during the Great War was
closed abruptly by Emperor Charles and Premier von Seidler on
May 4, 1918.
The majority of the population of the Dual Monarchy were
at last becoming articulate, and, what was far more significant,
they were uniting in common opposition to the continuance of
the Habsburg Empire.' This was the burden of the Pan-Slavic
Congress held at Prague on January 6, 1918, of a second Con-
gress held at Agram on March 2, and of a third held at Laibach
in July. But greater freedom of speech naturally prevailed out-
side of Austria-Hungary than within; and consequently the
clearest statement of the aims of the subject peoples of the Dual
Monarchy was made at the famous Congress of Oppressed Aus-
trian Nationalities convened at Rome under the auspices of the
Italian Government on April 10, 1918. This Congress, which
included leading representatives of the Czechoslovaks, Jugo-
slavs, Rumans, and Poles, unanimously adopted the following
resolutions : *' (i) Every people proclaims it to be its right to
determine its own nationality and to secure national unity and
complete independence ; (2) Every people knows that the Austro-
Hungarian Monarchy is an instrument of German domination
and a fundamental obstacle to the realization of its free develop-
ment and self-government; (3) The Congress recognizes the
necessity of fighting against the common oppressors."
That the Congress at Rome faithfully reflected the sentiments
of the subject nationahties in Austria-Hungary was amply
demonstrated three days later by a noteworthy assembly at
Prague. On this occasion the Reichsrat deputies of the Czech
nation and those of the Jugoslav nation, the latter speaking in
the name of the Croats, Slovenes, and Serbs, met and made a
joint agreement, through an oath worthy of everlasting remem-
brance, to suffer and struggle relentlessly to free their peoples
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 351
from the foreign yoke and bring down into the dust the old
imperialistic Empire, covered, as they said, with the maledic-
tions of mankind.
To the appeals of the oppressed Austrian nationalities the
Allies did not turn deaf ears. Already, in 191 7, France had
authorized the organization of PoHsh and Czechoslovak armies
on the Western Front and had recognized them as belligerent
units; and now, on April 21, 1918, Italy recognized the Czecho-
slovak National Council as a de facto government and placed a
Czechoslovak legion beside her own troops on the Piave Front.
On May 29 Secretary Lansing, in behalf of the United States,
declared *' that the nationaHstic aspirations of the Czechoslovaks
and the Jugoslavs for freedom have the earnest sympathy
of this Government"; and a week later the sixth session
of the Supreme War Council, meeting at Versailles and
attended by the prime ministers of France, Great Britain,
and Italy, adopted resolutions that "the creation of a
united, independent Polish state, with free access to the
sea, constitutes one of the conditions of a soHd and just
peace and the rule of right in Europe," and that "the Allies
have noted with satisfaction the declaration of the American
Secretary of State, to which they adhere, expressing the greatest
sympathy with the national aspirations of the Czechs and Jugo-
slavs for freedom." Of the complete independence of Czecho-
slovakia, formal recognition was accorded by France on June 30,
by Great Britain on August 13, by the United States on Septem-
ber 2, and by Japan on September 9. No other course could
honorably be taken by the Allies toward a country whose soldiers
at the time were waging war against the Central Empires in
France, in Italy, and most thrillingly in Russia.
Under the circumstances the Habsburg officials at Vienna and
at Budapest bent all their energies to the task of preserving some
semblance of order in their dominions until such time as the
Germans should have won the war and come to their assistance.
They proclaimed martial law in Bohemia and in Croatia. They
imprisoned "seditious" persons and endeavored to suppress
"revolutionary" publications. They kept a fairly large army
on the Italian Front, though they discovered to their chagrin
that it was no longer fit for any offensive operations. They
sent some artillery and a few regiments of infantry to aid Luden-
dorff in his supreme effort on the Western Front. Most of all,
for the success of the great German offensive in France they
prayed ceaselessly and imploringly. There was little else that
352 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
they could do. There was no other hope for them. German
defeat would mean for Germany simply defeat; for the Dual
Monarchy, it would signify dissolution.
Despairingly the Magyars and the German Austrians wit-
nessed the quick, sharp hammer-blows with which Marshal Foch
during August and September was driving Ludendorff 's mighty
hosts out of France and Belgium. Still more despairingly they
beheld the surrender of Bulgaria and the advance of General
Franchet d'Esperey's armies, in October, to the Danube and into
Bosnia and Herzegovina. The nadir of their despair was reached
when, on October 24, General Diaz, the commander-in-chief of
the ItaHan armies, struck suddenly against their lines along the
Piave and in the Alps. Their remaining armed forces were now
so honeycombed with disaffection and sedition that they were
incapable of making even a defensive stand.
Italian armies on October 24-25, 1918, smote the Austrians
in the Monte Grappa region, between the Brenta and Piave
rivers, while a British unit attacked along the lower Piave and a
French unit took Monte Seisemol on the Asiago plateau. By
October 30 the Italians had captured Monte Grappa, with 33,000
prisoners, and were driving the Austrians back along the whole
front from the Alps to the Adriatic.
With the fall of Monte Grappa the enemy army in the moun-
tains was definitely cut off from the one in the plains, and both
began to flee in increasing confusion. By November i the one
in the south was in utter rout, and the ItaHans were already
across the Livenza river, inflicting terrific losses on the fugi-
tives. The whole stretch of country, in the mountains and on
the plains, for a distance of seventy miles, was strewn with the
bodies of Austrian dead. On November 3 the Italian War
Office announced that both Trent and Trieste had been cap-
tured and that ItaHan cavalry had entered Udine. In ten days
the Austrians lost an immense quantity of material of all kinds,
nearly all their stores and depots, and left in Italian hands some
300,000 prisoners and not fewer than 5000 guns.
Meanwhile, Austria-Hungary had bowed to the inevitable.
On October 29, Count JuHus Andrassy, who had recently suc-
ceeded Baron Burian as foreign minister of the Dual Monarchy,
notified President Wilson that his Government was ready to
acknowledge ^'the rights of the peoples of Austria-Hungary,
notably those of the Czechoslovaks and the Jugoslavs," and to
make a separate peace without awaiting the outcome of Ger-
many's negotiations, and he begged the United States to urge
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 353
upon the Allies the cessation of hostilities. On October 31 an
official Austrian mission, under a flag of truce, visited the head-
quarters of General Diaz and offered unconditional surrender.
An armistice was accordingly drawn up and signed on November
3, 19 18; and on the following day hostiUties against Austria-
Hungary ceased. The principal terms of the armistice were
as follows : complete demobilization of the Austro-Hungarian
armies and the withdrawal of all troops operating with the
Germans, half of the artillery and equipment being dehvered to
the Allies ; evacuation of all territories invaded by Austro-
Hungarian troops and likewise of all territory in dispute between
the Austro-Hungarians on one hand and the Italians and Slavs
on the other, such territory being occupied by the Allies ; AlKed
occupation of strategical points in Austria-Hungary and of the
transport system of the Dual Monarchy; withdrawal of all
German troops from the Balkan and Italian fronts as well as
from Austria-Hungary; immediate repatriation of Allied pris-
oners ; surrender of captured Allied merchantmen ; and delivery
to the Allies of fifteen Austro-Hungarian submarines, three
battleships, three light cruisers, nine destroyers, twelve torpedo
boats, and six monitors, all other warships being disarmed ; and
Allied occupation of Pola and control of the Danube.
The irretrievable disaster of the Austro-Hungarian armies in
Italy led swiftly, even before the conclusion of the armistice, to
the dissolution of the Dual Monarchy. By the end of October
the Government at Vienna had resigned and the empire was
already disintegrating into independent states. Emperor Charles
acquiesced in the inevitable by appointing Professor Lammasch,
an anti-war Liberal, as head of a liquidation ministry to hand
over the former imperial powers to the provisional governments
of the several emerging nationalities.
From the ruins of the Habsburg Empire, Czechoslovakia
emerged at once. On October 18 its independence had been
solemnly declared at Paris ; ten days later the Austrian Governor
fled from Prague ; and on October 29 Dr. Karel Kramarcz, the
local head of the Czechoslovak National Council, proclaimed the
deposition of Charles as king of Bohemia, Moravia, Silesia, and
Slovakia, and the establishment of a free and united republic.
At the end of October two delegations of Czechoslovak leaders —
the one from Prague and the other from Paris — met at Geneva
in Switzerland and drafted a constitution for the new republic,
modeled in part after that of the United States, and chose Pro-
fessor Thomas G. Masaryk, the ''grand old man" of Bohemia, as
2 A
354 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
provisional president. A Czechoslovak National Assembly,
convened in Prague in November, ratified the choice of Masaryk
as president and selected Kramarcz as prime minister.
Jugoslavia was also becoming a reality. Over the Slovenes
of Austria and the Croats of Croatia and the Serbs of Bosnia-
Herzegovina, the Jugoslav National Council at Agram assumed
control. On October 29 the Croatian Diet unanimously pro-
claimed the deposition of Emperor Charles and the separation of
the "kingdom of Dalmatia, Slovenia and Fiume" from Hungary.
At the same time the Diet expressed a desire for union with
Serbia and Montenegro. ''The people of Croatia, Slovenia, and
Serbia wish to have nothing in common with Austria and Hun-
gary. They aspire to a union of all the Jugoslavs within the
limits extending from the Isonzo to the Vardar. They desire to
constitute a free state, sovereign and independent." For the ful-
fillment of this desire, a provisional agreement was reached at
Geneva, in Switzerland, on November 7, between Nicholas
Pashitch, premier of Serbia, Dr. Anton Koroshetz, leader of the
Jugoslav party in the Austrian Reichsrat, and Dr. Anton Trum-
bitch, president of the Jugoslav National Council in London.
Although there were cultural and religious differences between
the Croatians and Slovenes, on one hand, and the Serbs, on the
other, and although the Slovenes in particular would have pre-
ferred a republic to a monarchy, nevertheless so great was the
desire for national union that, in accordance with the arrange-
ments effected at Geneva, the Jugoslav Convention at Agram on
November 24 formally proclaimed the establishment of *'the
Unitary Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes." ^ Of the new
kingdom — really a Greater Serbia — King Peter of Serbia be-
came monarch, with Prince Alexander as regent, and with a
coalition ministry including Pashitch as premier, Koroshetz as
vice-premier, and Trumbitch as minister of foreign affairs.
Against the union. King Nicholas of Montenegro alone held out ;
his fate was sealed by the Montenegrin Parliament, which on
December i deposed him and voted for the incorporation of
Montenegro into the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes.
Apace the disintegration of the Dual Monarchy proceeded.
Transylvania fell away froni Hungary and Bukowina from Aus-
tria, and both were prepared by nationahst agitators for union
with Rumania. The Banat of Temesvar drifted away from
Hungary and became the object of rival claims of Rumania and
^ This action was confirmatory of the Declaration of Corfu of July 20, 1917.
See above, p. 265.
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 355
Serbia. And Galicia, the scene of conflict between Poland and
Ukrainia, was a unit in repudiating Austrian rule.
Even Hungary would no longer endure any form of union with
the Teutons. Demonstrations at Budapest on October 28 inau-
gurated a swift and comparatively bloodless revolution which
put Count Michael Karolyi and his Independence Party in
power. On November 2 Karolyi announced to the Hungarian
National Council that the Emperor-King Charles had volun-
tarily freed the Magyars from their oath of fealty and left them
free to decide their future form of government. On November
16 Hungary was formally declared a repubhc, with Karolyi as
governor, and assurances were given of radical democratic
reform. It was the end of the Ausgleich between Austria and
Hungary. The Dual Monarchy was no more.
In the meantime Vienna had become the center of a revolution
which aimed to weld the Teutonic population of Austria proper
and of the Tyrol into the "German State of Austria" under a
national and democratic government. The movement began on
October 30 with a demonstration of students and workmen in
front of the Parliament building, when the president of the
German National Council announced a new administration.
"But without the Habsburgs !" shouted the crowd. An officer
in uniform then called upon his fellow-officers to remove their
imperial cockades, which was done "with enthusiasm" ; and the
imperial standard, flying before the Parliament building, was
hauled down. Even German Austria was done with the Habs-
burgs.
Emperor Charles was ruined by a war which he did not make
and by circumstances over which he had little control. Young,
well-intentioned, and amiable, his respectable personal qualities
were no proof against the vast elemental forces which took his
realm from him and only left him the unenviable fame of being
the last of the Habsburg Emperors. On November 11, 1918,
Charles issued his final imperial decree. "Since my accession,"
he said, "I have incessantly tried to rescue my peoples from this
tremendous war. I have not delayed the reestablishment of
constitutional rights or the opening of a way for the people to
substantial national betterment. -Filled with an unalterable
love for my people, I will not, with my person, be a hindrance to
their free development. I acknowledge the decision taken by
German Austria to form a separate state. The people have by
their deputies taken charge of the government. I relinquish
all participation in the administration of the state. Likewise I
356 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
have released the members of the Austrian government from
their offices. May the German Austrian people realize harmony
from the new adjustment. The happiness of my peoples was my
aim from the beginning. My warmest wishes are that an in-
terval of peace will avail to heal the wounds of this war." On
November 13 the National Assembly at Vienna formally pro-
claimed German Austria a republic.^
The Great War began in July, 1914, with the attack of the
Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary upon the little Slav state
of Serbia. By the autumn of 1918, however, Serbia was free and
amply avenged. Within the former confines of the Dual Mon-
archy were now the three independent republics of Czecho-
slovakia, German Austria, and Hungary, while large portions of
its erstwhile territories were added to Poland, to Italy, to Ru-
mania, and to Serbia. The Habsburg Empire was destroyed;
it had taken the sword, and by the sword it had perished.
Of Mittel-Europa all that remained was the Empire of the
HohenzoUerns, and the way was now opened for an Allied
advance into Germany not only through France and Belgium
but through Austria and Czechoslovakia and Poland. The
Empire was tottering and the HohenzoUerns were preparing for
flight. Germany, which in 19 14 had not delayed to stand "in
shining armor" beside her ally, could not delay in 1918 to follow
Austria-Hungary in suing for peace.
THE END OF HOSTILITIES: FLIGHT OF WILLIAM II
Synchronizing with the surrender of Bulgaria and Turkey and
the collapse of Austria-Hungary was the constant, forced retire-
ment of German troops from France and Belgium. Late in
October serious mutinies broke out in the German fleet, soldiers
at the front refused to fight, Ludendorff resigned, Liebknecht
and other Independent Socialists were inciting revolution,
Emperor WilHam was promising far-reaching democratic reforms,
and Chancellor Prince Maximilian was begging President Wilson
to grant an armistice.
^ Austrian general elections were held on February 15, 1919, with four million
men and women participating. The National Constituent Assembly, thus chosen,
convened on March 4, its membership comprising 70 Social Democrats, 64 Christian
Socialists (Clericals), and 91 adherents of minor groups. Karl Seitz, leader of the
Social Democrats, was elected president ; a coalition ministry of Social Democrats
and Christian Socialists was formed under Karl Renner as chancellor ; and a re-
publican constitution for German Austria was drafted and subsequently adopted.
Ex-Emperor Charles sought refuge in Switzerland in March, 1919.
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 357
Negotiations between the United States and Germany which
began on October 5 ended on November 5, when President Wil-
son informed the Germans that Marshal Foch had been author-
ized to conclude an armistice with accredited German agents and
that the Allies were ready to make peace according to the terms
laid down ''in the President's address to Congress of January,
19 18, and the principles of settlement enunciated in his sub-
sequent addresses," subject to reservations on "Point Two"
(the freedom of the seas) and to an explicit understanding that
"compensation will be made by Germany for all damage done to
the civilian population of the Allies and their property by the
aggression of Germany by land, by sea, and from the air." The
next day the German Government sent a mission headed by
Mathias Erzberger to receive the terms of armistice from Marshal
Foch. At Rethondes, six miles east of Compiegne, the dejected
German envoys on November 8 met the stern generalissimo of
the Allied armies and heard from his lips the hard conditions of
the victors, conditions which without amendment they must
accept or reject within seventy-two hours. At five o'clock in
the morning of November 11 the terms of the armistice were
finally accepted and signed.
In accordance with the armistice, hostilities were to cease
everywhere at eleven a.m. on November 11. Within fourteen
days Germany was to evacuate Belgium, France, Alsace-Lor-
raine, and Luxemburg ; within a month she was to evacuate all
territory on the left bank of the Rhine. Allied troops would
promptly occupy these areas together with the bridgeheads at
the principal crossings of the Rhine (Mainz, Coblenz, and
Cologne) to a depth of thirty kilometers on the right bank. The
treaties of Brest-Litovsk and Bucharest were to be renounced
and German troops withdrawn from Russia, Rumania, Austria-
Hungary, and Turkey. German submarines and warships were
to be surrendered, and likewise five thousand locomotives, five
thousand motor lorries, and 150,000 railway cars in good working
order. The economic blockade against Germany would remain
in force.
The terms of the armistice, originally agreed upon for thirty
days, were subsequently renewed from time to time and re-
mained in effect, with minor changes, until the signing of the
definitive treaty of peace at Versailles on June 28, 1919. In the
meantime the Allies secured a strangle-hold upon Germany.
Within ten days after German acceptance of the armistice, the
Allied armies had passed beyond Brussels, had penetrated into
358
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Luxemburg, and had reached Saarbriicken and the Alsatian line
of the Rhine to the Swiss border. King Albert of Belgium
formally entered Ghent on November 13, Antwerp on November
19, and Brussels on November 22. General Petain, commander-
in-chief of the French armies, who was made a Marshal of France
on November 19, entered Metz the same day ; and on November
25 French troops under Marshals Foch and Petain triumphantly
E^ LAND
\i^ WMS.EW6.C0.,N.Y.
Territory Occupied by the Allies under the Armistice of November ii
occupied Strassburg. Everywhere the advancing armies were
welcomed by the inhabitants. The demonstrations by the
people in Belgium and in Alsace-Lorraine were marked by undis-
guised joy, in the one case that they were again free and inde-
pendent after four years' indescribable sufferings, in the other
case that they were returning to France after a compulsory
separation of forty-eight years. Even in Luxemburg, which was
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 359
believed to have strong German leanings, the American troops
were cordially received. By the middle of December the French
had advanced 170 miles, the British, 150, the Americans, 160,
and the Belgians, 160. The British took over the administra-
tion of the zone around Cologne, the Americans that around
Coblenz, and the French that around Mainz.
The first surrender of German naval vessels under the armis-
tice was the delivery of twenty submarines to Admiral Tyrwhitt
of the British navy off Harwich at sunrise on November 20.
The following day nineteen more were delivered. The most
spectacular event, however, was the surrender of the German
High Seas Fleet to Admiral Beatty and the Allied armada off the
Firth of Forth on the morning of November 21, the greatest
naval capitulation in history. The ships surrendered were nine
dreadnoughts, five battle cruisers, seven light cruisers, and fifty
destroyers, representing a total tonnage of 410,000. Under
British guardianship this mighty flotilla was interned at Scapa
Flow in the Orkneys ; the vaunted German navy was at last in
British hands, and Germany was defenseless not only in Europe
but on the seas and in the dominions beyond the seas.
The Teutonic debacle was complete. Sea power was gone.
Land power was gone. Belgium was arising from her ruins.
France was in possession of Alsace-Lorraine. Allied armies held
the Rhine. To the East, Polish troops were advancing toward
Posen and Danzig, while the Czechoslovaks were occupying
Upper Silesia. Rumania denounced the treaty of Bucharest and
reappeared as one of the Allies. Constantinople was at the
mercy of the Allied fleets, and communications were opened
between General Franchet d'Esperey, on the Danube, and Gen-
eral Denikin, commanding anti-Bolshevist forces in southern
Russia. The whole dream of Teutonic mastery of Russia was
dispelled. Skoropadsky, the pro-German dictator of Ukrainia,
was overthrown ; the pro- Ally General Mannerheim became the
head of the Finnish Government; and the states of Finland,
Esthonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Ukrainia made haste to pro-
claim their complete independence and to appeal to the Allies
for assistance against the Teutons on one side and against the
Bolsheviki on the other. In Poland the German-appointed
regency resigned on November 14, 191 8, in favor of General
Joseph Pilsudski, who had recently been released from a German
prison; in January, 1919, Pilsudski reached an agreement with
the Polish National Committee at Paris whereby Ignace Pade-
rewski, the celebrated pianist, became premier and minister of
foreign affairs while he himself was made president.
360 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
To the neutral countries of Europe the cessation of hostilities
brought an intense feeling of relief. The Scandinavian countries,
the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Spain could now reduce their
armed establishments to a peace footing without fear of having
their neutrality violated ; they perceived the early ending of the
economic distress under which they had long labored ; and they
promptly repressed whatever sympathies they may have had for
Germany. For a time they were threatened in greater or lesser
degree by the revolutionary agitation which followed in the
wake of Mittel-Europa's collapse, but they managed to weather
the storm, and Denmark was soon demanding the retrocession
of northern Schleswig as her portion of the spoils of vanquished
Germany.
Such a catastrophe as was overtaking the Teutons could not
leave intact either the territory or the political institutions of
Germany. The German Empire had been builded in the four
years from 1866 to 1870 by iron and blood ; by iron and blood it
was destroyed in the four years from 1914 to 19 18. Its subject
nationalities — the Poles in Posen and West Prussia, the Czechs
in Silesia, the Danes in Schleswig, and the French in Alsace-
Lorraine — were now liberated from its yoke ; and the German
people themselves were free within their restricted territories to
resume the task of creating national unity at the point where the
democratically minded deputies of 1848 had laid it down and
resigned themselves to the acceptance of Bismarck's substitute
of militarism, autocracy, and imperialism.
On the eve of the conclusion of the armistice, when Germany
first began to appreciate the extent of her defeat and humiliation,
there were loud popular outcries against the Kaiser and insistent
demands for his abdication. William hurriedly left Berlin and
sought refuge at General Headquarters at Spa. But hither the
clamor followed him. News came that Liebknecht and the
Minority Socialists were inciting openly to rebellion and that
mutinies were occurring in the navy. The south German
states threatened to secede unless the Emperor should abdicate.
Philip Scheidemann, the leader of the Majority Socialists, tele-
graphed that he could no longer be responsible for the actions of
his followers. On November 8 the Socialists at Munich, under
Kurt Eisner, deposed King Louis, transformed Bavaria from a
monarchy into a republic, and served notice on Emperor William
that they could not tolerate royalist institutions. Frantically
Chancellor Prince Maximilian wired the Kaiser that abdication
must be immediately forthcoming. To all these civilian en-
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 361
treaties William II might have turned a deaf ear, but when at
last Field Marshal von Hindenburg and other weighty members
of the General Staff bluntly told him that they could no longer
insure his personal safety because the German army itself was
seething with disloyalty and sedition, he hastily packed his bags
and with a few faithful henchmen fled quite ingloriously on
November 9, 1918, across the frontier into Holland. On the
following day he took up his residence in Count Goddard Ben-
tinck's chateau at Amerongen. To Holland, also, fled subse-
quently that other despised HohenzoUern, the Crown Prince
Frederick William. It was a curious commentary upon the
mutability of human fortune that the history of the German
Empire was almost exclusively the history of two reigns —
William the First (1871-1888), under whom the Empire had been
reared in might, and of William the Last (1888-1918), under
whom the Empire had fallen with a fearful crash.
On November 9, 191 8, the German Imperial Chancellor,
Prince Maximilian of Baden, issued the following decree: "The
Kaiser and King has decided to renounce the throne. The
Imperial Chancellor will remain in ofhce until the questions con-
nected with the abdication of the Kaiser, the renouncing by the
Crown Prince of the throne of the German Empire and of Prussia,
and the setting up of a regency, have been settled. For the
regency he intends to appoint Deputy Ebert as Imperial Chan-
cellor, and he proposes that a bill should be brought in for the
establishment of a law providing for the immediate promul-
gation of general suffrage and for a constituent German National
Assembly, which will settle finally the future form of govern-
ment of the German Nation and of those peoples which might
be desirous of coming within the empire."
A general upheaval throughout Germany quickly followed
the publication of Prince Maximilian's decree. Throughout the
Rhenish and Westphalian industrial regions the movement
spread like wildfire. Imperial emblems were torn down and red
flags hoisted. With Socialists cooperated Catholic Centrists
and Protestant Liberals. Hamburg, Bremen, and Leipzig went
over to the revolution. While contested in some places, on the
whole it was accomplished with an astonishing lack of disorder.
In Berlin only a few hours on Sunday, November 10, sufficed for
its complete triumph. Here a general strike was started at nine
o'clock in the morning, and shortly afterwards thousands of
soldiers, carrying red flags and accompanied by armed motor
cars, began to pour into the center of the city. With them
362 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
came workingmen from outlying factories, and a little later
trains arrived bringing 3000 sailors from Kiel. Presently all
these arrivals broke up into detachments and occupied the
bridges, public buildings, street corners, and railway stations.
Almost as by magic red flags appeared everywhere, and officers
on the streets and barracks stripped off their cockades and
epaulettes — in very few cases was compulsion required — and
threw them away. Hundreds of Iron Crosses could be picked
up from the gutters. The announcement from the front of the
Reichstag building that Friedrich Ebert, a conspicuous leader
of the Social Democratic Party, had become Chancellor and had
chosen a popular ministry, was greeted with thunderous cheers.
From the official news agency a message of democratic triumph
was transmitted to the whole world. "The revolution has
gained a glorious and almost bloodless victory."
In those November days of 191 8 German crowns fell like over-
ripe fruit in late autumn. The flight of the king of Bavaria on
November 8 and of the king of Prussia on November 9 was fol-
lowed immediately by the abdication or deposition of the kings
of Wiirttemberg and Saxony, the grand dukes of Baden, Olden-
burg, Mecklenburg, and Saxe- Weimar, the dukes of Brunswick
and Anhalt, and all the lesser princes. By the end of November
every German state possessed a republican form of government.
It was not until Chancellor Ebert was firmly established in
power and Germany seemed thoroughly committed to repub-
licanism that Emperor William II, at Amerongen, on November
28, 1918, signed a formal abdication of the crowns of Prussia and
the German Empire, and that Crown Prince Frederick William,
at Wieringen in Holland, on December i, definitely renounced
all claims to the succession. On November 30 the Ebert Govern-
ment decreed a provisional electoral law, by which a National
Assembly should be elected by secret ballot of all Germans over
twenty years of age, men and women alike, and this Assembly
would determine the country's future political institutions.
In the meantime Germany was tormented by economic dis-
tress and torn by partisan strife. On the one hand a consider-
able number of Junkers, pan-Germans, and confirmed mil-
itarists, blaming the radicals for the disasters which had over-
taken the nation and fearing the revolution would deprive them
of their rights and privileges, conducted an agitation in behalf
of a monarchical restoration. On the other hand the *'Spar-
tacus" group of SociaKsts, led by Karl Liebknecht and Rosa
Luxemburg, were unwilling that the German Revolution should
ALLIES TRIUMPH AND CENTRAL EUROPE REVOLTS 363
stop short with the establishment of a democratic republic; in
imitation of the Russian Bolsheviki they held that there should
be no National Assembly and that the body politic, as well as the
Government, should consist of one class, the proletariat, while
the intellectual class should be hired to work for it, and the cap-
italists and landlords should be eliminated altogether. With the
*'Spartacans," the Minority Socialists, led by Hugo Haase,
Eduard Bernstein, and Karl Kautsky, were inclined to coop-
erate. The Spartacans were aided, moreover, by the ambas-
sador of the Russian Soviet Government in Berlin, Karl Radek,
and to a certain extent by Kurt Eisner, the Socialist premier of
Bavaria; they championed 'direct action" and fomented
strikes and disorders. For a while it was feared in Allied coun-
tries that Germany — and all Mittel-Europa — would follow
Russia into Bolshevism.
The Majority Socialists, however, under Ebert and Scheide-
mann steered a middle course, suppressing the reactionaries on
one hand and discountenancing the activities of the Sparta-
cans on the other. They were resolved to erect a democratic
republic by orderly processes, and in their resolution they were
supported by the bulk of trade-unionists throughout Germany
as well as by the Catholic Center Party, recently rechristened
the '' Christian People's Party," and by the "Democratic Party, "
which represented a fusion of the radicals of the old Progressive
Party and the left wing of the old National Liberal Party.
On the eve of the elections to the National Assembly, in
January, 1919, the Spartacans and other extremists, abetted by
the chief of police at Berlin, made a desperate effort to seize the
Government and introduce a reign of terror. The insurrection
was sternly suppressed by Ebert's Government : several hundred
rioters were slain ; Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg were
killed by loyalist mobs on January 15 ; and on January 19 the
elections to the National Assembly passed off without untoward
incidents.^ ( '
At Weimar, on February 6, 1919, the German National
Assembly was opened. It included 164 Majority Socialists, 91
Centrists, and 77 Democrats, — a total Government hloc of
332, — while the Opposition was confined to 34 Nationalists
(former Conservatives and reactionaries) and 24 Minority
^ Subsequently there were spasmodic outbreaks of disorder in Germany. The
assassination of Kurt Eisner by reactionaries on February 21 precipitated fairly
serious civil war in Bavaria ; and in March there were menacing situations else-
where in the country. Ebert's Government managed, however, to retain the
upper hand and to restore order.
364 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Socialists (more or less in sympathy with soviet principles).
Some seven ''Independents" brought up the total membership
of this historic body to 397. Among the members were twenty-
eight women — veritably a remarkable sign of the new demo-
cratic era.
On February 11, 1919, the National Assembly adopted a
provisional constitution for republican Germany and elected
Friedrich Ebert as Provisional State President. At the same
time Philip Scheidemann became chancellor, with a coalition
ministry comprising seven Majority Socialists, three Centrists,
three Democrats, and one Independent, and including such well-
known men as Mathias Erzberger, Gustav Noske, Eduard
David, and Count von Brockdorff-Rantzau.
The flight of Emperor William II and the ensuing establish-
ment of a democratic republic in Germany aroused Teutonic
hopes that the Allies in dictating final peace-terms would be
specially considerate and merciful. But such hopes were soon
blasted. The Allies had suffered too much and too long from
HohenzoUern militarism and imperialism and had had too many
proofs of popular German devotion to that imperialism and mili-
tarism, to be impressed by a twelfth-hour conversion of the
German people to pacifism and democracy. As recently as
March, 1918, Germany had dictated an outrageous peace to
Russia and to Rumania, and if her armies on the Western Front
had been as successful in the summer of 1918 as Ludendorff had
predicted, she would have shown no consideration and no mercy
to France or Great Britain or the United States. And in this
event the bulk of the German people would probably have been
as mute and as acquiescent as they had been in the negotiations
at Bucharest and Brest-Litovsk. Knowing these things the
Allies proceeded in much the same manner as they would have
done if Kaiser Wilhelm were still in power : the German people
might revolt and become republican if they liked — that was
little or no business of the Allies; it was the business of the
Allies to refashion the map of Europe and dictate the peace-
settlement in their own interests. **To the victors belonged
the spoils," and the Allies were the victors.
Longitude
CHAPTER XV
A NEW ERA BEGINS
THE SETTLEMENT
No series of events in the whole recorded history of mankind
had proved so cataclysmic, in a like period of time, as the Great
War, which began on July 28, 19 14, with Austria's attack on
Serbia and virtually closed on November 11, 191 8, with the armis-
tice between Germany and the Allies. In politics, in economics,
in society, Europe had undergone a revolution and the entire
world was in ferment. Yet out of the chaos must come order,
out of war must come peace. Just as the Great War had put
an end to an epoch of international anarchy and fear, so the peace-
settlement must serve to inaugurate a new era of international
cooperation and hope. Upon the sanity of the settlement would
depend the happiness of men and the true welfare of nations in
future generations.
The nature of Allied victory possessed for the peace-settlement
an advantage and a disadvantage. On the one hand, that the
victory was complete and overwhelming made it possible for
the Allies, if they chose to do so, to liquidate Mittel-Europa and
settle once for all the litigious estates of the Ottoman Turks, the
Habsburgs, and the Hohenzollerns. That the victory was
achieved by a large number of nations, held together in a loose and
informal federation, was disadvantageous, however, for each vic-
torious Power had its own particular interests to subserve, and
peace was likely to partake less of the character of ideal justice
than of selfish compromise.
Among the masses in all countries were large numbers who en-
tertained the fondest and most glorious expectations of what the
Peace Congress would do. According to them, it should lay
broad and deep the foundations of a new world-order ; it should
conduct its proceedings in the light of open day ; it should recog-
nize to the fullest degree the right of every people to decide its own
fate ; it should treat great and small nations alike ; truly it should
36s
366 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
*'make the world safe for democracy" ; it should finally end not
only the Great War but all wars.
But the diplomatists and statesmen of the several Powers,
while professing the utmost devotion to these altruistic principles,
had to face melancholy facts as well as roseate rainbows. They
had to recognize, and make allowance for, certain very earthy,
practical circumstances. In the first place, the war had been
so long and so exceedingly bitter and the Teutons had been guilty
of such heinous offenses against public and private morality that
naturally in Allied countries there was a feverish and night-
marish horror, in which some members of the governments
and the bulk of the people shared, and which gave rise to an
almost hypnotic fear of what Germany might do in the future
if she were not crushed and terribly punished at the present.
Doubtless in some quarters this psychosis went so far as to con-
fuse justice with vengeance.
Secondly, the war had entailed such grave economic losses
and hardships that many Allied citizens, aware of the downright
inability of Germany to make adequate financial reparation,
clamored all the more for some tangible compensation from her
in the form of territories and rights.
Thirdly, the AlHed Governments, though originally taking
the sword in order to rescue civilization from destruction, had
come in the course of the protracted conflict to wield that
sword for a great variety of specific ends : France, to regain
Alsace-Lorraine and to secure guarantees against subsequent
German aggression; Great Britain, to destroy the menacing
sea-power of Germany and to strengthen her own empire ;
Italy, to obtain Italia irredenta from Austria-Hungary and to
assure a commanding position for herself in the Adriatic and
eastern Mediterranean; Japan, to extend her sway in the Far
East and to establish a sort of ''Monroe Doctrine" for China;
Serbia, Rumania, Czechoslovakia, and Poland, to secure inde-
pendence and in each instance to annex any lands in which its
nationahty was represented; Greece, to obtain southern Al-
bania, and Thrace and Smyrna — all the coasts and islands of the
^gean. Upon these specific ends the peoples of the several
countries had set their minds, and their representatives at Paris
could not afford to disappoint them. The United States was
the only Great Power associated with the Entente which had no
territorial ambitions and whose motives in this respect could be
described as absolutely disinterested.
Then too, the temporary league of free nations, which had
A NEW ERA BEGINS 367
finally destroyed Mittel-Europa and crushed the German Em-
pire, had been builded up and strengthened by means of promises
held out to prospective members at various times when the
Entente was hard pressed. These promises were usually made
in the form of ''secret treaties," such as those of 191 5 by which
Italy had been brought into the war, or those of 191 6 which had
induced Rumania to join the Allies. In 191 7 a whole series of
secret engagements had been entered into, guaranteeing definite
territorial or economic gains to Great Britain, Russia, France,
Italy, and Japan. To none of the "secret treaties" was the
United States a party ; of the existence of some of them she was
actually kept in ignorance until after the cessation of hostilities ;
yet one of the celebrated ''fourteen points" of President Wilson,
on which the Allies consented to negotiate peace, was ''open
covenants openly arrived at." Here was a circumstance most
trying even to experienced and calloused diplomatists.
Between the actual situation imposed upon Allied statesmen
by circumstances of the preceding four years and the hopes of
enhghtened pubhc opinion in AHied countries there was ob-
viously a wide chasm. Between the aims and ambitions of the
several Allied Powers there was patent divergence and potential
cause of conflict. To prevent the chasm from becoming un-
bridgeable and the national divergences from leading to armed
strife — either of which would surely redound to Germany's
advantage and might easily enable the Teutons to escape just
punishment for their transgressions — it was decided soon after
the cessation of hostihties (November 11, 1918) to exclude Ger-
many from the Peace Conference until the Allies themselves
should have agreed upon the provisions of the final treaty of
peace, until their own differences should have been amicably
adjusted and the demands of their diplomatists squared as far
as possible with the dictates of popular conscience. It was
decided also, quite appropriately, that the Preliminary Con-
ference among the Allies "should be held in Paris, and the Defini-
tive Peace Congress with the Germans at Versailles, the two
historic capitals of France, — France which, perhaps of all the
Allies, had contributed most, ahke in suffering and in glorious
deed, to the cause of Allied victory.
January 18 was the date in 187 1 when the Hohenzollern king
of Prussia, in the midst of a successful war against France, and
surrounded by his triumphant generals and statesmen, had
stood in the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles and been proclaimed
German Emperor. Forty-eight years had since elapsed, and
368 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
now at the close of an overwhelmingly victorious war against
Germany, Allied statesmen and AlHed generals assembled at
Paris to undo the work of Bismarck and the Hohenzollerns. On
January i8, 1919, the Peace Conference held its first session.
It was a brilliant assemblage of the foremost men of those
countries which had banded together to resist Teutonic ag-
gression. There was Clemenceau, the grizzly and sagacious
veteran of French RepubHcan politics, the *' Tiger " of his country
and of the Alliance ; there was Marshal Foch, the organizer and
winner of victory ; there was President Wilson, who had played
a major role in the past two years of the war and who, in coming
to Europe, had established a wholly new precedent for American
executives ; there was Lloyd George, the *' httle Welsh attorney,"
who from being the most feared and hated radical social reformer
in Great Britain had become the most conspicuous patriot in
all the dominions of King George V; Orlando, the Italian
premier ; Marquis Saionji, twice prime minister of Japan ;
Venizelos, the greatest statesman of modern Greece ; Kramarcz,
premier of Czechoslovakia; Bratiano, premier of Rumania;
Pashitch, premier of Serbia; Stephen Pichon, French minister
of foreign affairs ; Jules Cambon, who was French ambassador
at Berlin when war broke out in 1914; Arthur J. Balfour,
British foreign secretary and once upon a time attendant at
the Congress of Berlin; General Botha and General Smuts,
erstwhile Boer warriors against Great Britain but now stalwart
defenders of the British Union of South Africa ; William Hughes,
premier of AustraHa ; William Massey, premier of New Zealand ;
Sir William Lloyd, premier of Newfoundland; Sir Robert
Borden, premier of Canada; the Maharajah of Bikaner and
Sir S. P. Sinha, representing India ; Prince Feisal, the son of the
Sherif of Mecca who had become the sultan of the new Arab
kingdom of Hedjaz; Robert Lansing, American Secretary of
State; Colonel House, special friend and confidential adviser
of President Wilson ; Henry White and General Bliss, represent-
ing the diplomatic and mihtary traditions of the United States ;
Baron Sidney Sonnino, Italian foreign minister continuously
since 19 14 and an uncompromising advocate of Italian imperial-
ism; Epitacio Pessoa, president-elect of Brazil and one of the
foremost jurists of Latin America; Paul Hymans, Belgian
foreign minister ; Van Der Heuvel, Belgian envoy to the Pope ;
and Emile Vandervelde, the patriotic Belgian Socialist. At-
tending all these celebrities were a host of more obscure but
no less important *' experts" — professors and publicists and
A NEW ERA BEGINS 369
cartographers and financiers and secretaries — a host as necessary
to the Peace Conference as privates to an army. And waiting
upon them were numerous ''missions" and '^ envoys" from
racial or religious groups throughout the world, who sought
favors or aspired to freedom : Russians, Koreans, negroes,
Irishmen, Abyssinians, etc.
The formal assembling of the Peace Conference on January 18
had been preceded by almost daily conferences of the Inter-
allied Supreme War Council and by several informal meetings
of the President of the United States with the premiers and
foreign ministers of Great Britain, France, and Italy, assisted
by the Japanese ambassadors in Paris and London. At these
meetings and conferences the procedure and general scope of
the Peace Conference had been planned.
The Preliminary Peace Conference, as organized, included
seventy delegates from thirty- two states, distributed as follows :
United States, Great Britain, France, Italy, and Japan, five
each; Belgium, Brazil, and Serbia, three apiece; Canada,
Australia, South Africa, India, China, Greece, Hedjaz, Poland,
Portugal, Rumania, Siam, and Czechoslovakia, two apiece;
and one each from New Zealand, Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador,
Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Liberia, Nicaragua, Panama,
Peru, and Uruguay. At the opening session of the Conference
in the Peace Hall of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, just across
the Seine from the Place de la Concorde, President Poincare
of the French Republic welcomed the delegates with felicitous
phrase, and then Premier Clemenceau of France was chosen
president, while honorary vice-presidencies were bestowed upon
Secretary Lansing of the United States, Premier Lloyd George
of Great Britain, Premier Orlando of Italy, and Marquis Saionji
of Japan.
Thenceforth, until the presentation of the draft of the com-
pleted treaty to the Germans on May 7, the Conference met
on rare occasions, and even its sessions were largely perfunctory
and ceremonial. The real work of the Conference was carried
on by special committees of diplomatists and ''experts" se-
lected as needs arose for the consideration of such matters as
''league of nations," "responsibility for the war," "reparations,"
"labor legislation," "international regulation of waterways,"
"financial questions," "economic questions," "territorial ques-
tions," etc. Most of the work was conducted in privacy and
secrecy, and only such committee reports were passed on to the
plenary Conference as met the approval of the spokesmen of
370 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
the Great Powers. At first the Great Powers maintained a
''Supreme Council," consisting of the two ranking delegates
from the United States, Great Britain, France, Italy, and Japan,
to which was subordinated all the machinery of the Conference
and before which all conflicting claims were presented. But
the Supreme Council of Ten proved too unwieldy, and it gradually
gave way to an informal Council of Five, including Japan ; then
Japan was dropped from the inner circle, and Premiers Clemen-
ceau, Lloyd George, Orlando, and President Wilson, known as
the Council of Four, carried on the discussions on the most im-
portant issues among themselves; finally, when on the eve of
the conclusion of the treaty with the Germans Italy became
temporarily alienated by the proposed settlement of Adriatic
claims, and Orlando withdrew, the chief responsibility for the
Conference devolved upon the ^'Big Three" — Wilson, Clemen-
ceau, and Lloyd George.
It was no easy task to reconcile differences of opinion and
policy among the thirty-two delegations and to preserve a united
front on the part of all the AlKed and Associated Governments.
President Wilson, who had set his heart upon fashioning a League
of Nations, felt himself obHged to make repeated concessions to
his associates in order to enhst their support for his pet project.
For example, ''freedom of the seas," of which he talked much
before he went to Europe, quite disappeared from polite con-
versation — it was a concession to British susceptibihties, and a
concession gratefully received, for the British delegates at Paris,
as soon as they were assured of the unquestioned control of the
seas by Great Britain, and British management, through a
"mandatary" system, of the bulk of the German colonies, be-
came enthusiastic champions of the League of Nations and de-
voted friends of President Wilson. To France President Wilson
found it convenient to yield not only Alsace-Lorraine and various
economic privileges in Germany but special financial and po-
htical rights, for a term of fifteen years, in the strictly Teutonic
Saar basin and the extraordinary guarantee of a new defensive
alliance between France, the United States, and Great Britain —
an alliance which in spirit if not in letter was contrary to earlier
declarations against group alliances within the League of Nations.
Furthermore, the German rights and privileges in Shantung,
instead of being surrendered to China, were transferred to
Japan, and the secret treaties which had been concluded in 191 7
between Japan and the Entente were recognized and upheld, be-
cause otherwise Japan threatened to withdraw from the Con-
A NEW ERA BEGINS 371
ference and to disrupt the League of Nations ; in this way the
United States departed radically from her traditional Far
Eastern poHcy of protecting China and permitted one of the
weaker Allies to be despoiled by one of the stronger. In the
case of Italy, which had the audacity to demand the cession,
at the expense of Serbia, not only of all the territory pledged her
by the secret treaties but the Adriatic port of Fiume also, Presi-
dent Wilson stood his ground better, but the Italian delegates
actually withdrew temporarily from the Conference and subse-
quently secured a compromise.^
In addition to these difficulties, the diplomatists at Paris were
confronted with perplexing boundary disputes among the lesser
Powers. So intermingled were different nationalities in various
parts of the ruined empires of Russia, Austria, and Turkey, that
it was well-nigh impossible to draw frontiers for Poland, Czecho-
slovakia, Rumania, Serbia, Greece, and Armenia, which would
satisfy the ambitions of their own peoples and which at the same
time would not outrage their neighbors. So conflicting, more-
over, were the interests of Japan, on one hand, and of Australia
and New Zealand, on the other, that it required much tact to
arrive at a territorial settlement in the Pacific. Over all these
questions the negotiations were protracted, and it was almost mi-
raculous that a general agreement was finally reached. Only the
weariness of the European peoples and the dictatorial attitude of
the representatives of the five Great Powers prevented some of
the AUied states from engaging in open war with each other, and
even then there were hostile clashes in Central Europe between
Poles and Czechoslovaks, between Poles and Ukrainians, between
Rumanians and Jugoslavs, and between Jugoslavs and Italians.
After four months of unremitting labor on the part of the
Allied diplomatists the draft of the proposed treaty with Ger-
many, containing about 80,000 words, was agreed to by the
Council of Five and accepted by the PreUminary Peace Con-
ference in plenary session assembled on May 6 ; ^ and the Pre-
^ Against the excessive imperialism of Orlando and Sonnino, protests had been
made in Italy, and at the close of 191 8 the Socialist Leonida Bissolati and the
Clerical Francesco Nitti had resigned their posts in the Orlando cabinet as minis-
ters respectively of pensions and finance. As an outcome of the controversy with
the Jugoslavs and President Wilson over Fiume, a new ministry was formed in July,
1 91 9, with Nitti as premier and Tommaso Tittoni as foreign secretary. Nitti was
somewhat more conciliatory than his predecessor, but not even he could be deaf
to vociferous demands of his countrymen for extensive territorial annexations.
For the settlement subsequently proposed, in January, 1920, see below, p. 385.
2 This plenary session on the afternoon of May 6 was secret ; and the treaty
draft was accepted without its details being fully and generally known. The reading
372 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
liminary Peace Conference was then transformed into the
Definitive Peace Congress, in which Germany was to be repre-
sented. Already, on May i, the German plenipotentiaries,
headed by Count Brockdorff-Rantzau, the foreign secretary of
the republican government at BerUn, had been formally received
at Versailles and had presented their credentials to the Allies.
Now, on May 7, 1919, which by a curious coincidence was the
fourth anniversary of the sinking of the Lusitania, Premier
Clemenceau, in the presence of the plenipotentiaries of France,
Great Britain, Italy, Japan, the United States, and the lesser
Allied belligerents, and in their behalf, submitted the final
peace-terms to Count Brockdorff-Rantzau and his associates
in the great dining hall of the Trianon Palace Hotel at Versailles.
The terms were stringent ; they testified eloquently to Germany's
degradation.
Throughout the next six weeks the world's attention was
centered upon the desperate efforts of Count Brockdorff-Rantzau
and his fellow-delegates to induce the Council of Five to modify
the stringent peace-terms. As oral discussion had been barred,
the Germans continued submitting notes of protest and argu-
ment until May 29, when they finally produced an elaborate
set of counterproposals in a document aggregating some 60,000
words. To this the Council of Five on June 16 made an almost
equally extended reply, chapter for chapter; it was in effect
an ultimatum calling for Germany's final acceptance or refusal
on or before Monday, June 23. It offered a number of con-
cessions, but none of vital import.
During the seven-day interval that followed, while the German
Government and National Assembly were in agitated discussion
as to whether to sign or refuse to sign, the Franco-Anglo-American
armies of occupation, under Marshal Foch, made all necessary
preparations, in case of refusal, to cross the Rhine in force and
march on Berlin, and the whole world awaited the outcome calmly
but with intense interest. Would Germany sign? German
newspapers, German statesmen, the Scheidemann ministry, and
President Ebert said ^'No." The masses of war-weary people,
led by the Minority Socialists, said ^'Yes." The first result in
Germany was a cabinet crisis : Chancellor Scheidemann resigned
and was succeeded by Gustav Adolf Bauer, a Majority Socialist,
with a colorless and obviously transitional ministry which was
of a 10,000-word digest constituted the first and only knowledge of the treaty
vouchsafed by the Council of Five to the smaller Powers. Several Powers such as
Portugal, France, China, and Italy, made " reservations." The complete text of
the treaty was not printed until later.
A NEW ERA BEGINS 373
inclined to sign. Simultaneously the hloc parties — the Ma-
jority Socialists, the Catholic Centrists, and the Democrats, —
fearful lest continued refusal to sign would aid the program of
the Minority Socialists and of the Spartacan extremists, decided
to support the new government; and on June 23, the last day
of grace, the German National Assembly at Weimar voted to
accept unconditionally the Allied terms.
Dr. Hermann Miiller, the foreign secretary in the new German
government, and Dr. Johannes Bell, colonial secretary, were
finally prevailed upon by Chancellor Bauer to perform the dis-
tasteful duty of signing a most humiliating treaty of peace.
And on June 28, 1919, in the Hall of Mirrors in the stately old
palace of Louis XIV, the Peace of Versailles was signed by the
plenipotentiaries of Germany and by those of thirty-one ^
nations leagued against her. The scene was that in which in
187 1 the militaristic German Empire had been born. The
date was that on which in 19 14 the Archduke Francis Ferdinand
of Austria-Hungary had been assassinated. The Great War thus
formally closed on the fifth anniversary of the immediate occasion
of its outbreak, and its close officially registered the death of the
German Empire.
With the signing of the treaty of Versailles, the principal
purpose of the Peace Congress was achieved; and President
Wilson and many of the premiers and "experts" returned home.
Nevertheless, Paris remained throughout 19 19 and well into 1920
the center of most significant international negotiations. The
Supreme AlHed Council, now consisting of diplomatic agents of
the five Great Powers, continued to hold sessions and to fashion
peace-treaties with Austria, Bulgaria, Hungary, and Turkey, as
well as to work out numerous details of the settlement as it
affected the lesser AlHed Powers and particularly as it concerned
the new states which the Great War had brought into existence.
The final settlements of 1919-1920 may now be rapidly
sketched, beginning with the outstanding provisions of the treaty
of Versailles between the Allies and Germany. This treaty, as
ratified by the German National Assembly at Weimar on July 7,
1919, revolutionized the international position of Germany,
territorially, economically, and militarily. By the terms of the
treaty, Germany ceded Alsace-Lorraine to France, Eupen and
^ Of the total thirty-two delegations included in the Allied Conference, the
Chinese alone refused to sign, because of the special concessions to Japan. It should
be remarked that General Smuts in attaching his signature on behalf of South
Africa protested bluntly against what he conceived to be the illiberahty of the
victors to the vanquished.
374
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Malmedy to Belgium, Memel to Lithuania/ and a large part of
the provinces of Posen and West Prussia to Poland ; to Poland,
1 The treaty merely provided for the detaching of Memel from East Prussia;
the understanding was that subsequently it would be awarded to Lithuania.
A NEW ERA BEGINS
375
moreover, she agreed to cede Upper Silesia, the southern part
of East Prussia, and a strip west of the Vistula, if the population
NEW EASTERN BOUNDARIES OV GERUANY
SCALE OF MILES
510 20 30 40 50
Konlggratzi
of these districts should express the desire, in a plebiscite con-
ducted under international auspices, for incorporation within
the Polish Republic, and in order to provide Poland with a con-
376 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
venient access to the Baltic she consented to the estabhshment
of Danzig as an internationaHzed free city; furthermore, she
would acquiesce in the cession to Denmark of such districts of
Schleswig as should vote accordingly in a similar plebiscite;
and likewise she would submit for fifteen years to the economic
exploitation by France, and the political control by an inter-
national commission, of the rich Saar basin, and would under-
take to abide by the decision reached by popular plebiscite at
the end of fifteen years as to whether the Saar region should
thereafter remain permanently under international government
or revert to Germany or be ceded outright to France.
In addition to territorial cessions in Europe, Germany sur-
rendered all her overseas colonies and protectorates. Her lease
of Kiao-chao and other privileges in the Chinese province of
Shantung as well as her Pacific islands north of the equator went
to Japan ; her portion of Samoa, to New Zealand ; her other
Pacific possessions south of the equator, to Austraha ; German
Southwest Africa, to the British Union of South Africa ; German
East Africa, to Great Britain ; and Kamerun and Togoland were
partitioned between Great Britain and France. In most cases
the Powers receiving German colonies did so not as absolute
sovereigns but as ** mandataries" of the projected League of
Nations, to which they would be required from time to time to
give an account of their stewardship. Besides, Germany re-
nounced all special rights and privileges in China, Siam, Liberia,
Morocco, and Egypt. - ^
Politically, Germany recognized the complete independence
and full sovereignty of Belgium, and likewise of German Austria,
Czechoslovakia, and Poland; she denounced the treaties of
Brest-Li to vsk and all other agreements entered into by her with
the Bolshevist government of Russia and gave the Allies carte
blanche to deal as they would with Russia not only, but with
Turkey, Bulgaria, Hungary, and Austria.
Militarily, Germany promised to reduce her army to 100,000
men, including officers; to abolish conscription within her
territories; to raze all forts fifty kilometers east of the Rhine;
to stop all importation, exportation, and nearly all production of
war material; to reduce her navy to six battleships, six light
cruisers, and twelve torpedo boats, without submarines, and a
personnel of not more than 15,000; to surrender or destroy all
other armed vessels ; and to abandon military and naval aviation
within three months. Moreover she agreed to demolish forti-
fications at Heligoland, to open the Kiel Canal to all nations^ to
A NEW ERA BEGINS 377
refrain from building forts on the Baltic, and to surrender her
fourteen submarine cables. She specifically agreed to the trial
of her War Lord, the ex-Kaiser, by an international high court
for a supreme offense against international morality,^ and of
other Germans for violation of the laws and customs of war.
By way of reparation and economic settlement, Germany
accepted full responsibility for all damages caused to the allied
and associated governments and nationals, and promised to re-
imburse all civilian damages, beginning with an initial payment
of five billion dollars, subsequent payments being secured by
bonds to be issued at the discretion of an International Repara-
tion Commission. Germany agreed to pay shipping damage
on a ton-for-ton basis by cession of the bulk of her merchant,
coasting, and river fleets, and by new construction; to devote
her economic resources to the rebuilding of the devastated
regions; in particular, to deliver enormous quantities of coal
and coal-products to France, Belgium, and Italy; to return
works of art removed from Belgium and France ; and to deliver
manuscripts and prints equivalent in value to those destroyed
at Louvain. She pledged herself, moreover, to return to the
1 9 14 most-favored-nation tariffs, without discrimination of any
sort ; to allow allied and associated nationals freedom of transit
through her territories ; and to accept highly detailed provisions
as to pre-war debts, unfair competition, internationalization of
roads and rivers, and other economic and financial clauses.
Until reparation should be made and the treaty fully carried
out. Allied occupation of the left bank of the Rhine and of the
bridgeheads at Cologne, Coblenz, and Mainz, would continue,
although provision was made that if Germany should be duly
fulfilling her obligations, Cologne would be evacuated at the end
of five years, Coblenz at the end of ten years, and Mainz at the
end of fifteen years.
In the destruction of militaristic Germany, the peace removed
a chief menace to the free development of democratic peoples.
But the treaty of Versailles went further, and in two significant
and novel respects attempted to deal with the social unrest and
international anarchy which had hitherto prevailed throughout
^ In accordance with this provision, Great Britain, France, and Italy, in January,
1920, asked the Netherlands Government to surrender William II for trial on the
charge of "moral" ofifenses, such as the breaking of a treaty by the invasion of
Belgium, the authorization of ruthless submarine warfare, and the use of poisonous
gas. Queen Wilhelmina's advisers refused to comply mth the request on the
ground that no existing international court had legal jurisdiction and that the
Dutch people "could not betray the faith of those who have confided themselves
to their free institutions."
378 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
the world. One section of the treaty sought to eradicate many
of the evils inhering in the old individualistic doctrine and selfish
practice of coequal sovereign states, by establishing a League
of Nations. Another section recognized the relations between
capital and labor everywhere as matters of international concern.
These provisions were designed quite as much for the Allies them-
selves, and even for neutral Powers, as for Germany.
Thus, the treaty of Versailles provided for the formation of
a permanent world-organization of labor, consisting of an annual
International Labor Conference and an International Labor
Office. The former was to be composed of four representatives
of each state, two from the government and one each from the
employers and the workingmen, and to act as a deliberative
body, its measures taking the form of draft conventions or recom-
mendations for legislation, which, if passed by two-thirds vote,
must be submitted to the law-making authority in every state
participating. Each government was left free to enact such
recommendations into law; approve the principle, but adapt
them to local needs; leave the actual legislation in case of a
federal state to local legislatures ; or reject the recommendations
altogether without further obligation. The International Labor
Office was to be conducted at the seat of the League of Nations ;
its chief functions would be the collection and distribution of
information on labor throughout the world, the preparation of
agenda for the Labor Conferences, and the oversight of the en-
forcement of labor conventions between states.
Nine principles of labor conditions were specifically recognized
by the treaty of Versailles on the ground that *'the well-being,
physical, moral, and intellectual, of industrial wage-earners is of
supreme international importance." With exceptions necessi-
tated by differences of climate, habits, and economic develop-
ment, the most significant of these principles were affirmed to
be : (i) that labor should not be regarded merely as a commodity
or article of commerce; (2) right of association of employers
and employees ; (3) a wage adequate to maintain a reasonable
standard of life ; (4) the eight-hour day or forty-eight hour week ;
(5) a weekly rest of at least twenty-four hours, which should
include Sunday wherever practicable; (6) abolition of child
labor and assurance of the continuation of the education and
proper physical development of children ; (7) equal pay for equal
work as between men and women; (8) equitable economic
treatment of all workers, including foreigners ; and (9) a system
of inspection in which women should take part.
A NEW ERA BEGINS 379
In accordance with the treaty, the first meeting of the Inter-
national Labor Conference was held at Washington, in October
and November, 19 19, and the new labor era was ushered in by
discussions at that time of the prevention of unemployment, the
extension and application of the international conventions adopted
at Berne in 1906 prohibiting night work for women and the use
of white phosphorus in the manufacture of matches, and the
employment of women and children at night or in unhealthy
work.
Recognition of the international importance of labor questions
was one of the most promising achievements of the Paris Peace
Congress of 191 9. Another, even more sensational, was the
recognition of the evils inherent in pre-war international anarchy
and the resulting determination on the part of President Wilson
and his associates at Paris to institute a new world-order of
international cooperation. The Covenant of the League of
Nations,^ as proposed and adopted by the Preliminary Peace
Conference, appeared in the treaty of Versailles as Section One ;
and with the Covenant the whole settlement of 191 9 was in-
extricably bound up.
As established by the Covenant, the League of Nations com-
prised all the allied- and associated powers and most neutrals,
excluding (at the start) only Germany, Austria, Hungary, Bul-
garia, Turkey, Russia, Mexico, and Costa Rica. In the future
any state, dominion, or colony might be admitted to member-
ship by two-thirds vote of the Assembly, and any state upon
giving two years' notice might withdraw if it had fulfilled its
international obligations. The organs of the League were to
be : (i) a permanent Secretariat, with headquarters at Geneva
in Switzerland; (2) an Assembly, consisting of representatives
of the several members of the League (each member having one
vote and not more than three representatives), and meeting at
stated intervals ; and (3) a Council, composed of representatives
of the five Great Allied Powers, — the United States, Great
Britain, France, Italy, and Japan, — together with representa-
tives of four other members selected from time to time by the
Assembly, and normally taking decisions by unanimous vote.
The members of the League undertook ''to respect and pre-
serve as against external aggression the territorial integrity
and existing pohtical independence" of one another. Further-
more, the members pledged themselves to submit matters of
dispute to arbitration or inquiry and not to resort to war with
1 See Appendix, below, p. 413.
38o A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
one another until three months after the award. Awards might
take the form of judicial decisions or simply of advisory opinion ;
normally they would be rendered by a Permanent Court of
International Justice, for the establishment of which the Council
should forthwith formulate plans. Members not submitting
their case to this Court must accept the jurisdiction of the
Council itself or of the Assembly; in the former instance, the
Council would make award by unanimous vote (not counting
the parties to the dispute) ; in the latter instance, the Assembly
would make award by unanimous vote of its members represented
on the Council and a simple majority of the rest (not counting
the parties to the dispute). Members agreed to carry out
arbitral awards, and not to go to war with any party to a dis-
pute which should comply with the award. If a member should
fail to carry out an award, the Council would propose ''the nec-
essary measures." Members resorting to war in disregard of
the Covenant would immediately be debarred from all inter-
course with other members, and the Council would in such cases
consider what military or naval action could be taken by the
League collectively against the offending party. Similarly,
upon any war or threat of war by any outside Power against
any member of the League, the Council would promptly meet to
consider what common action should be taken.
The Covenant formally abrogated all obligations between
members of the League inconsistent with its terms, but expressly
affirmed ''the validity of international engagements, such as
treaties of arbitration or regional understandings like the Monroe
Doctrine, for securing the maintenance of the peace of the
world." It especially provided, also, that all treaties or inter-
national engagements concluded after the institution of the
League should be registered with the Secretariat and pubHshed,
and that the Assembly might from time to time advise members
to reconsider treaties which had become inapplicable or involved
danger to peace. To the Council was intrusted the important
function of preparing plans for a general reduction of arma-
ments; these plans were to be revised every ten years, and,
once adopted, no member must exceed the armaments fixed,
without the Council's concurrence.
Under the general supervision of the League of Nations were
placed the International Labor Organization and its activities,
the execution of agreements for the suppression of traffic in
women and children and for the control of trade in arms and
ammunition, the assurance of equitable treatment for commerce
A NEW ERA BEGINS 381
of all members of the League, and the international prevention
and control of disease. International bureaus and commissions
already estabhshed were subordinated to the League, as well as
all those to be established in the future.
In addition to its general duties, the League of Nations was
intrusted by the treaty of Versailles with several specific duties
in connection with the German settlement. Thus, the League
might question 'Germany at any time for a violation of the
neutralized zone east of the Rhine ; it would appoint three of the
five members of the Saar Commission, oversee its regime, and
conduct the plebiscite; it would designate the High Com-
missioner of Danzig, guarantee the independence of the Free
City, and arrange for treaties between Danzig and Germany
and Poland; it would work out the mandatary system to be
applied to the former German colonies ; it would act as a final
court in the plebiscites in Schleswig and on the PoHsh frontiers,
and in the disputes as to the Kiel Canal ; and it would decide
certain of the economic and financial problems arising from the
war.
The French Government, still fearful of a German ^'war of
revenge,'' would have preferred to have obtained further mihtary
guarantees from Germany and to have strengthened the Covenant
by providing for a permanent international General Staff which
should direct the military action of the League of Nations in
resisting any attempted German aggression in the future. To
molhfy the French and meet their criticisms. President Wilson
and Premier Lloyd George concluded on June 28 special treaties
respectively between the United States and France and between
France and Great Britain, by the terms of which the United
States and Great Britain would be bound to come immediately
to the aid of France if any unprovoked act of aggression should
be made against her by Germany. It was specifically provided
that these treaties should be submitted to the Council of the
League of Nations, which would decide whether to recognize
them as engagements in conformity with the League Covenant ;
in the meantime, the Franco-American treaty should be sub-
mitted for approval to the United States Senate and the French
Parliament.
The treaty of Versailles, including the Labor Convention and
the Covenant of the League of Nations, was ratified by Ger-
many on July 7, by France on October 13, by Great Britain
and Italy on October 15, and by Japan on October 30. China
accepted it, with reservations concerning the cession of Shantung
382 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
to Japan, on September 24; and most of the other signatories
ratified it promptly. In the case of the United States, President
Wilson encountered extraordinary opposition from the Repub-
lican majority in the Senate and even from certain members of
his own pohtical party. Among his opponents were those who
specially objected to the Covenant of the League of Nations as
tending to impair American sovereignty and vitiate certain
constitutional powers of the American Congress, or as tending
further to entangle the United States in the meshes of Old-
World diplomacy; there were those likewise who were bitterly
disappointed with the terms of peace with Germany, particu-
larly the concessions to Japan and to Great Britain, and who
were unwilling that the United States should underwrite a
''vicious" and '' unjust" peace; and there were doubtless those
who felt that President Wilson had treated the Senate altogether
too cavalierly, as well as those who were fearful lest a Demo-
cratic President should derive political capital from a radical
change in American foreign policy. For months a deadlock
ensued between the President and the Senate Majority, the
latter insisting upon ''reservations" which the former would not
accept. The Senate in November, 19 19, adopted, by majority
vote, some fifteen drastic reservations to the treaty of Versailles,
but failed to secure the necessary two-thirds vote for the ratifi-
cation of the treaty with these reservations. Thenceforth
various efforts were made to reach a compromise; and in Feb-
ruary, 1920, it looked as though the United States would shortly
ratify the treaty with somewhat milder reservations than those
originally adopted by the Senate in November.^ As yet it was
extremely doubtful whether the United States Senate would
ratify the Franco-American AlHance Treaty, although its com-
plement had already been ratified by Great Britain.^
The Allies delayed for some time to put the treaty of Ver-
sailles into effect, hoping that the United States would join
them in ratifying the document. At length, however, on Jan-
uary 10, 1920, representatives of all the Powers which to date
had approved the Versailles Treaty deposited their certificates
of ratification at Paris and signed the proces-verbal which put
the treaty into effect. This ceremony, which formally ended
the Great War, was discharged in the Clock Hall of the French
Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Fourteen allied and associated
1 For these Senate Reservations of November, 1919, see Appendix II.
2 For the proposed treaty of Triple Alliance between France and Great Britain,
and France and the United States, see Appendix III.
A NEW ERA BEGINS 383
Powers on the one hand, — France, Great Britain, Italy, Japan,
Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Guatemala, Panama, Peru, Poland,
Siam, Czechoslovakia, and Uruguay, — and Germany on the
other, made peace and again became ''friendly nations." The
United States did not participate, nor did China, Greece, or
Rumania.
On January 16, 1920, pursuant to the call of President Wilson,
the first meeting of the Council of the League of Nations was
held in Paris. It comprised representatives of Great Britain,
France, Italy, Japan, Spain, Belgium, and Brazil. Leon Bour-
geois, the French representative, was elected chairman, and
Sir Eric Drummond was installed as permanent secretary; and
the Council prepared to arrange for the convocation of the
League Assembly, and to take up and continue the manifold
labors of the Supreme Council of the Peace Conference, which
formally disbanded on January 20.
The settlement of 19 19-1920 was effected not only by the
Covenant of the League of Nations, by the proposed new Triple
Alliance of France, Great Britain, and the United States, by the
novel Labor Convention, and by the drastic terms of the treaty
of Versailles with Germany, but also by the series of peace
treaties concluded by the AlHes in turn with Austria, with Bul-
garia, with Hungary, and with Turkey, and likewise by a vast
number of special engagements entered into among the allied
and associated Powers themselves.
Austria, by the treaty signed at St. Germain on September 10,
19 1 9, and ratified by the Austrian National Assembly on October
17, was required to recognize the complete independence of
Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Poland, the Serbo-Croat-Slovene
State (Serbia), and to cede various territories which previously,
in union with her, composed the Dual Monarchy of Austria-
Hungary. Austria was left thereby a small independent German
republic, with an area of five thousand to six thousand square
miles and a population of between six and seven millions. She
was deprived of seaports and her army was restricted to 30,000
men.
From Bulgaria were taken, by the treaty signed at Neuilly,
near Paris, on November 27, 19 18, most of the territories which
she had appropriated in the Balkan wars of 1912-1913 and
all her conquests in the Great War; the Dobrudja went to
Rumania; the greater part of Macedonia, to Serbia; and the
Thracian coast, to the Allies, who seemed disposed to award it
eventually to Greece with an understanding that Bulgarian
384 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
goods might be transported across it duty-free. Bulgaria was
obliged to pay an indemnity of approximately $445,000,000, and
to reduce her army to 20,000 men, with a police-force not exceed-
ing 10,000.
With Hungary, the Allies encountered exceptional difficulties
in making peace, for a radical Socialist revolution at Budapest
on March 21 overthrew the government of Count Karolyi and
set up a Soviet government under Bela Kun, a former associate
of Lenin and Trotsky, the Russian Bolshevist leaders ; and Bela
Kun pursued most dilatory and annoying tactics in deahng with
the Allies. It was not until Rumanian troops invaded the
country and approached the capital, in August, that Bela Kun
was driven from power and replaced by a Provisional Govern-
ment under Archduke Joseph, which resumed negotiations for
peace. As ultimately arranged, Hungary was stripped of non-
Magyar peoples as completely as Austria had been shorn of
non- German peoples : Slovakia went to Czechoslovakia ; Tran-
sylvania was ceded to Rumania ; Croatia was incorporated into
the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes ; and the Banat
was divided between Rumania and Serbia. Hungary itself
shrank from a maritime, imperialistic country of 125,000 square
miles and twenty-two million inhabitants into a landlocked
national Magyar state of nine millions with a trivial army of
30,000 men.
The conclusion of peace with the Ottoman Empire was an
even slower process. Allied diplomatists obviously did not
know what to do with Constantinople, now that Russia had
collapsed, and they were embarrassed by protracted disputes
between France and Great Britain over Syria, and between Italy
and Greece over Asia Minor. By February, 1920, however, the
general outlines of the probable settlement in the Near East
were becoming clear: the Arab state of Hedjaz, embracing the
territory east of the Red Sea and the River Jordan and the
towns of Damascus and Aleppo, would become autonomous,
under a British mandate; Armenia would become a free Chris-
tian republic, under international auspices; and, probably as
mandataries of the League of Nations, Great Britain would take
Palestine and Mesopotamia, France would, secure Syria and
Cilicia, Italy would appropriate Adalia, and Greece would ob-
tain Smyrna and adjacent territory on the coast of Asia Minor.
It appeared certain that the Dardanelles and the Bosphorus
would be internationalized and that Turkey's future would be
that of a small national state confined mainly to Asia Minor.
A NEW ERA BEGINS 385
Among the Allied and Associated Governments various other
territorial and commercial matters were the subject of nego-
tiation in 1919-1920. Thus, in November, 1919, Poland was
given a twenty-five year mandate to Eastern GaUcia, with its
sixteen million inhabitants, a majority of whom are Ruthenians
(Ukrainians) ; and arrangements were made for a plebiscite in
Teschen, to determine whether that district should go to Poland
or to Czechoslovakia. Furthermore, Greece and Italy agreed
to settle their outstanding differences : Italy would yield to
Greece southern Albania and the twelve islands in the JEgesm
which had been under Italian rule since the Tripolitan War of
1911-1912 ; in return, Greece would lease to Italy the site of a
coaling station in the Mgesm islands and would recognize an
Italian protectorate over the greater part of Albania. Then,
too, in November, 1919, the Arctic archipelago of Spitzbergen,
hitherto a ^'no man's land," was ceded to Norway. And a
special convention between Belgium and the Netherlands, con-
cluded in 1920, freed navigation on the Scheldt from onerous
Dutch restrictions and otherwise relieved Belgium of burden-
some disabilities imposed upon her by the treaty of 1839, which
had recognized her independence.
To draw a boundary-line along the eastern coast of the Adri-
atic between Italy and Jugoslavia (Serbia) proved peculiarly
troublesome. So long as the Orlando cabinet was in power at
Rome, Italy vehemently demanded the cession to her, not only
of the Adriatic islands and that part of Dalmatia pledged her by
the secret treaties of 191 5 and 191 7, but the important port of
Fiume also, — a demand stubbornly rejected both by the Jugo-
slavs and by the American President. With the advent to
power of the more conciliatory Italian cabinet of Francesco
Nitti in July, 191 9, the outlook for a mutually acceptable com-
promise grew brighter, only to be overcast, however, in Septem-
ber, by the forcible seizure of Fiume by a free-lance Italian expe-
dition under Gabriele d'Annunzio, the ultra-patriotic poet-
soldier-adventurer. D'Annunzio posed as a twentieth-century
Garibaldi, and even surpassed his illustrious prototype in rhe-
torical exuberance and likewise in creating embarrassment for
the Italian Government. D'Annunzio won a plebiscite in
Fiume and raided the town of Zara in Dalmatia ; but the gen-
eral Italian election, in November, 1919, registered an over-
whelming majority of the ItaHan people as disposed to support
Nitti rather than D'Annunzio, and late in January, 1920, the
ItaHan Government agreed to a compromise proposed by the
386 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Allied Supreme Council, by which both Fiume and Zara would
be internationalized under the auspices of the League of Nations ;
Italy would secure the eastern Adriatic coast as far south as
Fiume, the greater part of Albania, and the Adriatic islands of
Lissa and Lesina; and Serbia would obtain the other Adriatic
islands, Dalmatia, and a northern strip of Albania. Against
this compromise, however, the Jugoslavs protested, and in Feb-
ruary the deadlock still persisted.
A whole series of treaties was concluded by the Great Powers
with the several states which had recently come into existence —
Poland, Czechoslovakia, Finland, etc., — and likewise with those
lesser Powers whose national unifications had been achieved in
the course of the Great War — Rumania, Serbia, and Greece.
These treaties contained provisions relating to boundaries, to the
assumption of debts of annexed regions, and to commercial
affairs. In most instances, moreover, they contained provisions
guaranteeing certain rights and privileges to racial or religious
minorities within these states. In the case of Poland, and in that
of Rumania, special protection was deemed necessary for the
Jews ; in the case of Serbia, it was the CathoKcs ; in the case of
Czechoslovakia, it was the German minority in Bohemia.
In all these cases much the same phraseology was utilized as
in the treaty concluded by the Allies with German Austria:
"Austria undertakes to bring her institutions into conformity
with the principles of liberty and justice and acknowledges that
the obligations for the protection of minorities are matters of
international concern over which the League of Nations has
jurisdiction. She assures complete protection of life and liberty
to all inhabitants of Austria, without distinction of birth, lan-
guage, race, or religion, together with the right to the free exercise
of any creed. All Austrian nationals without distinction of
race, language, or rehgion are to be equal before the law. No
restrictions are to be imposed on the free use of any language
in private or pubhc, and reasonable facilities are to be given to
Austrian nationals of non- German speech for the use of their
language before the courts. Austrian nationals belonging to
racial, rehgious, or linguistic minorities are to enjoy the same
protection as other Austrian nationals, in particular in regard
to schools and other educational establishments and in districts
where a considerable portion of Austrian nationals of other than
German speech are resident ; facilities are to be given in schools
for the instruction of children in their own language and an
equable share of public funds is to be provided for the purpose.
A NEW ERA BEGINS 387
These provisions do not preclude the Austrian Government from
making the teaching of German obHgatory. They are to be
embodied by Austria in her fundamental law as a bill of rights,
and provisions regarding them are to be under the protection
of the League of Nations."
Such were the salient points in the settlement effected in
1919-1920 by the host of statesmen, diplomatists, and ^'experts/'
There were still a vast number of intricate and perplexing prob-
lems to be faced and solved by the Great Powers before the world
could properly be pronounced "normal" and "settled." There
were treaties to be ratified and put in force. There was the
League of Nations to be provided with machinery and precedents.
There was the dilatory and doubtful action of the United States.
There was the uncertain status of Esthonia, Latvia, Lithuania,
and Ukrainia. There were no defined eastern boundaries of
Poland. There were outstanding imperiaHstic difficulties in
Asia, in Africa, and in America. There were the grievances of
China against Japan, and of Ireland against Great Britain.^
Above all, there was Bolshevism in Russia, chaos in one of the
largest countries on the surface of the globe.^
1 As a result of the unwillingness or inability of the British Government to carry
into effect the Home Rule Act of 1914, Ireland had grown steadily more restive,
until the general election of December, 19 18, returned from the unhappy island
26 Ulster Unionists, 6 NationaHsts, and 73 Sinn Feiners. Sinn Fein thus secured
an overwhelming majority of Irish votes, and, by a sort of referendum, Ireland
declared in no uncertain terms for the right of independent, national self-determi-
nation. The Sinn Feiners who were elected to Parliament, refusing to take part in
the proceedings of the British House of Commons at Westminster, assembled in
Dubhn, proclaimed the independence of their country, drafted a democratic con-
stitution, elected Eamonn de Valera president and appointed plenipotentiaries to
the Peace Congress. The British Government would not treat with the "pro-
visional government" at Dublin or allow the Irish Question to be discussed at
Paris. President Wilson, it is true, received a committee representing Irish-
Americans and listened to their pleas in behalf of Ireland, but Premier Lloyd George
dechned even to receive them. Subsequently, in September, 1919, the "Irish
Parliament" was suppressed by the British Government; and throughout 1919
Ireland was ruled with a rod of iron. At the end of the year a new project for
Irish Home Rule was put forward by the British Government, involving the crea-
tion of separate parliaments for Ulster and for the rest of Ireland and of a joint
" Council of Ireland," but it was opposed both by the Ulster Unionists and by the
Sinn Feiners.
2 The Allies failed signally in 1919 to solve the "Russian Question." In Jan-
uary they proposed a conference of all Russian factions and "governments" on
Prinkipo Island, in the Sea of Marmora, under their auspices; the Bolsheviki
accepted, and likewise the Esthonians, Letts, Lithuanians, and Ukrainians, but
the opposition of anti-Bolshevist Russians was so acute and the Allies themselves
were so irresolute that the project was soon dropped. The Allies could not bring
themselves to recognize the Bolshevist regime at Moscow, although Lenin assured
them that the Soviet Government would agree to assume the foreign indebtedness
of previous Russian governments. On the other hand, they did not give sufficient
aid to Admiral Kolchak or other anti-Bolshevist Russian leaders to bring about the
388 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Yet at the beginning of 1920 enough of a settlement had already
been reached, and the settlement was sufficiently revolutionary,
to justify us in hailing it as the beginning of a new era. In the
following section we shall undertake roughly to estimate what
the settlement had cost Europe and the world in the five years of
warfare from the assassination of the Archduke Francis Ferdi-
nand, on June 28, 1914, to the signing of the treaty of Versailles,
on June 28, 1919. Then, in the concluding section, we shall
make bold to state wherein, as we think, lies the significance of
the new era, the real meaning of the Great War.
THE LOSSES
The Great War was indeed a cataclysm ; and commensurate
with the revolutionary peace settlement which followed it were
the gigantic losses in life and property which attended it. Six-
teen estabHshed states — Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia,
France, the British Empire, Italy, the United States, Japan,
Belgium, Turkey, Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, Rumania,
Greece, and Portugal, — and three new ones which the war
brought forth — Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hedjaz, — as-
sembled their human powers for the conflict — fifteen on one
side and four on the other. Against one or moje of the four,
eleven other nations also declared war, but engaged in it less
actively, — Brazil, China, Costa Rica, Cuba, Guatemala, Haiti,
Honduras, Liberia, Nicaragua, Panama, and Siam. Of the re-
maining twenty independent nations of the world, five — Bolivia,
Ecuador, Peru, Santo Domingo, and Uruguay — severed diplo-
matic relations with one or more of the four original aggressors,
and one — Persia — became a battle-ground of contending forces.
Only fourteen independent states on the earth's surface pre-
served neutrality — Abyssinia, Argentina, Chile, Colombia,
Denmark, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Paraguay, Salvador,
Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and Venezuela. All states, neu-
tral as well as belHgerent, were seriously aflfected by the Great
War.
The toll of human life taken by the Great War was simply
astounding. The table printed below gives the most rehable
estimates regarding the man-power employed and the casualties
downfall of Lenin by force of arms. While declaring that their intervention in
Russia was aimed at relieving the distress and suffering of the Russian people, they
enforced with great rigor an economic blockade against the Bolsheviki, thereby
inflicting no slight hardship upon the most populous regions of Russia. It was not
until January 16, 1920, that the Alhed Supreme Council raised the blockade.
A NEW ERA BEGINS
389
suffered by the sixteen nations which were officially mobilized
for the war and took an active part in it.
Mobilized Strength and Casualty Losses of the Belligerents*
Central Powers
Nation
Mobilized
Dead
Wounded
Prisoners
OR
Missing
Total
Casualties
Germany
Austria-Hungary . .
Turkey
Bulgaria
11,000,000
6,500,000
1,600,000
400,000
1,611,104
800,000
300,000
101,224
3,683,143
3,200,000
570,000
152,399
772,522
1,211,000
130,000
10,825
6,066,769
5,211,000
1,000,000
264,448
Total
19,500,000
2,812,328
7,605,542
2,124,347
12,542,217
Allied and Associated Powers
Nation
Mobilized
Dead
Wounded
Prisoners
OR
Missing
Total
Casualties
Russia . . .
France . . .
British Empire
Italy . . .
United States
Japan . . .
Belgium . .
Serbia . . .
Montenegro .
Rumania . .
Greece . . .
Portugal . .
12,000,000
7,500,000
7,500,000
5,500,000
4,272,521
800,006
267,000
707,343
50,000
750,000
230,000
100,000
1,700,000
1,385,300
692,065
460,000
67,813
300
20,000
322,000
3,000
200,000
15,000
4,000
4,950,000
2,675,000
2,037,325
947,000
192,483
907
60,000
28,000
10,000
1 20,000
40,000
15,000
2,500,000
446,300
360,367
1,393,000
14,363
3
10,000
100,000
7,000
80,000
45,000
200
9,150,000
4,506,600
3,089,757
2,800,000
274,659
1,210
90,000
450,000
20,000
400,000
100,000
10,000
Total . .
39,676,864
4,869,478
11,075,715
4,956,233
20,892,226
It has been estimated that the Polish combatants with the
Allies numbered 150,000; that the Czechoslovak armies in
Siberia, France, and Italy included 180,000 nationals; that the
sultan of Hedjaz fought the Turk with 250,000 Arabs. These
three new nations, therefore, employed a combatant force of
580,000 men, which was joined to the Allies' 39,676,864 against
the Central Powers' 19,500,000.
Nearly sixty million men at war! Of this huge number
nearly eight millions died and approximately six millions (or
thirty per cent, of the wounded) became human wrecks. But
1 Much of this statistical information is taken from an interesting article by
Walter Littlefield in The New York Times Current History for February, 19 19,
pp. 239 et sqq.
390 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
this only refers to the soldiers and sailors who died or were
irreparably maimed. Civilians suffered even more grievously,
not only by engines of war, but by famine, disease, and massacre.
There were those who were killed by direct military causes ;
those who died from indirect causes.
In the first category we have : 692 Americans slain on the high
seas; 20,620 British subjects slain on the high seas; 1270
English men, women, and children, the victims of air raids and
bombardment; 30,000 Belgians butchered or deprived of life
in various ways ; 40,000 French similarly destroyed ; and 7500
neutrals slain by submarines and mines ; a total of over 100,000.
In the second category we have : four million Armenians, Syrians,
Jews, and Greeks, massacred or starved by the Turks; four
million deaths beyond the normal mortality as the result of the
influenza and pneumonia induced by the war; one million
Serbian dead through disease or massacre. All this gives a
military and civilian mortality, directly or indirectly the product
of the Great War, of about seventeen millions.
And this is not all. Who can even estimate the millions of
human beings whose bones whitened the roads of Poland,
Ukrainia, and Lithuania, and the other millions who were starved
throughout the length and breadth of Europe by blockades,
malnutrition, and revolutionary disorders?
It should be remembered, moreover, that the gigantic human
losses were bound to be an even greater debit to the following
generation than to the present, for the soldiers killed were mostly
youthful, the ablest, strongest, most spirited, and most promising
members of the race, and among civilians the mortality was
highest of children and of child-bearing women. Furthermore,
while Europe was most grievously affected in this respect, many
regions in other continents received serious set-backs. For
example, in the total armed strength and casualties of the
British Empire were included millions of stalwart young men from
Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and India;
in the case of Canada, out of an aggregate population of seven
and a half million, nearly one million went to war, and of this
number over one hundred thousand never returned ; even India
supplied almost a million native troops who suffered enormous
losses in Mesopotamia, in Arabia, and in East Africa. In the
French totals likewise were embraced at least 900,000 colonials,
chiefly black, who did their full share of fighting and suffered
proportionately.
Throughout the world there was a noticeable decline in the
A NEW ERA BEGINS
391
birth-rate. In France, for illustration, official statistics showed
that civilian population in the four years of the war decreased
by considerably over three-quarters of a million, without in-
cluding the deaths in occupied Northern France or the losses
due directly to the war. In 19 13 the births in France outnum-
bered the deaths by 17,000, but in the following year this excess
disappeared and thereafter the deaths considerably outnumbered
the births — in 1914 by more than 50,000, and in 1915, 1916,
191 7, and 1 91 8 by nearly 300,000 in each year. Births, which
numbered approximately 600,000 in 19 13, dropped to 315,000
in 1916, while the deaths increased, but not in comparable pro-
portions, so that the total decrease in population was due less
to any great increase in deaths than to a great diminution in
births. It seemed as though mothers despaired of bringing
children into a world the prey to the horrors and terror of war.
And what was true of France was true, only in lesser degree, of
other belligerents.
If during the four years of the Great War blood flowed like
water, money was poured out similarly. From August, 1914, to
August, 1918, — thereby excluding the final stage of the war
and the whole period of settlement and readjustment, — the
principal belligerent nations increased their public debts as
follows 1
Public Indebtedness^
Central Powers
Nation
August. 1914
August, 1918
Increase
Germany
Austria
Hungary
$ 1,165,000,000
2,640,000,000
1,345,000,000
$ 30,000,000,000
13,314,000,000
5,704,000,000
$28,835,000,000
10,674,000,000
4,359,000,000
Total
$ 5,150,000,000
$ 49,018,000,000
$43,868,000,000
Allied and Associated Powers
Great Britain ....
Rest of British Empire .
Russia
France
United States ....
Italy
$ 3,458,000,000
1,454,000,000
5,092,000,000
6,598,000,000
1,208,000,000
2,792,000,000
$ 30,000,000,000
3,000,000,000
25,383,000,000
25,227,000,000
15,008,000,000
7,676,000,000
$26,542,000,000
1,546,000,000
20,291,000,000
18,629,000,000
13,800,000,000
4,884,000,000
Total
$20,602,000,000
$106,294,000,000
$85,692,000,000
^ These statistics are taken from an article by D. .G. Rogers in The New York
Times Current History for August, 19 18, pp. 227 e/ sqq.
392 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
Among the Allies, Great Britain showed the largest increase
of indebtedness : her total of twenty-six and a half billions in-
cluded some eight billions advanced by her to the Entente and
to the British Dominions and likewise some four billions loaned
her by the United States. In the same category with the eight
billions advanced by Great Britain, chiefly to Russia and Italy,
should be put American loans totaling eight and a half billions,
of which four billions went to Great Britain, two and a half to
France, one and a quarter to Italy, and the rest was distributed
in smaller amounts among Russia, Belgium, Greece, Cuba,
Serbia, Rumania, Liberia, and Czechoslovakia. In the case
of the Central Empires, their increased indebtedness included
large financial advances to Bulgaria and Turkey.
Increase of public indebtedness, staggering though it appeared,
was only part of the cost of the Great War to the belligerent
states. Vast sums of money were taken in direct and indirect
taxes, — heavy income taxes, taxes on war profits, taxes on
luxuries, etc., etc. No human being escaped the necessity of
contributing something to the military decision. In France, for
example, the civilian population paid in taxes in 1918 thirty-
eight dollars per capita. Hand in hand with this universally
burdensome taxation and with the floating of gigantic loans
went naturally enormous issues of paper-money and a dangerous
inflation of currency. Thus, while the amounts of gold and silver
in the banks of the warring countries of Europe changed but little
in the aggregate from August, 19 14, to November, 19 18, the ratio
of these amounts to their liabilities decreased from 54.3 to 9.4.
The result was a stupendous increase in the cost of living through-
out the world.
Then, too, the Great War served to diminish the production
of food-staples and thereby to bring Europe to the verge of
starvation. Mr. Herbert Hoover, who as Director General of
the International Relief Organization made a tour through the
Continent shortly after the signing of the armistice, cabled in
January, 19 19, to the United States a brief statement of conditions
as he had found them :
^'Finland — The food is practically exhausted in the cities.
While many of the peasants have some bread, other sections are
mixing large amounts of straw. They are exhausted of fats, meats,
and sugar, and need help to j>revent renewed rise of Bolshevism.
''Baltic States — The food may last one or two months on a
much reduced scale. They sent a deputation to our Ministry at
Stockholm imploring food.
A NEW ERA BEGINS 393
"Serbia — The town bread ration is down to three ounces
daily in the north not accessible from Salonica. In the south,
where accessible, the British are furnishing food to the civil
population. We are trying to get food in from the Adriatic.
''Jugoslavia — The bread ration in many towns is three or four
ounces. All classes are short of fats, milk, and meats.
''Vienna — Except for supplies furnished by the Italians and
Swiss, their present bread ration of six ounces per diem would
disappear. There is much illness from the shortage of fats,
the ration being one-and-one-half ounces per week. There is
no coffee, sugar, or eggs, and practically no meat.
"Tyrol — The people are being fed by Swiss charity.
" Poland — The peasants probably have enough to get through.
The mortality in cities, particularly among children, is appalling
for lack of fats, milk, meat, and bread. The situation in bread
will be worse in two months.
"Rumania — The bread supply for the entire people is esti-
mated to last another thirty days. They are short of fats and
milk. The last harvest was sixty per cent a failure.
"Bulgaria — The harvest was also a failure here. . There are
supplies available for probably two or three months.
"Armenia — is already starving.
" Czechoslovakia — There is large suffering on account of lack
of fats and milk. They have bread for two or three months
and sugar for six months."
The havoc wrought by the Great War can never be fully
estimated. For France, one of the grievous sufferers, a few
statistics are available,^ and from these perhaps we may form a
faint notion of the cost of the war. French agriculture was hard
hit: the soil of the entire country, having been tilled for four
years mainly by women, elderly men, and young boys, was greatly
impoverished ; the number of cattle, which in England decreased
by four per cent., decreased in France by eighteen per cent. ; the
production of milk decreased by sixty- three per cent. ; the number
of sheep diminished by thirty-eight per cent., and of swine, by
forty per cent. In the invaded region alone the damage caused
directly by the Germans to the soil, to live-stock, to crops, tools,
etc., was estimated conservatively at two billion dollars.
Furthermore, the part of France occupied by the Germans
produced before the war four-fifths of the coal and iron supplies
of the whole country and included three-fourths of the nation's
1 In a report prepared in December, 191 8, by Mr. George B. Ford, head of the
Research Department of the American Red Cross in France.
394 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
spinning and weaving industries. During the four years of
their occupation the Germans willfully and methodically de-
stroyed all that was in their power to destroy. In the cotton
industry, the French lost more than two and a quarter miUion
spindles and twenty thousand looms. Iron works, machine
works also, were looted, the useful equipment — engines, rolling
mills, machine tools, even structural steel — having been taken
away and utilized again in the iron works in Germany. Mines
were flooded, the surface plants dynamited, the workmen's
dwellings destroyed. It was estimated that altogether four bil-
lion dollars' worth of machinery would be needed to replace that
destroyed or carried away.
Another two billion dollars would be required to replace the
250,000 destroyed buildings in France and to repair the 500,000
damaged buildings. Yet another two billions would have to
be spent in repairing and replacing the used or destroyed public
works in northern France : the Northern Railway alone had
lost 1 73 1 bridges and 338 stations. According to figures sub-
mitted by the Budget Committee to the Chamber of Deputies
in December, 19 18, the total damage in the north of France,
including public works, buildings, furniture, industry, agri-
culture, and forestry, was estimated at sixty-four billion francs,
or close to thirteen billion dollars.
Little Belgium had suffered at least two billion dollars' worth
of outright destruction, and in addition there were two billions in
thefts and taxes imposed by Germany. Of this amount, one
and one-half billions represented the loss of machinery, tools,
and stock. And if to the special losses of France and Belgium
were added those of Poland, Russia, Rumania, Serbia, and
Italy, a financial amount could be computed that would surpass
human powers of comprehension. No financial amount could
compensate the world for the destruction of such monuments as
the cathedral of Rheims or the library of Louvain.
Finally, in sketching the cost of the Great War, we must not
lose sight of the enormous destruction of the world's shipping.
The total losses of the world's merchant tonnage from the be-
ginning of the war to the end of October, 1918, through belligerent
action and marine risk, was 15,053,786 gross tons, of which
9,031,828 were British. In December, 1918, Sir Eric Geddes,
First Lord of the British Admiralty, stated that 5622 British
merchant ships had been sunk during the war, of which 2475 had
been sunk with their crews still on board and 3147 had been sunk
and their crews set adrift. Fishing vessels to the number of
A NEW ERA BEGINS 395
670 had been destroyed, and more than 15,000 men in the British
merchant marine had lost their Hves through enemy action.
Emergency building had contributed much to the replacement
of lost tonnage, but it had been accomphshed at heavy expense.
The United States bore its share of the losses. According to
official figures published by the Bureau of Navigation, a total
of 145 American merchant vessels, of 354,449 gross tons, with
775 lives, was lost through enemy acts from the beginning of the
war to the cessation of hostilities on November 11. Nineteen
of the 145 vessels and sixty-seven of the 775 lives were lost through
German torpedoes, mines, and gunfire prior to the entrance of
the United States into the Great War.
LANDMARKS OF THE NEW ERA
The Great War could not do otherwise than close one era in
human history and inaugurate another. Its expenditure of
man-power and of natural resources was too prodigious to allow
the world to be the same in 1920 as it had been in 19 14. To be
sure, much remained unchanged, for the human animal is too
instinctively conservative, too naturally a victim of habit, to
permit even a cataclysm like the Great War to wrench him quite
loose from the institutions and customs of the past. Besides,
many of the changes which attracted most attention during the
five years' conflict were destined possibly to be only temporary,
and others would seem perhaps to future generations humorously
insignificant.
Yet after making full allowance for the numerous and im-
portant respects in which the world was not changed by the
Great War, or was altered only temporarily, sufficiently striking
novelties had already appeared in society and in government in
1920, as a direct or indirect outcome of the struggle, to justify
us in describing them briefly as landmarks of a new era. In
these landmarks is found the significance of the Great War.
What was accomplished by five years' unprecedented out-
pouring of blood and treasure ? The most obvious achievement,
certainly the most universally impressive to contemporaries,
was the staggering defeat of Germany and her associates. Ger-
many, a militaristic Power par excellence, after frightening Europe
for two generations by swashbuckling words and rattlings of
heavy armor, had finally essayed by dint of methods most truly
anarchic and by aid of confederates most terribly unscrupulous
to impose her will and her KuUur upon the world; she had
396 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
ultimately taken the sword and sought to substitute for the
system of free sovereign states and for the Balance of Power a
world-order established and maintained on the basis of a Pax
Romana Germanica. She had failed. The slogan of her Bern-
hardi — Weltmacht oder Niedergang — had been answered with
Niedergang. Her dream of a Teutonized Mittel-Europa was
dispelled. Turkey and Austria-Hungary were disrupted; Bul-
garia and Germany herself were overwhelmed and crushed. The
Great War, in this respect, confirmed an historical lesson of
modern times, that no one state could or would be suffered to
revive a Roman Empire ; and William II of Germany proved
to be but a shadow following the fated footsteps of Emperor
Charles V, of Philip II of Spain, of Louis XIV of France, and of
Napoleon Bonaparte. And with the downfall of the German
Empire in the twentieth century, the free nations of the world
breathed more easily.
Other achievements, incidental to this major one, deserve
more extended consideration, for they, in the main, are positive
and constructive, while the defeat of Germany in itself was
merely destructive and negative. If we contrast the world in
191 9 with the world in 19 14, we discover the following facts and
tendencies, significant outgrowths of the Great War and prophetic
landmarks of a new era :
I. Nationalism. The Great War marked the all but universal
triumph of the principle of nationalism, the doctrine that people
who speak the same language and have the same historic tra-
ditions shall live together under a common polity of their own
making. This principle, this doctrine, made rapid headway
during the five years' strife; the Germans utilized it against
Russia, and the Allies invoked it against the Central Empires.
Generally the prophets and seers of the new era, unlike those of
the eighteenth century, did not decry nationalism in behalf
of an Utopian ''cosmopolitanism"; they extolled nationalism
alike as desirable in itself and as a starting-point on the
promised road to ''internationalism." Nor did the peace-
makers of 1919-1920 repeat the mistake of their predecessors
at Vienna a century earlier and ignore the unmistakable pop-
ular longings for national self-determination ; on the other hand,
they consecrated nationalism and wrote it into the public law
of Europe.
Four great non-nationalistic states were dismembered —
Austria-Hungary, Turkey, Russia, and Germany, — and one
small state — Montenegro — disappeared. From the ruins
A NEW ERA BEGINS 397
emerged nine newly independent national states — Poland,
Czechoslovakia, Hedjaz, Armenia, Finland, Ukrainia, Lithuania,
Latvia, and Esthonia, — while, through annexations and con-
solidations, the national unification was virtually completed of
Italy, of Jugoslavia (Serbia) , of Rumania, and of Greece ; and
the return of Alsace-Lorraine to France and of the Danish-
speaking portion of Schleswig to Denmark redressed long-
standing national grievances. Germany, deprived of Danes,
French, and Poles, became for the first time in history genuinely
a national state. Similarly, Russia became a homogeneous state
of Great Russians ; Hungary, a national state of Magyars ; the
Ottoman Empire, a small national state of Mohammedan Turks ;
and Austria, a minor but homogeneous Teuton colony on the
Danube. Had German Austria been permitted to unite formally
with Germany, all central Europe, except Switzerland, would
have been completely reorganized on a national basis.
In recognizing the new nationalistic order of things, the
diplomatists had the farsightedness to try to correct its intolerant
tendencies by eliciting pledges from the new national states to
preserve and respect religious, cultural, and economic rights
of dissentient nationalities within their territories. In this war
the Jews especially were, in Central Europe, placed more or less
under international protection. What with the encouragement
of Zionism in Palestine and with the international guarantee
of their status in Europe, the Jews were signal gainers by the
Great W^ar.
In certain quarters of the world, particularly in Allied terri-
tories, national self-determination was temporarily checked or
suppressed. Such was the situation in Ireland, where, though
conditions were not essentially different from those in Czecho-
slovakia, the British Government thwarted the undoubted desire
of the majority of the people to found a national republic and
successfully combated their every effort to obtain a hearing at
the Peace Congress. In Egypt, too, the British suppressed a
national insurrection by force of arms in the spring of 191 9.
And in Albania the Italians set to work deliberately to stifle the
spirit of independent nationalism. Yet in all 'these regions
nationalistic agitation werit forward ; it troubled to an unusual
degree the British in India and in Persia, the Japanese in Korea,
and to some extent the Americans in the Philippines.
11. Change in Relative Importance of States. As an outcome
of the Great War there was, on the one hand, a considerable in-
crease in the number of small independent states in the world.
398 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
and, on the other, a reduction in the number of Great Powers. Of
the eight recognized Great Powers in 19 14, Austria-Hungary had
ceased to exist by 1919, and Germany and Russia, at least tem-
porarily, had been outclassed. Russia had become a pariah
among the nations, thanks to her embracing of extreme sociaHsm ;
and Germany had lost her navy, her colonies, and her merchant
marine and had declined from a position as the foremost military
state in the world to virtual disarmament and impotence.
In theory at any rate the new state-system was unlike the old.
The old, as was pointed out in the opening pages of this book,
was essentially anarchic ; it rested on the fancied self-sufficiency
of each of its members, on series of alliances and ententes formed
for selfish ends, and on balances of power and threats of war.
The new system had gradually evolved from the exigencies of
the Great War and had been enshrined in the Covenant of Ver-
sailles; it was based on the concept of a League of Nations in
which no state should presume to set its own interests above
those of mankind at large, and on a contract according to which
certain activities were recognized as of international concern
rather than as within the restricted purview of individual nations.
If the League of Nations flourished, if the new order became a
reality, — and only the lapse of many years could tell, — then the
old ascription of absolute and unrestricted sovereignty to each and
every independent state would in time be revised, and out of the
anarchic welter and chaos of modern times would succeed an
organized Inter-Nation capable of preserving the peace of the
world and of promoting the orderly development of human life.
To the realization of such a dream the Great War pointed
posterity.
Without some sort of a League of Nations, the growth of na-
tionaHsm during the war and its recognition by the Peace Con-
gress might readily become a curse rather than a blessing.
Merely to add ten or a dozen new national states to forty or
fifty already existing, merely to *'Balkanize" Central Europe,
would render confusion worse confounded, if the new ones like
the old should not receive a striking object-lesson, which un-
fortunately at the outset they seemed all too prone to ignore,
in the necessity of restraint and humility and cooperation, in
uprooting the weeds of nationalism and cultivating only its
best fruits.
The League of Nations, as actually estabHshed in 1920, was
none too strong. Excluded from its membership were not only
Germany, Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey, but also
A NEW ERA BEGINS 399
Russia and most of the states newly detached from the old Russian
Empire; and the United States seemed unwilling to adhere to
it without *' reservations '* which further weakened it. Further-
more, between the multitude of small states included in the
League and the four Great Powers which at first practically
controlled it, — Great Britain, France, Italy, and Japan, —
there was a wide divergence of power and prestige. There were
adverse critics a-plenty who insisted that the Covenant was
primarily a cloak for the further aggrandizement of the four.
Great Powers at the expense of the rest.
III. Imperialism. Superficially, at any rate, the Great War
gave zest and zeal to the game of capitalistic imperiahsm. As
nationalism was the goal of the smaller states, so imperiaHstic
gains seemed to be the stakes of most of the Great Powers. Great
Britain emerged from the war as the foremost maritime and co-
lonial and industrial Power in the world ; she had humbled Ger-
many, her latest rival, as completely as in earlier eras she had
overcome the Spaniards, the Dutch, and the French ; to her al-
ready far-flung empire were now added, in one form or another,
some of the wealthiest provinces of the old Ottoman Empire, —
Mesopotamia and Palestine,^ — and the bulk of the German
overseas possessions, — East Africa, Southwest Africa, parts of
Kamerun and Togoland, and the Pacific islands south of the
equator. She could now complete the construction of the Cape-
to-Cairo railway exclusively on British soil, and by bringing Persia^
within her orbit of influence she could dominate economically and
pohtically the vast expanse of land and water from Cairo and
Damascus to Rangoon and Singapore. The richest regions of Asia
and of Africa were hers. To be sure, these gains were shared by
Great Britain with South Africa, AustraHa, and New Zealand,
for the British Empire, it should be remembered, was less a
unitary state than an alliance of mother-country and self-govern-
ing dominions; nevertheless, they redounded to Anglo-Saxon
prestige throughout the world and most substantially to the
economic advantage of British capitahsts within the United
Kingdom.
France emerged from the Great War as the foremost military
state on the Continent of Europe. She was exalted as Germany
was abased. Against the possibiUty of the mihtary resurrection
1 Great Britain also now exercised a veiled protectorate over Hedjaz and a
greatly strengthened protectorate over Egypt.
2 A treaty concluded in 19 19 between Persia and Great Britain virtually recog-
nized the former as constituting a "sphere of influence" of the latter.
400 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
of Germany she was now insured by possession of Strassburg and
Metz, by a fifteen-year occupation of Mainz, and, she hoped, by
a special defensive alliance with Great Britain and the United
States. Moreover, she enjoyed a paramount influence alike in
the military and in the economic poHcies of Poland, Czecho-
slovakia, Rumania, Jugoslavia, and Greece ; most of the smaller
states of Europe were her satellites. And outside of Europe,
France maintained her position as a colonial and imperialistic
Power second in importance only to Great Britain. To the
French Empire were added "mandates" for Syria, Cilicia, and
portions of Kamerun and Togoland, and a greatly strengthened
protectorate of Morocco.
Italy not only completed her national unification but assumed
a leading imperialistic role in the Adriatic and in the eastern
Mediterranean. She obtained a hold on Albania and AdaHa
and counted upon extensions of her territories and privileges in
Tripoli, Cyrenaica, and Somaliland.
Japan asserted and maintained a kind of Monroe Doctrine for
China, that no European Power might increase its holdings in the
Far East but that she herself might freely act as sponsor and
guardian for the entire Chinese Empire. Specifically, she annexed
the former German Pacific islands north of the equator and ac-
quired the German rights and concessions in the Chinese province
of Shantung. Less directly, she obtained at least a temporary
hold on eastern Siberia.
The United States gained nothing directly. Indirectly, how-
ever, her participation in the Great War and her probable
underwriting of the various treaties which concluded it marked
her coming-of-age as a Great Power and as a World Power. On
the one hand, she gained from Europe a formal recognition of the
Monroe Doctrine ; on the other hand, she set a precedent for
subsequent interference in the affairs of Asia not only but of
Europe likewise. She departed from her traditional poHcy of
avoiding "entangling alHances" with Old- World Powers; and
if she should ratify either the Covenant of the League of Na-
tions or the defensive treaty of alliance with France, or both, she
would obviously have entered into novel international engage-
ments and assumed new international obligations of far-reaching
import.
In fine, while Germany and Russia were turned from imperial-
istic paths by the Great War, four of the five victorious Great
Powers, and possibly the fifth, paved wide and deep the high-
ways of their own imperiaHsm. One concession was made, how-
1 i BelKlan
Principal railways ehowu thus
A NEW ERA BEGINS 401
ever, to critics of imperialism, for most of the former German
colonies were ceded to the several Allies not in full sovereignty
but as '■'mandataries" of the League of Nations. In other
words, the five Great Powers recognized the international,
rather than the strictly national, character of capitalistic im-
perialism. The very phrasing of one of the sections of the
Covenant was eloquent of the new point of view and of prom-
ise for the future : ''To those colonies and territories which as a
consequence of the late war have ceased to be under the sover-
eignty of the state which formerly governed them and which are
inhabited by people not yet able to stand by themselves under
the strenuous conditions of the modern world, there should be
applied the principle that the well-being and development of such
peoples form a sacred trust of civilization and that securities for
the performance of this trust should be embodied in this Covenant.
The best method of giving practical effect to this principle is that
the tutelage of such peoples should be intrusted to advanced na-
tions who by reason of their resources, their experience or their
geographical position can best undertake this responsibility, and
who are willing to accept it, and that this tutelage should be ex-
ercised by them as mandataries on behalf of the League.
''The character of the mandate must differ according to the
stage of the development of the people, the geographical situation
of the territory, its economic conditions and other similar cir-
cumstances. Certain communities formerly belonging to the
Turkish Empire have reached a stage of development where their
existence as independent nations can be provisionally recognized
subject to the rendering of administrative advice and assistance
by a mandatary until such time as they are able to stand alone ;
the wishes of these communities must be a principal condition in
the selection of the mandatary. Other peoples, especially those
of Central Africa, are at such a stage that the mandatary must
be responsible for the administration of the territory under con-
ditions which will guarantee freedom of conscience and religion,
subject only to the maintenance of public order and morals, the
prohibition of abuses such as the slave trade, the arms traffic and
the liquor trafiic, and the prevention of the estabHshment of
fortifications or military and naval bases and of military train-
ing of the natives for other than police purposes and the defense
of territory, and will also secure equal opportunities for the trade
and commerce of other members of the League. There are terri-
tories, such as Southwest Africa and certain of the South Pacific
islands, which, owing to the sparseness of their population or their
2D
402 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
small size, or their remoteness from the centers of civilization,
or their geographical contiguity to the territory of the mandatary,
and other circumstances, can be best administered under the laws
of the mandatary as integral portions of its territory, subject to
the safeguards above mentioned in the interests of the indigenous
population.
*'In every case of mandate the mandatary shall render to the
Council [of the League of Nations] an annual report in reference
to the territory committed to its charge. The degree of author-
ity, control, or administration to be exercised by the mandatary
shall, if not previously agreed UDon by members of the League,
be explicitly defined in each case by the Council. A permanent
commission shall be constituted to receive and examine the annual
reports of the mandataries and to advise the Council on all matters
relating to the observance of the mandates."
IV. Republicanism . The Great War was as advantageous to
repubhcanism throughout the world as it was disastrous to mon-
archy. In 1 9 14, six of the eight Great Powers were monarchical ;
in 191 9, only three remained monarchical and these three —
Great Britain, Italy, Japan, — had reconsecrated their poHtical
institutions by miHtary victory. The three most famous dynas-
ties — the Habsburgs, the Romanovs, and the Hohenzollerns —
had been worsted and had ceased to reign. From German lands
had been chased out all those lesser historic sovereign families —
the Wittelsbachs, the Wettins, the Guelfs, etc} Republics had
replaced monarchies in Russia, in Germany, and in Austria;
and in the states newly created in Central Europe republican
forms of government prevailed — in Poland, Czechoslovakia,
Ukrainia, Lithuania, Latvia, Esthonia, and Finland. Not only
were the American continents almost wholly repubhcan, but
Europe was now predominantly so, and even in Asia the vast
Chinese Empire was nominally repubhcan. Divine-right mon-
archy was at last extinct, except possibly in Japan; even con-
stitutional, Hberal monarchy was on the decHne.
V. Political Democracy. Within most of the belligerent coun-
tries radical poHtical reforms of a democratic nature were fos-
tered and hastened by the war. Throughout Central Europe,
in Germany, in Austria, and in Hungary, as well as in the newly
1 Individual kings were forced out of Greece and Bulgaria, but in both these
countries monarchy survived. In the case of Montenegro, King Nicholas was de-
posed in favor of King Peter of Serbia. In 191 8 there were ineffectual anti-royalist
demonstrations in the Netherlands, in Sweden, and in Spain. A royalist uprising
in Portugal against the republican government was easily put down. Only in
Hungary was there, in 1920, a popular drift from republicanism back to monarchy.
A NEW ERA BEGINS 403
erected states of Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Finland, a host of
new constitutions were written providing pretty uniformly for
representative government, ministerial responsibihty, and guar-
antees of personal liberties. In Germany and in Austria full
woman suffrage on the same basis as that of men was accorded
by the new constitutions; it was an appropriate recognition of
the significant role which women had played in the Great War
as well as a logical interpretation of the spirit of political democ-
racy. In Great Britain, too, the franchise was granted to most
women, while in the United States a constitutional amendment
providing for general woman suffrage was approved by the Con-
gress and submitted to the federated States for ratification. In
France, a bill granting the franchise to women passed the Cham-
ber of Deputies and barely missed passage through the Senate.
In Italy, a woman-suffrage bill was pending in 1920.
In Great Britain the electoral reforms of 1832, 1867, and 1884-
1885 were consolidated and supplemented by an important Elec-
toral Reform Bill enacted in 19 18. AnomaHes of former acts
were effaced and much-needed uniformity was secured. Here-
after, a general election was to be held everywhere on the same
day ; no person could vote in more than two constituencies ; the
franchise was extended to all men who were twenty-one years of
age and had maintained a, residence or place of business for six
months, to all women who were thirty years of age and had owned
or tenanted premises for six months or were married to men who
owned or tenanted premises, and to veterans of the war who were
nineteen years of age ; the principle of proportional representa-
tion was to be applied to university constituencies returning two
or more members ; and a redistribution of seats was effected,
whereby there would be one member for every 70,000 of the
population in Great Britain, and one for every 43,000 in Ireland,
so that the total membership of the House of Commons would
be increased from 670 to 707.^
In France, a long-debated Electoral Reform Bill, which had
been repeatedly passed by the Chamber and as repeatedly blocked
by the Senate, was finally enacted in 1919. Under its terms, the
scrutin de liste was substituted for the scrutin d'arrondissement,
^ The first general elections, under this Reform Act, were held in December,
1918, and gave a decisive verdict in favor of the Lloyd George Coalition Govern-
ment. The distribution of seats in the new House of Commons was as follows :
Coalitionists, 471 (334 Unionists, 127 Liberals, 10 Laborites) ; Opposition, 236
(46 Unionists, 37 Asquith Liberals, 65 Laborites, i Socialist, 7 Irish Nationalists,
73 Sinn Feiners, 7 Independents). In Great Britain the position of the Conserva-
tive Unionists was greatly strengthened, and in Ireland that of the Sinn Fein.
404 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
and the principle of proportional representation was recognized
and adopted. In Belgium likewise the year 191 9 witnessed an
electoral reform, by which the system of plural voting was abol-
ished and that of one-man-one-vote was introduced. In Ru-
mania,^ too, universal suffrage was substituted for the undemo-
cratic device of the three-class system which in earlier years had
been borrowed from Prussia.
VI. Temporary Impatience with Popular Government. Though
the outcome of the Great War was distinctly favorable to the
cause of repubhcanism and of poHtical democracy, temporarily
at least there was not unnatural impatience with popular govern-
ment. In the midst of the war, when the fortunes of the Central
Powers reached full-tide and those of the Allies appeared to ebb,
many persons felt and expressed doubt of democracy and liberty ;
they pointed to Teutonic success as proof positive of the inherent
superiority, at any rate in times of stress and strife, of autocracy
over democracy, of obedience over freedom; they complained
bitterly of the inefficiency of popular government and of the li-
cense of popular criticism ; and they sought to destroy Autoc-
racy by resorting to methods quite autocratic. In part the
Allied Governments responded to these feeHngs and complaints ;
everywhere the machinery of political democracy was supple-
mented, and in some instances well-nigh supplanted, by a bureau-
cracy of *' experts," dependent upon a dictatorial ''War
Cabinet" ; parhaments became chiefly '' rubber-stamps " for regis-
tering and recording the decisions of the Government ; and in-
dividual liberties were substantially abridged. In all belligerent
countries a censorship, open or veiled, was rigorously maintained ;
and constitutional guarantees of the freedom of association, meet-
ing, and pubHcation, were practically set aside, either by formal
statutory restriction, or, more often, by direct action on the part
of outraged patriots. In the passions and hysteria of the Great
War, majorities proved themselves utterly intolerant of minor-
ities, and even majorities were impatient of the slow and ponder-
ous workings of the usual engines of orderly political democracy.
How much of this was merely episodical to the war, time alone
will tell. Undoubtedly most of it arose out of mihtary exigen-
cies and will disappear with them. But it may not be idle to
conjecture that in the age-long struggle between the principle of
^ The disasters which overtook Rumania from 191 6 to 1918 led not only to
political reform but also to a noteworthy social transformation, for the large landed
estates were broken up and distributed, with compensation to their former owners,
among the numerous and needy peasantry.
A NEW ERA BEGINS 405
governmental authority and that of personal liberty, the Great
War aided the former to the detriment of the latter.^ Nor might
it be wholly beside the point to hazard the guess that the political
democracy of the future would undergo a noteworthy transforma-
tion in letter if not in spirit : democracy might be rendered more
real and more effective if it were based on social groupings rather
than on territorial divisions, if "experts" were accorded a more
honorable and appropriate place within it, and if its machinery
were simplified and applied less reservedly to social ends, to the
well-being of a whole community. To reform political democracy
and to extend its operation to industry and commerce was a bur-
den imposed upon progressive nations by the Great War.
VII. Hahit of Resorting to Force. In the Great War, Germany
had employed armed force in order to impose her peculiar Kultur
upon the world, and the Allies had developed and utilized a su-
perior armed force in order to curb Teutonic ambitions and to
preserve their own freedom and independence. For four years
and more the fate of the bulk of mankind had hung, not upon or-
derly, peaceful evolution, but upon violence and force, — ''force
to the utmost, force without stint or limit." And men who had
been taught by the most practical examples and experiences that
force was the righteous arbiter in the gravest of all international
questions were dangerously but naturally inclined to resort to a
forceful and illegal settlement of domestic differences. ''Direct
action" was too frequently invoked during the Great War, and
at its close, both by ultra-conservatives and by ultra-radicals.
In economic matters as well as in purely pohtical questions
revolutionary aims and revolutionary methods were increasingly
championed. On one side, reactionary statesmen and reaction-
ary capitalists counseled the governments to refuse popular de-
mands for political and economic reforms and to employ soldiers,
if necessary, to back up their refusal. On the other hand, groups
of fanatical agitators preached class-warfare and the violent over-
turn of "bourgeois" government and society. The career of the
Bolsheviki in Russia was made possible only by a condition and
a state of mind engendered by the Great War. And only the
habitual resort to force explained fully the policy which the Allies
pursued in 1919 of attempting to overthrow the Bolsheviki by
foreign intervention.
With the passing of war-psychology, the human mind will
probably return gradually to a quieter and more normal state.
^ A case in point is the enactment of permanent prohibition of alcohoUc bev-
erages throughout the United States (19 18).
4o6 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
But in the meantime, for at least a generation, the world will
be laboring to throw off the inherited incubus of terrorism and
violence. In all countries, particularly in those which have suf-
fered most in the Great War, a high degree of character, intelli-
gence, and self-restraint will be required of the whole citizenry
if, as a final outcome of the Great War, liberty is not to de-
generate into license and civilization into barbarism.
VIII. Social Tendencies. The Great War strengthened cer-
tain tendencies which had been developing in the social order of
the preceding era and inaugurated new ones :
(a) There was a marked increase of state socialism and of state
intervention in labor disputes. Systems of transportation and
communication were pretty generally taken over and managed
by the governments ; hours of labor were regulated, as were also
in many instances wages and profits ; and in some cases whole
war-industries were maintained and operated by public author-
ities. In Great Britain, the Labor Party demanded (January,
19 18) the permanent nationalization of land, railways, and mines.
{h) There was an increased influence, on the one hand, of bank-
ers and great financiers, and, on the other hand, of labor organ-
izations. " Profiteering " on the part of producers of war materiel
and of dealers in foodstuffs was accompanied by unusual pros-
perity of farmers and by an unprecedented rise of wages of day-
laborers. Salaried and professional men suffered disproportion-
ately from the parallel rise in the cost of living. Trade-unionists
enormously increased their influence both by reason of the greater
demand for their individual service and by reason of their per-
fected organization and their consequent gain in collective bar-
gaining.
(c) There was a new vogue of Marxian Socialism. Socialists
controlled Russia from the time of the Bolshevist Revolution in
November, 191 7; they played prominent roles in the revolu-
tionary movements in Germany, Austria, and Hungary, in 1918,
and they were more vocal than ever in Italy, in France, in Great
Britain, and in the United States. Nevertheless they were much
divided among themselves on aims and tactics : generally, in
Allied countries, they had learned to cooperate loyally with bour-
geois governments, while in Germany and Austria the majority
of them found no great difficulty in sharing responsibility for the
new revolutionary governments with Catholic parties ; in Russia,
the Bolshevist Socialists in attempting to carry the teachings of
Marx into practice, profoundly modified the historic traditions
of their party and succeeded in alienating not only the mass of
A NEW ERA BEGINS 407
non-Socialists throughout the world but the majority of Socialists
in foreign countries and a large number of Russian Socialists.
It seemed as though the Great War had cleft Marxian Socialism
asunder : one wing was so fully committed to force and violence
as to nullify Marx's political doctrines ; the other wing was so
completely given to compromise as to postpone indefinitely the
realization of Marx's economic program. Socialism might be
the goal of the future, but it was likely to be attained, if at all,
through middle-class cooperation rather than by the unaided ef-
forts of old-fashioned doctrinaire Marxian Socialists.
{d) Over against the manifest tendency toward state socialism
appeared, curiously enough, a counter-tendency toward what for
lack of a better phrase may be termed gild socialism. By this
term is meant all those expedients, such as profit-sharing, shop-
stewards, joint management, etc., by which the workers would
gradually gain control, and then ownership, of industries, and
thus secure direct industrial democracy without the interposition
of the state except as a regulator and accelerator of the process
and as a protector of the interests of the public. Certainly con-
siderable progress was made in Great Britain, in the United States,
in France, in Italy, and in Germany, in 1918 and in 1919, toward
admitting representatives of the workers to boards of directors of
various industrial establishments and toward sharing profits be-
tween capitalists and workingmen.
Many persons professed to see in gild socialism the most prac-
ticable solution of the perplexing but all-important problem of
improving the condition of the working classes without decreas-
ing production, and at the same time the most promising antidote
alike to state socialism, with its dangerous bureaucracy, and to
Marxian Socialism, with its destructive class-hatred. Gild social-
ism in industry, taken in conjunction with an agricultural pro-
gram of small holdings and of cooperation in production, buying
and selling, might provide the basis for a significant social trans-
formation during the ensuing century. It should be remarked in
this connection that among many groups espousing such an evolu-
tion the Social Catholics were particularly active at the close of
the Great War : it was the burden of the platforms of the Center
Party in Germany, of the Christian Socialist Party in Austria,
of the Democratic Party in Poland, of the Clericals in Belgium,
of the Action Liberate in France, and of the newly formed Catho-
lic Popular Party in Italy; it received the endorsement of the
Catholic War Council of the United States.
(e) Whatever might be thought of the relative value of schemes
4o8 A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
of state socialism and gild socialism, there was certainly in the
popular mind at the close of the Great War a firmer conviction
than ever before that social reforms and readjustments were
imperatively needed, that cooperation must be substituted for
competition. Just how this conviction would be translated into
action, none could predict with assurance ; that it would involve
an eclectic choice of the best points in all existing social theories
— capitalism, socialism, state-intervention, trade-unionism,
profit-sharing, and industrial democracy — admitted of little
doubt. At any rate it was evident that the world was quite done
with the economic individualism of the preceding century. As
the British Labor Party said in its famous '^ reconstruction" pro-
nouncement of January, 191 8: ''The individualist system of
capitalist production . . . may, we hope, have received a death-
blow. With it must go the political system and ideas in which
it naturally found expression. We of the Labor Party, whether
in opposition or in due time called upon to form an admin-
istration, will certainly lend no hand to its revival. If we in
Britain are to escape from the decay of civilization itself we
must insure that what is presently to be built up is a new social
order, based not on fighting, but on fraternity, — not on the
competitive struggle for the means of bare life, but on a deliber-
ately planned cooperation in production and distribution for the
benefit of all, — not on the utmost possible inequality of riches,
but on a systematic approach toward a healthy equality of mate-
rial circumstances for every person, — not on an enforced do-
minion over subject nations, subject races, subject colonies, sub-
ject classes, or a subject sex, but, in industry as well as in
government, on that equal freedom, that general consciousness
of consent, and that widest possible participation in power,
both economic and political, which is characteristic of democ-
racy. We do not, of course, pretend that it is possible, even
after the drastic clearing away that is now going on, to build
society anew in a year or two of feverish ' reconstruction.' What
the Labor Party intends to satisfy itself about is that each brick
that it helps to lay shall go to erect the structure that it intends,
and no other."
IX. Science and Education. The Great War gave an impetus
to certain applications of experimental science. Thus, there was
an extraordinary development not only of strictly mihtary weap-
ons such as heavy artillery, machine guns, poisonous gases,
tanks, airplanes, and submarines, but also of devices and imple-
ments which could be put to important commercial uses in the
A NEW ERA BEGINS 409
subsequent era of peace. To this category belonged the gradual
perfecting of all sorts of aircraft, so that in 1 919 government mails
were being regularly transported by airplane between chief cities
in the United States, and British and American air pilots were
crossing the Atlantic in their frail, high-powered bird-ships. To
this category belonged also the development of wireless telephony
and of devices for detecting sounds in water. Likewise Great
Britain and the United States were forced by circumstances of the
war to improve their chemical and dyeing industries and to bring
them up to a par with those of Germany.
In their endeavors to return wounded men to something like
their former condition army surgeons accomplished marvels, and
surgery developed in the course of the war to a point which ordi-
narily would have taken many years to attain. Considerable
progress was made, moreover, in the sciences of sanitation and
preventive medicine, in the age-long struggle against venereal
disease, and in psycho-analysis and other methods of treating
mental disorders. Psychology of groups as well as of individuals
was studied scientifically ; and in colleges and universities every-
where there was an immensely magnified interest in the social
sciences — in politics, in economics, in sociology, and in recent
history.
To the thousands of young men of every nation who partici-
pated in the Great War and survived it the experiences in camp
and on the field possessed undoubted educational value. Most
of these young men had formerly not traveled far from home, but
during the war they were perpetually on the move, and they must
have received a tremendous number of significant impressions
which they could have received in no other way. The barbarian
migrations of early centuries and the Crusades of the Middle Ages
have long been pointed to as educational tours of the greatest
importance ; yet neither the Crusades nor the barbarian mi-
grations affected nearly so many persons or embraced such ex-
tended regions as did the Great War. In the Great War, whole
nations were in arms ; millions of Russians sojourned in Germany,
millions of Austrians in Russia, millions of Germans and English-
men in France ; and the trip of two million young Americans to
Europe surpassed any educational tour ever planned by Cook's
or other commercial firm.
The influence of education upon the development of a nation's
ideals as well as upon the efficiency of an army was clearly per-
ceived in the case of Germany ; and one Allied government after
another sought while the war was still in progress to supplement
4IO A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR
the work of the public schools at home by conducting school-
classes among the troops at the front. In Great Britain, a radical
and far-reaching Education Bill, sponsored by Herbert Fisher,
the secretary of education in the Lloyd George cabinet, was en-
acted in 1918.
X. Religion. The Great War produced no spectacular re-
ligious "revival," as had been predicted. It did promote, how-
ever, closer cooperation than had ever before obtained among
Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and even Mohammedans. In the
case of the United States, the joint endeavors of the Young
Men's Christian Association, the Knights of Columbus, the
Jewish Welfare Board, and the Salvation Army served both to
maintain the high morale of the troops at the front and to pro-
mote among the civilian population at home a greater interest
in reHgious organizations. In the case of all countries, neutrals
as well as belHgerents, the International Red Cross Society
performed great and noble service for mankind. Among Chris-
tians outside of the Roman communion there were renewed
efforts to secure some sort of organic church unity.
On the whole, though Pope Benedict XV was denounced by
some Allied citizens as pro- German and by some Germans as too
pro-Ally, the Catholic Church was ably guided during the Great
War and remained true to its high ideals. Politically it occupied
a better position at the close of the struggle than at the beginning ;
without materially impairing the prestige of the Catholic Center
Party in Germany, Catholic Belgium had been vindicated.
Catholic Poland had been reborn, Portugal had resumed diplo-
matic relations with the Holy See, Great Britain had sent an
envoy to the Vatican, and a more cordial attitude toward the
Church had been evinced by both France and Italy. Though
the Italian Government successfully prevented the pope from
raising the "Roman Question," the Vatican obtained from the
Peace Congress a solemn guarantee of the inviolability of the
property of Christian missions abroad. The ardor with which
Catholics supported the new national movements and espoused
programs of social reform was a tribute to the continuing vital-
ity of their faith.
If the Great War did not immediately redound to the advan-
tage of any particular ecclesiastical system, it at any rate dealt
a body-blow at those doctrines of materialism and determinism
which had been taking root everywhere throughout the nineteenth
century and which had flourished and flowered mightily and poi-
sonously in Germany on the eve of the final conflict. Once more
A NEW ERA BEGINS 411
*' spiritualism" came to the fore; man grew interested again in
the phenomena of the "unseen"; and again absolute standards
of right could be referred to with no more cynical smiling than
was occasioned by mention of relative standards of might. Not
the struggle for existence between each two specimens of the hu-
man species was to be the '* natural" rule for the future, but the
natural order was to be one with the supernatural, that all men
are brothers and that in unselfish cooperation lies the hope of
humanity and civiHzation.
Cooperation was the chief lesson taught by the Great War.
No divine-right monarch could henceforth set his will above that
of the nation — such was the moral of the first Russian Revolu-
tion. No single social class could henceforth dominate a whole
community — such was the moral of the two Russian Revolutions
and likewise of the upheavals throughout Central Europe. No
one nation could henceforth set itself above all others and domi-
nate the whole world — such was the moral of the defeat and col-
lapse of Germany. Cooperation between social classes, cooper-
ation between nations — these were to be the watchwords and
countersigns of the new era. From the ruinous competition in
industrial life and the maid anarchy in international relations,
which held sway in 19 14, to the cooperative enterprise and the
League of Nations of 1920 was a far cry. The revolution was
due to the turmoil and terrors and travail of the Great War.
APPENDIX I
THE COVENANT OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS
The high contracting parties, in order to promote interna-
tional cooperation and to achieve international peace and
security by the acceptance of obligations not to resort to war, by
the prescription of open, just, and honorable relations between
nations, by the firm establishment of the understandings of inter-
national law as the actual rule of conduct among governments,
and by the maintenance of justice and a scrupulous respect for
all treaty obHgations in the dealings of organized peoples with
one another, agree to this covenant of the League of Nations.
Article i . — The original members of the League of Nations
shall be those of the signatories which are named in the annex
to this covenant and also such of those other States named in
the annex as shall accede without reservation to this covenant.
Such accession shall be effected by a declaration deposited with
the secretariat within two months of the coming into force of the
covenant. Notice shall be sent to all other members of the
League.
Any fully self-governing State, dominion, or colony not named
in the annex may become a member of the League if its admission
is agreed to by two-thirds of the assembly, provided that it shall
give effective guarantee of its sincere intention to observe its
international obligations, and shall accept such regulations as
may be prescribed by the League in regard to its military, naval
and air forces and armaments.
Any member of the League may, after two years' notice of its
intention so to do, withdraw from the League, provided that all
its international obligations and all its obHgations under this
covenant shall have been fulfilled at the time of its withdrawal.
Article 2. — The action of the League under this covenant
shall be effected through the instrumentality of an assembly
and of a council, with a permanent secretariat.
Article 3. — The assembly shall consist of representatives
of the members of the League.
413
414 APPENDIX I
The assembly shall meet at stated intervals and from time to
time as occasion may require at the seat of the League or at such
other place as may be decided upon.
The assembly may deal at its meetings with any matter within
the sphere of action of the League or afifecting the peace of the
world.
At meetings of the assembly each member of the League shall
have one vote, and may have not more than three representatives.
Article 4. — The council shall consist of representatives of
the principal Allied and Associated Powers, together with repre-
sentatives of four other members of the League. These four
members of the League shall be selected by the assembly from
time to time in its discretion. Until the appointment of the
representatives of the four members of the League first selected
by the assembly, representatives of Belgium, Brazil, Spain, and
Greece shall be members of the council.
With the approval of the majority of the assembly, the council
may name additional members of the League whose representa-
tives shall always be members of the council ; the council with
like approval may increase the number of members of the League
to be selected by the assembly for representation on the council.
The council shall meet from time to time as occasion may re-
quire, and at least once a year, at the seat of the League, or at
such other place as may be decided upon.
The council may deal at its meetings with any matter within the
sphere of action of the League or affecting the peace of the world.
Any member of the League not represented on the council shall
be invited to send a representative to sit as a member at any
meeting of the council during the consideration of matters
specially affecting the interests of that member of the League.
At meetings of the council, each member of the League repre-
sented on the council shall have one vote, and may have not
more than one representative.
Article 5. — Except where otherwise expressly provided in
this covenant or by the terms of the present treaty, decisions
at any meeting of the assembly or of the council shall require
the agreement of all the members of the League represented at
the meeting.
All matters of procedure at meetings of the assembly or of the
council, including the appointment of committees to investi-
gate particular matters, shall be regulated by the assembly or by
the council and may be decided by a majority of the members of
the League represented at the meeting.
THE COVENANT OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS 415
The first meeting of the assembly and the first meeting of the
council shall be summoned by the President of the United States
of America.
Article 6. — The permanent secretariat shall be established
at the seat of the League. The secretariat shall comprise a
Secretary General and such secretaries and staff as may be re-
quired.
The first Secretary General shall be the person named in the
annex; thereafter the Secretary General shall be appointed by
the council with the approval of the majority of the assembly.
The secretaries and staff of the secretariat shall be appointed
by the Secretary General with the approval of the council.
The Secretary General shall act in that capacity at all meet-
ings of the assembly and of the council.
The expenses of the secretariat shall be borne by the members
of the League in accordance with the apportionment of the ex-
penses of the International Bureau of the Universal Postal Union.
Article 7. — The seat of the League is established at Geneva.
The council may at any time decide that the seat of the League
shall be established elsewhere.
All positions under or in connection with the League, includ-
ing the secretariat, shall be open equally to men and women.
Representatives of the metnbers of the League and officials of
the League when engaged on business of the League shall enjoy
diplomatic privileges and immunities.
The buildings and other property occupied by the League or
its officials or by representatives attending its meetings shall be
inviolable.
Article 8. — The members of the League recognize that the
maintenance of peace requires the reduction of national arma-
ments to the lowest point consistent with national safety and the
enforcement by common action of international obligations.
The council, taking account of the geographical situation and
circumstances of each State, shall formulate plans for such re-
duction for the consideration and action of the several govern-
ments.
Such plans shall be subject to reconsideration and revision at
least every ten years.
After these plans shall have been adopted by the several gov-
ernments, the limits of the armaments therein fixed shall not be
exceeded without the concurrence of the council.
The members of the League agree that the manufacture by
private enterprise of munitions and implements of war is open
4i6 APPENDIX I
to grave objections. The council shall advise how the evil
effects attendant upon such manufacture can be prevented, due
regard being had to the necessities of those members 6f the
League which are not able to manufacture the munitions and
implements of war necessary for their safety.
The members of the League undertake to interchange full and
frank information as to the scale of their armaments, their mili-
tary and naval program and the condition of such of their
industries as are adaptable to warlike purposes.
Article 9. — A permanent commission shall be constituted
to advise the council on the execution of the provisions of Article
I and 8 and on mihtary and naval questions generally.
Article 10. — The members of the League undertake to
respect and preserve as against external aggression the terri-
torial integrity and existing political independence of all mem-
bers of the League. In case of any such aggression or in case of
any threat or danger of such aggression the council shall advise
upon the means upon which this obhgation shall be fulfilled.
Article ii. — Any war or threat of war, whether imme-
diately affecting any of the members of the League or not, is
hereby declared a matter of concern to the whole League, and the
League shall take any action that shall be deemed wise and
effectual to safeguard the peace of nations. In case any such
emergency should arise the Secretary General shall on the re-
quest of any member of the League forthwith summon a meeting
of the council.
It is also declared to be the friendly right of each member of
the League to bring to the attention of the assembly or of the
council any circumstances whatever affecting international re-
lations which threaten to disturb international peace or the
good understanding between nations upon which peace depends.
Article 12. — The members of the League agree that if there
should arise between them any dispute likely to lead to a rupture,
they will submit the matter either to arbitration or to inquiry
by the council, and they agree in no case to resort to war until
three months after the award by the arbitrators or the report by
the council.
In any case under this article the award of the arbitrators shall
be made within a reasonable time, and the report of the council
shall be made within six months after the submission of the dis-
pute.
Article 13. — The members of the League agree that when-
ever any dispute shall arise between them which they recognize
THE COVENANT OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS 417
to be suitable for submission to arbitration and which cannot
be satisfactorily settled by diplomacy, they will submit the whole
subject-matter to arbitration.
Disputes as to the interpretation of a treaty, as to any question
of international law, as to the existence of any fact which if
established would constitute a breach of any international obli-
gation, or as to the extent and nature of the reparation to be made
for any such breach, are declared to be among those which are
generally suitable for submission to arbitration.
For the consideration of any such dispute the Court of Arbi-
tration to which the case is referred shall be the court agreed on by
the parties to the dispute or stipulated in any convention exist-
ing between them.
The members of the League agree that they will carry out in
full good faith any award that may be rendered, and that they
will not resort to war against a member of the League which com-
plies therewith. In the event of any failure to carry out such an
award, the council shall propose what steps should be taken to
give effect thereto.
Article 14. — The council shall formulate and submit to the
members of the League for adoption plans for the estabHshment
of a Permanent Court of International Justice. The court shall
be competent to hear and determine any dispute of an inter-
national character which the parties thereto submit to it. The
court may also give an advisory opinion upon any dispute or
question referred to it by the council or by the assembly.
Article 15. — If there should arise between members of the
League any dispute Hkely to lead to a rupture, which is not sub-
mitted to arbitration in accordance with Article 13, the members
of the League agree that they will submit the matter to the
council. Any party to the dispute may effect such submission
by giving notice of the existence of the dispute to the Secretary
General, who will make all necessary arrangements for a full
investigation and consideration thereof.
For this purpose the parties to the dispute will communicate
to the Secretary General, as promptly as possible, statements
of their case with all relevant facts and papers, and the council
may forthwith direct the publication thereof.
The council shall endeavor to effect a settlement of the dis-
pute, and if such efforts are successful, a statement shall be made
pubHc giving such facts and explanations regarding the dispute
and the terms of settlement thereof as the council may deem
appropriate.
2 E
4i8 APPENDIX I
If the dispute is not thus settled, the council either unanimously
or by a majority vote shall make and publish a report containing
a statement of the facts of the dispute and the recommendations
which are deemed just and proper in regard thereto.
Any member of the League represented on the council may
make public a statement of the facts of the dispute and of its
conclusions regarding the same.
If a report by the council is unanimously agreed to by the
members thereof other than the representatives of one or more
of the parties to the dispute, the members of the League agree
that they will not go to war with any party to the dispute which
compHes with the recommendations of the report.
If the council fails to reach a report which is unanimously
agreed to by the members thereof other than the representatives
of one or more of the parties to the dispute, the members of the
League reserve to themselves the right to take such action as they
shall consider necessary for the maintenance of right and justice.
If the dispute between the parties is claimed by one of them,
and is found by the council to arise out of a matter which by
international law is solely within the domestic jurisdiction of
that party, the council shall so report, and shall make no recom-
mendation as to its settlement.
The council may in any case under this article refer the dis-
pute to the assembly. The dispute shall be so referred at the
request of either party to the dispute, provided that such re-
quest be made within fourteen days after the submission of the
dispute to the council.
In any case referred to the assembly all the provisions of this
article and of Article 1 2 relating to the action and powers of the
council shall apply to the action and powers of the assembly, pro-
vided that a report made by the assembly, if concurred in by the
representatives of those members of the League represented on
the council and of a majority of the other members of the
League, exclusive in each case of the representatives of the
parties to the dispute, shall have the same force as a report by
the council concurred in by all the members thereof other than
the representatives of one or more of the parties to the dispute.
Article 16. — Should any member of the League resort to
war in disregard of its covenants under Articles 12, 13, or 15, it
shall ipso facto be deemed to have committed an act of war
against all other members of the League, which hereby under-
take immediately to subject it to the severance of all trade or
financial relations, the prohibition of all intercourse between
THE COVENANT OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS 419
their nationals and the nationals of the covenant-breaking State,
and the prevention of all financial, commercial, or personal inter-
course between the nationals of the covenant-breaking State and
the nationals of any other State, whether a member of the League
or not.
It shall be the duty of the council in such case to recommend
to the several governments concerned what effective military,
naval or air force the members of the League shall severally con-
tribute to the armed forces to be used to protect the covenants
of the League.
The members of the League agree, further, that they will
mutually support one another in the financial and economic
measures which are taken under this article, in order to mini-
mize the loss and inconvenience resulting from the above meas-
ures, and that they will mutually support one another in resist-
ing any special measures aimed at one of their number by the
covenant-breaking State, and that they will take the necessary
steps to afford passage through their territory to the forces of
any of the members of the League which are cooperating to pro-
tect the covenants of the League.
Any member of the League which has violated any covenant
of the League may be declared to be no longer a member of the
League by a vote of the council concurred in by the representa-
tives of all the other members of the League represented thereon.
Article 17. — In the event of a dispute between a member of
the League and a State which is not a member of the League, or
between States not members of the League, the State or States not
members of the League shall be invited to accept the obligations
of membership in the League for the purposes of such dispute,
upon such conditions as the council may deem just. If such
invitation is accepted, the provisions of Articles 12 to 16 inclu-
sive shall be applied with such modifications as may be deemed
necessary by the council.
Upon such invitation being given the council shall immediately
institute an inquiry into the circumstances of the dispute and
recommend such action as may seem best and most effectual
in the circumstances.
If a State so invited shall refuse to accept the obligations of
membership in the League for the purposes of such dispute, and
shall resort to war against a member of the League, the pro-
visions of Article 16 shall be applicable as against the State
taking such action.
If both parties to the dispute when so invited refuse to accept
420 APPENDIX I
the obligations of membership in the League for the purposes of
such dispute, the council may take such measures and make such
recommendations as will prevent hostilities and will result in the
settlement of the dispute.
Article i8. — Every treaty or international engagement
entered into hereafter by any member of the League shall be
forthwith registered with the Secretariat and shall as soon as
possible be published by it. No such treaty or international
engagement shall be binding until so registered.
Article 19. — The assembly may from time to time advise
the reconsideration by members of the League of treaties which
have become inapplicable and the consideration of international
conditions whose continuance might endanger the peace of the
world.
Article 20. — The members of the League severally agree
that this covenant is accepted as abrogating all obligations or
understandings inter se which are inconsistent with the terms
thereof, and solemnly undertake that they will not hereafter
enter into any engagements inconsistent with the terms thereof.
In case any member of the League shall, before becoming a
member of the League, have undertaken any obligations incon-
sistent with the terms of this covenant, it shall be the duty of
such member to take immediate steps to procure its release from
such obligations.
Article 21. — Nothing in this covenant shall be deemed to
affect the validity of international engagements, such as treaties
of arbitration or regional understandings like the Monroe Doc-
trine, for securing the maintenance of peace.
Article 22. — To those colonies and territories which as a
consequence of the late war have ceased to be under the sov-
ereignty of the States which formerly governed them and which
are inhabited by peoples not able to stand by themselves under
the strenuous conditions of the modern world, there should be
appHed the principle that the well-being and development
of such peoples form a sacred trust of civilization and that
securities for the performance of this trust should be embodied
in this covenant.
The best method of giving practical effect to this principle is
that the tutelage of such peoples should be intrusted to advanced
nations who by reason of their resources, their experience or their
geographical position can best undertake this responsibility, and
who are willing to accept it, and that this tutelage should be ex-
ercised by them as mandataries on behalf of the League.
THE COVENANT OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS 421
The character of the mandate must differ according to the stage
of the development of the people, the geographical situation of
the territory, its economic conditions and other similar circum-
stances.
Certain communities formerly belonging to the Turkish
Empire have reached a stage of development where their exist-
ence as independent nations can be provisionally recognized
subject to the rendering of administrative advice and assistance
by a mandatary until such time as they are able to stand alone.
The wishes of these communities must be a principal considera-
tion in the selection of the mandatary.
Other peoples, especially those of Central Africa, are at such
a stage that the mandatary must be responsible for the adminis-
tration of the territory under conditions which will guarantee
freedom of conscience and reHgion, subject only to the mainte-
nance of public order and morals, the prohibition of abuses such
as the slave trade, the arms traffic and the liquor traffic, and the
prevention of the establishment of fortifications or military and
naval bases and of military training of the natives for other than
poHce purposes and the defense of territory, and will also secure
equal opportunities for the trade and commerce of other members
of the League.
There are territories, such as Southwest Africa and certain of
the South Pacific islands, which, owing to the sparseness of their
population or their small size, or their remoteness from the
centers of civilization, or their geographical contiguity to the
territory of the mandatary, and other circumstances, can be
best administered under the laws of the mandatary as integral
portions of its territory, subject to the safeguards above men-
tioned in the interests of the indigenous population.
In every case of mandate the mandatary shall render to the
council an annual report in reference to the territory committed
to its charge.
The degree of authority, control, or administration to be
exercised by the mandatary shall, if not previously agreed upon
by the members of the League, be explicitly defined in each case
by the council.
A permanent commission shall be constituted to receive and
examine the annual reports of the mandataries and to advise the
council on all matters relating to the observance of the mandates.
Article 23. — Subject to and in accordance with the pro-
visions of international conventions existing or hereafter to be
agreed upon, the members of the League :
422 APPENDIX I
(a) will endeavor to secure and maintain fair and humane
conditions of labor for men, women, and children, both in their
own countries and in all countries to which their commercial
and industrial relations extend, and for that purpose will estab-
lish and maintain the necessary international organizations;
(b) undertake to secure just treatment of the native inhabit-
ants of territories under their control;
(c) will intrust the League with the general supervision over
the execution of agreements with regard to the traffic in women
and children and the traffic in opium and other dangerous drugs ;
(d) will intrust the League with the general supervision of
the trade in arms and ammunition with the countries to which
the control of this traffic is necessary in the common interest;
(e) will make provision to secure and maintain freedom of
communications and of transit and equitable treatment for the
commerce of all members of the League. In this connection the
special necessities of the regions devastated during the war of
1914-1918 shall be borne in mind ;
(/) will endeavor to take steps in matters of international
concern for the prevention and control of disease.
Article 24. — There shall be placed under the direction of
the League all international bureaus already established by
general treaties if the parties to such treaties consent All such
international bureaus and all commissions for the regulation of
matters of international interest hereafter constituted shall be
placed under the direction of the League.
In all matters of international interest which are regulated by
general conventions but which are not placed under the control
of international bureaus or commissions, the secretariat of the
League shall, subject to the consent of the council and if desired
by the parties, collect and distribute all relevant information
and shall render any other assistance which may be necessary
or desirable.
The council may include as part of the expenses of the secre-
tariat the expenses of any bureau or commission which is placed
under the direction of the League.
Article 25. — The members of the League agree to encourage
and promote the establishment and cooperation of duly author-
ized voluntary national Red Cross organizations having as pur-
poses the improvement of health, the prevention of disease, and
the mitigation of suffering throughout the world.
Article 26. — Amendments to this covenant will take effect
when ratified by the members of the League whose representa-
THE COVENANT OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS 423
tives compose the council and by a majority of the members of
the League whose representatives compose the assembly.
No such amendment shall bind any member of the League
which signifies its dissent therefrom, but in that case it shall cease
to be a member of the League.
ANNEX
I. Original members of the League of Nations signatories of
the treaty of peace.
United States of America Haiti
Belgium
Hedjaz
Bolivia
Honduras
Brazil
Italy
British Empire
Japan
Canada
Liberia
Australia
Nicaragua
South Africa
Panama
New Zealand
Peru
India
Poland
China
Portugal
Cuba
Rumania
Ecuador
Serb-Croat-Slovene State
France
Siam
Greece
Czecho-Slovakia
Guatemala
Uruguay
States invited to accede to the covenant.
Argentine Republic
Persia
Chile
Salvador
Colombia
Spain
Denmark
Sweden
Netherlands
Switzerland
Norway
Venezuela
Paraguay
II. First Secretary General of the League of Nations. The
Honorable Sir James Eric Drummond, K.C.M.G., C.B.
APPENDIX II
AMERICAN RESERVATIONS TO THE TREATY OF VERSAILLES
(Adopted by majority vote of the United States Senate on November 8,
1919, and again, with minor modifications, in March, 1920. President
Wilson consistently opposed them, however, and on both occasions their
proponents failed to muster the necessary two-thirds vote of the United
States Senate to assure American ratification of the treaty of Versailles
with these Reservations.)
That the Senate advise and consent to the ratification of the
treaty of peace with Germany concluded at Versailles on the
28th day of June, 1919, subject to the following reservations
and understandings, which are hereby made a part and condi-
tion of this resolution of ratification, which ratification is not
to take efifect or bind the United States until the said reservations
and understandings adopted by the Senate have been accepted
by an exchange of notes as a part and a condition of this reso-
lution of ratification by at least three of the four principal allied
and associated powers, to wit, Great Britain, France, Italy, and
Japan :
1. The United States so understands and construes Article
I. that in case of notice of withdrawal from the League of Nations,
as provided in said article, the United States shall be the sole
judge as to whether all its international obligations and all its
obligations under the said covenant have been fulfilled, and
notice of withdrawal by the United States may be given by a
concurrent resolution of the Congress of the United States.
2. The United States assumes no obligation to preserve the
territorial integrity or political independence of any other country
or to interfere in controversies between nations — whether
members of the League or not — under the provisions of Article
X., or to employ the military or naval forces of the United States
under any article of the treaty for any purpose, unless in any
particular case the Congress, which, under the Constitution, has
the sole power to declare war or authorize the employment of
the military or naval forces of the United States, shall by act
or joint resolution so provide.
424
AMERICAN RESERVATIONS TO THE TREATY 425
3. No mandate shall be accepted by the United States under
Article XXIL, Part L, or any other provision of the treaty of
peace with Germany, except by action of the Congress of the
United States.
4. The United States reserves to itself exclusively the right
to decide what questions are within its domestic jurisdiction and
declares that all domestic and political questions relating wholly
or in part to its internal affairs, including immigration, labor,
coastwise traffic, the tariff, commerce, the suppression of traffic
in women and children, and in opium and other dangerous drugs,
and all other domestic questions, are solely within the jurisdic-
tion of the United States and are not under this treaty to be
submitted in any way either to arbitration or to the considera-
tion of the Council or of the Assembly of the League of Nations,
or any agency thereof, or to the decision or recommendation of
any other power.
5. The United States will not submit to arbitration or to
inquiry by the Assembly or by the Council of the League of
Nations, provided for in said treaty of peace, any questions which
in the judgment of the United States depend upon or relate
to its long-established policy, commonly known as the Monroe
Doctrine ; said doctrine is to be interpreted by the United
States alone and is hereby declared to be wholly outside the juris-
diction of said League of Nations and entirely unaffected by
any provision contained in the said treaty of peace with Ger-
many.
6. The United States withholds its assent to Articles CLVL,
CLVIL, and CLVIIL, and reserves full liberty of action with
respect to any controversy which may arise under said articles
between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan.
7. The Congress of the United States will provide by law
for the appointment of the representatives of the United States
in the Assembly and the Council of the League of Nations, and
may in its discretion provide for the participation of the United
States in any commission, committee, tribunal, court, council,
or conference, or in the selection of any members thereof and for
the appointment of members of said commissions, committees,
tribunals, courts, councils, or conferences, or any other repre-
sentatives under the treaty of peace, or in carrying out its pro-
visions, and until such participation and appointment have been
so provided for and the powers and duties of such representa-
tives have been defined by law, no person shall represent the
United States under either said League of Nations or the treaty
426 APPENDIX II
of peace with Germany or be authorized to perform any act for
or on behalf of the United States thereunder, and no citizen of
the United States shall be selected or appointed as a member
of said commissions, committees, tribunals, courts, councils, or
conferences except with the approval of the Senate of the United
States.
8. The United States understands that the Reparations Com-
mission will regulate or interfere with exports from the United
States to Germany, or from Germany to the United States, only
when the United States by act or joint resolution of Congress
approves such regulation or interference.
9. The United States shall not be obligated to contribute
to any expenses of the League of Nations, or of the secretariat,
or of any commission, or committee, or conference, or other
agency, organized under the League of Nations or under the
treaty or for the purpose of carrying out the treaty provisions,
unless and until an appropriation of funds available for such ex-
penses shall have been made by the Congress of the United States.
10. If the United States shall at any time adopt any plan for
the limitation of armaments proposed by the Council of the
League of Nations under the provisions of Article VIIL, it
reserves the right to increase such armaments without the con-
sent of the council whenever the United States is threatened
with invasion or engaged in war.
11. The United States reserves the right to permit, in its
discretion, the nationals of a covenant-breaking State, as defined
in Article XVI. of the covenant of the League of Nations, residing
within the United States or in countries other than that violat-
ing said Article XVI., to continue their commercial, financial,
and personal relations with the nationals of the United States.
12. Nothing in Articles CCXCVL, CCXCVIL, or in any of
the annexes thereto or in any other article, section, or annex
of the treaty of peace with Germany shall, as against citizens of
the United States, be taken to mean any confirmation, ratifica-
tion, or approval of any act otherwise illegal or in contravention
of the rights of citizens of the United States.
13. The United States withholds its assent to Part XIII.
(Articles CCCLXXXVII. to CCCCXXVII. inclusive) unless
Congress by act or joint resolution shall hereafter make provision
for representation in the organization established by said Part
XIII. and in such event the participation of the United States
will be governed and conditioned by the provisions of such act
or joint resolution.
AMERICAN RESERVATIONS TO THE TREATY 427
14. The United States assumes no obligation to be bound
by any election, decision, report, or finding of the Council or
Assembly in which any member of the League and its self-govern-
ing dominions, colonies, or parts of empire, in the aggregate
have cast more than one vote, and assumes no obKgation to be
bound by any decision, report, or finding of the Council or As-
sembly arising out of any dispute between the United States
and any member of the League if such member, or any self-gov-
erning dominion, colony, empire, or part united with it politically
has voted.
APPENDIX III
AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES AND FRANCE
(Signed at Versailles, June 28, 1919, but not ratified by the United States
Senate.)
Whereas the United States of America and the French Repub-
lic are equally animated by the desire to maintain the peace of the
world so happily restored by the treaty of peace signed at Ver-
sailles the 28th day of June, 1919, putting an end to the war
begun by the aggression of the German Empire and ended by
the defeat of that power ; and,
Whereas the United States of America and the French Republic
are fully persuaded that an unprovoked movement of aggression
by Germany against France would not only violate both the
letter and the spirit of the Treaty of Versailles to which the
United States of America and the French Republic are parties,
thus exposing France anew to the intolerable burdens of an un-
provoked war, but that such aggression on the part of Germany
would be and is so regarded by the Treaty of Versailles as a hos-
tile act against all the powers signatory to that treaty and as
calculated to disturb the peace of the world by involving inevi-
tably and directly the states of Europe and indirectly, as expe-
rience has amply and unfortunately demonstrated, the world
at large ; and,
Whereas the United States of America and the French Repub-
lic fear that the stipulations relating to the left bank of the Rhine
contained in said Treaty of Versailles may not at first provide
adequate security and protection to France on the one hand and
the United States of America as one of the signatories of the
Treaty of Versailles on the other ;
Therefore, the United States of America and the French Re-
pubUc having decided to conclude a treaty to effect these neces-
sary purposes, Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States
of America, and Robert Lansing, Secretary of State of the United
States, specially authorized thereto by the President of the
United States, and Georges Clemenceau, President of the Council,
Minister of War, and Stephen Pichon, Minister of Foreign Affairs,
42S
AGREEEMENT BETWEEN THE tJ. S. AND FRANCE 429
specially authorized thereto by Raymond Poincare, President
of the French Republic, have agreed upon the following articles :
Article I. — In case the following stipulations relating to
the left bank of the Rhine contained in the treaty of peace with .
Germany signed at Versailles the 28th day of June, 1919, by the
United States of America, the French Republic and the British
Empire among other powers :
'' Article 42. Germany is forbidden to maintain or construct
any fortifications either on the left bank of the Rhine or on
the right bank to the west of a line drawn 50 kilometres to
the east of the Rhine.
*' Article 43. In the area defined above the maintenance
and assembly of armed forces, either permanently or tempo-
rarily, and military manoeuvres of any kind, as well as the
upkeep of all permanent works for mobilization are in the same
way forbidden.
^'Article 44. In case Germany violates in any manner
whatever the provisions of Articles 42 and 43, she shall be
regarded as committing a hostile act against the powers sig-
natory of the present treaty and as calculated to disturb the
peace of the world."
may not at first provide adequate security and protection to
France, the United States of America shall be bound to come
immediately to her assistance in the event of any unprovoked
movement of aggression against her being made by Germany.
Article IL — The present treaty, in similar terms with the
treaty of even date for the same purpose concluded between Great
Britain and the French Republic, a copy of which treaty is an-
nexed hereto, will only come into force when the latter is ratified.
Article III. — The present treaty must be submitted to the
Council of the League of Nations, and must be recognized by the
Council, acting if need be by a majority, as an engagement
which is consistent with the Covenant of the League. It will
continue in force until on the" application of one of the parties
to it the Council, acting if need be by a majority, agrees that the
League itself affords sufficient protection.
Article IV. - — The present treaty will be submitted to the
Senate of the United States at the same time as the Treaty of
Versailles is submitted to the Senate for its advice and consent
to ratification. It will be submitted before ratification to the
French Chambers for approval. The ratification thereof will
be exchanged on the deposit of ratifications of the Treaty of
Versailles at Paris or as soon thereafter as shall be possible.
430 APPENDIX III
In faith whereof the respective plenipotentiaries, to wit: On
the part of the United States of America, Woodrow Wilson,
President, and Robert Lansing, Secretary of State, of the United
States ; and on the part of the French Republic, Georges Cle-
menceau. President of the Council of Ministers, Minister of War
and Stephen Pichon, Minister of Foreign Affairs, have signed the
above articles both in the English and French languages, and
they have hereunto affixed their seals.
Done in duplicate at the City of Versailles, on the twenty-
eighth day of June, in the year of our Lord one thousand nine
hundred and nineteen, and the one hundred and forty-third of
the Independence of the United States of America.
[Seal] Woodrow Wilson.
[Seal] Robert Lansing.
[Seal] G. Clemenceau.
[Seal] S. PiCHON.
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
I. General Historical Background
Manuals : C. J. H. Hayes, A Political and Social History of Modern Europe^
2 vols. (1916) ; L. H. Holt and A. W. Chilton, The History of Europe
from 1862 to igi4 (191 7); J. S. Schapiro, Modern and Contemporary
History (1918) ; CD, Hazen, Fifty Years of Europe (1919) ; E. B.
Krehbiel, Nationalism, War and Society (19 16).
Diplomatic Histories: F. M. Anderson and A. S. Hershey (editors).
Handbook for the Diplomatic History of Europe, Asia, and Africa, 1870-
yL igi4 (1918) ; Charles Seymour, The Diplomatic Background of the War
vL (1916) ; W. S. Davis, The Roots of the War (1918) ; Arthur Bullard,
The Diplomacy of the Great War (19 16), a survey of international politics
from 1878 to 1914 ; W. M. FuUerton, Problems of Power, 2d ed. (1915) ;
H. A. Gibbons, The New Map of Europe, IQII-IQ14 (1914), The New
> Map of Africa, igoo-igi6, a History of European Colonial Expansion
^ and Colonial Diplomacy (1916), and The New Map of Asia, igoo-igig
(1919) ; A. C. Coolidge, The Origins of the Triple Alliance (191 7) ;
E. J. Dillon, From the Triple to the Quadruple Alliance, Why Italy went
into the War (1915) ; B. E,. Schmitt, England and Germany (1916) ;
Andre Tardieu, France and the Alliances, the Struggle for the Balance of
Power (1908); E. D. Morel, Ten Years of Secret Diplomacy (191 5);
Gilbert Murray, The Foreign Policy of Sir Edward Grey igo6-igi5
(191 5); Ernst (Graf) zu Reventlow, Deutschlands Auswdrtige Politik
1888-igij (1914).
Germany : W. H. Dawson, The German Empire {i86y-igi4) and the Unity
Movement, 2 vols. (1919) ; R. H. Fife, Jr., The German Empire between
Two Wars, a Study of the Political and Social Development of the Nation
> between 1871 and igi4 (1916) ; J. Ellis Barker, Modern Germany, its
Rise, Growth, Downfall, and Future (1919) ; C. D. Hazen, Alsace-Lor-
raine under German Rule (191 7) ; P. E. Lewin, The Germans and Africa
(191 5), and The German Road to the East, an account of the ^^ Drang
nach Osten^' and of Teutonic Aims in the Near and Middle East (191 7) ;
F. A. J. von Bernhardi, Germany and the Next War, Eng. trans, by
A. H. Powles (1913).
n. General Works on the War •
Documents : A vast amount of material has been published by the Govern-
ments of the several belligerents, both diplomatic and mUitary ; many
documents of signal importance have been published in convenient
form by the American Association for International Conciliation (New
York), by the World Peace Foundation (Boston), by The Nation (New
York), and by The New Europe, a valuable weekly review of foreign
politics (191 7-1920); Current History, a monthly magazine issued
431
432 SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
since 19 14 by The New York Times, is a store-house of documents,
special articles, and illustrations; The Times Documentary History of
the War, published by the London Times, is similarly useful.
Secondary Worxs : John Buchan, Nelson's History of the War, 24 vols.
(1915-1919) ; F. H. Simonds, History of the World War ; Hilaire Belloc,
Elements of the Great War ; Arthur Conan Doyle, A History of the Great
War; Mr. Punch's History of the War (1919) ; Louis Raemaeker, Rae-
maeker's Cartoon History of the War; F. W. T. Lange and W. T. Berry,
Books on the Great War, an annotated bibliography.
in. Diplomacy and Apologetics of the War
Diplomacy: J. B. Scott (editor). Diplomatic Documents relating to the Out-
break of the European War, 2 vols. (191 6); E. R. O. von Mach, Official
Diplomatic Documents relating to the Outbreak of the European War,
with photographic reproductions of the official editions of the documents
published by the Governments of Austria-Hungary, Belgium, France,
Germany, Great Britain, Russia, and Serbia (1916) ; F. Seymour Cocks,
The Secret Treaties; O. P. Chit wood, The Immediate Causes of the Great
War (191 7) ; J. W. Headlam, The History of Twelve Days, July 24th
to August 4th, IQ14 (191 5) ; J. W. Headlam, The German Chancellor
and the Outbreak of War (191 7) ; E. C. StoweU, The Diplomacy of the
War of 1 91 4 (191 5) ; Munroe Smith, Militarism and Statecraft (19 18).
Apologetics : E. R. Bevan, Method in the Madness, a fresh consideration
of the case between Germany and Ourselves (19 17); Yves Guyot, The
Causes and Consequences of the War, Eng. trans, by F. A. Holt (1916) ;
G. Lowes Dickinson, The European Anarchy (1916) ; J. M. Beck,
The Evidence in the Case (1914) ; E. J. Dillon, A Scrap of Paper (1914) ;
/ Accuse, by a German, Eng. trans, by Alexander Gray (191 5) ; Modern
Germany in relation to the Great War, by various German writers, no-
tably Professors Meinecke, Oncken, Schumacher, and Erich Marcks,
trans, by W. W. Whitelock (1916) ; H. T. W. Frobenius, The German
Empire's Hour of Destiny (191 4); E. R. O. von Mach, What Germany
Wants (1914) and Germany's Point of View (191 5); Paul Rohrbach,
/ Germany's Isolation, an Exposition of the Economic Causes of the War,
Eng. trans, by P. H. Phillipson (191 5); Friedrich Naumann, Central
^ Europe, Eng. trans, by Christabel M. Meredith (191 7) ; Ernst (Graf)
zu Reventlow, The Vampire of the Continent, Eng. trans, by G. C.
Hill (1916) ; G. M. C. Brandes, The World at War, Eng. trans, by
Catherine D. Groth (191 7).
Criticism and Comment : J. W. Gerard, My Four Years in Germany (191 7),
and Face to Face with Kaiserism (1918) ; D. J. Hill, Impressions of the
Kaiser (1918) ; M. F. Egan, Ten Years near the German Frontier (1919) ;
Henry Morgenthau, Ambassador Morgenthau's Story (1918) ; Henry
van Dyke, Fighting for Peace (191 7); Emile Priim, Pan-Germanism
versus Christendom, the Conversion of a Neutral (191 7) ; T. Tittoni,
Who is Responsible for the War, the Verdict of History (191 7) ; Count
Julius Andrassy, Whose Sin is the World War (191 5) ; Christian Gauss,
The German Emperor as Shown in his Public Utterances (191 5); S.
Grumbach, Germany's Annexationist Aims, Eng. trans, by J. E. Barker
(191 7) ; J. P. Bang, Hurrah and Hallelujah, the Teaching of Germany's
Poets, Prophets, Professors and Preachers, Eng. trans, by Jessie Brochner
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY 433
(191 7) ; William Archer, Gems {?) of German Thought (191 7) ; Edwyn
Bevan, German Social Democracy during the War (1919) ; H. N. Brails-
ford, Across the Blockade (1919) ; T. L. Stoddard, Present Day Eur ope j
its National States of Mind (191 7).
IV. Special Works on Particular Countries
Belgium : Brand Whitlock, Belgium, a Personal Narrative, 2 vols. (1919) ;
Hugh Gibson, A Journal from our Legation in Belgium (191 7); Car-
dinal Mercier, Pastorals, Letters, Allocutions igi4-igi7, with a bio-
graphical sketch by Rev. J. F. Stillemans (191 7) ; Leon van der Essen,
The Invasion and the War in Belgium, with a Sketch of the Diplomatic
Negotiations preceding the Conflict (191 7) ; C. P. Sanger and H. T. J.
Norton, England's Guarantee to Belgium and Luxemburg, with the full
text of the treaties (191 5); Reports on the Violations of the Rights of
Nations and of the Laws and Customs of War in Belgium, by a Com-
mission appointed by the Belgian Government, 2 vols. (191 7) ; Charles
De Visscher, Belgium's Case, a Juridical Enquiry, Eng. trans, by E.
F. Jourdain (1916) ; K. A. Fuehr, The Neutrality of Belgium, a Study
of the Belgian Case under its aspects in Political History and International
Law (1915), the German case; Erich Erichsen, Forced to Fight, the
Tale of a Schleswig Dane (191 7) ; A. J. Toynbee, The German Terror in
Belgium, an Historical Record (191 7) ; Charles Sarolea, How Belgium
Saved Europe (1915) ; Emile Waxweiler, Belgium, Neutral and Loyal ^
the War of 191 4 (1915).
Austria-Hungary : H. W. Steed, The Hapsburg Monarchy (1913) ; R. W.
Seton- Watson, Racial Problems in Hungary (1908), The South Slav
Question and the Hapsburg Monarchy (191 1), Corruption and Reform in
Hungary (191 1), German, Slav, and Magyar, a Study in the Origins of
the Great War (1916) ; E. Ludwig, Austria-Hungary and the War (19 16).
The Near East : N. E. and C. R. Buxton, The War and the Balkans (191 5) ;
L. H. Courtney, ist Baron Courtney, Nationalism and War in the Near
/ East (1916) ; J. A, R. Marriott, The Eastern Question, an Historical
Study in European Diplomacy (191 7) ; Marion I. Newbigin, Geographical
Aspects of Balkan Problems in relation to the Great European War (191 5) ;
Fortier Jones, With Serbia into Exile, an American's Adventures with
the Army that Can Not Die (1916) ; V. R. Savic, Southeastern Europe
(1918) ; Greece in her True Light, her position in the world-wide war as
expounded by. El. K. Venizelos, her greatest statesman, in a series of official
documents, trans, by S. A. Xanthaky and N. G. Sakellarios (1916) ; His-
toricus (pseud.), Bulgaria and her Neighbors (191 7) ; G. J. Shaw-Lefevre,
ist Baron Eversley, The Turkish Empire, its Growth and Decay (191 7) ;
Henry Morgenthau, Ambassador Morgenthau's Story (191 8) ; Andr6
Cheradame, The Pan-German Plot Unmasked (191 7); C. Snouck,
The Revolt in Arabia (19 17).
>J[ Armenia : Viscount Bryce, Treatment of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire
1915-1916, Documents presented to Viscount Grey (191 7) ; H. A. Gibbons,
The Blackest Page of Modern History (1916) ; A. J. Toynbee, The Ar-
menian Atrocities, the Murder of a Nation (1916) ; Abraham Yohannan,
The Death of a Nation, or the Ever Persecuted Nestorians or Assyrian
Christians (19 16).
2F
434 SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
Zionism: Paul Goodman and A. D. Lewis (editors), Zionism, Problems and
Views (1917).
East-Central Europe : I. D. Levine, The Resurrected Nations, a Popular
History (igig) ; Ralph Butler, The New Eastern Europe (1919) ; Ste-
phan Rudnicki, The Ukraine (191 5) ; C. Rivas, La Lithuanie sous la
^ joug allemande (1918) ; H. A. Gibbons, The Reconstruction of Poland and
the Near East, Problems of Peace (191 7) ; E, H. Lewinski-Corwin, A Po-
litical History of Poland (191 7) ; F. E. Whitton, A History of Poland
(1918).
Russia : H. W. Williams, Russia of the Russians (1914) ; Gregor Alexinsky,
Modern Russia (19 14), Russia and the Great War (191 5), and Russia
and Europe (191 7) ; Leo Wiener, An Interpretation of the Russian People
(191 5); R, W. Child, Potential Russia (1916) ; I. F. Marcosson, The
Rebirth of Russia (191 7) ; I. D. Levine, The Russian Revolution (191 7) ;
Gen. Basil Gourko, War and Revolution in Russia, igi4-igiy (1919) ;
A. F. Kerensky, The Prelude to Bolshevism (1919) ; A. S, Rappoport,
Pioneers of the Russian Revolution (1919) ; John Reed, Ten Days that
Shook the World (19 19) ; Emile Vandervelde, Three Aspects of the
sj Russian Revolution (1919) ; John Spargo, Bolshevism versus Democracy
(1919) ; Arthur Ransome, Russia in 191 9; A. R. Williams, Arthur
Ransome, and Col. Raymond Robins, Lenin, the Man and his Work
(1919) ; J. V. Bubnoff, The Cooperative Movement in Russia, its history,
significance, and character (191 7).
The Far East : K. S. Latourette, The Development of China (191 7) ; S. K.
X Hornbeck, Contemporary Politics in the Far East (1916) ; Jefferson
Jones, The Fall of Tsingtau, a Study of Japan's Ambitions in China
(191 5) ; G. H. Blakeslee (editor), Japan and Japanese- American Rela-
tions (191 2) ; T. F. F. Millard, Our Eastern Question, America's Con-
tact with the Orient and the Trend of Relations with China and Japan
(19 1 6), and Democracy and the Eastern Question (1919) ; Naoichi
Masaoka (editor), Japan to America, a symposium of papers by political
leaders and representative citizens of Japan and on the relations between
Japan and the United States (191 5) ; B. L. Putnam Weale, The Fight
for the Republic in China (191 7), and The Truth about China and Japan
(1919).
V. Great Britain and the War
Britain and the Empire : David Lloyd George, Through Terror to Triumph,
speeches and pronouncements, arranged by F. L. Stevenson(i9i5) ; W. S.
M. Knight, A History of Great Britain during the Great War (1916) ;
Andre Chevrillon, England and the War 1914-1915, with a preface by
Rudyard Kipling (191 7) ; J. C. Smuts, War-Time Speeches, a compila-
tion of public utterances in Great Britain (191 7) ; G. L. Beer, The English-
speaking Peoples, their Future Relations and Joint International Obli-
gations (1917) ; Sinclair Kennedy, The Pan- Angles, a Consideration of
the Federation of the Seven English-speaking Nations (1914).
Ireland: W. B. Wells and N. Marlow, The History of the Irish Rebellion
of igi6 (1917) ; F, P. Jones, History of the Sinn Fein Movement and the
Irish Rebellion of 1916 (191 7) ; G. W. Russell (pseud., A. E.), National
Being, Some Thoughts on an Irish Policy (1916) ; L. R. Morris, The
Celtic Dawn, a Survey of the Renascence in Ireland 1889-1916 (191 7) ;
Shane Leslie, The Celt and the World, a Study of the Relation of Celt
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY 435
and Teuton in History (1917) ; Francis Hackett, Ireland, a Study in
Nationalism (1918) ; E. R. Turner, Ireland and England (191 9) ; Lord
Ernest William Hamilton, The Said oj Ulster (191 7).
VI. The United States and the War
General Narrative: J. B. McMaster, The United States in the World
y War, 2 vols. (1918-1919) ; J. S. Bassett, Our War with Germany, a
History (1919) ; Florence F. Kelly, What America Did (1919) ; Colonel
De Chambrun and Captain De Marenches, The American Army in the
European Conflict (1919) ; L. P. Ayres, The War with Germany, a
statistical summary, 2d ed. (1920).
President Wilson : J. B. Scott (editor), President Wilson's Foreign Policy,
messages, addresses, papers (1918) ; William Archer, The Peace Presi-
dent, a brief appreciation of Woodrow Wilson (1919) ; Daniel Halevy,
President Wilson (1919).
Miscellaneous : W. F. Willoughby, Government Organization in War
Time and After, a Survey of the Federal Civil Agencies created for the
Prosecution of the War (1919) ; Lt.-Col. J. C. Wise, The Turn of the
Tide, Operations of American Troops (1919) ; Committee on Public
Information, War Information Series; Ida C. Clarke, American Women
and the World War (19 18).
Vn. Detailed Military and Naval Operations
Military: In addition to the General Works on the War, listed above,
there are innumerable accounts of various campaigns. Chief among
these are official reports of the commanding generals and narratives by
press correspondents and reminiscences of soldiers engaged. The
books of Philip Gibbs are probably the most important journalistic
narratives. Special mention should be made of "1914'^ ; the Memoirs
of Field Marshal Viscount French (1914) ; Maj. Gen. Sir F. Maurice,
The Last Four Months, How the War Was Won (1919) ; E. A. Powell,
Italy at War (191 7) ; G. Gordon-Smith, Through the Serbian Campaign
(1916) ; John Masefield, Gallipoli (1916) ; John Reed, The War in
Eastern Europe (1916) ; Stanley Washburn, The Russian Campaign
(191 5) ; A. T. Clark, To Bagdad with the British (191 7) ; J. H. Morgan
(translator). The War Book of the German General Staff, being "The
Usages of War on Land'' issued by the Great General Stafl of the German
Army (191 5); Gen. Erich von Ludendorff, Ludendorffs Own Story,
August, 1914, to November, 1918, 2 vols. (1920) ; Rajonond Recouly,
A Life of Marshal Foch (1919) ; H. A. Atteridge, Marshal Ferdinand
Foch (1919) ; S. Lauzanne, Fighting France (1918) ; Mario Alberti,
Italy's Great War (1918) ; Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig, Despatches,
December, 191 5- April, 191 9 (1920).
^ Naval: Admiral Viscount Jellicoe of Scapa, The Grand Fleet, 1914-1916
(1919) ; A. S. Hurd and H. H. Bashford, The Heroic Record of the British
Navy, a Short History of the Naval War, 1914-1918 (1919) ; Grand Ad-
/ miral von Tirpitz, My Memoirs, 2 vols. (19 19).
Miscellaneous : C. R. Gibson, War Inventions and How They Were In-
vented (191 7) ; I. F. Marcosson, The Business of War (1918) ; P. Azan,
The Warfare of To-day (1918) ; W. J. Abbot, Aircraft and Submarines
436 SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
(191 8) ; E. Middleton, Aircraft of To-day and of the Future (1918) ;
H. P. Davison, The American Red Cross in the Great War (1919) ; Evan-
geline C. Booth and Grace L. Lutz, The War Romance of the Salvation
Army (1919) ; W. L. Mallaber, Medical History of the Great War (1916) ;
Romain Rolland, Above the Battle (1916) ; H. G. Wells, Mr. Britling
Sees it Through (1916) ; Henri Barbusse, Under Fire (191 7); Bruce
Bairnsfather, Bullets and Billets (191 7).
VIII. The League of Nations and the Peace
Peace Proposals : R. S. Bourne (editor), Towards an Enduring Peace,
a Symposium of Peace Proposals and Programs, IQ14-IQ16 (1916) ;
Documents and Statements relating to Peace Proposals and War Aims,
December, IQ16, to November, igi8 (1919).
The League of Nations: S. P. Duggan (editor), The League of Nations,
the Principle and the Practice (1919) ; Mathias Erzberger, The League
of Nations, the Way to the World's Peace, Eng. trans, by Bernard Miall
(1919) ; D. S. Morrow, The Society of Free States (1919) ; T. J. Law-
rence, The Society of Nations (1919) ; D. J. Hill, The Rebuilding of
Europe (191 7); J. A. Hobson, Towards International Government
(191 5) ; J. S. Bassett, The Lost Fruits of Waterloo (1918) ; F. B, Sayre,
Experiments in International Administration (1919).
f The Peace Congress : Walter Lippmann, The Political Scene (1919) ;
H. M. Hyndman, Clemenceau, the Man and his Time (1919) ; J. M.
Keynes, The Economic Consequences of the Peace (1920) ; E. J. Dillon,
The Inside Story of the Peace Conference (1920).
Politics and Economics : F. A. Ogg and C. A. Beard, National Govern-
ments and the World War (1919) ; J. L. Laughlin, Credit of the Nations
(1918) ; E. J. Clsipp, Economic Aspects of the War (1915) ; F. W. Hirst,
The Political Economy of War (191 5) ; A. D. Noyes, Financial Chapters
on the War (1916) ; H. L. Gray, War-Time Control of Industry (1918) ;
t^ E. L. Bogart, Direct and Indirect Costs of the Great World War (1918) ;
D. C. McMurtrie, The Disabled Soldier (1919) ; P. W. Kellogg and A.
H. Gleason, British Labor and the War (1919) ; F. A. Cleveland and
Joseph Schafer (editors), Democracy in Reconstruction (1920); E, M.
Friedman (editor), American Problems of Reconstruction (1919) ; Ber-
trand Russell, Proposed Roads to Freedom, — Socialism, Anarchism,
and Syndicalism (191 9).
INDEX
Abbas II., 72
Abruzzi, Dukp of the, 95
Acre, captured, 347
Action Liberale, in France, post-war, 407
Acts, war measure enacted by Congress,
222
Adalia, Italian mandatary, 384; Italy's
hold on, 400
Adrianople, and Bulgaria, 84, 87
Adriatic islands, 385-386
.^gean Sea, coasts and islands, 87, 91, 366,
38s
Africa, German colonies, 67-69; colonies,
Libya, 92; and Gt. Brit., 399; manda-
taries, 401, 421
Africa, German East, cession to Gt. Brit.,
375
Africa, German Southwest, cession to
British Union of South Africa, 375
Africa, South, loyalty, 66; army, losses,
3QO
Agadir, 12
Agram, riots, 349; Pan-Slavic Congress,
350; Jugoslav Convention, 354
Agriculture, Germany, 9j France, 393
{See also Land)
Ailette River, 277
Air raid victims, 390
Airplanes, 24, 180; • German raids, 74;
lack of, lis; Allied, 118, 177; hydro-
planes, 221; Aviation act, 222; Ger-
man, 324; military and naval aviation
to be abandoned by Germany, 376;
development of, 408-409
Aisne, 33; Battle of the, 34, 292, 313-316;
2d Battle of the, 275-278; offensive,
281 ; Drive, 314-316
Albania, cession to Italy, 72, 87, 91, 93,
386; cession to Greece, 87, 366, 385;
conquest of, 135-137; Italian protecto-
rate, 253, 385 ; nationalism, 397 ; Italy's
hold on, 400
Albert, Duke of Wiirttemberg, 27-29, 31,
36, 1 8s
Albert, King of Belgium, 329, 332, 358
Albert (Town) captured, 307
Alcoholic beverages, prohibition of, 405
Aleppo, 284; captured, 347; under the
Arabs of Hedjaz, 384
Alexander, Prince, of Greece, 285, 354
Alexandra Feodorovna, Tsarina, 225-226
Alexeiev, General, 51, m, 229, 242, 337
Algeria, 71
All-Russian, Union of Zemstvos, 194;
Extraordinary Commission, 249; gov-
ernment, 341
AUenby, Edmund, 286-287, 344, 346-347
Allenstein, 42
Alliances, Austria and Germany, 6, 317;
France and Russia, 6 ; England and Japan,
63; Russia and Gt. Brit., 69; Entente
and Italy, 72-73; Triple Alliance, 90;
France, U. S., and Gt. Brit., 370; Japan
and the Entente, 370. {See also En-
tangling alliances, Entente.)
Allied armies, battle-line, 35-37, 114, 176-
177, 183, 305-306, 326, 328-329; 332,
345 ; losses, 89, 388-390 ; lacking am-
munition, artillery and airplanes, 115 ;
nadir of defeat, 1 21-124; munitions,
168; cooperation, 277; plans, 278-321-
322; armed intervention in Russia, 338-
342; Army of the East, 344; occupation
of the Rhine and bridgeheads, 357, 377;
education, among troops at the front,
410
Allied Conference, Paris, 272; Supreme
Council, raises economic blockade against
Bolsheviki, 388
Allies, optimism, 80-83 ; attempt to domi-
nate the Near East, 80-98 ; naval suprem-
acy, domestic disturbances, diplomacy,
etc., 81-83 ; attack on the Dardanelles,
83-89; fail to relieve Russia, 11 2-1 20;
decline of prestige, 1 21-124; counting
on Greek aid, 129; fail to relieve Serbia,
129-134; troops ip Salonica, 130; fail
to obtain a decision in 1916, 168-200;
coordination of plans, 168-170; Drives,
Somme, Isonzo, Sereth, 171-181; and
the German Peace, 198-200; coopera-
tion, 202-203 ; reply to President Wil-
son's note on war-aims, 209-210; and
the Russian Revolution, 236-237; war-
aims, 253, 272, 297-298; pave the way for
ultimate victory, 261-298; plans and
prospects for 1917, 261-272; resume of
membership, 270-271; Supreme War
Council, 271-272; lesson of the Hinden-
burg Line, 272-281 ; recovery of prestige
437
438
INDEX
in the Near East, 281-287; pessimism,
287; seeming obstacles to victory, 287-
2g8; triumph, and Central Europe
revolts, 326-364; victories in the West,
326-334; intervention in Russia, 334-
342 ; triumph in the Near East, and sur-
render of Bulgaria and Turkey, 342-
348; treaty with Austria, 386-387.
(See also headings under Inter- Allied.)
Alsace-Lorraine, 34, 148-149, 254, 397;
invasion of, 28-29; and Austria, 266;
plebiscite, 290; and Pope Benedict,
291 ; to be righted, 298 ; autonomy,
331; joyous greetings to the AlUes, 358;
cession to France, 366, 374
American Expeditionary Force, 219, 261,
329. {See also U. S. army.)
American railroad engineers, and the Trans-
Siberian railway, 340-341
American Red Cross, report on food, 393
Americans killed at sea, 390
Amerongen, refuge of William II, 361-362
Amiens, 35 ; attacked, 306
Ammonite, in explosive mines, 278
Ammunition. {See Munitions)
Anarchic state system in Germany, 398
Anarchy, in commerce, 1-7; international,
1-7, 17, 201-203, 211, 224, 270, 365, 377-
379, 411; in Russia, 231
Anatolia, German influence, 71
Anatolian railway, 69
Ancre valley, 273
Andrassy, Julius, 265, 352
Anglo-American sea patrol, and the sub-
marines, 322
Anglo-French War Council, 169
Anglophobia, U. S., 204
Annexations, 289
An,nunzio, Gabriele d', 385
Antwerp, 28; Fall of, 35; raided, 74;
entered by King Albert, 358
Anzacs, 88
Arabia, 253
Arabs of Hedjaz. {See Hedjaz)
Arbitration, international, 204; and a
negotiated peace, 288; compulsory, 290;
League of Nations, 379-380, 416-417 .
Archangel, captured, 340
Ardennes, destruction of, 38 ; Forest of, 29
Argentina, and Germany, 271
Argonne, 32-33, ii7
Arizona, offered as bribe to Mexico, 216
Armament, limitation of, 211, 290, 298,
380, 415 ; disarmament, Bolshevist policy,
254; disarmament, Germany, 398
Armed force, German, 405
Armed neutrality. {See Neutrality,
armed)
Armenia, 136-137; in Russian hands,
139-140; self-determination, 251; auton-
omy, 254 ; and Mittel-Europa, 335 ;
frontiers, 371; a free republic, 384;
food supply, 393 ; nationahsm, 397
Armenia, Old, captured, 282
Armenians, massacred or starved, 139, 390
Armentieres, captured, 308
Armistice, of Nov. 11, 1918, 340, 357; for
Bulgaria, 345; for Turkey, 347-348;
for Austria-Hungary, 353
Arms. {See Munitions)
Armies. {See Allied armies, Austrian army,
French army, etc.)
Army, of the East, 344 ; life, educational
value of, 409; surgery, development of,
409
Arnim, Gen. Sixt von, 303, 307-308
Arras, 35-36; Battle of, 275; offensive, 280
Arsiero, 157; captured, 174
Art, works, to be returned by Germany,
377
Artillery, British and French, 178; Battle
of Flanders, 278-280; German, 304;
development of, 408. {See also Guns;
Machine guns)
Artois, Allied attack, 118
Asia Minor, 136; and Greece, 73; and
Italy, 87; coasts of, Greek mandatary,
384
Asiago, captured, 157, 174; Plateau, 296
Asiatic Turkey, 136
Asolone, Monte, captured, 296
Asquith, Premier, 19, 78, 83, 159, 193, 197
Assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdi-
nand, 13-14, 374
Assembly of Czechs and Jugoslavs at Prague,
350-351
Atrocities (German), at Sommeilles, 38
frightfulness, etc., 74; chlorine gas, 117
deplored by Pope Benedict, 197-198
devastation, 274; deportation of Bel-
gians and French, 144-145
Atrocities (Turkish), Armenian massacres,
139 ; in the Caucasus, 335
Auberive, captured, 321
Auffenburg, General von, 44-45
Australasian troops, at GallipoU, 122
Austraha, loyalty, 66, 68; territorial de-
mands, 371 ; army, losses, 390
Austria, alliance with Germany (1879), 6;
Reichsrat, 264-265 ; proclaimed a re-
public, 356; treaty with the Allies, Sept.
10, 1919, 383, 386-387; public debt,
391-392 ; nationahsm, 397
Austria-Hungary, Dual Monarchy, 14-
20; and Gahcia, 43, and Serbia, 55-57;
and Italy, 57; treaty with Bulgaria, 84;
INDEX
439
Triple Alliance, go; and the Irredenta,
Qi ; recovers Galicia, 99-102 ; peace with
Finland, 259; internal disturbances,
263, 300, 317, 319; and Alsace-Lor-
raine, 266; autonomy of peoples, 298;
alliance with Germany, 317; collapses,
348-356; evacuation of conquered terri-
tories, 353; navy, surrender, 353; dis-
rupted, 396-397
Austro-German trade to Odessa, 259
Austro-Hungarian army, organization, 23-
24; defeated, 45-46; counter-offensive,
47; losses, 56-57, 174, 176, 319, 352, 389;
fraternization with Italian troops, 294;
battle-line, 318; plans, 318; mutinies,
349; demobilization, 353
Autocracy, 404; in Russia, 225-233, 237-
238, 262, 270
Automobiles, 24
Averescu, General, 188-189
Aviation, act, 222; military and naval
aviation to be abandoned by Germany,
376. {See also Airplanes; Balloons;
Dirigibles)
Avksentiev, Nicholas, 341
Avlona, 91-93. 135-136
Avocourt Wood, captured, 277
Aziziyeh, captured, 283
Babuna Pass, 1 29 ; captured, 345
Bagdad, 137; Bagdad railway, 69, 83, 136,
139; Berlin-to-Bagdad project, '72, 142,
282, 346-347; saved to the Turks, 142;
captured, 283 ; Bagdad-Samara railway,
284
Bainsizza Plateau, captured, 294-295
Baku, and Russia, 341
Balance of power, 5-6, 202, 396
Balfour, Arthur J., 193, 220, 368
Balkan States, 12-20; war of 191 2-13, 70;
disintegration of, 72-73; League of 191 2,
73 ; and Allied diplomacy, 82 ; and the
Entente, 84 ; domination of, 89 ; and the
Triple Alliance, 90; trade routes to Ger-
many, 282; relations to be adjusted, 298;
Balkanization of Central Europe, 398
Balloons, 221
Baltic Sea, railroads to Bagdad, 282; Ger-
man forts on, 377
Baltic states, food supply, 392
Banat of Temesvar, rival claimants for,
354-355 ; partition of, 384
Bankers, and. a negotiated peace, 288;
secret conferences, 289 ; post-war, 406
Bapaume, 177-179; captured, 272-273, 306,
326
Barleux, captured, 306
Barrage, creeping, 323
Basra, captured, 72
Batocki, Herr von, 170
Bauer, Gustav Adolf, 331, 372
Bavaria, a republic, 360 ; civil war, 363
Beatty, Vice- Admiral Sir David, 62, 165,
359
Beersheba, captured, 286
Beirut, captured, 347
Beisan, captured, 347
Bela Kun, 384
Belfort, 31, 150
Belgian army, 25 ; offensives from Malines
and Antwerp, 35 ; losses, 389
Belgian commission to the U. S., 39
Belgians, butchered, 390
Belgium, neutrality, 19; invasion of, 24-
30; situation, close of 1914, 37; relief
work in, 39; deportations, 144-145;
195; restoration, 254, 298, 331; van-
quished, 300; special convention with
Holland, 385 ; damage and destruction,
394 ; electoral reforms, 404
Belgrade, captured, 57, 127, 346; railroads
to Berlin, 282
Bell, Johannes, 374
Belleau Wood, 316, 322
Below, Gen. Fritz von, 303, 314, 316, 320
Below, Gen. Otto von, 303-306
Benedict XV, Pope, 197-198, 290-291, 331,
410
Bentinck, Count Goddard, 361
Berchtold, Count, 47
Berlin, and the Near East, 134, 282 ; revo-
lution, 361-363
Berlin-to-Bagdad project. {See Bagdad)
Bernhardi, 396
Bernstein, Eduard, 363
Bernstorff, Count, 207, 215
Berthelot, General, 329
Beseler, Gov.-Gen. von, 196
Bessarabia, 123, 182, 191, 259
Bethmann-HoUweg, Chancellor von, 19,
93, 149, 164, 166-167, 213, 266-267,
288-289
Beyers, Gen., 66-67
Big Three, 370
Bikaner, Maharajah of, 368
Birth-rate, decUne, 391
Bismarck, 8-9, 360, 368
Bismarck Archipelago, 67
Bissolati, Leonida, 371
Bitlis, captured, 140; abandoned by the
Russians, 142
Black Sea, and Mittel-Europa, 335, 343
Blacklist of neutral pro-German firms,
170
Bliss, Tasker, 368
Bloc, in the Reichstag, 267-269, 363, 373
440
INDEX
Blockade, against German trade, 170;
foodstuffs, 196-197; by German sub-
marines, 214, 219; removal of economic
barriers, 298; economic, against Ger-
many, 357; general, 360; against the
Bolsheviki, 360, 388
Bliicher (Cruiser), 62
Boehm-Ermolli, General, 47, loo-ioi, 242,
303, 314, 320-322
Boers, 66-67
Bohemia, martial law, 351; protection for
German inhabitants of, 386
Bojadiev, General. 127
Bolivia, severs relations with Germany,
218, 271, 388
Bolo Pasha, 292-293
Bolsheviki, 239-241, 244, 247; policy of,
248; constitution, 250; foreign policy,
252; peace negotiations, 252-253, 256;
revolution, and the Entente, 269 ; chaotic
conditions, 270; in Italy, 293; paci-
fism, 294; and Brest-Litovsk treaty,
334; and Mittel-Europa, 335-342; ap-
peals against, 359; institutions desired
for Germany, 363; and Germany, 375;
and Allied peace treaties, 387-388; Fin-
land, 392 ; foreign intervention, 405 ;
and socialism, post-war, 406-407
Bombardments, victims, 390
Bonnet Rouge (Newspaper), 292
Borden, Sir Robert, 66, 368
Boris, Crown Prince of Bulgaria, 345-346
Borissoff, captured, 258
Boroevic, General, 176, 318-319
Boselli, Paolo, 158, 293, 297
Bosnia-Herzegovina, autonomy, 254
Bosphorus, internationalization, 384
Botha, Louis, 66-67, 368
Bothmer, Count, 242
Boulogne, occupation by the Germans, 36
Boundary disputes, 370
Bourgeois, L&)n, 383
Bourgeoisie, Russian, 236, 239, 241, 245,
248-249; German, 289; American and
Japanese, 336; post-war, 405-406
Bourlon Wood, captured, 280
Bouvet (Warship), 85
Boy-Ed, 207
Bozen, 91
Bran ting, 289
Bratiano, Premier, 368
Brazil, severs relations with Germany,
218, 271
Bread lines, Russia, 227
Bremen, revolution, 361
Brenta River, 352
Breshkovskaya, Madame, 245
Breslau (Cruiser), 59-60, 70
Brest-Litovsk treaty, 253-259, 297, 300,
317, 334-337, 341-342, 350, 357, 364, 375
Brialmont, Engineer, 189
Briand, Aristide, 83, 145, 167, 193, 198,
292
Bridges destroyed, 394
British army, organization, 23, 25 ; advance
halted, 30; losses, 30, 115, 120, 122, 133,
146, 181, 278, 281, 307, 310, 389; con-
scription, 148, 310-312; artillery, 178;
battle-lines, 278, 283, 305-306; in Cologne,
359. {See also Great Britain)
British Expeditionary Force, size of, 39;
in France, 62 ; in Egypt, 282
British India. {See India)
British navy, warships in the Battle of
Flanders, 36; supremacy, 58-62, 65, 73,
81-82 ; assistance of Japan, 62-65 ; and
Turkey, 71; submarines, 75; attack on
the Dardanelles, 83-86; losses, 165;
sinks ships at Zeebrugge and Ostend, 310.
{See also Great Britain)
Brockdorff-Rantzau, Count von, 364, 372
Brody, loi
Bronstein. {See Trotsky, Leon)
Bruges, captured, 35, 332
Brussels, captured by the Germans, 28; by
the Allies, 357; entered by King Albert,
3S8_
Brussilov, General, 44, 51, loi, 172-174,
176, 228-229, 242-243
Buchan, John, Nelson's history of the
War, 303
Bucharest, 189; Treaty of, 259, 297, 300,
317, 346, 357, 364
Buczacz, captured, 174
Budapest, revolution, 355; socialist revo-
lution, 384
Buffer states, 19, 25
Buildings, destroyed by the Germans, 394
Bukowina, Russian army in, 47; cession to
Rumania, 123; captured, 174; evac-
uated by Russians, 243; union with
Rumania, 354
Bulgaria, and Adrianople, 73; territorial
demands, 87, 122-125; hostile to Allies,
95-96; loans from Germany, 125; secret
convention with Austria-Hungary, 84,
125; treaty with Turkey, 125; enters
the War, 124-129; and the Allies, 287;
indifference, 300; surrenders, 342-348;
sues for armistice, 345 ; treaty, Nov. 27,
1918, 383-384; food supply, 393
Bulgarian army, mobilization, 125; battle-
line, 343 ;, losses 389
Billow, General von, 26, 28, 30-31, 36, 38,
91
Bundesrat, 9
INDEX
441
Bureaucracy, in Russia, 225-231, 237-
238; in Austria, 265; in Germany,
268, 301 ; among the Allies, 404 ; state
socialism, 407
Bureaus, international, and the League
of Nations, covenant, 422
Burian, Stephan, Baron, 47, 91, 266, 317,
352
Byng, Sir Julian, 305-307, 326, 329
Cables, submarine, surrendered by Ger-
many, 377
Cadorna, Luigi, 95, 97, 156-157, 169, 174,
176, 272, 294-296
Caillaux, Joseph, 292-293
Calais, German designs on, 36, 307
Calthorpe, Admiral, 347-348
Cambon, Jules, 368
Cambrai, captured, 35, 329; Battle of,
280-281
Camouflage, cf ships, 221
Camp Ufe, educational value of, 409
Canada, loyalty, 66
Canadian army, holds Ypres, 116; losses,
390
Canals, international control, 290
Cantigny, captured, 323
Cape-to-Cairo railway, 399
Capelle, Vice- Admiral von, 164
Capital and labor, and the Treaty of Ver-
sailles, 378
Capitalism, post-war, 408
Capitalistic imperialism, 399-401
Capitalists, German, lo-ii; eliminated in
Germany, 362
Caporetto, captured, 295
Carey, Gen. Sandeman, 306
Caroline Islands, occupied by the Jap-
anese, 67
Carpathian passes, 47-48, 99, loi, 187, 259
Carso plateau, 176; captured, 294-295
Carson, Sir Edward, 66, 131, 159, 311-312
Casement, Sir Roger, 1 60-1 61
Castelnau, General, 28, 33, 118, 169
Catholic Centrists.. {See Centrists)
Catholic Church, and militarism, 1 1 ; ex-
clusion from participation in diplomatic
questions, 92; Pope Benedict, 197-198,
290-291, 331, 410; peace plea, 290-291;
and Joseph Caillaux, 292 ; German propa-
ganda, 293 ; and conscription in Ireland,
311-312; in Serbia, 386; post-War
parties, 406 ; Social, post- War, 407 ;
Popular Party in Italy, post-War, 407;
War Council, U. S., post- War, 407; and
the War, 410
Cattaro, 135
Cattle, decrease, 393
Caucasus, Provisional government and the
Soviets, 337
Cavell, Edith, 120
Censorship, press, 21; in Germany, 269,
288; post- War, 404
Central Committee of the Constitutional
Democratic Party, Russia, 337
Central Committee of the Russian Socialist
Revolutionary Party, 337
Centrists, Germany, 11, 266-269, 33t^>
361, 363, 373 ; post- War, 407
Cettinje, captured, 135
Chalons, captured, 33
Champagne, Allied attack, 11 8-1 19
Chanak (Fort), 85
Charleroi, captured, 30
Charles, Emperor of Austria, 195, 197,
263-266, 270, 317, 350, 353-356
Charles I, King of Rumania, 182
Charles V, Emperor, 396
Charles Francis, Archduke of Austria,
158, 185
Chateau-Thierry, captured, 323
Chaulnes, captured, 273
Chauny, captured, 306
Chauvinism, 94
Chemical industries, development of, 409
Chemin des Dames, 277; captured, 329
Cherbatov, Prince, 109, in
Child labor, and the Treaty of Versailles,
378-379; and the League of Nations
covenant, 422
Children, traffic in, and the League of Na-
tions covenant, 422
China and Germany, 1 1 ; independence of,
63; Russo-Japanese War, 108; severs
relations with Germany, 271; protec-
tion of, 371 ; refuses to sign Peace Treaty,
374; German rights renounced, 375;
treaty not ratified, 383; and Japan,
400; republic, 402
Chlorine gas, 11 5-1 17. {See also Gases,
poisonous)
Cholm, incorporated into Ukrainia, 349
Christian missions, protection, 410
Christian People's Party. {See Centrists)
Christian Socialists, Austria, 356, 407
Church, leadership and a negotiated peace;
unity, post- War, 410
Churchill, Winston, 81, 133
Cilicia, French mandatary, 384, 400
Ciove, Monte, 157
City of Memphis (Ship), 216
Cividale, captured, 295
Civilization, defense of, 206
Clam-Martinitz, Count, 264-265
Class, dictatorship, Russia, 246; struggle,
Russia, 239; hatred, post- War, 407
442
INDEX
Clemenceau, Georges, 293, 297, 313, 323,
368-370, 372
Clericals, Belgivun, post-War, 407
Coal resources, 40; fields, Russia, 259;
Petroseny basin, 259; delivered by
Germany, 377; mines damaged, 393-
394
Coaling station, cession to Italy, 385
Coblenz, mobilization of German army,
22; occupied by Allied troops, 357;
administered by the U. S. army, 359;
evacuated by Allied armies, 377
Collective bargaining, 406
Cologne, occupied by Allied troops, 357;
administered by the British army, 359;
evacuated by Allied armies, 377
Colonies, trade. Socialist program, 290;
adjustment of claims, 298; mandataries,
401, 420. {See also Africa, Germany,
colonies, etc.)
Combles, captured, 180
Commerce, national and international, 2-7 ;
German, 10; trade-war, 169-170; trade
routes, Berlin and the Near East, 134,
282; "open door" for colonies, 290;
removal of economic barriers, 298; con-
trol of. League of Nations, 380, 401,
421-422; development of devices and
implements, 408-409
Committee on Public Information, U. S.,
222
Commons, House of, elections, 403
Competition, industrial, 411
Compiegne, captured, 31, 315
Compulsory war-service. {See Conscription)
Concrete redoubts, 279
Conference, at Potsdam (1914), 14-16;
to Revise War-Aims, at Paris, 246-247;
of France, Gt. Brit., and Italy, at Ra-
pallo, 271 ; Allied Conference at Paris,
272 ; of International Sociahsts, 267,
289-292; of All-Russian Factions at
Prinkipo Island, 387. {See also Peace
Conferences)
Conferences, secret, bankers', 289
Congress, U. S., war measures, 222; of
Ruthenians, at Kiev, 238; of Oppressed
Nationalities, at Rome, 350; Definitive
Peace Congress, 372
Connolly, James, 161
Conscription, British Isles, 147-148, 310-
311 ; in Germany, 195, 375
Conservatives, Germany, 267-268; in Gt.
Brit., 403
Conspirators, pro-German, 207
Constantine, King of Greece, 87, 95, 123,
129-134, 136, 190-191, 284-285, 344
Constantinople, 69-72, 83-89; and Russia,
55, 234, 252; to Berlin, railroads,
282; defenseless, 359; internationalized,
384
Constituent National Assembly, of Russia,
228-229, 244, 248-249, 251-252, 341;
of Austria, 356; of Germany, 361-363,
374
Constitution, of Prussia, 9; of Finland,
230; of Ireland, 263; of the German
Republic, 364
"Contemptible little army," 80
Contraband, 204
Convoy of merchantmen, 221
Cooperation, Allies, 168-170, 202-203, 210;
in Germany, 195; AUied armies, 277;
international, 365, 379; nationalists,
398 ; bourgeoisie and socialism, post-War,
406-407 ; in production, post-War, 407-
408; religious, post-War, 410; social and
international, 411
Copper mines, 134
Corea. {See Korea)
Corfu, 135 ; Declaration of, 265, 354
Corinth, Isthmus of, captured, 284
Cosmopolitanism, 396
Cossacks of the Don, anti-Bolshevik, 255;
and the Soviets, 337
Cost of living, 392, 406
Costa Rica, severs relations with Ger-
many, 271
Cote de I'Oie, captured, 153, 277
Cotton industry, destroyed, 394
Council of National Defense, in U. S., 222;
in Russia, 245
Council of People's Commissioners, Russia,
247, 249, 251, 257
Coimcil of the Empire, Russia, 225
Covmcil of the League of Nations, first
meeting, 383
Council of Three, 370; of Four, 370; of
Five, 370-372 ; of Ten, of the Preliminary
Peace Conference, 370
Council of Workmen's Deputies, Russia,
228
Council, War, at Paris, 169
Courland. {See Latvia)
Court of International Justice, 41 7
Courtrai, captured, 332
Covenant of the League of Nations. {See
League of Nations)
Covenant of Versailles, 398
Cracow, 45-46, 48-49, 99 ; riots, 349
Craiova, captured, 188
Craonne, captured, 277
Creel, George, 222
Crimean War, 72
Croatia, martial law, 35 1 ; cession to Serbia,
384
INDEX
443
Croats, in Austria, 263; Jugoslav control,
354 _ _ •
Crown Prince Frederick William of Ger-
many and Prussia. {See Frederick Wil-
liam)
Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria. {See
Rupprecht)
Ctesiphon, captured, 137
Cuba, German conspirators, 207; joins
the Allies, 218, 271
Cumieres, captured, 154
Currency inflation, 392
Curzon, Earl, 193
Cuxhaven, 59
Cyprus, annexed by Gt. Brit., 72; cession
to Greece, 123
Cyrenaica, Italy's hold on, 400
Czechoslovak, mutinies, 82, 317; army,
389; army in Siberia, 337-340
Czechoslovakia, autonomy, 349; govern-
ment recognized, 351; independence,
352-356, 383; territorial demands,
366, 371; food supply, 393; nationaUsm,
397; republican form of government,
402
Czechoslovaks, occupy Upper Silesia, 359
Czechs, in Austria, rebellion, 263 ; indict-
ment of the Habsburg monarchy, 264-
26s
Czernin, Count Ottokar, 254, 256, 264-
266, 270, 289, 317
Czernowitz, 47; captured, 243
Dalmatia, cession to Italy, 91, 385; ces-
sion to Serbia, 386
Damage, by the Germans. {See Destruc-
tion)
Damascus, under the Arabs of Hedjaz, 384
Damloup, redoubt, 155 ; captured, 192
Danish Islands, 207. {See also Denmark)
Dankl, General, 44-46, 52
Danube River, Allied control, 353
Danzig, 42; an internationalized free city,
375,381
Dardanelles, 70, 83-85, 92; failure of cam-
paign, 122; close of campaign, 133;
internationalization, 298, 384
David, Eduard, 364
Dead Man's Hill, 152-153, 277
Debeney, General, 326, 329
Debts, public, of belligerent nations, 391
Declaration of Corfu, 265, 354
Declaration of the Rights of the Toiling
and Exploited Peoples, 250-252
Defeatism, 199-200, 212, 288, 291-294;
in France, 292-293; in Italy, 294, 297;
obstacle to Allied victory, 297, 325
Definitive Peace Congress, 372.
Degoutte, General, 321, 323, 329
Delcasse, Theophile, 83, 131
Democracy, and diplomacy, 5-7; world
made safe for, 217, 263; Russia, 231-
232; Bolshevist policy, 248; in Austria,
264; in Germany, 269, 299, 362, 364;
diplomacy, 290; after the War, 402-
405, 408 ; industrial, post-war, 407-408
Democratic Party in Poland, post-War, 407
Democrats, Germany, 373
Denikin, General, 242, 359
Denmark, Danish Islands, 207; demands
Schleswig, 360; acquires Schleswig, 375.
{See also Scandinavia)
Dependent states, construction of, 145
Deportations of Belgians and French,
144-145, 195
Derby, Lord, 147-148
De Robeck, Vice-Admiral, 85
Destruction, by the Germans, 274, 377,
393-395
Determinism, and the War, 410
Deutschland (Submarine), 166
De Valera, Eamonn, 311, 387
Devastation, by the Germans. {See De-
struction)
Devlin (Irish leader), 159
DeWet, Gen., 66-67
Diala River, 283
Diaz, General, 296, 318-319, 352-353
Dictator, military, 291-292
DiUon, John, 311
Diplomacy, pre- War, 5-7; Teutonic and
Allied, 57, 82; and a negotiated peace,
288 ; democratic control, 290
Dirigibles, 221
Disarmament. {See Armament, limitation
of)
Disease, international control of, through the
League of Nations, 381, 422
Divine-right monarchy extinct, 402
Dixmude, captured, 36
Dmitriev, Radko, 46, 51
Dobrudja, and Bulgaria, 123, 343; cap-
tured, 188-191; autonomy, 254; given
up by Rumania, 259; cession to Ru-
mania, 383
Dodecanese. {See Aegean islands)
Dogger Bank, naval engagement, 62
Domestic disturbances, 82
Don Cossacks, anti-Bolshevik, 255; and
the Soviets, 337
Dorpat, captured, 258
Douai, 35 ; captured, 39, 332
Douaumont, 150-155 ; captured, 192
Dover, raided, 74
Draft, selective, 222
Drama (Town), cession to Bulgaria, 123
444
INDEX
Drang nach Osten, 136, 142
Dresden (Cruiser), 60
Drives, German, 143
Drugs, dangerous, and the League of Na-
tions covenant, 422
Drummond, Sir Eric, 383, 423
Dual Alliance (Franco-Russian), 6
Dual Monarchy. {See Austria-Hungary)
Dublin, Sinn Fein, 1 58-1 61; home-rule
meetings, 310-31 1
Dubno, captured, 173
Dukla Pass, 48 ; abandoned, loi
Duma. {See Russia, Duma)
Dumba, Constantine, 207
Diina River, 106-107
Dunkirk, 35-36
Durazzo, 135 ; captured, 136, 346
Duval, 292
Dwellings, destroyed, 394
Dyeing industries, development of, 409
East Prussia, invasion of, 40-43
Ebert, Friedrich, 361-364, 372
Economic blockade. {See Blockade)
Economic resources, Allied and Central
Powers compared, 81 ; Conference, Paris,
169; rights, and nationalism, 397; in-
dividualism, pre-War, 408
Economics, scientific study of, 409
Ecuador, severs relations with Germany,
271, 388
Education, and the Allied peace treaties,
386; and science, 408-410; among the
troops at the front, 410
Educational value of camp and army life, 409
Efficiency, German, 83
Egypt, and Gt. Brit., 55, 71-72, 399; Mos-
lem rebellions, 71, 82 ; and Turkey, 136-
137; German rights renovmced, 375;
nationalism, 397
Eichhorn, Field Marshal von, 337
Einen, General von, 320-321
Eisner, Kurt, 360, 363
Eix, 152
El Bassan, captured, 135, 346
EI Ramie, captured, 286
Elections, Austria, 356
Electoral reforms, Prussia, 269, 331; Ger-
many, 362; Gt. Brit., and France, 403-
404. {See also Suffrage, Women suffrage)
Emden (Cruiser), 60-61
Emmich, General von, 27
Engineers, American railroad, and the
Trans-Siberian railway, 340-341
Engines, stolen, 394
England. {See Great Britain)
English army. {See British army)
English navy. {See British navy)
Entangling alliances, 204, 211, 400. {See
also Alliances)
Entente, aUiance with Italy, 72-73; propa-
ganda, 207-208; secret treaties, 220,
252-253, 367; resume of membership,
270-271; secret treaty with Japan, 370.
{See also Alliances)
Enver Pasha, 70, 82, 282, 347
fipinal, 31
Erdelli, General, 242-243
Erzberger, Mathias, 331, 357, 364
Erzerum, captured, 140
Erzingian, captvircd, 142, 182
Esperey, Gen. Franchet d', 32, 344-347,
352, 359
Espionage Act, U. S., 222
Essad Pasha, 135-136
Essen, Krupp guns, 23-24, 84-85, no;
food riots, 170
Estaires, captured, 308
Esthonia, Provisional government, 238;
and Mittel-Europa, 255, 334; inde-
pendence, 341, 359; nationalism, 397;
republican form of government, 402
Eugene, Archduke, 47, 52
Eupen, cession to Belgium, 374
European War. {See Great War)
Ewarts, General, 171, 230
Excess profits tax act, 222
Expeditionary (Allied) Force at Salonica,
344
Factors reUed upon to win the war, 81-83
Falkenhayn, Erich von, 40, 148, 184, 187-
189, 192
Famine, caused by the Turks, 390
Far East, general peace in, 63-64
Farmers, post- War prosperity, 406
Fatherland Party, Germany, 166
Favored-nation tariffs, 377
Fiayolle, General, 180, 306-307, 321
Feisal, Prince, 368
Feng, Kwo-Cheng, President of Chinese
Republic, 271
Ferdinand, King of Bulgaria, 84, 124-125,
127, 190, 343, 345-346
Ferdinand, King of Rumania, 182, 184
Fere-Champenoise, 32
Fere-en-Tardenois, captured, 323
Finland, 54; constitution, 230; autonomy,
237, 251, 255, 290, 359; peace treaty
with Germany, Austria, and Russia,
259; vanquished, 300; and Mittel-Europa,
334-335; food supply, 392; nationalism,
397 ; republican form of government, 402
Fire, liquid, 177
Firth of Forth, surrender of German navy,
359
INDEX
445
Fisher, Herbert, 410
Fishing vessels sunk, 394
Fismes, captured, 314-315. 323
Fiume, cession to Italy, 371, 385-386
Five Great Powers, 95 ; Council of, 370-
372
Flanders, Battle of, 36, 278-281
Flares and rockets, 303
Fleury, captured, 155
Foch, Ferdinand, 32-33, 117, 272, 276,
313-316, 320-323, 326, 328, 332, 344,
352, 356, 358, 368, 372
Foodstuffs, from the Balkan States, 134;
in Austria and Germany, 170, 192; U. S.
to Poland, 196-197; to Gt. Brit., 219;
Control and Shipping Acts, 222; dicta-
torship, Hoover, 223; Russia, 227;
American, 261 ; administratorship, Mi-
chaelis, 268; for Germany, 269, 334;
Siberia, 335, 338; diminished produc-
tion, 392; post- War conditions, 392-
393, 406^
Force, in international relations, 211, 270;
moral, 290; habit of resorting to, 405-
406. (See also Militarism)
Ford, George B., 393
Forts and fortifications, Poland, 104; Ger-
man underground, 114; frailty of, 148;
German, to be razed, 375
Four, Council of, 370
Fournet, Admiral du, 190
Fourteen Points, 297-298, 332, 367
France, alliances with Great Britain and
Russia, 6 ; Germany declares war against,
18; production of munitions, 118; de-
clares war against Bulgaria, 126; de-
portations, 144-145, 195; and the Ger-
man peace, 198; not represented at
Stockholm Peace Conference, 290; res-
toration of all territory, 298; terri-
torial demands, 366; alliance with U. S.
and Gt. Brit., 370, 383 ; treaties with U. S.
and Gt. Brit., 381 ; civilians killed, 390 ;
public debt, 391-392 ; taxes, 392 ; damage
and destruction, 394; foremost military
power, 400 ; electoral reforms, 403-404
Francis Ferdinand, archduke, assassina-
tion, 13-14, 374
Francis Joseph, Emperor of Austria, 195
Frankfort Assembly, 8
Frederick II (the Great), of Prussia, 8
Frederick, Archduke, 102, 172-173
Frederick William I, of Prussia, 8
Frederick William, Crown Prince of Ger-
many and Prussia, 12, 27, 29, 31-34, 36,
149-155, 158, 185, 192, 277-278, 304,
320, 361-362
Free trade, socialist peace program, 290
Freedom of the seas, 204, 206, 211, 214-
215, 290, 298, 357, 370
French, Gen. Sir John, 28-29, 30-32, 62,
115, 118, 147, 312
French army, organization, 23-24; plan of
defense, 25 ; advance halted, 28-31 ;
successful resistance, 32-33 ; irresistible,
40; losses, 120, 181, 314-315; artillery,
178; battle-line, 323; in Mainz, 359;
losses, 389 ; colonial army, losses, 390
French Canadians, loyalty, 66
French navy, 60; in the Dardanelles, 84-
86
French Revolution, and nationalization, 3
Fresnes, 152
Friedensturm, 320
Frise, captured, 150
Frontier disputes, 371
Fuel administrator, Garfield, 223
Gaelic League, 159
Galicia, 41 ; Russian invasion, 43-50 ; re-
covery by Austria, 99-102; Polish, 195-
196; evacuated by Russians, 243; Poles
and Ruthenians in, 263 ; repudiates
Austrian rule, 355; mandatary of Po-
land, 385
Gallieni, General, 31, 148, 166
Gallipoli Peninsula, 85-86, 88-89; failure
of campaign, 122, 281-282; withdrawal
from, 131, 133-134, 136, 139, 141
Garfield, Harry A., 223
Gases, poisonous, 11 5-1 17, 177, 408
Gaulois (Warship), 85
Gaza, captured, 286
Geddes, Sir Eric, 394
Geneva, provisional agreement between
Serbia and Jugoslavia, 354; seat of the
League of Nations, 415
Georgia, and Mittel-Europa, 335
Georgians, autonomy, 238
Gerard, James, 215
German army, size of, 22; organization,
22-24; position of divisions, 25-28,
30-31 ; advance halted, 32 ; battle-lines,
33, 35, 192, 242, 262, 272-274, 303, 305-
306, 310; advance toward coast, 35-
36; position at close of 191 4, 37; losses,
44, 48, 120, 155, 174, 178, 180-181, 192,
242, 272-278, 280, 301, 307-308, 313,
316, 323-324, 326, 328-330, 333, 389;
retreat in Poland, 52; advantages, 99-
100 ; equipment, 105 ; height of triumph,
121-124; drives, 143; munitions, 147;
waning strength, 197 ; devastation of
territory, 273-274; Sturmtruppen, 302,
306; artillery, 304; conscription, 334;
mutinies, 361 ; reduction of, 375
446
INDEX
German army plans, general, 24-27, 40;
against Russia, 102-103 ; on the Western
Front, 148-149, 300-304, 307, 314-315,
320; against Rumania, 187-188; against
Italy, 294
German colonies, conquest of, 65-68 ; African
colonies, 67-69; restoration, 254; sur-
rendered, 375 ; mandataries of other na-
tions, 381, 401, 420-421 ; lost, 398
German East Africa, cession to Gt. Brit.,
375. (See also Africa, German colonies)
German navy, activities, 59-61, 63; losses,
64, 166, 398; ships seized, 222; mutinies,
356, 360; surrender of warships, 357,
359; revolution, 362; reduction of, 375-
376
German peace, prospect of, in 191 6, 143;
peace talk in Germany, 166-167; "Peace
drives," 191-200, 287; peace offer to
Russia, 258; peace resolution, 267-
268; negotiations, 269; hopes of, in 191 7,
299; "Peace offensive" in 1918, 320;
a dictated peace to Russia and Rumania,
364
German Southwest Africa, cession to British
Union of South Africa, 375. {See also
Africa, German colonies)
German state of Austria, 355
Germans in Bohemia, 386
Germany, alliance with Austria, 6, 317;
nationalism, 8, 396-397 ; iron ring, 1 1 ;
and Japan, 11; and China, 11; declares
war, 18; invasion of Belgium and France,
32-33; gains and losses, 39-40; com-
merce, 58, 61 ; conquest of colonies,
65-69; influence in Turkey, 69; im-
p>erialism, 72, 143; counter-offensive on
the seas, 73-79; government control of
food supply, 76; war-loans, 81; economic
resources, 81 ; diplomacy, 82 ; influence
in Greece and Rumania, 84; conquers
Poland, 102-107; "f rightfulness," 117;
masters the Near East, 1 21-142; con-
quers Serbia, 124-129; trade in the Near
East, 134-282; optimism, 143, 146-
148, 166, 197; fails to obtain a decision
in 1916, 143-167; unity of command,
144; Fatherland Party, 166; blockade,
against, 170; Peace Drive, 191-200;
Patriotic Auxiliary Service Act, 195;
foodstuffs for Poland, 196-197; con-
spirators m U. S., 206-207; reply to
President Wilson's note on war-aims,
209; rules for safety of U. S. shipping,
214-215; territorial demands, 254-255;
acquisitions, 258; dommation over Slavs,
263; makes the supreme effort, 299-
325; madness, "Whom the Gods would
destroy," 299-304; drive against the
British, 304-313; Battle of Picardy,
304-313; drive against the French,
313-316; Battles of the Aisne and Oise,
313-316; drive against the Italians,
317-320; final drive, 2d Battle of the
Mame, 320-325; national unity, 360;
Empire lasts through two reigns only,
361 ; Constituent National Assembly,
361-363, 374; republican form of gov-
ernment, 362; provisional constitution,
364; excluded from the Peace Confer-
ence, 367; public debt, 391-392; state-
system, 398
Ghent, 35; captured, 332; entered by
King Albert, 358
Gild sociahsm, post- War, 407
Gilinsky (aid-de-camp to the Tsar), 169
Giolitti, 94
Gneisenau, Count, 8
Gneisenau (Cruiser), 60
Goeben (Cruiser), 59-60, 70
Goliath (Battleship), 88
Golitzin, Prince, 226-227
Goltz, Marshal von der, 139, 141
Good Hope (Warship), 60
Goose Ridge (Cote de I'Oie), captured,
153, 277
Goremykin, Premier, 109, iii, 226
Gorizia, 91; captured, 176, 182, 184, 295
Gorlice, captured, loi
Gough, Sir Hubert, 305-307, 312
Gouraud, General, 321, 329, 332
Gourko, General, 230, 242
Government ownership, Bolshevist policy,
248; Soviet poUcy, 250; transportation
and communication, 406
Gradisca, 91, 93
Grain, Rumanian, 182; American, 223;
Siberia, 338
Grappa, Monte, Austrian defeat, 35 2
Graudenz, 42
Great Britain, alliances with Japan, France
and Russia, 6; approach of the War,
15-20; masters the seas, 58-79; al-
liance with Japan, 63 ; loyalty of colonies,
65-69; alliance with Russia, 69; im-
perialism, 72; Ministry of Munitions,
83 ; Coalition Cabinet, 83 ; production
of munitions, 118; declares war against
Bulgaria, 126; War-weariness, 146-
147; changes in Cabinet, 193; North-
cliffe and English journalism, 193, 197,
208; electoral reforms, 262; not repre-
sented at Stockholm Peace Conference,
290; and Irish difficulties, 300; terri-
torial demands, 366; aUiance with U. S.
and France, 370, 383; treaty with
INDEX
447
France against Germany, 381 ; British
subjects killed at sea, victims of air raids
and bombardments, 390; public debt,
391-392; loans to Russia and Italy,
392 ; fund to Serbia, 393 ; imperialism,
399 ; electoral reforms, 403
Great Britain, army. {See British army)
Great Britain, navy. (See British navy)
Great Powers, 5-6; at war, 18; Five, 95;
changes in, 398
Great War, to be a long war, 80; winning
factors relied upon, 81-83; and former
wars, 201; turning point, 313; nations
engaged in, 388
Greece and Asia Minor, 73 ; and the En-
tente, 84; territorial demands, 87, 123,
253, 366, 371; armed neutrality, 130-
134; surrender of telegraphs and postal
service, 190; restoration, 254; enters
the War, 271, 285; evacuation by Bul-
gars, 345 ; treaty not ratified, 383 ; na-
tionalism, 397
Greek army, mobilization, 130; battle-
Une, 285; losses, 389
Greeks, massacred or starved, 390
Green Book, Italy, 89
Gregorian calendar, 265
Grey, Sir Edward, 19, 125-126, 162, 193
Grodek position, loi
Groeber (Centrist deputy), 331
Griinewald, Battle of, 53
Guatemala, severs relations with Ger-
many, 271
Guchkov, Minister of War and Marine,
230, 234, 245
Guelf, House of, 402
Guepratte, Rear-Admiral, 85
Guesde, 289
Guillamat, General, 285, 344
Gumbinnen, 42
Guns, 23-24. {See also Artillery; Ma-
chine guns)
Haase, Hugo, 166, 363
Habsburg, House of, 57, 264, 266, 346,
349-351, 353, 35S-3S6, 365, 402
Hague, Tribunal, 17; proposed peace con-
ferences, 198
Haifa, captured, 347
Haig, Sir Douglas, 147, 177, 273, 275-276,
278, 301, 30s, 308, 313, 320, 329
Haiti, German conspirators, 207; severs
relations with Germany, 271
Halicz, captured, 44, 242-243
Haller, Joseph, 350
Ham, captured, 306
Hamburg, revolution, 361
Hamilton, Sir Ian, 87-88, 133
Hampshire (Cruiser), 166
Harbin, seat of Temporary Government of
Autonomous Siberia, 337
Hardinge, Lord, 66
Hartlepool, raided, 74
Harvest failure, Rumania and Bulgaria,
393
Harwich, surrender of German submarines
at, 359
Hausen, General von, 26, 28, 31
Hedjaz, independence, 183, 282-283; army,
and the Turks, 286, 346-347 ; protecto-
rate under Great Britain, 384, 388, 399;
army statistics, 389 ; nationalism, 397
Heeringen, General von, 27, 29, 32
Heights of the Meuse, 149-155
Helflerich, Karl, 268, 304
Heligoland, naval engagement, 62; de-
molished, 376
Henderson, Arthur, 193, 235, 290-291
Herbertshohe, 67
HertUng, Count, 269-270, 288-289, 328,
330-331
Heuvel, van der, 368
High cost of living, 392, 406
Hindenburg, General von, 42-43, 45-47,
50-52, 171, 174, 184-185, 187, 270,
272-278, 300-301, 304, 328, 361
Hindenburg Line, 280-281, 326, 328
Hindenburg's Drive, 102-107, 109, 117,
120
Hintze, Admiral von, 320
Hipper, Vice-Admiral von, 165
History, scientific study of, 409
Hoetzendorf, Field Marshal von, 318-
319
HohenzoUern, House of, 8, 259, 282, 285,
356, 364-365, 402
Holland. {See Netherlands)
"Holy War," 71
Home rule for Ireland, 158-161, 262-263,
310-311
Homs, captured, 347
Honduras, severs relations with Germany,
271
Hoover, Herbert, 223, 392
Home, Sir Henry, 307, 328-329
Horvath, General, 337
Hours of labor, and the Treaty of Ver-
sailles, 378-379; post- War, 406
House, Colonel, 368
House of Commons, elections under new
reform act, 403
Howitzers. {See Guns)
Hughes, Charles, 208
Hughes, William, 368
Humbert, 292
Hunding Line, 332
448
INDEX
Hungary, grain fields, 102 ; domination over
Rumans, Slovaks, and Jugoslavs, 263;
discontent, 265 ; declared a republic,
355, 383, 402 ; stripped of non-Magyar
peoples, 384; public debt, 391; na-
tionalism, 397
Husein, Sherif of Mecca, 183, 282-283
Hussein Kemal Pasha, 72
Hutier, General von, 243-244, 303, 306,
315-316, 320
Hydroplanes, 221
Hymans, Paul, 368
Illinois (Ship), 216
Imperialism, 4, 72, 94, 202, 236, 288, 364,
399-402
Income tax act, 222; taxes, 392
Indefatigable (Cruiser), 165
Indemnities, Bolshevist policy, 254; so-
cialist program, 289 ; by Central empires,
291 ; paid by Bulgaria, 384
Independents, Germany, 289
India, loyalty, 66; and a "Holy War,"
71; Moslem rebellions, 82; troops at
Gallipoli, 122; and the Turks, 137; army,
losses, 390; nationalism, 397
Individualism, economic, pre-War, 408
Industrial revolution, 205 ; situation in
Russia, 225; solidarity, 289; revolution
in Germany, 361 ; leaders, and a negotiated
peace, 288 ; conditions, and the Treaty of
Versailles, 378-379; convention, 383;
disputes, state intervention, 406; labor
hours, post- War, 406; democracy, post-
War, 407-408 ; competition, 41 1 ; condi-
tions, and the League of Nations cove-
nant, 422. {See also Labor Party)
Infiltration tactics, 302-303, 306, 318-
319, 321
Inflation of currency, 392
Inflexible (Warship), 85
Influenza, deaths, caused by the War, 390
Insterburg, 42
Intellectuals of Germany, 363
Inter-Allied Conference, 235, 244, 312;
General Staff, 272; Naval Board, 272;
Supreme War Council, 369. {See also
AlUes)
Inter-Nation, result of the Great War, 398
The International, 289
International anarchy. {See Anarchy,
international)
International law, capture of merchant-
men, 76-78; arbitration, 204; Repara-
tion Commission, 377 ; Labor Office,
378; Labor Conference, annual, 378-
379; cooperation, 379; Red Cross So-
ciety, 410; Justice, Permanent Court of.
417; engagements, articles 18 to 21 in
the League of Nations covenant, 420;
bureaus, and the League of Nations
covenant, 422
International Peace Conference, Socialists',
at Stockholm, 267, 289-292
Internationalism, 205, 396
Invincible (Cruiser), 165
Ipek, captured, 135
Ireland, loyalty, 66; home rule, 66, 159-
161, 262-263, 310-312, 387; discontent,
146; Unionists, 158; Sinn Fein rebellion,
158-161; troops, 180; emigrants and
Anglophobia, 204; constitution, 263;
compulsory military service, 3 10-31 1;
Parliament suppressed, 387; self-de-
termination, 397 ; representation, 403
Irkutsk, captured, 338
Iron ring, 11, 13; and steel resources, 40;
production in Russia, 259; crosses, 362;
industry damaged, 393-394
Irredentist agitation, 89-97. {See also
Italy; Trentino)
Irresistible (Warship), 85
Ishtip, captured, 345
Isonzo River, 97, 113, 156, 174-175, 295-
297
Italian army, and navy, 95 ; battle-lines,
156, 294; losses, 157, 294-295, 389;
fraternization with Austrian troops, 294
Italian navy, Piave River, 95, 319
Italy, alliance with Germany and Austria,
5t6; and the Dual Monarchy, 15, 57;
Pact of London (1914), 20, 95 ; enters the
War, 89-98; Treaty of London (1915),
92-93; alliance with the Entente, 72-
73; and Allied diplomacy, 82; neu-
trality, 84; ^gean Islands, 87; enters
the War, 89-97; Triple Alliance, 90;
geography of frontier, 96-97; declares
war against Bulgaria, 126; defense,
156-158; and the German peace, 198;
territorial concessions, 253 ; frontiers to
be readjusted, 298; territorial demands,
366,371; public debt, 391-392 ; national-
ism, 397 ; imperialism, 400
Ivangorod (Fortress), 104-106
Ivanov, General, 44, 51, 172, 228
Jacobstadt, captured, 244
Jadar, Battle of, 56
Jaffa, captured, 276
Jaffa- Jerusalem railway, 286
Jagow, Gottlieb von, 16, 197
Jakova, captured, 135
Japan, alliance with Great Britain, 6, 63"
and Russia, 1 2 ; ultimatum to Germany.
62 ; enters the War, 62-65 ; Russo-Jap-
INDEX
449
anese War, io8; German conspirators,
207; and the Allies, 216; and Shantung,
220; territorial demands, 366, 371; secret
treaty with the Entente, 370 ; and China,
400
Japanese army, losses, 64, 389; in Siberia,
340-341
Japanese navy, aid to Great Britain, 62-65 >
takes islands of the South Pacific, 67
Jaroslav, captured, 43-46, 48, 99, 10 1
JeUicoe, Admiral Sir John, 165
Jericho, captured, 347
Jerusalem, captured, 286, 346
Jerusalem- Jaffa railway, 286
Jewish Welfare Board, 410
Jews, in Poland, 195; equality, 254; Zion-
ism, 287, 397 ; of Rumania, 386 ; mas-
sacred or starved, 390; international
protection, 397. {See also Palestine)
Joffre, General, 28-31, 87, 131, 148, 151,
15s, 169, 193, 220, 275
Joint management, post- War, 407
Jonnart, Charles, 284, 293
Joseph, Archduke, 384
Joseph Ferdinand, Archduke, 45, 100, 105
Joseph Frederick, Archduke, 242
Journal, of Paris (Newspaper), 292; Bonnet
Rouge (Newspaper), 292
Journalism, Northcliffe, journals in Eng-
land, 193, 197, 208; Germany, 301, 304
Jugoslavia, autonomy, 263, 265, 349, 351-
356; territorial demands, 371, 386;
Adriatic boimdary line, 385-386; food
supply, 393 ; nationalism, 397
Jugoslavs, mutinies, 82, 317; loyal to
Austria-Hungary, 96
Jvmkers, 10, 362
Justice, Permanent Court of International,
417
Jutland, Battle of, 165
K. O. N. (Polish Committee of National
Defense), 196
Kaiser Wilhelmsland, captured, 67
Kaledine, General, 245, 255
Kamerun, French in, 68; partitioned,
375 ; mandatary under France, 400
Kamio, General, 64
Kantara, railroad, 282, 285
Karagatch, cession to Bulgaria, 1 25
Karolyi, Coimt Michael, 355, 384
Kasan, captured, 338
Kastoria, captured, 189
Kato, Baron, 63
Kautsky, Karl, 563
Kavala, cession to Bulgaria, 87, 123; cap-
tiu-ed, 189-190
Keckau, captured, 243
2 G
Kemmel, Mont, captured, 308
Kerensky, Alexander, 230, 234-235, 239-
241, 244-247, 252, 290, 341
Khvostov, Alexis, iii
Kiao-chao, 60, 62-64; cession to Japan, 375
Kiel, 59; revolution, 362
Kiel Canal, internationalization, 376, 381
Kiev, captured, 258
Kilid Bahr (Fort), 85, 88-89
Kimpolung, captured, 47
Kirlibaba Pass, 47
Kitchener, Lord, 21, 25, 39, 83, 115, 133,
166, 169
Klotz, Louis, 293
Kluck, General von, 3, 26, 28, 30-33
Knights of Columbus, 410
Koerber, Ernst von, 264
Koevess, General von, 135
Kolchak, Admiral, 337, 341, 387
Kolomea, captured, 243
Konigsberg, 42
Konigsberg (Cruiser), 61
Korea, Russo-Japanese War, 108; na-
tionaUsm, 397
Koritza, captured, 189
Kornilov, General, 230, 243, 245-246
Koroshetz, Anton, 354
Kossovo, 129
Kovno, captured, 106-107
Kragujevatz, captured, 128
Kramarcz, Karel, 353-3S4» 368
Krasnik, captured, 44, 105
Kriemhilde Line, 332
Krithia, 88
Kronprinz Wilhelm (Cniiser), 61
Kropotkin, 245
Krupp, no; guns, 23-24, 84-85. {See
also Munitions)
Krylenko, General, 247
Kiihlmann, Richard von, 254, 256, 258,
268, 270, 319
Kultur, 147, 201, 210, 274, 395, 405
Kum Kale (Fort), 85-86
Kun, Bela, 384
Kuprikeui, defeat of Turks at, 140
Kuprulu, captured, 127
Kuropatkin, General, 171
Kusmanek, General von, 48
Kustendil, captured, 127
Kut-el-Amara, 137-139; siege, 141-142;
captured, 282, 347
La Bassee, 36
Labor Party, England, 21-22, 290, 406, 408;
in Ireland, and conscription, 311. {See
also headings under Industrial)
Labyrinth (Trenches and tunnels), 117
Lacaze, Admiral, 193
450
INDEX
Lafayette, 203
Laibach, riots, 349 ; Pan-Slavic Congress, 350
Lambros, Premier, 285
Lammasch, Professor, 353
Land ownership, Bolshevist policy, 248;
Soviet policy, 250; estates, Rumania,
404; nationalization in Great Britain,
406 ; small holdings, 407
Landlords, eliminated in Germany, 362
Landrecies, captured, 332
Lands turm, 22
Landwehr, 22
Language, free use of, 386
Lanrezac, General, 29-30
Lansdowne, Lord, 291
Lansing, Robert, 351, 368-369
Laon, 39, 275
Larissa, captured, 284
Latin- America, German conspirators, 207
Latvia, 121; autonomy, 238, 254, 256,
359; and Mittel-Europa, 255, 334; van-
quished, 300; nationalism, 397; re-
publican form of goverimient, 402
LaiiriQr, Sir Wilfrid, 66
Laventie, captured, 308
Law, Andrew Bonar, 193, 246
League of Free Nations, 270, 366-367
League of Nations, 169, 203, 209-211, 298,
331-332, 370-371, 375, 378, 398, 411;
Covenant of, 379, 383, 399-401 ; text,
413-423; first meeting of Council, 383;
reservations, 399; list of original mem-
bers, 423
League to Enforce Peace, 208
Ledebour (Socialist leader), 166
Leipzig, revolution, 361
Leipzig (Cruiser), 60
Lemberg, 43-44; captured, 48, 99, loi,
242 ; riots, 349
Le Mort Homme, captured, 277
Lenin, Nikolai, 240-241, 244, 247, 250,
252, 258, 335-336, 384, 387-388
Lens, 117, 119; British objective, 275;
captured, 328
Leopold, Prince of Bavaria, 185, 242
Lesina, cession to Italy, 386
Lettland. (See Latvia)
Lettow-Vorbeck, General von, 68
Liberal Party, in Canada, 66; in Russia,
108-111, 194, 226; in England, 158-
159; in Germany, 267, 361
Liberals, Young Turks. {See Young Turks)
Liberia, enters the War, 271 ; German rights
renounced, 375
Liberty Loan Acts, U. S., 222
Liberty, personal, 403-406
Libya, and Italy, 92
Lichnowsky, Prince, 15
Liebknecht, Karl, 166, 356, 360, 362-363
Liege, captured, 27, 33 ; Billow's proclama-
tion, 38
Lille, 30; captured, 35, 39, 332
Linsingen, General voin, 47, loo-ioi
Liquid fire, 177
Lissa, cession to Italy, 386
Lithuania, Teutonic conquest, 121; auton-
omy, 238, 254-256, 359; vanquished,
300; ajid Mittel-Europa, 334-335; and
White Russia, 336; starvation in, 390;
nationalism, 397; republican form of
government, 402
Lithuanians in Russia, 54
Little Russia, independence, 238, 255
Littlefield, Walter, 389
Livenza River, 296, 352
Living, high cost of, 392, 406
Livonia, and Mittel-Europa, 255; in-
dependence, 341
Lloyd, Sir William, 368
Lloyd George, David, 83, 166-167, 169,
193, 198, 262, 297, 311, 368-370, 381,
387, 403
Loans, U. S. to the Allies, 223
Locomotives, German, surrendered, 357
London, Pact of (1914), 20, 95; Treaty of
London (1915), 92-93
London, raided, 74
Longwy, captured, 30
Loos, captured, 118
Loucheur, Louis, 293
Louis, King of Bavaria, 360, 362
Louis XIV, 396
Louise, queen of Prussia, 8
Louvaih, captured, 27-28; destruction of,
37-38; manuscripts and prints destroyed,
377 ; Library, 394
Lovtchen, captured, 135
Lowestoft, raided, 74
Ludd, captured, 286
Ludendorff, General, 184, 254, 270, 294,
300-303, 310, 313-321, 324-325, 327-
328, 342, 344, 346, 351-352, 356, 364
Liideritz Bay, 67
Lusitania (Steamship), 78, 163, 206, 372
Lutsk, captured, 173
Luxburg, Count, 271
Luxemburg, Rosa, 166, 362-363
Luxemburg (Town), 19; captured, 300, 358-
359
Luxuries, taxes, 392
Lvov, Prince George, 229-230, 232, 234-
237, 239-241, 243-244, 246-248, 252,
340-341
Lvov (Town). {See Lemberg)
Lyautey, Hubert, 193, 276
Lys River, 332
INDEX
451
Macedonia and Bulgaria, 87, 123, 183;
Allied failure, 282; battle-line, 285;
offensive of (1918), 344-346; cession to
Serbia, 383
Machine-gun, "nests," 113, 333; Allied,
177-178; development of, 408
Machine tools stolen, 394; works looted,
394
Machines, a war of, 99-100, 115
Mackensen, General von, 51-52, 100-102,
104-10S, 107, 127, 129, 143, 182, 187-
189, 192-193, 242-243, 270
Mackensen's Drives, 99-102 ; into Galicia,
117; against Russia, 120; into Serbia,
127-131
MacNeill, General, 161
Magyars. {See Hungary)
Mails, by airplane, 409
Mainz, occupied by Allied troops, 357;
administered by French army, 359;
evacuated by Allies, 377
Majestic (Battleship), 88
Makarov, Russian Minister, 109
Malines, 28; captured, 35
Malinoff, Premier, 344
Malmedy, cession to Belgium, 374
Malvy, Louis, 292
Mandataries, German colonies, 370, 375,
381 ; Near East, 384 ; of France, 400 ;
defined in the League of Nations covenant,
401-402; 420-421
Mangin, General, 192; 321, 323, 326, 332
Mannerheim, General, 335, 359
Manoury, General, 32
Manuscripts destroyed by Germans, 377
Marianne Islands, occupied by the Jap-
anese, 67
Marienburg, 42
Maritz, Gen., 66-67
Marne, ist Battle, 31-32,33, 40, 148, 152, 15 5,
324; 2d Battle, 320-325
Marshall Islands, occupied by the Jap-
anese, 67
Martial law, in Bohemia and Croatia, 351
Marwitz, General von der, 303, 306, 320
Marx, Karl, 239, 289
Marxian socialism, post-War, 406-407
Masaryk, Thomas G., 353-354
Massacres, by the Turks, 390
Massey, William, 368
Masurian Lakes, Battle of, 42
Materialism, and the War, 410
Maubeuge, captured, 30, 39, 332
Maude, Gen. Sir Stanley, 182, 283-284
Maud'huy, General, 36
Maximilian, Chancellor Prince, 331, 356,
360-361
Maxwell, Gen. Sir John, 161
Maynooth, meeting protesting against
conscription, 311
Meat, American, 223
Mecca railway, 136
Medicine, preventive, development of, 409
Memel, cession to Lithuania, 374
Menin, captured, 332
Menshiviki, 239, 240-241, 244
Mental disorders, treatment of, 409
Merchant marine, Germany, 398
Merchantmen, sunk, 163-164, 206, 219-
224, 254, 394-395; armed against sub-
marines, 216, 290; surrender of captured
Allied, 353
Mercier, Cardinal, 38-39
Merville, captured, 308
Mesopotamia, and Great Britain, 55, 71-72,
i37> 399; Turkish sovereignty, 136-
137, 182; Allied failure, 282; occupied
by Allies, 284; British mandatary, 384
Messines, captured, 278; Ridge, captured,
308
Metz, 22, 34; captured, 358
Meuse River, Battle of, . iS2-'i55, 192;
Valley, 333
Mexico, German aUiance with, 216
Mezieres, captured, 30
Michael, Grand Duke of Russia, 229
Michaelis, George, 268-269, 288-289
MiUtarism, 4-7; German, 8-13, 364, 395-
396, 398; Prussian, 82
Military, dictator, 291-292 ; training in
mandataries, 401, 421; surgery, develop-
ment of, 409
Milk supply, decrease, 393
Millerand, Alexandre, 83
Milner, Lord, 193, 313
Milyukov, Paul, no, 194, 228, 230, 233-
234, 245-246
Minerals, Mittel-Europa, 144
Mines, submarine, North Sea, 59; neutrals
slain by, 390 ; estimate of sinkings, 395 ;
floating, 74; explosive, on the Messines-
Wytschaete ridge, 278
Mines, in Galicia, 102; copper, 134; na-
tionalization of, in Great Britain, 406
Minority socialists, Germany. {See Social-
ists, Germany)
Mirbach, Count von, 337
Missions, Christian, inviolability guar-
anteed, 410
Mitrovitza, captured, 129
Mittel-Europa, 69, 72, 136, 142-145, 147,
166, 168, 170, 182-183, 185, 191, 195,
197-198, 201, 213, 217, 225, 253-255,
262-263, 266, 269-271, 282, 284, 289,
294, 297, 300, 318, 325, 334-335. 342-343,
346, 348, 350, 356, 360, 363, 365, 367, 396
452
r-'-
mDEX
Mobilization, 17-24
Moderates, in Germany, 266
Moewe (Raider), 162
Mohammed V, Sultan, 347
Mohammed VI, Sultan, 347
Moldavia, captured, 189
Moltke, Helmuth, Count von, 8
Moltke, Hehnuth von. Chief of the Gen-
eral Staff, 27, 40, 321
Monarchist agitation in Germany, 362
Monarchy, and the War, 402
Monastir, 123; captured, 129, 190, 284
Monfalcone, 91
Monmouth (Warship), 60
Monro, General, 133
Monroe doctrine, 204-205, 207, 211, 380,
400; between China and Japan, 366,
400 ; League of Nations, 420
Mons, captured, 30, 332
Mont Kemmel, captured, 308
Mont St. Quentin, captured, 273
Montdidier, captured, 307, 327
Monte Asolone, captured, 296
Monte Ciove, 157
Monte Grappa, Austrian defeat, 352
Monte Pasubio, 157
Monte San Michele, 176
Monte Seisemol, 352
Monte Tomba, captured, 296
Montenegrin army, 55, 57; losses, 389
Montenegro, enters the War, 19-20, 73;
refuge of King Peter, 129; conquest of,
135-137; restoration and indemnities,
254, 298; and Jugoslavia, 263; Allied
failure, 282 ; vanquished, 300 ; cleared of
Austrians, 346; Jugoslav control, 354;
disappears, 396-397; King Nicholas de-
posed in favor of King Peter of Serbia,
402
Montmedy, captured, 30, 39
Moreuil, 306
Morocco, and a "Holy War," 71 ; Mos-
lem rebellions, 82; German rights re-
novmced, 375; protectorate under France,
400
Mortality, Poland, 393
Mortars. {See Guns)
Moscow, congress of Zemstvos, in; and
the revolution, 228; Extraordinary Na-
tional Conference at, 245; seat of gov-
ernment, 248
Moslem imrest, 71 ; rebellions, 82
Most-favored-nation tariffs, 377
Mosul 284; captured, 347
Motor lorries, German, surrendered, 357
Motorcycles, 24
Mudra, Gen. von, 320-321
Mudros, Turkish armistice signed, 348
Miihlon, Dr., 16
Miilhausen, captured, 28
MiJller, Hermann, 374
MuUer, Karl von, 60-61
Munich, food riots, 170
Municipalities, Union of, .in Russia, 194,
225
Munitions, gims, 23-24; Krupp gims,
84-85, no; AUied lack of, 115-117;
production in Great Britain and France,
118; in Germany, 119; Allied supply,
168; trade in, 206; supplied by U. S.,
223; for Germany, 269; manufacture
of, 415-416; control of. League of Na-
tions covenant, 380, 401, 421-422. {See
also Artillery)
Murman railway, 339-340
Murmansk, Allied Expeditionary Force,
339-340
Murray, Sir Archibald, 282, 285-286
Mush, captured, 140
Namur, captured, 28, ss
Nancy, 29
Naphtha deposits of Baku, 341
Napoleon I, 19, 396
Napoleon III, 19
Narew River, fortresses, 104
Narva, captured, 258
National Constituent Assembly, of Russia,
228-229, 244, 248-249, 251-252, 341;
of Austria, 356; of Germany, 361-363, 374
National councils of the Austro-Hun-
garian peoples, 349 •
National Guard, U. S., 222
National Liberals in Germany, 267
National Volunteers in Ireland, 159
Nationalism, 3-7, 396-398; and the
Catholic Church, 410
Nationalists, in Ireland, 159-161, 310-
312; in Russia, 237
Naumann, Friedrich, 69
Navy League, Germany, 13
Nazareth, captured, 347
Near East. {See Balkan States, Turkey,
Armenia, etc.)
Negotiated peace, 288, 292. {See also
Peace)
Negotin, captured, 127
Nesle, captured, 306
Netherlands, loss of trade, 79; reduction
of armaments, 360 ; refuge of William II,
361 ; special convention with Belgium,
385; neutrality, 388; anti-royalist de-
monstrations, 402
Neuilly, treaty signed by Bulgaria, 383
Neutral nations, 388; civilians slain by
submarines, 390
INDEX
453
Neutrality, armed, 146; U. S., 216-217
Neutralization of straits, 254
Neuve Chapelle, 36; captured, 115
Neuve E^glise, captured, 308
New era begins, 365-411; losses of bel-
ligerents, 388-395
New Mexico, bribe to Mexico, 216
New York Times Current History, 389,
391
New Zealand, loyalty, 68; territorial de-
mands, 371; army, losses, 390
Newfoundland, loyalty, 66
Nicaragua, severs relations with Ger-
many, 271
Nicholas II, Tsar of Russia, 110-112, 194,
198, 217, 225-230, 233, 235, 239,^338
Nicholas, Grand Duke of Russia, 42, 46,
53, 99> 105-106, no, 139-142, 182, 226,
229
Nicholas, King of Montenegro, 135, 354
Nieuport, 149
Nish, captured, 128, 346
Nitti, Francesco, 297, 371, 385
Nivelle, General, 155, 192, 194, 273, 275-
276, 292
Nixon, Gen. Sir John, 137, 142
NorthclijEfe, Lord, 193, 197, 208
Northern Railway, damages, 394
Norway, acquires Spitzbergen, 385. {See
also Scandinavia)
Noske, Gustav, 364
Novibazar, captured, 129
Novo Georgievsk, 106
Noyon, 177, 180; captured, 273, 306,
326
Number g (Cruiser), 60
Oath of Czech and Jugoslav representatives
to dismember the Dual Empire, 350-351
Ocean (Warship), 85
Octobrists, Russia, 236-237
Odessa, raided, 70; and Austro-German
trade, 259
Oil-wells, in Galicia, 102; in Rumania,
192
Oise, Battle of the, 313-316
Old Armenia, captured, 282
Omsk, All-Russian government, 340
"Open door" for colonies, 290
Opium traffic, and the League of Nations
covenant, 422
Oppressed nationalities, resurgence of, 348-
356
Orange Free State, loyalty, 66
Orlando, Vittorio, 297, 368-369, 371, 385
Orlov, Colonel, 337
Orsova, captured, 187-188
Ossowietz, captured, 106-107
Ostend, occupied by the Germans, 35-36;
Allied objective, 278; harbor closed by
ships sunk, 310; captured, 332
Otani, General, 340
Ottoman Empire. {See Turkey)
Ourcq River, 323
Pacific islands, and Japan, 400
Pacifism, 199, 212; and a negotiated peace,
288; British, 291; French, 292; Italian,
293; Russian, 294; German, 364
Pact of London (1914), 20, 95 ; Treaty of
London (1915), 92-93
Paderewski, Ignace, 359
Painleve, Paul, 276, 293
Palestine, Turkish sovereignty, 136-137;
British offensive, 285; campaign in,
285-287; British mandatary, 384; na-
tionalism, 397; and Great Britain, 399.
{See also Jews)
Pams, Jules, 293
Pan-German League, 13
Pan-Slavic Congress, 350
Panama, joins the Allies, 218, 271
Panama Canal, neutralization, 254
Papal appeals for peace, 266
Papen, von, 207
Paper-money issues, 392
Paris, menaced by the Germans, 26, 31,
74, 147, 301, 314, 320, 323; War Coun-
cil, 169; Conference to Revise War-
Aims, 246-247; Allied Conference, 272;
attacked by long-range guns, 304; Pre-
liminary Peace Conference, 304
Paris Journal (Newspaper), 292
Paris-to-Chalons railway, 314
Paris-to-Nancy railway, 320
Parliament, English, elections, 403
Pashitch, Nikola, 265, 354, 368
Passchendaele Ridge, captured, 278-280,
308, 329
Pasubio, Monte, 157
Patriotic Auxiliary Service Act, 195
Patrol boats, 221
Pau, Paul, 28
Pax Germanica, 143
Pax Romana Germanica, 396
Payment of damages, by Germany, 377
Peace Conference, Germany excluded, 367;
Preliminary Peace Conference, 367-
372 ; Supreme Council, 383. {See also
Brest-Litovsk Treaty)
Peace Conference, Socialists', at Stock-
holm, 267, 289-292
Peace Congress, 220, 290, 292, 398; hopes
entertained, 365; facts to be faced, 366;
Definitive Peace Congress, 372; and
Ireland, 397
454
INDEX
Peace, German. (See German peace)
Peace, Soviet, 241; in Russia, 259; papal
api>eals, 266; negotiated peace, 288,
292 ; program, socialist, conditions of,
289-290; forced on Rumania by Bucha-
rest Treaty, 297; Allied, 325; terms sub-
mitted to Germany, 372
"Peace through victory," 293, 297
Peace treaties, Finland with Germany,
Austria and Russia, 259; Allies, 383-
388. {See also Versailles, Peace Treaty)
"Peace without victory," 21 1-2 12, 288;
German championship of, 297
Pearse, Padraic, 161
Pepper Ridge, 152-153
Permanent Covu-t of International Justice,
417
Peronne, 177-178, 272; captured, 273, 306,
326
Pershing, John J., 223, 313, 323
Persia, and Turkey, 136-137 ; restoration,
254 ; nationalism, 397 ; and Great Brit-
ain, 399
Persian Gulf, 137
Perthes, capture of, 114
Peru, severs relations with Germany, 271.
388
Pessoa, Epitacio, 368
Retain, General, 151, 155, 276, 301, 304-
305,313, 320-321, 358
Peter, King of Serbia, 57, 129, 135, 354,
402
Petrograd, and the revolution, 227-228,
230, 232, 245, 247; Council of Work-
men's Deputies, 228
Petroseny coal basin, 259
Pflanzer, General von, 47, 100, 105
Philip II, of Spain, 396
Philippines, 12, 397
Piave River, 295-297, 317-320, 352
Picardy, Battle of, 304-313
Pichon, Stephen, 293, 368
"Pillboxes," 279
Pilsudski, General, 196, 350, 359
Plebiscite, of peoples ceded to Poland,
375; of Schleswig, 375; Saar basin,
381 ; Schleswig and Poland, 381 ; Fiume,
385 ; Teschen, 385
Plevlie, captured, 135
Plock, 46
Ploechti, captured, 192
Plumer, Sir Herbert, 307, 329
Plunkett, Sir Horace, 310
Pneumonia, deaths, caused by war, 390
Poincar^, President, 369
Poisonous gases, 115-117, 177, 408
Pojarevatz, captured, 127
Pola, captured, 353
Poland, 41 ; invasion of, 45, 50-55 ; au-
tonomy, 53-54, 195-196, 237, 254, 256,
290, 298, 349-351, 383; conquered by
the Germans, 102-107, 300; German
professions of friendship, 145; committee
of National Defense, 196; and Russia,
230 ; and Germany, 266-267 ; and Ukrai-
nia, 270; territorial demands, 366, 371;
acquires Posen and West Prussia, etc.,
374; plebiscite, 381 ; eastern boundaries,
387; starvation in, 390; food supply,
393; nationalism, 397; republican gov-
ernment, 402
Poles, of Galicia, 263
PoUsh army, advancing towards Posen,
359; statistics, 389
Political democracy, Bolshevist policy,
248-249; general, 402-405
Polivanov, General, 109
Polotzk, captured, 258
"Passeront pas," 148-155
Poole, General, 340
Populations, Allied nations and Central
Powers compared, 81
Port Arthur, 64
Portugal, proposed partition of colonies, 6 ;
enters the war, 162-163 ; royalist uprising,
402
Portuguese army, in France, 308; losses,
389
Posen, ceded to Poland, 374
Posina, captured, 174
Potsdam Conference (1914), 14-16
Power, Balance of. {See Balance of power)
Powers, the Great, 5-6; at war, 18; Five,
95 ; changes in, 398
Prague, riots, 349; Pan-Slavic Congress,
350; Assembly of Czechs and Jugo-
slavs at, 350-351
Prahovo, captured, 127
Preliminary Peace Conference, Paris, 367-
372. {See also Peace Conference)
Preparedness, German and Russian, 100;
U. S., 220-224
Presidential campaign, 1916, 208
Press censorship. {See Censorship, press)
Preventive medicine, development of, 409
Pria Fora, captured, 157
Prilep, captured, 129, 345
Prinkipo Island, conference of all-Russian
factions, 387
Prints, destroyed at Lou vain, 377
Prinz Eitel Friedrich (Cruiser), 61
Prishtina, captured, 129
Prisrend, captured, 129
Production, post-War, 407
Profit-sharing, post-War, 407-408
Profiteering, post-War, 406
INDEX
455
Profits, excess, 222; post-War, 406
Progressives, in Germany, 266-268
Prohibition of alcoholic beverages, 405
Proletarian dictatorship, 249
Proletariat, the governing class in Germany,
363
Propaganda, German, 147, 268, 289-291 ;
Entente, 207-208; Allied, in U. S., 212,
215; Allied, in Austria, 317; in Russia,
236-239, 241, 245, 255; Socialist, 254;
Bolshevist, 255-256, 259, 342; separatist,
in Austria-Hungary, 349
Proportional representation, 403-404
Protopopov, Minister of the Interior, 194,
226-227, 237
Provisional government, of Russia, 229-
230, 232, 234-237, 239-241, 243-244,
246-248, 252, 340-341; of Austro-Hun-
garian peoples, 349
Prunay, captured, 321
Prussia, constitution, 9; militarism, 8-
13, 82; electoral reforms, 269, 331
Przasnysz, capture of, 105
Przemysl, 43-48, 99, loi
Pskov, captured, 258
Psycho-analysis, development of, 409
Psychology, scientific study of, 409
Public works, destroyed by the Germans,
394 ; debts of belligerent nations, 391
Putilov Armament Company, no
Quast, General von, 303, 307
Queant, British objective, 275; cap-
tured, 328
Queen Elizabeth (Warship), 85, 88
Queen Mary (Cruiser), 165
Rada, of the Little Russians, 255
Radek, Karl, 363
Radicals, in Germany, 266-268; in France,
292
Radom, captured, 105
Radoslavoff, Premier, 124-125, 344
Rafa, railroad to Kantara, 285
Raids on coast towns, 74; on Paris, 74;
air-raids, 390
Railroad engineers, American, and the
Trans-Siberian railway, 340-341
Railways, Poland, 104-107; Serbia, 127;
Berlin-to- Constantinople, 134, 136, 282 ;
Berlin-to-Bagdad, 136-137; Mecca, 136-
137; German, 144; Sinai desert, 183,
282, 285; Rumania, 188-189; govern-
ment control, U. S., 223; Russia, 228,
259; international control, 290; France,
307, 310, 329; Paris to Chalons, 314;
Paris to Nancy, 320; Siberia, 335, 338-
341 ; Murman railway, 339-34° ; Bul-
garia, 345 ; Austria, 353 ; German cars
surrendered, 357; stations destroyed,
394; Cape-to-Cairo, 399; nationaliza-
tion in Gt. Brit., 406
Ramadie, captured, 284
Rapallo, Conference of France, Gt. Brit.,
and Italy at, 271
Rasputin, Gregory, 225-226
Rawaruska, captured, loi
Rawlinson, General, 326, 329
Rayak, captured, 347
Reactionaries, Germany, 363
Reconstruction, political in Russia, 237 ;
of society, post- War, 408
Red Cross Society, 410; organizations,
and the League of Nations covenant,
422
Red flags, in Germany, 361-362
Red Guards, 247, 250
Redmond, John, 66, 159
Redmond, Major William, 278
Redoubts, concrete, 279
Regneville, captured, 277
Reichsrat, Austria, 349-350
Reichstag, Germany, 9, 267-268, 300-
301
Religious freedom, 265, 386, 397, 401
Rennenkampf, General, 42, 43, 46
Renner, Karl, 356
Republicanism, and the War, 402
Restoration of occupied territories, 291
Rethel, captured, 332
Rethondes, armistice signed at, 357
Reval, captured, 258; Russian harbor zone,
341
Reventlow, 213, 267
Revolution, French, and nationalization,
3; industrial, 205. {See also Russia,
revolution)
Rheims, captured, 33-34; attack on, 316;
Cathedral, 394
Rhine bridgeheads, occupied by Allied
troops, 357, 377
Ribot, Alexandre, 83, 193, 276, 292-293
Richebourg St. Vaast, captured, 308
Riga, 106, 171; captured, 244; Russian
harbor zone, 341
Robertson, 169
Rochambeau, 203
Rockets, 303
Rodzianko, 109, 228-229
Rogers, D. G., 391
Rohrbach, Paul, 69
Roman Catholic Church. (See Catholic
Church)
Romanov dynasty, 226, 228-229, 232,
402. (See also Nicholas, Tsar)
456
INDEX
Rome, Congress of Oppressed Nationali-
ties, 350
Roon, 8
Roosevelt, Theodore, 208
Root, Elihu, 208, 235
Roques, General, 166, 193
Rostov, 255
Roubaix, captured, 332
Roulers, captured, 332
Rovereto, 91, 156
Roye, captured, 326
Rumania, and Russia, 47; and Bulgaria,
84; and the Entente, 84; keeps peace,
96; neutrality, 11 2-1 13; territorial
demands, 123-124, 366; enters the
War, 181-191 ; railroads, 188; collapses,
191; truce with Central Powers, 253;
restoration of territory, 254, 298; Allied
failure, 282; treaty of Bucharest, 297,
346; vanquished, 300; reenters the
War, 346; autonomy, 349; territorial
demands, 371 ; treaty not ratified, 383 ;
food supply, 393; nationalism, 397;
universal suffrage, 404
Rumanian army, losses, 189, 389; repels
Mackensen's attack, 243
Rumans of Transylvania and Bukowina,
47, 263
Rupprecht, Crown Prince of Bavaria, 27,
29, 36, 150, 18s, 304
Russia, alliances with France and Great
Britain, 6, 69; approach of the War, 15-
20, 24-25 ; German plans for invasion of,
40; imperialism, 54-55, 202; invasion
of Galicia, 80; outlet for grain trade,
83; retreats, 99-120; Duma, 107, 109-
III, 194, 225-230, 232, 234, 236; polit-
ical imrest, 107-112; condition of
peasants, 108; Revolution, 111-112,
197, 203, 217, 225-260, 262, 269; de-
clares war against Bulgaria, 125-126;
isolation, 144; War Industries Com-
mittee, 194; Union of Municipalities,
194, 225; and Poland, 195-196; and
the German peace, 198 ; revolts and makes
"peace," 225-260; Council of the Em-
pire, 225 ; destruction of autocracy,
the March (1917) revolution, 225-331;
Committee of Workmen, 227; Council
of Workmen's Deputies, 228; Constit-
uent Assembly, 228-229, 244, 248-
252, 341 ; Provisional Government, 229-
248, 252, 340-341; disintegration of
democracy; political and military ex-
periments, 231-246; war-weariness, 233;
territorial demands, 233, 252-253; rail-
roads, 243 ; Council of National Defense,
245; Preliminary Parliament, 246; dicta-
torship of the Bolsheviki; the Nov.
(1917) revolution, 246-252; Council of
the People's Commissioners, 247 ; All-
Russian Extraordinary Commission, 249;
Socialist Federated Soviet RepubUc,
constitution, 249; defection of; the
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, 252-260; dis-
integration, 255; out of the War, 257-
258; Russo-German commercial treaty
of 1904,. 259; manufacturing industries,
259; repudiation of foreign debt, 260;
restoration of all territory, 298; indem-
nity to Germany, 341 ; AU-Russian gov-
ernment, 341 ; public debt, 391-392 ;
nationaUsm, 396-397
Russia, Little, independence, 238, 255
Russia, White, self-determination, 336
Russian army, organization, 23 ; mobi-
lization, 41-43; position, 49-52; battle-
lines, 51, 104, 107, 171; losses, 51, loi,
108, 258, 389; equipment, 105; reor-
ganization, 171; undermined by Ger-
man propaganda, 238; renewed activ-
ity, 241-243 ; demobilization, 258
Russian Church, Bolshevist policy, 248
Russian navy, victory, Aug. 20, 1915, 106
Russo-Japanese war, contrasted with the
Great War, 108
Ruthenians, autonomy, 238, 349; Con-
gress at Kiev, 238; of GaUcia, 263, 385
Ruzsky, General, 44, 46, 51, 228-229
Saar Basin, 370, 375; Commission, 381
Saarbriicken, occupied by Allies, 358
Saarburg, captured, 22, 28
Saillisel, captured, 180
SaiUy, captured, 180
St. Germain, treaty signed by Austria at,
383
St. Gobain, emplacement of German long
range guns at, 304
St. Mihiel, 34; salient, 114-115; cap-
tvired, 328-329
St. Quentin, captured, 39, 329
St. Quentin (Mont), captured, 273
Saionji, Marquis, 368-369
Sakharov, Vladimir, 188
Salandra, Premier, 94, 158
Salaries, post-War, 406
Salonica, 129-136, 183, 185, 191, 284,
344
Salvation Army, 410
Samara, 137, captured, 284, 338
Samoa, surrenders, 67 ; cession to New Zea-
land, 375
Samogneux, captured, 277
San, Battle of the, loi
San Domingo. {See Santo Domingo)
INDEX
457
San Giovanni di Medua, 135
San Giuliano, Marquis, 90
San Michele, Monte, 176
Sanders, Liman von, 88, 347
Sanitation, development of, 409
Sanna-i-yat, 141 ; captured, 283
Santo Domingo, German conspirators,
207; severs relations with Germany,
271, 388
Sari-Bair, 122
Sarrail, General, 33, 131-133; 183, 185,
189-191, 262, 284-285
Saverne aSair, 9
Sazonov, 194
Scandinavia, loss of trade, 79; reduction
of armaments, 360. {See also Denmark,
Norway, Sweden)
Scapa Flow, German navy, at 359
Scarborough, raided, 74
Scharnhorst, General, 8
Scharnhorst (Cruiser), 60
Scheer, Vice-Admiral von, 165
Scheidemann, Philip, 166, 267, 289, 331,
360, 363-364. 372
Scheldt River, freed from Dutch restric-
tions, 385
Schleswig. cession to Denmark, 360, 375,
397; plebiscite, 381
Schools, and the Allied peace treaties,
386 ; among the troops at the front,. 410
Science and education, 408-410
''Scrap of paper," 19, 91-92
Scrutin de liste, 403
Scutari, captured, 135
Sea, power, importance of, 58-62 ; diffi-
culties at, in 1 91 6, 162-167. (See also
Freedom of the seas)
Secret pacifist campaign in Italy, 293 ;
diplomacy to be abolished, 298
Secret treaties. Treaty of London, 20,
92^3, 95 ; Bulgaria with Austria-Hun-
gary, and Turkey, 84, 125; Entente,
220, 252-253, 367 ; forbidden at the Brest-
Litovsk Conference, 254; Japan and the
Entente, 370
Security League, Germany, 13
Sedan, captured, 39, 332
Sedd-el-Bahr, 85-86, 88
Seidler, Dr. von, 265, 269-270, 349-350
Seisemol, Monte, 352
Seitz, Karl, 356
Selective Service Act, U. S., 222
Self-determination, 396-397; Russia, 233;
White Russia, 336; Congress held in
Rome, 350; Ireland, 387
Self-interest, in pre-War economics, 1-7
Semendria, captured, 127
Semenov, General, 337
Semlin, fall of, 56
Serajevo, 14
Serbia, 14-20; enters the War, 17-18,
20; security of, 55-57; and the Allies,
73, 95-96; vanquished, 126, 300; troops
assembled against, 131; territorial de-
mands, 254, 298, 366, 371 ; Allied failure,
282; evacuation by Bulgars, 345; inde-
pendence, 263, 383; food supply, 393;
nationalism, 397
Serbian army, battle-lines, 127-128, 132;
losses, 56-57, 126, 389
Serbians, dead through disease or massacre,
390
Sereth River, 173-174; Battle of, 243
Sergy, captured, 323
Seringes, captured, 323
Sezanne, 32
Shabatz, Battle of, 56
Shantung railway, 63-64; and Japan,
220, 370, 375, 380-381, 400
Shingarev, Minister of agriculture, 230
Shipbuilding, program, U. S., 223; Gt.
Brit., andU. S., 322
Shipping act, U. S., 222
Shipping, German rules for safety against
submarines, 214-215; destroyed, 216,
220-224, 394-395; damages paid by
Germany, 377
Ships, German, seized, 222
Shop-stewards, post- War, 407
Shumran Peninsula, captured, 283
Siam, enters the War, 271 ; German rights
renounced, 375
Siberia, liberation of prisoners, 230; in-
dependence, 255; Trans-Siberian rail-
way, 338, 340-341 ; and Mittel-Europa,
355; and the Soviets, 337; Temporary
Siberian government, 341 ; and Japan,
400
Sick Man of the East, 347
Siegfried Line. {See Hindenburg Line)
Silesia, occupied by Czechoslovaks, 359
Simbirsk, captured, 338
Sinai Desert, railroad, 282-283, cam-
paign, 285
Sinha, Sir S. P., 368
Sinn Fein Rebellion, 158-161, 310-312,
387, 403
Sixtus, Prince of Bourbon, 266
Skobelev, Minister of Labor, 234
Skoropadsky, Dictator of Ukrainia, 334, 359
Skouloudis, Premier, 132
Slave trade, and the League of Nations
covenant, 401, 421
Slavic Peril, 13, 24, 266
Slavs, German domination, 263
Slovakia, cession to Czechoslovakia, 384
458
INDEX
Slovaks of Hungary, rebellion, 263
Slovenes, independence, 263; Jugoslav
control, 354
Small holdings, post-War, 407
Smuts, General, 67-68, 368, 374
Smyrna, and Greece, 87, 123, 366; Greek
mandatary, 384
Social Democratic Party in Russia, 108,
no, 232, 236, 239
Social Democrats, in Germany 11, 21, 166-
167; in Austria, 356
Social imrest, 377-378; tendencies, post-
War, 406-408; Catholics, post- War,
407, 410; sciences, scientific study of,
409
Socialism, in commerce, 1-7; in Belgium,
27; in Germany, 82, 152, 266-268, 290,
299, 331, 356, 360-364, 372-373; in
France, 197, 290; in Russia, 239, 289,
336, 398; propaganda, in Russia, 254;
a negotiated peace, 288-289; Christian,
in Austria, 356; in Hungary, 384; post-
war, 406-407
Socialist Revolutionary Party in Russia,
232, 239
Socialists' International Peace Conference,
at Stockholm, 267, 289-292
Sociology, scientific study of, 409
Sofia, Secret Convention of Bulgaria, and
the Dual Monarchy at, 125
Sofia-to-Berlin, railroads, 282
Soissons, captured, 315, 323
Sokal, in Russian hands, 44, loi
Soldiers' and sailors' insurance act, U. S.,
222
Solf, W. S., 331
Solomon Islands, 67
Somaliland, Italy's hold on, 400
Somme Drive, 177-182
Sommeilles, destruction of, 38
Sonnino, Sidney, 90, 158, 198, 297, 368,
371
Sophia, Queen of Greece, 123
Souchez, captured, 118
Soukhomlinov, General, 109, 226
Sounds in water, detection of, 409
South Africa. (See Africa, South)
South Sea islands, loss of, by the Germans,
67
Souville, Fort, 155
Soviets, 228, 232-234, 237, 240-241, 244-
249 ; Congress of, 247 ; constitution, 249 ;
Declaration of the rights of the people,
250-252 ; accepts German peace terms,
258; peace with Finland, 259 ; andMittel-
Europa, 335-336, 341 ; treaties with
Ukrainia and Finland, 336; and Ger-
man socialism, 364 ; in Hungary, 384
Spa, headquarters of William II, 304;
secret German conference at, 327-328;
flight of WilHam II to, 360
Spain, loss of trade, 79 ; reduction of arma-
ments, 360; anti-royaUst demonstra-
tions, 402
Spargo, John, Bolshevism, 250
Spartacus group of socialists, 362-363,
373
Spee, Admiral von, 60
Spinning industry destroyed, 394
SpirituaUsm, and the War, 411
Spitzbergen, cession to Norway, 385
"Spurlos versenkt," 271
Stalemate and the Teutonic Peace Drive,
191-200
Stanislau, captured, 243
Starvation, and the War, 390; in Armenia,
393
State-system of Germany, 398; inter-
vention in labor disputes, 406, 408;
socialism, post- War, 406-407
Steamships, German rules for safety against
submarines, 214-215
Stevens, John R., 340
Stockholm, SociaUsts' International Peace
Conference at, 267, 289-292
Straits, neutralization of, 254
Strassburg, captured, 22, 358
Strikes, U. S., 207; in Russia, 225, 227
Strumnitza, captured, 345
Stryj, captured, loi
Sturdee, Vice-Admiral, 60
Stiirgkh, Karl, 264
Sturmer, Boris, 111-112, 194, 226, 237
Sturmtruppen, 302, 306
Styr River, 176
Submarine cables, surrendered by Ger-
many, 377
Submarines, 75-78, 82, 149, 152, 160, 162-
166, 206, 212-224, 261, 266-268, 271-
272, 278, 287-288, 300, 308, 322, 332,
339, 353, 357, 359, 376, 390; bases for,
35; British, 88; losses from sinkings
by, 322 ; development of, 408
Suez Canal, attacks by Turks, 72 ; 283,
German control, 137; neutralization, 254
Suez-to-Singapore project, 72
Suffrage, Soviet restrictions, 241 ; in Gt.
Brit., 262 ; in Jugoslavia, 265 ; in Ger-
many, 361-362; universal, 403-404.
{See also Electoral reforms. Woman
suffrage)
Supreme Allied Council, 374
Supreme Council of Ten, of the Preliminary
Peace Conference, 370
Supreme Council of the Peace Conference,
383
INDEX
459
Supreme War Council, Inter- Allied, 271-
272, 312, 369
Surgery, military, development of, 409
Sussex (Steamboat), 163-164
Suvla Bay, 122, 133
Suwalki, 43
Sweden, submarine restrictions, 163; anti-
royalist demonstrations, 402. {See also
Scandinavia)
Switzerland, reduction of armaments, 360;
supplying food to the Tyrol, 393
Syria, Turkish sovereignty, 136; mas-
sacres and starvation in, 390; French
mandatary, 384, 400
Taft, William H., 208
Tagliamento River, 295-296
Tahure, captured, 118, 321
Talaat Pasha, 347
Tank warfare, 177-178, 180, 323, 408
Tannenberg, Battle of, 53
Tardenois, captured, 323
Tarififs, most-favored-nation, 377
Tarnopol, captured, 44, 243; Russian
control, loi
Tarnow, occupied by the Germans, loi
Taxes, income tax, 222; war, 392
Tchaikovsky, Nicholas, 340
Tcheidze (Soviet leader), 234, 239, 245,
247
Tchemov, Victor, 234, 239-240, 341
Telephone, wireless, development of, 409
Ten, Supreme Council of, of the Prelim-
inary Peace Conference, 370
Teodorov, General, 127
Terestchenko, Minister of Finance, 230,
234
Tergnier, captured, 273
Teschen, plebiscite, 385
Texas, as bribe to Mexico, 216
Thann, 34
"They shall not pass," 148-155
Thiaumont redoubt, 155
Thiepval, captured, 180
Thomas, Albert, 169, 193, 235
Thomas, Rear- Admiral Sir Hugh, 165
Thorn, 42
Thrace, cession to Bulgaria, 84, 87; ces-
sion to Greece, 366, 383; and Turkey,
343 ; cession to the Allies, 383
Three, Council of, 370
Tiberias, captured, 347
Tirpitz, Admiral von, 59, 152, 163-164,
213, 267
Tisza, Count, 102, 265
Tittoni, Tommaso, 371
Togoland, 67; partitioned, 375; man-
datary under France, 400
Tolmino, cession to Italy, 91
Tomba, Monte, captiured, 296
Tomsk, Temporary Government of Au-
tonomous Siberia at, 337
Torcy, captured, 323
Torpedoes, North Sea, 59 ; vessek sunk
by, 395
Toul, 18, 31
Tourcoing, captured, 332
Townshend, General, 137-139, 141-142,
183, 283, 347
Trade. {See Commerce)
Trade-unions, Germany, 363; post- War,
406, 408
Trading-with-the-enemy act, U. S., 222
Trans-Siberian railway, 338; and Ameri-
can engineers, 340-341
Transit, freedom of, and the League of
Nations Covenant, 422
Transportation, maritime, 169; govern-
ment control, 406
Transvaal, loyalty, 66
Transylvania, 47, 123, 186-187; union
with Rumania, 354; cession to Ru-
mania, 384
Treaties, U. S., with France, promising
aid against Germany, 381; signed by
Austria and Bulgaria, 383; action, of
U. S., on Allied peace treaties, 387; Arti-
cles 18-21 in the League of Nations
covenant, 420. {See also Secret treaties)
Treaty of Brest-Li to vsk. {See Brest-
Litovsk Treaty)
Treaty of Bucharest, 259, 297, 300, 317,
346, 357, 364
Treaty of London, 20, 92-93, 95
Treaty of Peace, Versailles, 357, 374
Treaty, peace, Finland, with Germary,
Austria and Russia, 259; Allies, with
Austria, 386
Trebizond, captured, 140
Trench warfare, 36, 45, 51, 80, 11 3-1 20,
122, 133, 150, 153, 175-178, 192, 223,
242, 273, 279, 300, 328
Trent, 91; autonomy, 254; captured,
352
Trentino, 91-97, 102, 156-158; 174-175,
253 ; and Pope Benedict, 291
Trepov, Alexander, 194, 226
Trieste, 91, 94; autonomy, 254; captured,
352
Triple Alliance, Italy with Central Powers,
90; of France with Gt. Brit., and U. S.,
383
Tripoli, captured, 347; Italy's hold on,
400
Triumph (Battleship), 88
Troesnes, captured, 315
460
INDEX
Trotsky, Leon, 240-241, 244, 247, 250,
252-253, 257, 338, 384
Troyon, 34 '^\
Trumbitch, Anton, 265, 354
Tsars, 231, 237, 248-249, 257, 260
Tseretelli, Minister of Posts and Telegraphs,
234, 239, 241, 245
Tsing-tao (Fortress), 63-64
Turin, riots, 293
Turkestan, independence, 255
Turkey, in 1912, 6; and Germany, 1896-
1914, 12, 69-73; enters the War, 60, 70-
71 ; and the Dardanelles, 83 ; partition of,
92 ; effect of entry into the War upon the
Balkan States, 121 ; treaty with Bulgaria,
125; made a military base, 134-135;
autonomy of peoples, 298; dismember-
ment, 300, 396; surrenders, 342-348;
"Sick Man of the East," 347; conclusion
of peace, 384; disrupted, 396; national-
ism, 396-397; mandataries, 401, 421.
{See also Young Turks)
Turkish army, defeated, 139-140; losses,
140, 283, 347, 389; to be demobilized, 348
Turkish atrocities, 82; famine and mas-
sacres, 390
Turnu-Severin, captured, 188
Typhus, in Serbia, 57
Tyrol, 93 ; food supply, 393
Tyrwhitt, Admiral, 359
Udine, captured, 295, 352
Ufa, National Convention at, 341
Ukrainia, autonomy, 238, 263, 349, 359;
People's Republic, 255, 257; and Poland,
270; vanquished, 300; and Mittel-
Europa, 334; territorial demands, 371;
starvation in, 390; nationalism, 397;
repubUcan form of government, 402
Ukrainians, weakening loyalty to Russia, 54 ;
of Eastern GaUcia, 385
Ulster rebellion, Ireland, 158-161, 310-312,
387, 403
Ulyanov, Vladimir. {See Lenin, Nikolai)
Union of Municipalities, Russia, 194, 225
United States, transportation of munitions
and suppUes, 62, 65, 75, 83, 100, 261 ; aid
counted on by Germany, 75; right of
neutral trade, 76-; loss of trade, 78-79;
and the Grand Fleet, 162-167; as an
enemy of Germany, 163; proposed reUef
for Poland, 196-197; intervention in the
War, 200-224; isolation, or a League of
Nations, 201-212; alliance with France,
203; feeling towards Gt. Brit., 204;
feeling towards Germany, 204, 206; trade
in .munitions, 206 ; and unrestricted sub-
marine warfare, 213-219; enters the War,
218; at war with Austria-Hungary, 218,
266; preparedness, 219-224; Committee
on Public Information, 222; Selective
Service Act, 222; joins Allies, 271; aid
to AUies, 287-288; not represented at
Stockholm Peace Conference, 290; delay
in giving aid to Allies, 297, 300 ; no terri-
torial ambitions, 366-367; alliance with
Gt. Brit, and France, 370, 383 ; treaty
with France promising aid against Ger-
many, 381 ; ratification of Treaty of
Versailles, 382 ; action on Allied peace
treaties, 387 ; public debt, 391-392 ; loans
to Allies, 392 ; imperiahsm, 400
United States army, American Expeditionary
Force, 219, 261, 329; transportation sta-
tistics, 219, 322; mobilization, 222; selec-
tive draft, 222 ; arrival in France, 223 ; at
Chateau-Thierry, 316; at the Second
Battle of the Marne, 321-323; battle-
line, 323; aid to Allies, 326-327; at St.
Mihiel, 329; in Coblenz, 359; losses, 389
United States navy, 224; losses, 395
Unity of command, 168-169 ; German army,
144, 302 ; Supreme War Council, 271-272 ;
Allied armies, 277, 312-313
Universal suffrage. {See Suffrage)
Unrest, social, 377-378
Urbal, General d', 118
Uruguay, severs relations with Germany^
271, 388
Uskub, captured, 127
Valenciennes, captured, 30, 39, 332
Valievo, 56
Valois, captured, 323
Vandervelde, Emile, 27, 235, 289, 368
Vardar (Battle), 132
Vaux, captured, 155, 192
Veles, captured, 127
Venereal disease, 409
Venezuela, and Germany in 1903, 12
Venice, menaced, 296, 318
Venizelos, Eleutherios, 84, 87, 95, 123, 129-
134, 190-191, 284-285, 344, 368
Verdun, 18, 31-34, 148-155, 182, 184, 277,
281
Versailles, Peace Treaty, 357; Peace Con-
gress, 367 ; submission of peace terms to
Germany at, 372; Treaty of, signed, 374;
Covenant, 398
Vervins, captured, 39
Vesle River, 314
Victor Emmanuel, king of Italy, 176
Vienna, to Constantinople, railroads, 282;
Revolution, 355 ; food supply, 393
Vigilancia (ship), 216
Vigneuilles, captured, 329
INDEX
461
Villers Cotterets Forest, 322
Vilna, captured, 107
Vimy Ridge, 118; captured, 275, 277
Vishegrad, 57
Viviani, Rene, 83, 145, 220
Vladivostok, Temporary Government of
Autonomous Siberia at, 337; captured,
338; Allied Expeditionary Force at, 339-
341
Volhynia, 173
Volo, claptured, 284
Vologodsky, Peter, 341
Vouziers, captured, 332
Vulcan Pass, 188
Wages, and the Treaty of Versailles, 378;
post- War, 406
Wallachia, captured, 188-189
War, the {See Great War)
War-aims. Conference to Revise, at Paris,
246-247
War-aims, reply of Allies and Central Powers
to President Wilson's note on, 209-210;
Allies', 253, 272, 297-298
War Cabinet, Allied, 404
War Council, Anglo-French, 169
War credits, 21; zone, around the British
Isles, 76, 78; loans in Germany, 81;
service in Germany, 195; material, Ger-
many not to produce, 375; material,
manufacture of, 415-416; taxes, 392;
profits, taxes on, 392; psychology, 405-
406; industries, government control of,
406
War Industries Committee, Russia, 194, 225
War-weariness, 197, 212; in Great Britain,
146-147; in Russia, 233, 247, 252; in
Germany, 266, 372; Allies, 287-288, 297;
in France, 291 ; in Bulgaria, 343
Warsaw, 46; German drive against, 51-52;
defended, 99 ; a railway center, 104 ; cap-
tured, 105-106
Washington, George, 203-204, 211, 400
Water, detection of sounds in, 409
Water-supply, at Gallipoli, 122
Weapons, development of, 408
Weimar, National Assembly at, 363
Wettin, House of, 402
Wheat, Rumanian and Wallachian, 192
Whitby, raided, 74
White, Henry, 368
White Guards, Finland, 334-335
White Russia, self-determination, 336
Whitlock, Brand, 39
Wieringen, refuge of the German Crown
Prince, 362
Wilhelmina, Queen of the Netherlands, 377
Wilhelmina (Steamship), 76
Wilhelmshaven, 59
William I, of Germany, 361, 367
William II, of Germany, 64, 259, 267, 270,
304, 317, 320, 325, 327-328, 334-336, 342,
356, 360-362, 364, 377, 396
Wilson, Sir Henry, 272, 313
Wilson, Woodrow, 79, 164, 208-212, 215-
218, 244, 262, 266, 291, 297-298, 312,
331-332, 347, 352, 356-357, 367-371, 374,
379-387, 415
Windau, captured, 105; Russian harbor
zone, 341
Wireless telephone, 221, 409
Wittelsbach, House of, 402
Woevre plain, 1 51-15 2
Woman suffrage, 262, 403. {See also Elec-
toral reforms ; Suffrage)
Women, members of the German National
Assembly, 364; League of Nations, posi-
tions open to, 415; traffic in, and the
League of Nations covenant, 422
Workmen's Deputies, Council of, 228
World-dominion, 58, 201-202, 211, 396, 411
World made safe for democracy, 217
Woyrsch, General, 52, 100, 105
Wytschaete, captured, 278, 308
Yarmouth, raided, 74
Yellow Peril, 64
Young Men's Christian Association, 410
Young Turks Party, 70-71, 82, 282, 343, 347
Ypres, 35-36, 1 1 5-1 1 6, 278-280
Yudenitch, General, 140
Zabem. {See Saveme)
Zaimis, Premier, 285
Zamosc, capture of, 105
Zara, raided by D'Annunzio, 385-386
Zeebrugge, 35-36, 278; harbor closed by
ships sunk at, 310; captured, 332
Zemstvos, All- Russian Union of, 194
Zenson, captured, 296
Zeppelins, 74
Zimmermann, Alfred, 197, 216
Zionism, 287, 397. {See also Jews; Pales-
tine)
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