The English offensive in Picardy was a more serious matter, and from some points of view was the greatest offensive in the war. The Allied front had been prepared for offensive operations by minor attacks which had secured for the Allied troops dominating positions. The attack was a surprise attack. The Germans were expecting local attacks but not a movement of this magnitude. The surprise was increased because it was made through a heavy mist which prevented observation. It was preceded by tremendous artillery fire which lasted for four minutes, and which was followed by the charge of infantry and tanks. The German artillery hardly replied at all, and only the resistance of a few rifles and machine guns fired vaguely through the fog met the charging troops.

The attack was on a twenty-five-mile front and on the first day gained seven miles, captured seven thousand men and a hundred guns. On the following day there was an advance of about five miles and seventeen thousand more prisoners were captured.

The Germans were now retiring in great haste, blowing up ammunition dumps and abandoning an enormous quantity of stores of all kinds. The English were using cavalry and airplanes, which were flying low over the field and throwing the German troops into confusion. Over three hundred guns, including many of heavy caliber, were captured. The ground had been plowed up by shells and thousands of bodies of men and horses were found lying where they fell. A feature of the attack was the swift whippet tanks which advanced far ahead of the infantry lines.



Copyright Western Newspaper Union British Official Photo FORWARD WITH THE TANKS AGAINST BAPAUME This picture gives an excellent idea of the method of combined tank and infantry attack. Behind a low ridge among artillery positions they are forming their line. A company falls in behind one of the waddling monsters that will break a way for it through all obstacles, while on both sides of the road other detachments await the arrival of the tank they are to accompany.



Canadian Official Photograph. From Underwood and Underwood, N. Y. CANADIANS IN THE GREAT CAMBRAI DRIVE One of the busy scenes just preceding the victorious attack by the Canadians upon Cambrai. In the center can be seen captured Germans carrying in one of their wounded comrades.

In the French official report occurred the following statement:

"The brilliant operation which we, in concert with British troops, executed yesterday has been a surprise for the enemy. As occurred in the offensive of July 18th the soldiers of General Debeney have captured enemy soldiers engaged in the peaceful pursuit of harvesting the fields behind the German lines."

By August 10th the Germans had fallen back to a line running through Chaulnes and Roye. Montdidier had been captured, and eleven German divisions had been smashed. By August 12th the number of prisoners was 40,000, and by the 18th the Allied front was almost in the same line as it was in the summer of 1916, before the battle of the Somme.

The next step was to capture Bapaume and Peronne. The French, on August 19th, captured the Lassigny Massif, and continued to press on their attack. Noyon fell on the 29th, Roye on the 27th, Chaulnes on the 29th. Further north the British had captured Albert, and on the 29th occupied Bapaume. On September 1st they took Peronne with two thousand prisoners.

The advance still continued, and the German weakness was becoming more and more apparent. On September 6th the whole Allied line swept forward, with an average penetration of eight miles. Chauny was captured and the fortress of Ham. On September 17th the British were close to St. Quentin and the French in their own old intrenchments before La Fere. On September 18th a surprise advance over a twenty-two-mile front crossed the Hindenburg line at two points north of St. Quentin, Villeret and from Pontru to Hollom.

The first and third British armies, a little further to the north, were moving toward Cambrai and Douai, threatening not only them, but to get in the rear of Lens. This force proceeded up the Albert-Bapaume highway, and on August 27th captured a considerable portion of the Hindenburg line. On the 30th they reached Bullecourt and on September 2d crossed the Drocourt-Queant line on a six-mile-front. This was the famous switch line, meant to supplement the Hindenburg line and its capture meant the complete overthrow of the German intrenched positions at this point.



THE FAMOUS HINDENBURG LINE THAT CRUMBLED IN 1918.

The Germans retreated hastily to the Canal du Nord, and on September 3d Queant was captured by an advance on a twenty mile front, along with ten thousand prisoners. The Allied forces were moving steadily forward. On September 18th the British reached the defenses of Cambrai and were encircling the city of St. Quentin. On October 3d the advance upon Cambrai forced the Germans to evacuate the Lens coal fields, and on October 9th another advance over a thirty-mile front enabled the Allies to occupy Cambrai and St. Quentin. On the 11th they had reached the suburbs of Douai. By this time the whole of the Picardy salient had been wiped out.

The preceding summary of this great movement gives little idea of the tremendous struggle which had gone on during these two critical months, and hardly does more than suggest the tremendous importance of the British operations. The Hindenburg line was like a great fortification, and for more than a year had been regarded as impregnable. At Bullecourt there were two main lines. One hundred and twenty-five yards in front of the first line was a belt of wire twenty-five feet broad, so thick that it could not be seen through. The line itself contained double machine-gun emplacements of ferro-concrete, one hundred and twenty-five yards apart, with lesser emplacements between them. More belts of wire protected the support line. Here a continuous tunnel had been constructed at a depth of over forty feet. Every thirty-five yards there were exits with flights of forty-five steps. The tunnels were roofed and lined and bottomed with heavy timber, and numerous rooms branched off. They were lighted by electricity. Large nine-inch trench mortars stood at the traverses and strong machine-gun positions covered the line from behind.

The Hindenburg line was really only one of a series of twenty lines, each connected with the others by communicating trenches. The main lines were solid concrete, separated by an unending vista of wire entanglements. At points this barrier barbed wire extended in solid formation for ten miles. This tremendous system of defenses was originally called by the Germans the Siegfried line, and in the spring of 1917 they found it wise, at points where a strong offensive was expected, to fall back to it for protection. It had been their hope that it would prove an impassable barrier to the Allied troops, but now it had been broken, and the moral effect of the British success was even greater than the material.

One of the most noticeable results of the British advance had been the capture of Lens. It had been captured without a fight, because of the British threat upon its rear, but its capture was of tremendous importance. Lens had been the scene of bitter fighting in the latter part of August, 1917, when the Canadians had specially distinguished themselves. This city had been heavily fortified by the Germans who had recognized its importance as being the center of the great Lens coal fields, and they had never given it up. It had sometimes been described as the strongest single position that had ever confronted the Allies on the western front. It had been made a sort of citadel of reinforced concrete. Even the courage and power of the Canadians had only given them possession of some of its suburbs. Between these suburbs and the concrete citadel were the coal pits, with their fathomless depths of ages and the mysteries of kultural strategy. The struggle became a succession of avalanches of gas, burning oil, rifle and machine-gun fire. Both sides lost terrifically, but the Germans had held the town. Now it was given up without a blow and its great coal fields were once more in possession of the French. Before retreating the Germans showed their usual destructive energy and the mines were found flooded as a result of consistent and scientific use of dynamite.

The recapture of Lens was cheering news in Paris. Not the least of the many sufferings of the French during the last two years of the war was that which came from the scarcity of coal. Indeed, more than once during those two winters coal could not be obtained at any price. These periods unfortunately came in the latter part of the winter, and it happened they were unusual periods of intense cold. Thousands of people stayed in bed all day in order to keep warm. The capture of Lens, therefore, had been anxiously desired. Nearly the whole of the French coal supply had come from Lens and the adjacent Bethune coal fields. The Bethune field, although steadily working, had never produced enough coal for even the pressing necessities of the French munition works.

The news that Bapaume had fallen on August 29th brought back, especially to the British, memories not only of the previous year and of the great forward movement which, on March 17th, had swept them over Bapaume and Peronne, but also bitter memories of the retreat in the previous March, which had carried them back under the overwhelming German pressure. The capture therefore was balm to their spirits, and an English correspondent, Mr. Philip Gibbs, who had accompanied the British on their previous advance, found officers and men full of laughter and full of memories.

On all sides were the battle-fields of 1916 and 1917; Mametz Wood, Belleville Wood, Usna Hill, Ginchy, Morval, Guillemont. The fields were covered with battle debris, and yet to the English it was sacred ground from the graves of the men who fell there. Those graves still remained. The British shell fire had not touched them, but as the English advanced there were many bodies of gray-clad men on the roads and fields, and dead horses, and a litter of barbed wire, and deep shelters dug under banks, and shell craters, and helmets, gas masks, and rifles thrown here and there by the enemy as they fled. Now it was the Germans that were fleeing, and fleeing hopelessly, sullen, bitter at their officers, impatient of discipline.

One of the great differences between the attacks of the Allies in their last year of the war and those of preceding years, was the increased use and the improved character of the tanks. The tanks were a development of the war. Before the war, however, the development of the caterpillar tractor had suggested to a few farsighted people the possibility of evolving from this invention a machine capable of offensive use over rough country in close warfare. Experiments were made in behalf of the English War Office for some time without practical results.

At last, after these experiments had resulted in various failures, a type of tractor was finally designed which produced satisfactory results. It was a caterpillar tractor, with an endless self-laid track, over which internal driving wheels could be propelled by the engines. It was not until July, 1916, that the first consignment of these new engines of warfare arrived at the secret maneuver ground.

There were two kinds. One called the male was armed with two Hotchkiss quick-fire guns, as well as with an armament of machine guns. The other type, called the female, was armed only with machine guns. The male tank was designed for dealing with the concrete emplacements for the German machine guns. The other was more suitable for dealing with machine-gun personnel and riflemen. Some time was taken in training men to use these tanks, for the crew of a tank must suffer a great deal of hardship on account of the noise of the engine every command had to be made by signs, and the motion of the tank being like that of a ship on a heavy sea, was likely to produce seasickness.

The tanks were painted with weird colors for the purpose of concealment, and when they first appeared caused a great deal of wonder and amusement. They were first used in battle on September 15, 1916, in a continuation of the battle of the Somme, and proved a great surprise to the Germans. The Germans directed all available rifle and machine-gun fire upon them without success. A correspondent narrates that: "As the 'Creme de Menthe' moved on its way, the bullets fell from its sides harmlessly. It advanced upon a broken wall, leaned up against it heavily, until it fell with a crash of bricks, and then rose on to the bricks and passed over them and walked straight into the midst of factory ruins." They were an immense success and had come to stay.



CHAPTER XLIV

BELGIUM'S GALLANT EFFORT

For more than four years Belgium suffered under the iron heel of the German invaders. One little corner in the far west was occupied by her gallant army, fighting with the utmost courage and a patriotism which has won the admiration of the world under its great King Albert, whose heroic leadership had turned the little commercial nation into a nation of heroes. Conditions of life in the Belgian cities were almost intolerable. The great Belgian Relief Commission, under the direction of Mr. Hoover, had kept the people from starvation, but it could not secure them their rights. They lived in the midst of brutality and injustice.

On Belgian Independence Day at London, Arthur J. Balfour, the British Foreign Minister, made an address in which he commented upon the German treatment of Belgium. In the course of his address he said: "Bitter must be the thought in every Belgian heart of what Belgians in Belgium are now suffering. Let them however, take courage. Let their spirits rise in a mood of profound cheerfulness, for these dark days are not going to last forever, and when they come to a conclusion, when again peace dawns upon this much tormented and cruelly tried world, when Belgium is again free and prosperous, then Belgians, whether they have spent these unhappy years in exile, or, an even harder fate, have spent them in their own country, they will be able to look back upon this time of cruel and unexampled trial, and they will say to themselves, to their children and to their descendants, that Belgium, though her existence as a political entity is less than a century, has within that period shown an example of courage, constancy and virtue to mankind for which all the world should be grateful."

The English Foreign Minister was perhaps not prophesying. He knew something of what was coming. The Great Offensive which was to free Belgium of her German oppressor was already under way. The first move, however, was not upon land, but upon the sea. In the autumn of 1914 the little Belgian port of Zeebrugge, with the neighboring port of Ostend, was captured by the Germans. The Germans, who had already seized the shipbuilding plants at Antwerp, then began to build submarines, and sent them down the canals through Bruges to Zeebrugge and Ostend. From these ports they proceeded to attack the English commerce.

In the spring of 1918 submarine attacks on English shipping were so serious that England was using every possible effort to destroy these piratical craft, and it was determined to make an attempt to block the entrances to the canals at Zeebrugge and at Ostend, by sinking old ships in the channels.

The expedition took place during the night of April 22d, under the command of Vice-Admiral Sir Roger Keyes. Six obsolete British cruisers took part in the expedition. These were the Brilliant, Iphigenia, Sirius, Intrepid, Thetis and Vindictive. The Vindictive carried storming parties to destroy the stone mole at Zeebrugge; the remaining five cruisers were filled with concrete, and it was intended that they should be sunk in the entrances of the two ports. A large force of monitors and small fast craft accompanied the expedition. An observer thus describes the heroic exploit:

The night was overcast and there was a drifting haze. Down the coast a great searchlight swung its beam to and fro in the small wind and short sea. From the Vindictive's bridge, as she headed in toward the mole, there was scarcely a glimmer of light to be seen shoreward. Ahead as she drove through the water rolled the smoke screen, her cloak of invisibility, wrapped about her by small craft. This was the device of Wing-Commander Brock, without which, acknowledged the Admiral in command, the operation could not have been conducted. A northeast wind moved the volume of it shoreward ahead of the ships. Beyond it was the distant town, its defenders unsuspicious.

It was not until the Vindictive, with bluejackets and marines standing ready for landing, was close upon the mole, that the wind lulled and came away again from the southeast, sweeping back the smoke screen and laying her bare to eyes that looked seaward, There was a moment immediately afterward when it seemed to those on the ships as if the dim harbor exploded into light. A star shell soared aloft, then a score of star shells. Wavering beams of the searchlights swung around and settled into a glare. A wild fire of gun flashes leaped against the sky; strings of luminous green beads shot aloft, hung and sank. The darkness of the night was supplemented by a nightmare daylight of battle-fired guns, and machine guns along the mole. The batteries ashore woke to life.

It was in a gale of shelling that the Vindictive laid her nose against the thirty-foot-high concrete side of the mole, let go her anchor, and signaled to the Daffodil to shove her stern in. The Iris went ahead and endeavored to get alongside likewise.

The fire was intense while the ships plunged and rolled beside the mole in the seas, the Vindictive, with her greater draft, jarring against the foundations of the mole with every lunge. They were swept diagonally by machine-gun fire from both ends of the mole and by the heavy batteries on shore. Captain Carpenter conned the Vindictive from the open bridge until her stern was laid in, when he took up his position in the flame thrower hut on the port side. It is marvelous that any occupant should have survived a minute in this hut, so riddled and shattered was it.

The officer of the Iris, which was in trouble ahead of the Vindictive, described Captain Carpenter as handling her like a picket boat. The Vindictive was fitted along her port side with a high, false deck, from which ran eighteen brows, or gangways, by which the storming and demolition parties were to land. The men gathered in readiness on the main lower decks, while Colonel Elliott, who was to lead the marines, waited on the false deck just abaft the bridge. Captain Hallahan, who commanded the bluejackets, was amidships. The word for the assault had not yet been given when both leaders were killed.

The mere landing on the mole was a perilous business. It involved a passage across the crashing and splintering gangways, a drop over the parapet into the field of fire of the German machine-guns which swept its length, and a further drop of some sixteen feet to the surface of the mole itself. Many were killed and more wounded as they crowded up the gangways, but nothing hindered the orderly and speedy landing by every gangway. The lower deck was a shambles, as the commander made the round of the ship, yet the wounded and dying raised themselves to cheer as he made his tour.

The Iris had trouble of her own. Her first attempts to make fast to the mole ahead of the Vindictive failed, as her grapnels were not large enough to span the parapet. Two officers, Lieutenant-Commander Bradford, and Lieutenant Hawkins, climbed ashore and sat astride the parapet trying to make the grapnels fast, till each was killed, and fell down between the ship and the wall. Commander Valentine Gibbs had both legs shot away, and died next morning. Lieutenant Spencer though wounded, took command and refused to be relieved.



ZEEBRUGGE HARBOR, BLOCKED BY BRITISH

The Iris was obliged at last to change her position and fall in astern of the Vindictive, which suffered very heavily from fire. Her total casualties were eight officers and sixty-nine men killed, and three officers and 103 men wounded.

The storming parties upon the mole met with no resistance from the Germans other than an intense and unremitting fire. One after another buildings burst into flames, or split and crumbled as dynamite went off. A bombing party working up toward the mole in search of the enemy destroyed several machine gun emplacements but not a single prisoner awarded them. It appears that upon the approach of the ships and with the opening of fire the enemy simply retired and contented themselves with bringing machine guns to the short end of the mole.

The object of the fighting on the mole was in large part to divert the enemy's attention while the work of blocking the canals was being accomplished.

Of this operation the official narrative says: "The Thetis came first steaming into a tornado of shells from great batteries ashore. All her crew save a remnant who remained to steam her in and sink her, already had been taken off her by a ubiquitous motor launch. The remnant spared hands enough to keep her four guns going. It was hers to show the road to the Intrepid and Iphigenia which followed. She cleared a string of armed barges, which defends the channel from the tip of the mole, but had the ill-fortune to foul one of her propellers upon a net defense which flanks it on the shore side. The propeller gathered in the net and it rendered her practically unmanageable. Shore batteries found her and pounded her unremittingly. She bumped into the bank, edged off and found herself in the channel again, still some hundreds of yards from the mouth of the canal in practically a sinking condition. As she lay she signaled invaluable directions to others, and her commander blew charges and sank it. Motor launches took off her crew. The Intrepid, smoking like a volcano, and with all her guns blazing, followed. Her motor launch had failed to get alongside, outside the harbor, and she had men enough for anything. Straight into the canal she steered, her smoke blowing back from her into the Iphigenia's eyes so that the latter was blinded, and going a little wild, ran into the dredger, with her barge moored beside it, which lay at the western arm of the canal. She was not clear though, and entered the canal, pushing the barge before her.

"It was then that a shell hit the steam connections of her whistle and the escape of steam which followed drove off some of the smoke, and let her see what she was doing. Lieutenant Carter, commanding the Intrepid, placed the nose of his ship neatly on the mud of the western bank, ordered his crew away, and blew up his ship by switches in the chart room. Lieutenant Leake, commanding the Iphigenia, beached her according to arrangement on the eastern side, blew her up, saw her drop nicely across the canal, and left her with her engines still going to hold her in position till she should have bedded well down on the bottom. According to the latest reports from air observation the two old ships, with their holds full of concrete, are lying across the canal in a V-position, and it is probable that the work they set out to do has been accomplished and that the canal is effectively blocked."

At Ostend an attempt was also made to block the canal on the same night, but it was unsuccessful owing to a shift of wind which blew away the smoke screen behind which the British craft were acting, and enabled the German gun fire to destroy the flares which had been lit to mark the entrance to the harbor. The cruisers tried to act by guess work, and one of the block ships was sunk, but it was not in a position to obstruct the canal.

On May 9th another attempt was made, and the Vindictive, filled with concrete was sunk in the Ostend channel.

This daring exploit of the English fleet, though it had destroyed the value of Zeebrugge and Ostend as submarine bases, had left the Germans in possession. In September, however, General Foch determined that the time had come to throw his armies against the German forces in the distracted little country. He planned two widely separated thrusts. On the south he sent Pershing against the Germans between the Argonne and the Meuse. They made rapid progress, capturing Montfaucon, Varennes and driving on until they had destroyed the German control of the Paris-Chalons-Verdun Railroad.

This was a serious blow to the Germans, for a further push northward would cut the vital lateral railway connecting the German armies in Belgium and France with those in Alsace-Lorraine. Ludendorf hastened reserves to this front, and the American operation was slowed down. Meanwhile at the other end of the line the Belgians, with General Plumer's Second British Army, suddenly attacked on a front which extended all the way from the canal at Dixmude to the Lys, swept the Germans out of all the famous fighting ground of the Ypres salient, pushed across the Passchendaele Ridge and down into the Flanders plain below.

The situation of the Germans in the Lille regions of the south and also along the Belgian coast became at once dangerous. Once more Ludendorf was compelled to send reserves, and this thrust began to slow up but it was not checked permanently, and the Belgian armies were to move on. While this advance was being conducted the British fleet were bombarding the coastal defenses. The Belgian army, fighting with the utmost spirit under command of King Albert, made a penetration of five miles and captured four thousand prisoners and an immense amount of supplies.

On September 30th they captured the city of Roulers. For ten days there was a consolidation of position by the Allies, but on October 14th they made a furious attack in the general direction of Ghent and Courtrai. Thousands of prisoners and several complete batteries of guns were captured. In this attack British, Belgian and French troops took part, and the troops of the three nations went over the top without preliminary bombardment, taking the enemy by surprise.

On October 15th the news from Flanders showed that the victory was growing in extent, the Allied armies were advancing on a front of about twenty-five miles, and in some places had penetrated the enemy's positions six or seven miles. The Belgians had captured seven thousand prisoners and the British and French about four thousand. In French Flanders the British advanced to a point about three miles west of Lille.

The battle was carried on in a heavy rain which turned the battle-fields into seas of mud; while this hampered the Allied troops it hindered even more the Germans in trying to move away their material through the mired ground of the Flanders Lowland.

On the next day dispatches indicated that a retreat on a tremendous scale in northern Belgium was under way. The Germans were retreating so fast that the Allies lost touch with the enemy. The gallant little Belgian army, assisted by crack British and French troops, had driven the despoilers of its country from a large section which the Germans had occupied since the early days of the war, and had gained positions of such importance as to make it probable that the Germans would have to abandon the entire coast of Belgium.

Moreover, on the south, the city of Lille, with the great mining and manufacturing districts around it, was being left in a salient which was growing deeper every hour and which the enemy could not hope to hold. At certain points the resistance of the Germans was extraordinarily fierce. This was especially true in the region of Thouret. The battle here was from street to street and from house to house. The Germans had placed machine-guns in the windows of houses and cellars and fired murderous streams of bullets into the advancing Belgians but were unable to stop them.

The Belgians fought with a dogged determination such as only troops fighting to regain their outraged country could display. Nothing could stop them. At other points, especially in the northern part of the battle area, the Germans surrendered freely. Many civilians were rescued from the towns and districts captured, and little processions of these were straggling rearward out of range of the guns, and out of the way of the fighting troops. At times liberated Belgian women could see their sons, brothers or husbands going forward into battle. On October 17th the German retreat in Flanders became a rout. The enemy were fleeing rapidly on their entire front. The British entered Lille.

The Germans fled from Ostend and British naval forces were landed there. The Belgian infantry were sweeping up the coast, and Belgian patrols entered Bruges. In the afternoon of the day King Albert of Belgium, and Queen Elizabeth entered Ostend. The splendid fighting of the Belgian troops and their magnificent victory was now attracting universal attention. It was one of the revelations of the war. They were bearing the giant's share of the work of the Allied armies in their own country, and had already liberated territory which more than doubled the area of that part of Belgium which had been in their possession.

With the Belgian coast cleared of invaders it became open to British transports which would afford relief to the whole Allied armies from the resultant decrease in the congestion of the channel ports. On October 19th the progress continued. Zeebrugge was occupied by the Allies, the last Belgian port remaining in German hands.

The Belgian advance continued along the whole line. King Albert entered Bruges. Day after day the advance continued. The reception of the King and Queen of Belgium in the recovered towns was something to remember. In Bruges they rode in amid the tumultuous cheering of the frenzied population. On the central square they were received by the burgomaster with an escort of a solitary gendarme, who had refused to give up his uniform and old-fashioned rifle to the enemy; though fined and imprisoned he had kept their hiding place secret. As he stood there alone with fixed bayonet the King and the Queen shook him by the hand and congratulated him. Greatly moved, he stammered, "It is too great an honor, too great an honor."

And with all this happiness came the happiness arising from the return of the soldiers to the homes from which they had been absent so long, the reunions of husband and wife, of parents and children. Belgium was now to reap the reward for her heroism.



CHAPTER XLV

ITALY'S TERRIFIC DRIVE

For many months after the great Italian stand on the Piave there was inactivity on both fronts in Italy. The Italians had been reinforced by troops from France and Great Britain and their own army was now larger than it had been at any other time. On June 15th, about the time when the Germans were being driven back on the Marne and the Oise, the Austrians, urged to action by the Germans, suddenly undertook a great offensive on a front from the Asiago Plateau to the sea, a distance of ninety-seven miles.

From the very start it was plain that the Italians were resisting magnificently. The offensive was not unexpected, either in time or locality, and had been openly discussed in the Italian press. The Italians therefore were not taken by surprise, and moreover since the disaster of Caparetto the Italians had learned by a patient campaign of education what they were fighting for.

On the second day of the battle the Austrian troops made a desperate effort to break through the Italian lines, particularly in the eastern sector of the Asiago Plateau, and crossed the Piave River at two places. They also attacked the French positions between Osteria di Monfenera and Maranzine, but were driven back with heavy loss. At every point where the Austrians were able to advance the Italians initiated vigorous counter-attacks. The order to Italy's army was, "Hold at any cost."

On the third day of the battle the Austrian offensive was being strongly checked. They had established three bridgeheads on the Piave, but had not been able to advance. The most notable of these crossings was that in the Montello sector. Montello is of particular importance, because it is the hinge between the mountains and the Piave sectors of the Italian front. If it could be held the Austrians would be in a position to dominate from the flank and rear all the Italian positions defending the line of the Piave in the dead flat plain to the south.



STORMING THE MOLE AT ZEEBRUGGE One of the most brilliant and spectacular feats in naval history was the British blocking of the submarine harbor at Zeebrugge. The picture shows one of the detachments of marines that braved the terrific German defense fire and swarmed up the mole that protects the harbor, planting explosives that made a great breach and let the tides in.



ITALIAN TROOPS TREKKING THE SNOW-FIELDS OF THE ALPS The Alpine troops of the Italian army have for years developed a military technique peculiar to the regions they must cover. Here a battalion of Alpini is seen on skis, the best method for traveling over the frozen snow crusts of the mountain region.

On the Lower Piave the Austrians had made gains and had captured Capo Sile. The Austrians were using a million men and were using liquid fire and gas bombs, but their every move was resisted strongly. Vienna was claiming the capture of 30,000 men, but the Italian reports claimed that the Austrian losses were stupendous. Thousands of dead were heaped before the Italian line in the mountain sectors, blocking the mule paths and choking the defiles. No fewer than nine desperate onslaughts upon Monte Grappa, always with fresh reserves, were broken upon Grappa heights, with terrific losses.

On July 19th the dispatches from Rome were emphasizing the Italian counter-attacks. Not only were the Italians preventing the enemy from making further gains, but they were beginning to crowd him back at the points where he had crossed the river, and were raining bombs and machine-gun bullets upon the Austrian troops at the bridgehead. They were also taking the initiative in the fighting in the mountain sectors.

By June 20th the Austrian defeat was clear. Their forces were backed against the flooded Piave, which had carried away their bridges and left them to the mercy of the Italians. Thousands were being killed and other thousands captured. Czecho-Slovak troops, it was reported, had joined in the fighting, and had given their first tribute of blood to the generous principles of freedom and independence for which they were in arms. In the Piave delta the Italians had regained Capo Sile, which had been captured early in the drive, and it was reported that all along the Piave line they had won complete control of the air, not a single Austrian machine being still aloft. The spirits of the Austrian troops had been definitely weakened. They were war wearied, and evidence began to accumulate that Austria's drive was a "hunger offensive."

As the battle continued reports began to arrive of the gallant deeds of American airmen, who were helping in the fighting along the front. The airmen were assisting in destroying the bridges that the Austrians were trying to throw across the river. The Piave was now a vast cataract and the bridges which it had not washed down were constantly destroyed by the aviators. The Austrians on the western bank were finding it difficult to obtain supplies and were resorting to hydroplanes for that purpose. On June 24th the Austrian attack had definitely failed and they were fleeing in disorder across the Piave. One hundred and eighty thousand men had already been lost and forty thousand were hemmed in on the western side of the river. The Austrian communications were emphasizing the difficulties they were meeting with through the heavy rains.

The victory of the Italians, which was now apparent, was received all over Italy with great public rejoicing. Italy had been repenting in sackcloth and ashes her defeat of the previous fall. Now they had made amends and were showing what the Italian soldier could really do. In America, and among the Allied Powers, there was great enthusiasm, and Secretary of War Baker sent this congratulatory message to the Italian Minister of War:

Your Excellency: The people of the United States are watching with enthusiasm and admiration the splendid exploits of the great army of Italy in resisting and driving back the enemy forces which recently undertook a major offensive on the Italian front. I take great pleasure in tendering my own hearty congratulations, and would be most happy to have a message of greeting and congratulation transmitted to General Diaz and his brave soldiers. NEWTON D. BAKER, Secretary of War of the United States.

In announcing to his victorious army the repulse of the Austrians General Diaz, the Italian Commander-in-Chief, said:

"The enemy who, with furious impetuosity, used all means to penetrate our territory has been repulsed at all points. His losses are very heavy. His pride is broken. Glory to all commands, all soldiers, all sailors."

On the 26th of June the Italian troops, having forced the last rear guard of the retreating Austrians to surrender and completely occupied the west bank of the Piave, began an offensive on the mountain front in the Monte Grappa sector. They gained more than 3,000 prisoners, and considerable territory. On the southern part of the Piave front they were carrying on a vigorous offensive against the Austrian positions within the Piave delta. The Austrian troops, at that point, were being prevented from retreat by the high water, and suffered terrible losses. On July 6th the Italians drove the last of the enemy from the delta.

The campaign in Italy now languished, until, on October 27th, Italy began her last terrible drive. The great Italian offensive was made not only by their own forces and the French and British troops, which had assisted them the previous June, but during the intervening period a large force of Americans had arrived in Italy. On June 27th Secretary Baker had made the announcement that General Pershing had been instructed to send into Italy a regiment that was then in training in France. The regiment thus sent was augmented considerably later. The purpose of sending troops to Italy, Mr. Baker explained, was rather political than military. It was desired to demonstrate again that the Allied nations and the United States were one in their purposes on all fronts, and to extend the intercourse between the troops of all the powers at war with Germany.

On the second day of the Italian offensive their success increased. More than nine thousand Austrians were taken prisoners and fifty-one guns were captured. The Piave River had been crossed, and the Italians had advanced four miles to its east. The attacks in the mountain region were being more bitterly contested, and counter-attacks had enabled the enemy to regain some of their lost positions.

On October 30th the Italian advance was continuing. The Austrian front appeared to be breaking under the heavy blows of the Allied troops. Dispatches indicated striking successes, not only on the Italian front but at the points where the British and the French were holding the line. The Americans were being held in reserve, but American airplanes were actively participating in the work at the front. By this time the last lines of the Austro-Hungarian resistance on the central positions along the Piave River had been broken, and more than fifteen thousand prisoners been taken. The Austrians, however, had been desperately resisting, and their artillery fire at many points was very effective, especially that which had been directed at the pontoon bridges thrown across the Piave.

King Victor Emanuel had been present in person during the crossing, and was often under the fire of the Austrian guns. On October 30th, 33,000 Austrians had been captured and the Italians had reached Vittorio. Americans had now joined in the fighting.

The Austrian retreat reached the proportion of a rout. They were still fighting, especially in the mountain region, but in the plains east of the Piave they were in full flight. Taking into consideration the numbers of troops in the Austrian lines and their apparently plentiful supplies, it began to seem probable that their break was due more to political maneuvers than to military force. The Austrians at this time were making a great peace drive, and the dissatisfaction at home had affected the morale of the troops at the front. The conditions in Italy were in close resemblance to those in Bulgaria just before Bulgaria applied for an armistice.

On the 1st of November the Austrians were completely routed, and were streaming in confusion down the valleys of the Alpine foothills, and fleeing northward from the Piave. Reports from Austria indicated riots at Vienna and Budapest. In Vienna people were parading the streets, shouting "Down with the Hapsburgs!" On October 29th, the Austrians asked for an armistice. Their announcement read as follows:

The High Command of the armies, early Tuesday, by means of a Parliamentaire, established communication with the Italian army command. Every effort is to be made for the avoidance of further useless sacrifice of blood, for the cessation of hostilities, and the conclusion of an armistice. Toward this step which is animated by the best intentions the Italian High Command at first assumed an attitude of unmistakable refusal, and it was only on the evening of Wednesday that, in accord with the Italian High Command, General Weber, accompanied by a deputation, was permitted to cross the fighting line for preliminary pourparlers.

General Diaz, the Italian Commander, had referred the Austrian request to the Versailles Conference, and had acted in accordance with their direction. In proposing the armistice the Austrians had also expressed their resolve to bring about peace and to evacuate the occupied territory of Italy. This was the beginning of the end.

The northern part of Italy is bounded by the Alps, and between those lofty ranges and the deep valleys there had been constant fighting. In this fighting, both on mountain and in valley, there were the most extraordinary deeds of individual heroism, constantly exhibited.

The Alpine regiments, known in Italy as the Alpini, were men of extraordinary physical powers, accustomed to mountain climbing, and filled with courage and patriotism. Owing to the nature of the territory in such contests, only a limited number of men could be used at one time, and the fighting went on over masses of snow or solid rock. Guns were hauled up precipices and dugouts excavated in the rock itself. The Italian troops, clothed in white overalls to prevent their being seen, moved with great rapidity from point to point, and forced their enemy to keep constantly on the alert. In the great Italian drive just described the most bitter fighting was that which occurred in these mountainous regions.

The work of the Italian aviators is also worthy of special attention. They not only secured entire command of the air, but by flying low they often threw into confusion with their machine guns the Austrian infantry. Their wonderful work in bringing in military information, and in bombing expeditions, was not excelled, if it was equaled, by the airmen of any other country. The Italian airplanes themselves were engineering triumphs. The inventive genius so notable in these days in Italy found expression in their development. Some of their machines were the biggest made during the whole war, and the long journeys made by such machines deserve special mention. The most interesting feat of this kind was performed on August 9th by the famous poet, Captain Gabrielle D'Annunzio. Accompanied by eight Italian machines, he flew to the city of Vienna, a total distance of 620 miles, and dropped copies of an Allied manifesto over the city. They crossed the Alps in a great wind storm at a height of ten thousand feet, and all but one returned safely. The manifesto, which was written by D'Annunzio reads as follows:

People of Vienna, you are fated to know the Italians. We are flying over Vienna and could drop tons of bombs. On the contrary we leave a salutation and the flag with its colors of liberty. We Italians do not make war on children, the aged and women. We make war on your government, which is the enemy of the liberty of nations,—on your blind, wanton, cruel government, which gives you neither peace nor bread, and nurtures you on hatred and delusions. People of Vienna, you have the reputation of being intelligent, why then do you wear the Prussian uniform? Now you see the entire world is against you, do you wish to continue the war? Keep on, then, but it will be your suicide. What can you hope from the victory promised to you by the Prussian generals? Their decisive victory is like the bread of the Ukraine,—one dies while awaiting it. People of Vienna, think of your dear ones, awake! Long live Italy, Liberty and the Entente!

It was said that copies of this proclamation in Vienna had a value of fifty dollars a copy. D'Annunzio's great fame had seized upon the popular imagination. His career in the war would have been interesting in itself, but when one recognizes that he was already a world figure, the greatest modern Italian dramatist and novelist, his life seems almost like a fairy story. Before the war began he made addresses all over his country, urging Italy's participation in the war, and when war was declared, to him, as much as to any other man, was due the credit. He entered the navy, and has written some fascinating descriptions of his life on board ship. Later he joined the airplane corps, and now was showering down upon the gaping populace of Vienna appeals to rise against its Hapsburg masters. D'Annunzio was extraordinary in his literary career. He had been the poet of passion, a writer of novels and plays, which, although artistic in the highest degree, showed him to be an egotist and a decadent. But long before the war he had tired of his erotic productions and had begun to write the praises of Nature and of heroes. He had been singing the praises of his country. "La Nave" symbolizes the glory of Venice. He had become more wholesome. War was making him not only a man but a hero.

Of course D'Annunzio was not the only great literary man who had left the study for the battle-field. AEschylus fought at Marathon and Salamis; Ariosto put down a rebellion for his prince between composition of cantos of Orlando Furioso; Sir Philip Sydney was scholar, poet and soldier, and many a soldier when his wars were over has turned to the labors of the pen. Yet it is not without surprise that one sees D'Annunzio join this distinguished company, and one's admiration grows as it becomes plain that he was not a mere poseur. He was a poet, but he was a soldier too. Not every great poet could drive an airplane to Vienna.



CHAPTER XLVI

BULGARIA DESERTS GERMANY

During the year 1916 there was little movement in the Balkans. The Allies had settled down at Saloniki and intrenched themselves so strongly that their positions were practically impregnable. These intrenchments were on slopes facing north, heavily wired and with seven miles of swamp before them, over which an attacking army would have to pass. It was obviously inadvisable to withdraw entirely the armies at Saloniki. So long as they were there it was possible at any time to make an attack on Bulgaria in case Russia or Roumania should need such assistance. And moreover, it was evident that it was only the presence of the Saloniki army that kept Greece neutral. During the year there were a few fights which were little more than skirmishes; almost all of the German soldiers had been withdrawn, and it was chiefly the Bulgarian army that was facing the Allies. On May 26th Bulgarian forces advanced into Greece and occupied Fort Rupel, with the acquiescence of the Greek Government.

The Greeks were in a difficult position. It was not unnatural that King Constantine and the Greek General Staff believed that the Allies had small chance of victory. Moreover, they had no special ambitions which could be satisfied by a war against the Central Powers. On the other hand, Turkey was an hereditary enemy, and the big sea coast would put them at the mercy of the British navy in case they should join their fortunes to those of Austro-Germany. To an impartial observer their policy of neutrality, if not heroic, was at least wise. The Greek Government, therefore, did its best to preserve neutrality. The surrender of Fort Rupel was not, however, a neutral act and roused in Greece a strong popular protest.

Venizelos, who at all times was strongly friendly to the Allies and who was the one great Greek statesman who not only believed in their ultimate victory but who saw that the true interests of Greece were in Anatolia and the Islands of the AEgean, was strongly opposed to King Constantine's action. The Allies showed their resentment by a pacific blockade, to prevent the export of coal to Greece, with the object of preventing supplies from reaching the enemy. This led to a certain amount of excitement and the Allied embassies in Athens were insulted by mobs. The governments, therefore, presented an ultimatum commanding the demobilization of the Greek army, the appointment of a neutral Ministry, and the calling of a new election for the Greek Chamber of Deputies, as well as the proper punishment of those who were guilty of the disorder.

In substance, the Greeks yielded to the Allied demand, but before a new election could be held an attack by the Bulgarians on the 17th of August changed the situation. The Bulgarian armies entered deep in Greek territory in the eastern provinces and captured the city of Kavalla without resistance from the armies of Greece. A portion of the Greek army at Kavalla surrendered and was taken to Germany as "guests" of the German Government.

This action of the Greek army led to a Greek revolution which broke out at Saloniki on the 30th of August. The King pursued a tortuous policy, professing neutrality and yet constantly bringing himself under suspicion. The Revolutionists organized an army and finally M. Venizelos, after strong efforts to induce the King to act, became the head of the Provisional Government of the Revolutionists. The Allies pursued a policy almost as tortuous as that of King Constantine. They could not agree among themselves as to the proper policy, and took no decided course. King Constantine apparently had the support of Russia and of Italy.

Meantime the fighting against Bulgaria was still proceeding. The main force of the Allies was directed against the city of Monastir, which, after considerable fighting, was captured on November 19th. This gave the Serbians possession of an important point in their own country and naturally proved a great stimulus to the Serbian armies.

From that time on, and during the year 1917, little was done. Minor offensives were undertaken, some of which, like the Allied attack upon Doiran, deserve mention, but on the whole the fighting was a stalemate. Meanwhile the action of the Greek Government had become so unsatisfactory that it was finally determined to demand the abdication of King Constantine, and on June 11th he found himself compelled to yield. In his proclamation he said:

Obeying necessity of fulfilling my duty toward Greece, I am departing from my beloved country accompanied by the heir to the crown, and I leave my son Alexander on the throne. I beg you to accept my decision with calm.

Early the next morning the King and his family set sail for Italy on his way to Switzerland, where he became another "King in exile." His son Alexander accepted the throne and issued the following proclamation:

At the moment when my august father, making a supreme sacrifice to our dear country, entrusted to me the heavy duties of the Hellenic throne I express but one single wish—that God, hearing his prayer, will protect Greece, that He will permit us to see her again united and powerful. In my grief at being separated in circumstances so critical from my well-beloved father I have a single consolation: to carry out his sacred mandate which I will endeavor to realize with all my power, following the lines of his brilliant reign, with the help of the people upon whose love the Greek dynasty is supported. I am convinced that in obeying the wishes of my father the people by their submission will do their part in enabling us together to rescue our dear country from the terrible situation in which it finds itself.

The whole country to all appearances received the abdication with satisfaction. On June 21st, M. Venizelos came to Athens and the Greek Chamber, which was illegally dissolved in 1915, was convoked and Venizelos once again became Prime Minister. At last he had succeeded, and he proceeded at once to join the whole of the Grecian forces to the cause of the Allies. Of all the statesmen prominent in the Great War, there was none more wise, more consistent or more loyal than the great Greek statesman.

For more than a year the Allied armies facing Bulgaria remained upon the defensive, when, suddenly, on the 16th of September, 1918, in the midst of the wonderful movements that were forcing back the German armies in France, a dispatch was received from the Allied forces in Macedonia. The Serbian army, in co-operation with French and English forces, had attacked the Bulgarian positions on a ten-mile front, had stormed those positions and progressed more than five miles. On the next day news was received that the advance was continuing; that the Allies had occupied an important series of ridges, and had pierced the Bulgarian front; that more than three thousand prisoners had been captured and twenty-four guns. The movement took place about twelve miles east of Monastir and the ridge of Sokol, and the town of Gradeshnitsa were captured by the Allied troops.

It soon became evident that one of the most important movements in the whole war was being carried on. The Bulgarian armies were crumbling, and the German troops sent to aid them had been put to flight. The Allied troops had advanced on an average of ten miles and were continuing to advance. The Serbs, fighting at last near their own homes, were showing their real military strength. Four thousand prisoners had been taken, with an enormous quantity of war supplies. The Bulgarian positions which had yielded so easily were positions which they had been fortifying for three years, and had been previously thought to be impregnable.

On September 23d it became evident that the retreat of the Bulgarians had turned into a rout. Notwithstanding reinforcements of Germans and Bulgars rushed down in a frantic effort to check them, the Allied armies were advancing on an eighty-five mile front, crushing all resistance. The Italian army, on the west, was meeting with equal success, and the news dispatches reported that the first Bulgarian army in the region of Prilep had been cut off. A dispatch received by the British War Office reported "As the result of attacks and continual heavy pressure by British and Greek troops, in conjunction with the French and Serbian advance farther west, the enemy has evacuated his whole line from Doiran to the west of the Vardar." As it retreated the Bulgarian army was burning supplies and destroying ammunition dumps, burning railway stations and ravaging the country.

By this time it was felt throughout the Allied world that the Bulgarian defeat would have important political consequences. It was remembered that a short time before King Ferdinand had paid a visit to Germany, and after long conferences with the German War Lord, had hastily returned to Bulgaria. It was recalled that there had been many signs of serious disorder in Bulgaria, where the Socialist party had been in close touch with the advance parties in the Ukrainian Republic. It seemed possible that the Bulgarian defeats had been brought about by Bulgarian dissension and it was also evident that Germany was in no position to offer effective support to its Bulgarian accomplice.

As the days passed by the news from this front became more and more favorable. At all points the Bulgarian armies were retreating in the most disorderly manner, closely pursued by the Serbians, French, English, Italians, and Greeks. Bulgarian troops were deserting in thousands, and thousands of others were surrendering without resistance.

On September 26th it was announced that the Bulgar front had disappeared; that the armies had been cut into a number of groups and were fleeing before the Allied troops. Town after town was being captured, with enormous quantities of stores. On Friday, September 27th, it was announced that Bulgaria had asked the Allies for an armistice of forty-eight hours, with a view to making peace.

The situation was now causing intense excitement. The Germans tried to minimize the Bulgarian surrender. A dispatch from Berlin declared that Premier Malinoff's offer of an armistice was made without the support of other members of the Cabinet or of King Ferdinand, and that Germany would make a solemn protest against it. German newspapers were demanding that Malinoff be dismissed immediately and court-martialed for high treason. The Berlin message asserted that the Premier's offer had created great dissatisfaction in Bulgaria and that strong military measures had been taken to support the Bulgarian front. According to statements from Sofia it was added a counter-movement against the action of the Premier had already been set on foot. It was declared in Germany that the Premier's act was the result of Germany's refusal to send sufficient reinforcements to Bulgaria. Secretary Lansing made the announcement that the United States Government had received a proposal for an armistice.

It appeared that Bulgaria had been maneuvering toward peace for some time. The Bulgarians had foreseen their inability to meet the expected Allied attack, and had made every effort to obtain German reinforcements. Moreover, they were highly dissatisfied with the treatment they had received from Germany in connection with Bulgaria's dispute with Turkey as to territorial dispositions to be made after the war. Probably the most important reason, however, for the Bulgarian overthrow was that by this time they were sick of the war. They had not, in the first place, gone into it with any enthusiasm, and though they could fight bravely enough against their Serbian foe, no true Bulgarian could ever feel himself in a natural position facing his old-time Russian friend.

Bulgaria had come to the end. Malinoff, the Premier, had from the beginning been opposed to the war. Mobs in Sofia were demanding surrender. Ferdinand was compelled to give way to the wishes of his Cabinet and his people, and in spite of the fact that he had promised the Kaiser to remain faithful to the Alliance, he gave his consent to the movement for unconditional surrender.

An official Bulgarian statement read as follows: "In view of the conjunction of circumstances which have recently arisen, and after the position had been jointly discussed with all competent authorities, the Bulgarian Government, desiring to put an end to the bloodshed, has authorized the Commander-in-Chief of the army to propose to the Generalissimo of the armies of the Entente at Saloniki, a cessation of hostilities, and the entering into of negotiations for obtaining an armistice and peace. The members of the Bulgarian delegation left yesterday evening in order to get into touch with the Plenipotentiaries of the Entente belligerents." This statement was dated September 24th.

When the Bulgarian officers entrusted with the proposal for an armistice presented themselves at Saloniki, General d'Esperey gave the following reply: "My response cannot be, by reason of the military situation, other than the following. I can accord neither an armistice nor a suspension of hostilities tending to interrupt the operations in course. On the other hand, I will receive with all due courtesy the delegates duly qualified of the Royal Bulgarian Government." The Bulgarian delegates were General Lonkhoff, commander of the Bulgarian Second Army, M. Liapcheff, Finance Minister, and M. Radeff, a former member of the Bulgarian Cabinet.

On the evening of the 29th an armistice was signed. The terms of the surrender were approved by the Entente governments, and hostilities ceased at noon September 30th. The terms of the armistice were as follows:

Bulgaria agrees to evacuate all the territory she now occupies in Greece and Serbia; to demobilize her army immediately and surrender all means of transport to the Allies. Bulgaria also will surrender her boats and control of navigation on the Danube, and concede to the Allies free passage through Bulgaria for the development of military operations. All Bulgarian arms and ammunition are to be stored under the control of the Allies, to whom is conceded the right to occupy all important strategic points. The military occupation of Bulgaria will be entrusted to British, French and Italian forces, and the evacuated portions of Greece and Serbia, respectively, to Greek and Serbian troops.

This armistice meant a complete military surrender, and Bulgaria ceased to be a belligerent. All questions of territorial rearrangement in the Balkans were purposely omitted from the Convention. The Allies made no stipulation concerning King Ferdinand, his position being considered an internal matter, one for the Bulgarians themselves to deal with. The armistice was to remain in operation until the final general peace was concluded.

The request of Bulgaria for an armistice and peace, stunned Germany, which at that time was living in an atmosphere of political crisis and military misfortune. The German papers laid much of the blame on the desperate economic conditions in Bulgaria, which had been made worse by political strife.

After the Bulgarian collapse the Serbians, with the other Allied troops who had just captured Uskub, swept northward to drive the remaining Germans and Austrians out of Serbia and beyond the Danube. On October 13th they captured Nish, thus cutting the famous Orient railroad from Berlin to Constantinople. German authorities announced that henceforth trains on this line would run only to the Serbian border.

On October 4th King Ferdinand abdicated his throne in favor of his son Crown Prince Boris, and left Sofia the same night for Vienna. Before leaving he issued the following manifesto renouncing the Bulgarian crown:

By reason of the succession of events which have occurred in my kingdom, and which demand a sacrifice from each citizen, even to the surrendering of oneself for the well being of all, I desire to give as the first example the sacrifice of myself. Despite the sacred ties, which for thirty-two years have bound me so firmly to this country, for whose prosperity and greatness I have given all my powers, I have decided to renounce the royal Bulgarian crown in favor of my eldest son, His Highness the Prince Royal Boris of Tirnovo. I call upon all faithful subjects and true patriots to unite as one man about the throne of King Boris, to lift the country from its difficult situation, and to elevate new Bulgaria to the height to which it is predestined.

Before signing his declaration of abdication he had consulted with the party leaders and received their approval. King Ferdinand had lost his popularity ever since it became apparent that he had made a mistake in siding with the Teutonic Powers. He was undoubtedly in fear that a revolution might upset the whole dynasty. Premier Malinoff announced the abdication to the Bulgarian Parliament, and the accession of Prince Boris to the throne was received with much enthusiasm. The church bells were rung, and great crowds gathered in the streets.

Speaking from the steps of the Palace the new King said; "I thank you for your manifestation of patriotic sentiments. I have faith in the good star of Bulgaria, and I believe that the Bulgar people, by their good qualities and co-operation, are directed to a brilliant future." King Ferdinand, it was given out, had renounced politics and was intending in the future to devote himself to his favorite pursuits, chiefly to botany.

The surrender of Bulgaria was at once recognized as the overthrow of Germany's "Mittel-Europa" threat, which had apparently been carried into effect when Turkey and Bulgaria joined the Central Powers. It had for a long time been one of Germany's most coveted aims. After the Franco-Prussian war the German people had grown enormously in wealth and in numbers. It had become one of the greatest manufacturing powers in the world. Its ships were transporting its commerce on every sea, but it was not satisfied. The German leaders, most of whom were young men at the time of the war with France, and had been deeply impressed by a sense of the German power, were full of the idea that Germany was the greatest of nations, and that she should impress her will on all the world.

They might have done this peacefully, for the seas were free, but German self-esteem was not satisfied with peaceful progress. They felt that it was necessary to reach out in the world for colonies. They seized a province in China. They meddled with affairs in Morocco. They annexed colonies in Africa, but none of these projects were wholly satisfactory. They provided no great outlet for the products of their workshops, nor for their overflow population, which largely went to North and South America and became citizens of these foreign nations.

Their eyes finally turned to the great East. There in China and India and the neighboring countries were three hundred millions of men whose trade would be a worthy prize for even Germany's ambition. Then began the development of what is sometimes called Germany's Mittel-Europa dream. Her scholars encouraged it; her travelers brought reports which stimulated the interest, and soon she began practically to carry it into effect. It meant the building of a great railroad down to the Persian Gulf; a railroad to be controlled by nations where her influence would be all-powerful. She needed Austria, she needed Serbia, she needed Bulgaria and Turkey.



HOW THE PAN-GERMANS PLANNED TO EXTEND THEIR "MITTEL-EUROPA" DREAM

At first the project was carried out peacefully. Friendly relations were stimulated with Turkey and the other necessary powers; permits were obtained to build the railroad. But Germany was not the only power that had dreamed this dream. Alexander the Great had done it. Napoleon had done it, and England had carried it out. From the days of Queen Elizabeth the English control of India was one of its greatest assets.

Through most of the nineteenth century the English power in the East was threatened, not by Germany, but by Russia. It was because of this threat that England had always protected Turkey. Turkey and Constantinople were her barrier against Russia. The literature of England in the last days of the nineteenth century shows clearly her fear of Russian intrigues in India. Kipling's Indian stories are full of it. But now that fear had passed. It was no longer the imaginary danger which might come from the great Slavic Empire, but a trade weapon in the grasp of the most efficient military power ever developed that was threatening. Against this threat England had been doing her best. Here and there near the Persian Gulf she had been extending her influence. Here and there, as German Consuls obtained concessions, they would find them later withdrawn, because England had stepped in. Yet just before the war England, anxious for peace, had come to an agreement with Germany practically admitting the German plans to be carried out as far as Bagdad.

It looked as though it were only a question of time, but when the Balkan wars established Serbia as the greatest of the Balkan powers, and gave Russia a preponderating influence among the Balkan nations, and when it began to look as if some great Balkan state might be established which should be friendly to Russia and consequently a hindrance to the German scheme, then it was that it was necessary that war should come. The Germans had been wonderfully successful. For a time they controlled Austria, Bulgaria, Serbia and Turkey, but with Bulgaria's fall the end had come. They were compelled to awake from their Mittel-Europa dream.



Copyright Press Illustrating Service BULGARIANS CELEBRATE PEACE The first peace picture. The Bulgarian army is holding a solemn thanksgiving mass on the battlefield just after the signing of the armistice which ended their participation in the war.



Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N. Y. French Official Photograph AMERICAN COLORED SOLDIERS IN ALSACE Inspection of arms before going into action. Colored troops were in battles with the Germans many times and succeeded in beating the enemy in every instance.



CHAPTER XLVII

THE CENTRAL EMPIRES WHINE FOR PEACE

The Allied victories in France during the months of August and September of 1918, led to a new peace offensive among the Central Powers. It was very plain to the German High Command, as well as to the Allied leaders, that Germany's great ambitions had now been definitely thwarted. It seems clear that, in spite of the hopeful and encouraging words which they addressed to their own armies, the expert soldiers, who were controlling the destinies of Germany, understood well the conditions they were facing. Putting aside all sentiment, therefore, they deliberately set out to obtain a peace which would leave them an opportunity to gain by diplomacy what they were sure that they were about to lose on the field of battle. They had made pleas for peace before, but their pleas had been rejected.

The Allied leaders were fighting for a principle. They could not be satisfied with a draw. They could not be satisfied if Germany were left in a position which would enable her after a rest of a few years to renew her effort to impose her will upon the world. It was unanimously recognized that the war must be carried on to the very end. The Allies took this position when the fortunes of war seemed to have gone against them, when Russia was defeated, Roumania and Serbia crushed, and the German lines in France were approaching the capital. It was unlikely that now, when Germany was suffering defeat and every day was yielding the Allied armies encouraging gains, there should be any change in the strong determination of the Allied leaders. Nevertheless, it was necessary to make the attempt.

On September 15th, the Austro-Hungarian Government addressed a communication to the Allied Powers and to the Holy See suggesting a meeting for a confidential and non-binding discussion of war aims, with a view to the possible calling of a peace conference.

The official communication from the Austro-Hungarian Government was handed to Secretary of State Lansing in Washington at 6.20 o'clock on September 16th.

At 6.45 the following abbreviated reply of the United States Government was made public, by the Secretary of State:

I am authorized by the President to state that the following will be the reply of this government to the Austro-Hungarian note proposing an unofficial conference of belligerents. "The Government of the United States feels that there is only one reply which it can make to the suggestion of the Austro-Hungarian Government. It has repeatedly and with entire candor stated the terms upon which the United States would consider peace, and can and will entertain no proposal for a conference upon the matter concerning which it has made its position and purpose so plain."

Arthur J. Balfour, the British Foreign Secretary, in a statement made September 16th said: "It is incredible that anything can come of this proposal.... This cynical proposal of the Austrian Government is not a genuine attempt to obtain peace. It is an attempt to divide the Allies." Premier Clemenceau in France took similar grounds, and stated in the French Senate: "We will fight until the hour when the enemy comes to understand that bargaining between crime and right is no longer possible. We want a just and a strong peace, protecting the future against the abominations of the past." Italy joined with her Allies and declared that a negotiated peace was impossible.

The refusal on the part of the Allies to respond to the Austrian peace proposal evidently greatly disturbed the German leaders. The continued German reverses, and the surrender of Bulgaria had taken away all hope. They were anxious to conclude some kind of peace before meeting irretrievable disaster. They therefore determined to appoint as Chancellor of the Empire some statesman who might be represented as a supporter of an honest peace, and Count von Hertling, whose previous utterances might put under suspicion any peace move coming from him, was removed and Prince Maximilian of Baden appointed as his successor on September 30th.

Prince Maximilian was put forward as a Moderate, in accordance with the evident purpose of the government to continue peace proposals. He was the heir apparent to the Grand Ducal throne of Baden, and was the first man in public life in Germany to declare that the Empire could not conquer by the sword alone. He did this in an address to the Upper Chamber in Baden, of which he was President, on December 15, 1917. "Power alone can never secure our position," he said, "and our sword alone will never be able to tear down the opposition to us."

At the same time he made an attack upon the ideals set up by President Wilson. "President Wilson," he continued, "after three years of war gathers together all the outworn slogans of the Entente of 1914, and denounces Germany as the disturber of the peace, proclaiming a crusade for humanity, liberty and the rights of small nations." Then, forgetting that the United States had entered the war nearly a month after the abdication of the Czar of Russia, he added: "President Wilson has no right to speak in the name of democracy and liberty, for he was the mighty war ally of Russian Czardom, but he had deaf ears when the Russian democracy appealed to him to allow it to discuss peace conditions." The Baden address created a great sensation all over Germany, which was increased when, in an interview in January, he declared that all ideas of conquest must be abandoned, and that Germany must serve as a bulwark to prevent the spread of Bolshevism among the western nations.

There can be no doubt that the appointment of Prince Maximilian was a definite attempt to seek peace. It was thought that he would be recognized by the Allied leaders as an honest friend of peace, and that any effort he would make would be treated with respect. He was, however, a vigorous supporter of the Kaiser and of German autocracy, and while his appointment might mean that Germany was desirous of peace it did not mean that she had changed her ways. Three days before the appointment of Prince Maximilian, President Wilson, in an address delivered in the Metropolitan Opera House in New York, had restated the issues of the war, declaring (1) for impartial justice, (2) settlement to be made in the common interests of all, (3) no leagues within the common family of the league of nations, (4) no selfish economic combination within that league, and (5) all international agreements and treaties of every kind must be made known in their entirety to the rest of the world.

Prince Maximilian, coming into power undoubtedly for the purpose of arranging a peace, proceeded at once to make a new peace offer. He based his action on President Wilson's speech and on October 4th sent to President Wilson, through the Swiss Government, the following note:

The German Government requests the President of the United States to take in hand the restoration of peace, acquaint all the belligerent states with this request, and invite them to send plenipotentiaries for the purpose of opening negotiations. It accepts the program set forth by the President of the United States in his message to Congress on January 8th, and in his later pronouncements, especially his speech of September 27th, as a basis for peace negotiations. With a view to avoiding further bloodshed the German Government requests the immediate conclusion of an armistice on land and on water and in the air.

He followed this note on October 5th with an address before the German Reichstag, of which the following are the most important points:

In accordance with the Imperial decree of September 30th, the German Empire has undergone a basic alteration of its politic leadership. As successor to Count George F. von Hertling, whose services in behalf of the Fatherland deserve the highest acknowledgment, I have been summoned by the Emperor to lead the new government. In accordance with the governmental method now introduced I submit to the Reichstag, publicly and without delay, the principles by which I propose to conduct the grave responsibilities of the office. These principles were firmly established by the agreement of the federated governments and the leaders of the majority parties in this honorable House before I decided to assume the duties of Chancellor. They contain therefore not only my own confession of political faith, but that of an overwhelming portion of the German people's representatives—that is, of the German nation—which has constituted the Reichstag on the basis of a general, equal, and secret franchise and according to their will.

Only the fact that I know the conviction and will of the majority of the people are back of me, has given me strength to take upon myself conduct of the Empire's affairs in this hard and earnest time in which we are living. One man's shoulders would be too weak to carry alone the tremendous responsibility which falls upon the government at present. Only if the people take active part in the broader sense of the word in deciding their destinies, in other words, if responsibility also extends to the majority of their freely elected political leaders, can the leading statesman confidently assume his part of the responsibility in the service of folk and Fatherland.

My resolve to this has been especially lightened for me by the fact that prominent leaders of the laboring class have found a way in the new government to the highest offices of the Empire. I see therein a sure guarantee that the new government will be supported by the confidence of the broad masses of the people, without whose true support the whole undertaking would be compelled to failure in advance. Hence what I say today is not only in my own name, and those of my official helpers, but in the name of the German people.

The program of the majority parties, upon which I take my stand, contains first, an acceptance of the answer of the former Imperial Government to Pope Benedict's note of August 1, 1916, and an unconditional acceptance of the Reichstag resolution of July 19th, the same year. It further declares willingness to join the general league of nations based on the foundation of equal rights for all, both strong and weak. It considers the solution of the Belgian question to lie in the complete rehabilitation of Belgium, particularly of its independence and territorial integrity. An effort shall also be made to reach an understanding on the question of indemnity. The program will not permit the peace treaties hitherto concluded to be a hindrance to the conclusion of the general peace. Its particular aim is that popular representative bodies shall be formed immediately on a broad basis in the Baltic provinces, in Lithuania and Poland. We will promote the realization of necessary preliminary conditions therefore without delay by the introduction of civilian rule. All these lands shall regulate their constitutions and their relations with neighboring peoples without external interference.

He went on to point out the progressive political developments in Prussia and declared that the "message of the King of Prussia promising the democratic franchise must be fulfilled quickly and completely."

President Wilson did not find Prince Maximilian's proposal wholly satisfactory, and on October 8th, he inquired of the Imperial Chancellor whether the meaning of the proposal was that the German Government accepted the terms laid down in his address to the Congress of the United States and in subsequent addresses; and whether its object in entering into discussions would be only to agree upon the practical details of their application. He also suggested that so long as the armies of the Central Powers were upon the soil of the governments with which the United States was associated, he would not feel at liberty to propose a cessation of arms to those governments. He also inquired whether the Imperial Chancellor was speaking merely for the constituted authorities of the Empire, who had so far conducted the war.

President Wilson's reply aroused much difference of opinion among the Allies, but on the whole was regarded as a clever diplomatic move.

The German Government responded to these questions of the President on October 12th, by a message signed by Dr. W. S. Solf, who had just been appointed Imperial Foreign Secretary. In this reply the German Government declared that it did accept President Wilson's terms; that it was ready to comply with the suggestion of the President and withdraw its troops from Allied territory, and that the German Government was representing in all its actions the will of the great majority of the German people.

Germany had, indeed, made enormous concessions, and the German people appeared to have taken for granted that such an offer would be accepted. An Amsterdam despatch declared: "People in Berlin are kissing one another in the street, though they are perfect strangers and shouting peace congratulations to each other. The only words heard anywhere in Germany are 'Peace at last'."

The President however, had been struck by the news coming in from day to day of new atrocities in France, and of new cases of submarine murders, and in his reply of October 14th, he declared that while he was ready to refer the question of an armistice to the judgment and advice of military advisers of the government of the United States and the Allied governments, he felt sure that none of those governments would consent to consider an armistice as long as the armed forces of Germany continued the illegal and inhuman practices which they were persisting in. He also emphasized the fact that no armistice would be accepted that would not provide absolutely satisfactory safeguards and guarantees of the maintenance of the military supremacy of the armies of the United States and of the Allies in the field. The President also called the attention of the Government of Germany to that clause of his address on the Fourth of July in which he had demanded "the destruction of every arbitrary power that can separately, secretly and of its single choice disturb the peace of the world, or, if it cannot be presently destroyed, at least its reduction to virtual impotency." He declared that the power which had hitherto controlled the German nation was of the sort thus described, and that its alteration actually constituted a condition precedent to peace.

This answer of the President was greeted with approval in the United States and everywhere in the Allied countries. It meant that the Imperial Power of Germany was not to be allowed to hide itself behind a so-called reorganization done under its own direction. As one of the Senators of the United States expressed it: "It is an unequivocal demand that the Hohenzollerns shall get out."

During these negotiations the Allied armies under Marshal Foch had been driving the enemy before them. When Baron Burian was making his peace offer on behalf of Austria-Hungary the Americans were engaged in pinching off the St. Mihiel salient, and about that date the British were launching their great attack on the St. Quentin defenses. The reports of the great Allied drive indicated a constant succession of Allied victories.

On September 19th, the British advanced into the Hindenburg line, northwest of St. Quentin, and on September 20th, while the American guns were shelling Metz, the British were advancing steadily near Cambrai and La Bassee.

Day by day the advance proceeded. On September 26th, the first American army smashed through the Hindenburg line for an average gain of seven miles, between the Meuse and the Aisne rivers on a twenty-mile front. On September 27th, the French gained five miles in an advance east of Rheims, and the British were attacking in the Cambrai sector on a fourteen-mile front, crossing the Canal du Nord and piercing the Hindenburg line at several points. On September 28th, the Americans reached the Kriemhilde line, while the British were close in on Cambrai. On September 30th, the British took Messines Ridge, while the French were still advancing between the Aisne and Vesle Rivers. On October 1st, the French troops entered St. Quentin and the British took the northern and western suburbs of Cambrai. During the next week an enveloping movement was instituted north and south of Lille. On October 5th, the Germans evacuated Lille, on October 9th the British took Cambrai.

In these drives the American colored troops played a conspicuous part. The entire Three hundred and sixty-fifth regiment, composed wholly of colored troops, was later awarded the coveted Croix de Guerre, or War Cross, by the French Government. It was a well-deserved honor, for the boys of the Three hundred and sixty-fifth bore themselves with great gallantry in the September and October offensive in the Champagne sector and suffered heavy losses. In conferring the Croix de Guerre, the citation dealt in considerable detail with the valor of particular officers and praised the courage and tenacity of the whole regiment.

The Germans were retreating in Belgium day by day, under the attacks of the Belgian and French armies. On October 11th the Germans evacuated the Chemin des Dames. On October 16th the Germans began the evacuation of the Belgian coast region and each day increased the number of Belgian towns once more in Allied control.



CHAPTER XLVIII

BATTLES IN THE AIR

He who conquers the fear of death is master of his fate. Upon this philosophy fifty thousand young men of the warring nations went forth to do battle among the clouds. The story of these battles is the real romance of the World War. In 1914 no one had ever known and history had never recorded a struggle to the death in the air. When the war ended a new literature of adventure had been created, a literature emblazoned with superb heroisms, with God-like daring, and with such utter disdain of death that they were raised out of the olden ranks of mere earth-crawling mankind and became supermen of the air.

Some of these heroic names became household words during the war. These were the aces of the French, American and German air-forces. The British adopted a policy in news concerning their airmen similar to that governing their publication of submarine sinkings. They argued that the naming of British, Canadian and Australian aces would direct the attacks of German aviators against the most useful men in the British forces. They also felt that publicity would tend toward the swagger which in English slang was "swank" and toward a deterioration in discipline.

Raoul Lufberry, Quentin Roosevelt, son of ex-President Roosevelt, and Edward Rickenbacher were names that figured extensively in news of the American air forces.

Lufberry and Roosevelt were killed in action. Rickenbacher, after dozens of hair-raising escapes from death, came through the war without injury. The pioneer of American aviators in the war was William Thaw of Yale, who formed the original Lafayette Escadrille.

Besides these men, America produced a number of other brilliant aces, an ace being one who brought down five enemy planes, each victory being attested by at least three witnesses.

The French had as their outstanding aces Georges Guynemer and Rene Fonck. Guynemer went into the flying game as a mechanician. He became the most formidable human fighting machine on the western front before he was sent to death in a blazing airplane.

Lieut. Rene Fonck ended the war with a total of seventy-five official aerial victories. He had an additional forty Huns to his credit but not officially confirmed. His greatest day was when he brought down six planes. His quickest work was the shooting down of three Germans in twenty seconds.

He fought three distinct battles in the air when, on May 8, 1918, he brought down six German airplanes in one day. All three engagements were fought within two hours. In all, Fonck fired only fifty-six shots, an average of little more than nine bullets for each enemy brought down—an extraordinary record, in view of the fact that aviators often fired hundreds of rounds without crippling their opponent.

The first fight, in which Lieutenant Fonck brought down three German machines, lasted only a minute and a half, and the young Frenchman fired only twenty-two shots. Fonck was leading two other companions on a patrol in the Moreuil-Montdidier sector on May 8th, when the French squadron met three German two-seater airplanes coming toward them in arrow formation. Signaling to his companions, Lieutenant Fonck dived at the leading German plane and, with a few shots sent it down in flames. Fonck turned to the left, and the second enemy flier followed in an effort to attack him from behind, but the Frenchman made a quick turn above him and, with five shots, sent the second German to death. Ten seconds had barely elapsed between the two victories.

The third enemy pilot headed for home, but when Lieutenant Fonck apparently gave up the chase and turned back toward the French lines the German went after him, and was flying parallel and a little below, when Fonck made a quick turn, drove straight at him and sent him down within half a mile of the spot where his two comrades hit the earth.

The German heroes were the celebrated Captain Boelke, and the no less famous inventor of the "flying circus," Count von Richthofen. Captain Boelke caused a great many Allied "crashes" by hiding in clouds and diving straight at planes flying beneath him. As he came within range, he opened up with a stream of machine-gun bullets. If he failed to get his prey, his rush carried him past his opponent into safety. He rarely re-attacked. Count von Richthofen was responsible for many airplane squadron tactics that later were used on both sides. The planes under his command were gaily painted for easy identification during the thick of a fight. Their usual method was to cut off single planes or small groups of Allied planes, and to circle around them in the method employed by Admiral Dewey for the reduction of the Spanish forts and ships in the Battle of Manila Bay.

The dangers of aerial warfare were instrumental in producing high chivalry in all the encampments of air men. Graves of fallen aviators were marked and decorated by their former foes, and captured aviators received exceptionally good treatment, where foemen aviators could procure such treatment for them.

Until the advent of America into the war, neither side had a marked advantage in aircraft. At first Germany had a slight advantage; then the balance swung to the Allied side; but at no time was the scale tipped very much. American quantity production of airplanes, however, gave to the Entente Allies an overwhelming advantage. Final standardization of tools and design for the "Soul of the American Airplane" was not accomplished until February, 1918. Yet within eight months more than 15,000 Liberty engines, each of them fully tested and of the highest quality, were delivered.