A short history of the great war, dealing particularly with its military and diplomatic aspects and the part played in it by the United States

Preface

The purpose of this volume is to offer the general reader an outline story of the War. In another book, The Strategy of the Great War, I have endeavoured to interpret the struggle in the broader sense — as a singular and enormously interesting departure from previous military experience, — due to the revolutionary conditions introduced by a sudden reversion to rigid positional, or trench warfare. The strategy of the war, determined in part by the military policies of the belligerents, but in still larger part by conditions over which the general staffs had little control, is a study in itself.

In this book the purely strategical aspects of the war are discussed only in so far as it is necessary to establish the true relation of battles and campaigns to one another and to the ultimate result. The main idea is to give a clear and accurate running accounSb of the war's origin and progress.

Full military details are still lacking and many early impressions will undoubtedly be corrected after the war archives of the belligerent nations begin to be published. Critical studies of the battles and campaigns are exceedingly few. I will cite here again, as an admirable example of work of this sort, General Palat's {Pierre Lehautcourt's) uncompleted series of volumes, entitled La Grande Guerre sur le Front Occidental, dealing with the 1 91 4 campaign in France and Belgium. Few German war records are as yet available. The General

IV

Preface

Staff's series of pamphlets — about thirty in number — entitled Kriegsberichte aus dem Grossen Hauptquartier, is highly coloured and misleading. It is also lamentably short on routine military information.

In My Thoughts and Actions, which appeared in the summer of 1919, General Ludendorff has presented an elaborate defence of his conduct of the war. It contains much interesting information as to the tactics of Ludendorff's various campaigns and as to his relations with Hindenburg. But since its main purpose is to shift responsibility for Germany's defeat to other shoulders than his own — particularly to those of Bethmann-HoUweg and the civil bureaucracy — its extreme bias must be discounted. Even on his own showing Ludendorff was accountable for the fatal blunder of the renewal of indiscriminate U-boat warfare in February, 1917.

Grand Admiral Tirpitz has written a volume of memoirs (suppressed in Germany, but published in the United States), in which he, too, exculpates himself and accuses practically all the other German leaders — military, naval, and civil — of gross incompetency. Bethmann-HoUvveg is bringing out a work, Betrachtungen zum Welt-Kriege, in which he attempts a similar exoneration. These writers all disagree as to facts. Bethmann-HoUweg, for instance, minimizes the importance of the famous consultation on July 5, 19 14, at Potsdam, at which Germany's Serbian policy was shaped. He says that on that day, after the receipt through the Austro-Hungarian Ambassador of an autograph letter from Emperor Francis Joseph, the Kaiser summoned him and Zimmermann to Potsdam, and that no others were present at the conference which followed. Tirpitz says that General Falkenhayn, the Prussian Secretary of

Preface v

War, and General Lyncker, the chief of the miHtary cabinet, were also present. Most of the current German contributors to the literature of the war are manifestly more interested in domestic polemics than in the establishment of the truth.

Authorities consulted on the Western Front campaigns include Volumes II and III of General Palat's series — Liege-Mulhouse-Sarrebourg-Morhange and Batailles des Ardennes et de la Samhre; Louis Madelin's The Victory of the Marne (of which there is an English translation); Field Marshal Viscount French's igi4; General Sir Frederick Maurice's Forty Days in igi4; Senor E. Diaz-Retg's The Attack on Verdun (of which there is a French translation from the Spanish) ; Lieutenant-Colonel Paul Azan's The Warfare of To-day; General Zurlinden's La Guerre de Liberation; General Malleterre's valuable work, Les Campagnes de igi5; Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The British Campaign in France and Flanders, 1917; Field Marshal Haig's exceptionally clear and dispassionate reports on the Battle of the Somme and on the succeeding British campaigns; General Pershing's report on the operations of the American Expeditionary Army,

For the Dardanelles-Gallipoli operation, Mr. Henry W. Nevinson's volume, The Dardanelles Campaign, is a model of its kind. Important facts bearing on the situation on the Turkish side are contained in Ambassador Morgenthau's Story and in Mr. George F. Schreiner's From Berlin to Bagdad.

The best first-hand authority on conditions on the Russian front is General Basil Gourko's War and Revolution in Russia, igi4-igiy. Mr. Robert Crozier Long's Russian Revolution Aspects is also of value.

Among the authoritative books on the naval opera-

VI

Preface tions of the war are Admiral Viscount Jellicoe's The Grand Fleet, igi4-igi6; Mr. Arthur H. Pollen's The British Navy in Battle, and Naval Power in the War, by Lieutenant-Commander Charles Clifford Gill, U. S. N.

Other sources made use of were the Italian General Staff's reports on the campaigns of 191 8 ; General Allenby's report on the Palestine campaign; General Milne's report on the final Macedonian campaign; Mr. Oman's The Outbreak of the War of igi4-igi8; Prince Karl Lichnowsky's Memorandum; Dr. Wilhelm Muhlon's diary; Lieutenant- General Baron Freytag-Loringhoven's Deductions from the World War and A Nation Trained in Arms or a Militia? ; Professor Douglas W. Johnson's Topography and Strategy in the War; Professor John Bach McMaster's The United States in the World War and the International Cyclopedia annuals for 19 14, 1915, 1916, and 1917.

The facts about the military participation of the United States contained in Chapter XLII, were drawn largely from The War with Germany, a statistical summary made by Colonel Leonard P. Ayres, U. S. A., and published by the Statistics Branch of the General Staff of the Army.

William L. McPherson.

New York,

September i, 1919.

Contents

I. — The Beginnings of the War. June

II. — Numbers and Strategy . . .13

III. — Belgium and the Marne. Aug. 3,

Chapter I

THE BEGINNINGS OF THE WAR. JUNE 28, I914- AUGUST 5, I914

The Serajevo assassinations on June 28, 1914, ushered in the World War. They were in no sense its cause. They merely offered the Austro-Hungarian Government a pretext for satisfying a long-standing grudge against Serbia.

The statesmen who ruled at Vienna in the name of the senile Francis Joseph had no particular desire to avenge the murder of the Archduke Francis Ferdinand and his morganatic wife, the Duchess of Hohenberg. The heir apparent was cordially disliked by the aged Emperor and in Austrian court and military circles. The Hungarians hated and feared him. He was devoted to his wife, who was a commoner and a Czech, and his fixed idea was to create a Hapsburg Slav state, to be admitted into the Empire on equal terms with Austria and Hungary. His scheme was known as "trialism." It enraged the Magyars, who saw that under it Hungary would be stripped of territory and

2 The Great War [iqui

prestige and would lose the commanding position which she had long held in the councils of the Dual Monarchy. Austrian power, as well as Hungarian, was based on the exploitation of suppressed races. But Hungary was the harsher and more exacting master.

The ruling classes at Vienna and Budapest welcomed Francis Ferdinand's taking off. It has been charged since the war that the Serajevo assassinations were accelerated by Austrian and Hungarian politicians, interested in getting rid of the heir apparent. The circumstances of the trial of the assassins and their alleged accomplices created much suspicion. The principals were let off with light sentences. The proceedings were in camera. The testimony adduced by the Austro-Hungarian secret service to connect Serbian ojEficials or patriotic societies with the crime was practically worthless.

But Vienna and Budapest jumped at the chance to lay the murder at the door of the Serbian Government and to frame demands on Serbia which were as insincere as they were provocative. Austria-Hungary needed a plausible pretext for attacking her tiny neighbour. At last she had found one.

Serbia was a hindrance to the realization of Austro- Hungarian ambitions in the Balkans. She blocked the way to Salonica. In 1908, when Count Aerenthal nullified the Treaty of Berlin by annexing Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia had made a violent protest. She would have drawn the sword, if Russia had been ready to support her. But Russia was still recovering from the effects of her defeat by Japan in 1904-05 and would not give the signal.

The incorporation of 1,250,000 more Southern Slavs into the Hapsburg Empire gave new Ufe to the agi-

[1 914] The Beginnings of the War 3

tation for Southern Slav unity and independence. Austria-Hungary had to contend with this agitation in the South, the Czech agitation in Bohemia and Moravia, and PoHsh unrest in GaHcia. The suppressed Slavic elements constituted an obstructive Hoc in the Austrian Reichstag and made life miserable for the government, which was forced to rule for the greater part of the time without parliamentary sanction.

The outcome of the Balkan wars increased the irritation of the ruling classes in the Dual Monarchy. Serbia emerged from those wars triumphant over both Turkey and Bulgaria, and greatly extended her borders. Austria-Hungary was enraged at the partition made in the Treaty of Bucharest and wanted to intervene by force to prevent Serbia's expansion. She confided to Italy in 1913 her wish to attack Serbia. But Italy declined to sanction the undertaking. This refusal ended the matter, for under the terms of the Triple Alliance neither Austria-Hungary nor Italy could take aggressive measures against any of the Balkan States without first consulting the other and giving guarantees of compensation in case the territorial status quo in the Balkans should be altered. Germany was also probably reluctant to start a European war in 1 91 3. That was the year of her special levy on capital for war purposes. She was just taking the final step in military preparedness.

But Germany, as well as Austria-Hungary, was headed toward war. For the latter war was a necessity growing out of domestic politics. The Dual Monarchy could not hope to recover stability and tranquillity until the Slav agitation was crushed. For Germany war was a means of restoring her shrunken international prestige. Since the Agadir venture and the Algeciras

4 The Great War tigu]

settlement, Germany's position in Europe had steadilygrown more and more uncomfortable. Her blustering diplomacy had driven Great Britain into the Triple Entente. Italy strayed away from the Triple Alliance when she made war on Turkey in 191 1. She was no longer a dependable ally, but a neutral, drifting back into friendly relations with Russia and Prance. Germany was distrusted on all sides. Her ambitions for world power were being inflamed by a sedulous Pan- German propaganda. Her leaders felt that it was almost time to get results out of her superior military resources and organization.

To Austria-Hungary and Germany the Serajevo assassinations were therefore a godsend. The murderers and their alleged associates were all subjects of the Dual Monarchy, and the crime was committed on its soil. But it was possible to charge the conspiracy to the activities of the Serbian patriotic society, the Narodna Odbrana, which for some years had been engaged in Pan-Serb propaganda. Using this accusation as a pretext for excessive demands for reparation, Serbia could be forced either to humiliate herself in the eyes of the subject Slav peoples or to accept a quarrel of Austria's making.

An indispensable preliminary, from the Austrian point of view, was to secure a positive understanding with Germany. There is little reason to doubt that that was achieved as early as July 5th. Vienna carried her case to Berlin and was told there to go as far as she liked. Prince Lichnowsky, German Ambassador to London, says in his famous Memorandum:

Subsequently [that is, after his visit in Berlin early in July] I learned that at the decisive conversation

[I9I4I The Beginnings of the War 5

at Potsdam on July 5th the inquiry addressed to us by Vienna found absolute assent among all personages in authority. Indeed, they added that there would be no harm if a war with Russia would result.

Dr. Wilhelm Muhlon testifies in his Diary:

Immediately before the Kaiser started on his trip to Norway there was a conference in Berlin with the Austrians. The Kaiser had declared to the Austrians that this time he would go with them through thick and thin.

Count Lerchenfeld, the Bavarian Minister to Prussia, wrote on July 18, 19 14, to Count Hertling, the Bavarian Minister of State :

The opinion here is general that this is Austria's hour of fate. For this reason, in reply to the inquiry from Vienna, the declaration was immediately made here than any line of action upon which Austria may resolve will be agreed to, even at the risk of war with Russia. The free hand which was given to Count Berchtold's chef de cabinet, Count Hoyos, who arrived in Berlin to deliver the detailed memorandum, was so extensive that the Austrian Government was . authorized to negotiate with Bulgaria regarding her joining the Triple Alliance.

Corroborating all these is Ambassador Morgenthau's report of a conversation he had with Baron Wangenheim in Constantinople, in August, 19 14. Wangenheim said that he had himself been present at the conference on July 5th. It was attended by several other ambassadors, by the heads of the General Staff of the Army and the General Staff of the Navy, by bankers and industrial chiefs. The Kaiser asked them all if they were ready for war and all said "yes," except the bankers, who asked for two weeks' time in which to adjust their foreign accounts.

The Austro-Hungarian-German understanding was clear-cut and precise. Vienna was to issue an ultimatum to Serbia containing demands so exorbitant that Serbia could hardly accept them. In case of nonacceptance or qualified acceptance, war was to be declared. If any Entente Power objected and proposed mediation by the European concert, Austria-Hungary was to contend that the affair was one concerning only herself and Serbia. She was to promise not to annex any Serbian territory, as, indeed, she was practically compelled to do by her obligations to Italy under the secret Triple Alliance Treaty. If Germany were asked to take part in a mediation, she would say that she could not consent to haling her ally before "a European areopagus" for pursuing a just grievance against Serbia. She would advise moderation and a "localization" of the disturbance.

If Russia, resenting the attempt to humiliate Serbia, should mobilize against Austria-Hungary, Germany would hold that such mobilization was a threat directed against herself and would also mobilize. And mobilization, from the German point of view, meant war.

Meanwhile a comedy was to be staged to deceive the Entente. The Kaiser was to go on his Norwegian cruise; Moltke, the chief of the German General Staff, and Jagow, the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, were to leave Berlin for short vacations. The German Foreign Office was to plead complete ignorance of the terms of the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum. Jagow,

[I9I4] The Beginnings of the War 7

according to Dr. Miihlon, confided to a friend that he "thought he could make a better impression in Paris and St. Petersburg with a statement that he never knew the contents of the note."

The presentation of the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum to Serbia was cunningly timed. It was dispatched on July 23d and an answer was required by 6 p.m., on July 25th. On July 24th, President Poincare and Premier Viviani, who was also the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, had just started back to Paris, after a visit of courtesy to St. Petersburg. Paris itself was absorbed by the Caillaux trial. Great Britain was in the thick of the crisis over the enforcement of the Irish Home Rule law. Ulster had defied the London Government and civil war seemed imminent. The Teuton plotters evidently calculated that the Entente Powers would be unable to interfere diplomatically to protect Serbia before war between Serbia and Austria-Hungary had become an accomplished fact.

The Austro-Hungarian ultimatum was, in effect, a notice to Serbia that she must stamp out any and all Pan-Serbian propaganda and discipline all Serbians who might have been in any way engaged in it. Austrian official collaboration in this work was also insisted upon. Serbia was to remove from the military and civil services all functionaries guilty of propaganda against Austria-Hungary or designated as guilty by the Vienna Government. Austria, in brief, demanded an abdication of Serbian sovereignty.

Acting on the advice of the Entente Powers, the Serbian Cabinet prepared an extremely conciliatory reply. It granted most of the Austro-Hungarian demands and made only slight reservations as to the others. It asked for a restatement of a few obscure points in the note and offered to refer any questions left outstanding to the Hague Tribunal.

No state ever showed more moderation under provocation than Serbia did. But the Austrian programme had been determined on in advance. Baron Giesl, the diplomatic representative of the Dual Monarchystationed at Belgrade, received the Serbian reply at 5.45 P.M. on July 25th. Within a few minutes notice was given to Premier Pasitch that the communication was unsatisfactory. At 6,30 p.m. the Austrian Legation Staff left Belgrade. The Minister had not taken the trouble to wire the note to Vienna and await instructions. Hostilities began on July 26th. Austria- Hungary formally declared war on July 28th.

The vital question from the beginning had been how far Russia would go to protect Serbia. Russia's course was open and straightforward. Her people had recovered from the depression following the Japanese War. Defeat in the East had led the government to turn its attention again to the Balkans. The Balkan wars had helped Russia, while injuring Austria- Hungary. Popular feeling in the Empire demanded a demonstration of some sort on Serbia's behalf. Otherwise Russian prestige in the Balkans would be shattered.

About the middle of July, Sazonoff , the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, had told the British Ambassador to Russia that "anything in the shape of an Austrian ultimatum to Belgrade could not leave Russia indifferent and she might be forced to take some precautionary military measures." With the Austro- Hungarian Ambassador, who delivered a copy of the ultimatum on July 24th, he was equally outspoken. Count Szapary reported to Vienna that Sazonoff's

[I9I4] The Beginnings of the War 9

"attitude was throughout unaccommodating and hostile." Count Pourtales, the German Ambassador to St. Petersburg, reported to BerHn that on the same day Sazonoff declared to him "most positively that Russia could not permit under any circumstances that the Serbo-Austrian difficulty should be settled between the parties concerned alone." But the latter was the only sort of settlement which Berlin and Vienna were willing to tolerate.

Diplomatic efforts between July 26th and August ist to head off war by some sort of joint European mediation were predestined to failure. So far as the two Teuton Powers were concerned, they were a by-play intended chiefly to mystify the British Government. France and Russia both distrusted German intentions. Sir Edward Grey was more optimistic and his illusions were furthered by the fact that the German Ambassador at London, Prince Lichnowsky, an honest and highminded diplomat, had been kept in ignorance of what was actually going on in Berlin.

On July 26th Austria-Hungary mobilized twelve of her first line army corps — eight completely and four partially. On July 29th Russia mobilized in the military districts of Odessa, Kiev, Moscow, and Kazan. Berlin had been informed in advance of this move, with a notice that there was no intention in it of aggression against Germany. On the same day Count Pourtales served notice on Sazonoff that "any further development of Russian military preparations would compel us to take counter-measures, and that meant war."

Since Russia could not mobilize effectively against Austria-Hungary without calling out the troops in the Poland district, which faced Germany as well as

Austria-Hungary, a completer mobilization was ordered on July 30th. Germany intended to make this an excuse for a mobilization against both Russia and France. On July 31st she sent an ultimatum, requiring Russia to stop within twelve hours "every measure of war against us and against Austria-Hungary." The next day Germany declared war on Russia.

The Berlin- Vienna plot had been carried out to the last detail. It is interesting to note that, at the last moment, Austria-Hungary showed signs of weakening. These may have been intended merely as a climax in deception. If they were genuine, they reflected the eleventh-hour realization of the Austrian General Staff that it was hardly prepared to fight Serbia on one front and Russia on another. At any rate, Vienna, under Entente pressure, began to admit that some discussion of the terms of the Serbian note was possible and also that Russian mobilization need not be interpreted as involving war. But by this time — late on July 31st — the German Government had clinched war by declaring practically that Russian mobilization against either Germany or Austria-Hungary constituted a casus belli.

It didn't suit the German General Staff to mobilize against Russia alone. France must be attacked and destroyed first. Berlin could never have imagined that France would fail to live up to her obligations to Russia. Nevertheless, it was desirable to draw France in at once. So the German Ambassador at Paris was instructed to inform the French Government, if it exhibited a desire to remain neutral, that neutrality could be purchased by the surrender to Germany, for the period of the war, of the frontier fortresses of Verdun and Toul.

France did not desire to remain neutral. She mobilized on August ist, but neither declared war nor com-

[I9I4] The Beginnings of the War n

mitted any hostile act. The German Government was, therefore, forced to invent some fictitious acts of aggression, and use them as the basis for a declaration of war against France. This declaration was made on August 3d. Thereafter, Germany was free to develop her long elaborated plans for an invasion of France.

Great Britain's attitude was still undefined. Sir Edward Grey had been the most sanguine supporter of the futile diplomacy of mediation. On August ist he still had some faith in Germany's willingness to forego war. After Berlin had taken the final step, he began to have questionings as to the extent of Great Britain's obligations to France and Russia, particularly to France. Self-interest and self-preservation both required Great Britain to draw the sword against Germany. But the Asquith government had strongly pacifist tendencies. It had kept Great Britain unready for war, and now shrank from facing the consequences of unreadiness.

Fortunately Germany herself resolved British hesitations. The German General Staff had decided to attack France through Belgium. On August 2d the German Government demanded free passage across Belgian territory for the German armies. The Belgian Government refused this unwarranted demand. On August 3d Berlin issued an ultimatum to Belgium and followed it by violating the Belgian border.

Sir Edward Grey had now a reason for siding with Germany's enemies which coiild not be challenged. Great Britain had guaranteed the territorial integrity and neutrality of Belgium. Germany — succeeding to the diplomatic contracts of Prussia — was a co-guarantor. Great Britain was morally bound to defend Belgium. It was also to her obvious interest to do so. Having once assumed that attitude, war with Germany was sure to follow.

Great Britain protested against the violation of Belgian neutrality and asked for assurances that Germany would not persist in it. Germany had no idea of giving such assurances. The British demand hardened on August 4th into an ultimatum, expiring at midnight. No assurances having been received from Berlin, Great Britain formally declared war against Germany on August 5th.

Chapter II Numbers And Strategy

When on the evening of August 4, 1914, Sir Edward Goschen, the British Ambassador in Berlin, called on Bethmann-Hollweg, he found the latter in a tremendous state of excitement. The Chancellor expressed the greatest astonishment that Great Britain should think of going to war just for "a scrap of paper" — meaning her engagement to uphold Belgian neutrality. He accused Great Britain of "striking a man from behind while he was fighting for his life against two assailants." And he added with a sneer: "At what price will that compact [the Belgian treaty] have been kept? Has the British Government thought of that?"

Bethmann-Hollweg, being only a civilian and living in the unreal atmosphere of Continental diplomacy, may have been startled by the idea that German policy had driven Great Britain into full partnership in the Entente. But the German military leaders could have had no illusions as to the effect of their adventure in Belgium. They had counted the cost. They were willing to fight Great Britain rather than forego the advantages of access through Belgium to the open plain of Northern France.

At first glance it seemed as if Germany had recklessly plunged into a war in which the odds were enormously against her. She had created an enemy coalition comprising three Great Powers — France, Great Britain, and Russia — and three smaller states — Belgium, Serbia, and Montenegro (for Montenegro was certain to act with Serbia). Portugal had a military alliance with Great Britain. So had Japan. These two countries were to be added to Germany's enemies. Austria- Hungary was the only ally Berlin had in sight. Italy was uncertain and might not remain "benevolently neutral," as the Triple Alliance treaty required her to do in case either or both her associates engaged in a war of aggression. Rumania, formerly a satellite of the Teuton Powers, had drifted away from them in recent years almost as far as Italy had.

The two Teuton empires were greatly outnumbered at the start, and remained outnumbered. Turkey joined them in the fall of 1914. But Italy joined the Entente in May, 191 5. Bulgaria sided with them in October, 191 5. Rumania sided with the Entente in August, 1916, and Greece in the summer of 1917. When Russia dropped out of the war the United States came in.

At the beginning of the war the man-power equation, based on population returns for the years immediately preceding, was :

The Teuton Powers

Austria-Hungary 52,000,000

The Entente Powers

France (without her colonies) 39,6oo 000

The United Kingdom 46,000,000

Numbers and Strategy 15

Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and

South Africa 20,000,000

Serbia and Montenegro 3,500,000

Japan entered the war on August 23, 1914. But her man power is not included in the Entente total, because she confined her operations to Asia. She sent no troops to Europe and only a few of the smaller units of her navy to the Mediterranean. On the other hand, Great Britain was able to recruit more than one million men in her Indian possessions. These were used chiefly in Mesopotamia and Palestine (many of them in the non-combatant services), A few East Indian divisions fought in France in the fall of 19 14, but the climate was too severe for them. France drew on her African colonies for more than five hundred thousand first line troops and auxiliaries. The best of these were employed regularly on the Western Front.

In 19 1 5 the numerical equation stood:

Quadruple Alliance

Germany and Austria-Hungary 120,000,000

Entente

Germany and her associates were always outnumbered more than two to one. The defection of Russia did not lower the ratio, materially, in view of the accession of the United States, Rumania, and Greece and the steadily increasing supply of British and French colonials.

Yet the German General Staff had foreseen an enemy preponderance in crude man power, and had frankly discounted it. The Germans knew that there were other factors in modern war more important than unorganized numbers. Numbers could count little against superior military organization, unified leadership, better trained troops, heavier guns, and completer technical equipment. Germany was thoroughly prepared for war. No one of the Entente belligerents, except France, was even moderately well prepared for it.

The German General Staff counted on a relatively short war. For a European war lasting three years — and against the enemies in sight at the beginning of it — Germany and Austria-Hungary had ample man power. Their strength could be fully developed within twelve months. On the other side only France's could be. Great Britain could not be ready to fight on a large scale until the summer of 1916. Russia, owing to her isolated position and her backward condition industrially, would never be able to make effective use of her vast numbers. Italy, after she entered the war, would be held down to the defensive or to ineffectual offensives, because of military difficulties she faced on her northern frontier.

Having her military resources well in hand, Germany also expected to fight a war of elimination. She tried to crush France in 19 14, and failed. But she extinguished Belgiimi. She overran Serbia and Montenegro

Numbers and Strategy i7

in 1915 and Rumania in 1916. She put Russia out of the lists in 191 7. Had she not unnecessarily dragged the United States into the war at the same time, she might have carried the struggle against France, Great Britain, and Italy to a draw (which would have meant a substantial victory for her) before her military strength had been exhausted.

Her advantages in the way of geographical position, rapidity of mobilization, centralized command, possession of the strategic offensive, larger munitions supplies, and superiority in heavy artillery and machine guns, more than offset the Allied advantage in potential man power. Bethmann-Hollweg ludicrously distorted the facts when he pictured Germany in 19 14 as a man being stabbed in the back by Great Britain while he was fighting for life with two other assailants — Russia and France. There was never any serious shortage of German troops on the Western Front until September, 191 8. And Germany always possessed a decided military superiority on the Eastern Front.