Allied Armies

“ Soon the number of effective infantry divisions on the British front had risen from forty-five to fifty-two. And meanwhile American energy was pouring men across the Atlantic, and everywhere along the Allied front and in the Allied countries, but especially in ravaged, war-weary France, the news of the weekly arrivals, 80,000, 100,000, 70,000 men, was exactly the stimulus that the older armies needed. ”

“ These will be willingly borne for our honour and for the preservation of our position in the world; and they will be shared by our Dominions beyond the seas, now sending contingents and assistance of every kind to help the Mother Country in this struggle. If I am unable, owing to military considerations for the best interests of the Allied Armies in the field, to speak with much detail on the present situation of our Army on the Continent, I am sure your Lordships will pardon me for the necessary restraint which is imposed upon me. ”

“ Men, of course, means soldiers.
It is to Russia and Great Britain that we look for the augmentation of the allied armies; the Allies must have larger armies than the enemy at the front, and they must have such reserves of men trained and ready, that a surprise like that in the Balkans shall no longer be possible.
If the French army is five millions strong, Britain must raise the same number; five millions being the amount of recruits for which she would be liable as a conscript country. Russia must have at least seven millions ”

“ Our men were falling very fast, for the enemy were in overwhelming strength, particularly in guns. But it is impossible to disguise the fact that the crafty Muscovites in the darkness and fog had stolen a march upon our commanders; that the Allies were taken completely by surprise; and that only the [77] intrepidity of the picquets of the Light and Second Divisions saved the entire Allied Armies from an overwhelming disaster. We can now say without boasting that the heroic conduct of a mere handful of Britons were, and are to this day, the admiration of all. ”

“ If this country had produced an army which was equal in proportion to its population to the number of men under arms in France and in Germany at the present moment there would be three millions and a half in this country and 1,200,000 in the Colonies. [Cheers.] That is what I mean when I say our resources are quite adequate to the task. It is not our fight merely—it is the fight of humanity. [Cheers.] The allied countries between them could raise armies of over twenty millions of men. Our enemies can put in the field barely half that number. ”

“ Owing to its world-wide reputation for skill and valor, the Second Division was selected by the commander in chief of the Allied Armies as his special reserve, and has been held in readiness to strike a swift and powerful blow at the vital point of the enemy’s line. The hour to move forward has now come, and I am confident that our division will pierce the enemy’s line, and once more gloriously defeat the Hun. ”

“ The adequacy or inadequacy of such an army as this for doing what was required of it—for securing speedy victory in event of war—or still better for preserving peace by the menace which it opposed to German schemes of aggression—can only be tested by considering the broad facts with regard to numbers, efficiency, and readiness of all the armies which would be engaged directly, or indirectly, in a European struggle. ”

“ I for one cannot bring my mind to adapt itself to the spectacle of the British people in arms as I see it day by day on all sides of me in this narrow but all-important wedge of the allied battle-line, where the ultimate fate of the British Empire will be sealed. ”

“ France has, say, three million soldiers; Germany, five; Austria, four—and England had, perhaps, a hundred thousand men, perhaps more, on board this fleet which defended the English land and lands far overseas without firing a shot. A battalion of infantry is more than sufficient in numbers to man a Dreadnought. How precious, then, the skill of that crew! Man-power is as concentrated as gun-power with a navy. Ride three hundred miles in a motor-car along an army front, with glimpses of units of soldiers, and you have seen little of a modern army. ”

“ The Germans attacked in masses and successive waves, and paid the penalty of their desperate strategy. For though the British, and later the French, lines were bent backward for miles, and gaps were occasionally torn in them by the foe's furious attack, the Allied defensive withstood the onslaught and after a month of the most terrific struggle the world has ever seen, both British and French forces presented an unbroken front to the disappointed enemy. ”

“ Nothing like the German army has ever before stood on this planet. A great race, strong in both body and mind, has devoted itself for half a century to learning everything that is to be learned about war. It's a magnificent machine, smooth, powerful, tremendous, unconquerable, and for that very reason neither you nor il, John, will ever see a war of the first magnitude in Europe. ”

“ Not only were the German armies no longer, in a military sense, homogeneous, but a considerable part of the force, being on the wrong side of the fortified frontier, could not be brought to bear, and another considerable part of the force, the army of the Crown Prince of Germany, had fallen into an entanglement. ”

“ The armies in the East and West acted independently and without concert, like a balky team, no two ever pulling together; enabling the enemy to use to a great advantage his interior lines of communication for transporting troops from East to West, re-enforcing the army most vigorously pressed, and to furlough large numbers, during seasons of inactivity on our part, to go to their homes and do the work of producing for the support of their armies. ”

“ But to employ in the same space a force no greater than the British, considering the advantage of position given with modern arms to an army acting on the defensive on well-chosen ground, would have meant the annihilation of the German army section by section. ”

“ I have said that the war has added to our military prestige—I will go further and say that, in the eyes of all the world, and particularly among those who follow the profession of arms, our military prestige has been immeasurably increased. We set out to fight the two greatest military powers, next to ourselves; and alone we would have crushed them utterly. As the event has proved, Germany and Austria found themselves confronted by the embattled hosts of no less than ten nations. ”

“ In the army and navy no reductions can, with reason, be required. At a moment like this, when all Europe is in arms; when, from the farthest borders of Poland, to the extremities of the Spanish Peninsula, the war-shout has gone forth; when not merely monarchs are at enmity, but nations are in arms! ”

“ No one who has followed with attention the efforts of the National Service League has any right to imagine that we desire a strong army solely in order to invade the territory of European or more distant States; or that we wish to root out the Territorial Force in order to establish in its place an army system modelled on the army system of Germany; or, again, that we have the ambition of resuscitating once more medieval blood-lust, anarchic plunder, and delight in war! ”

“ In my army we are made one for the other, and we shall remain closely bound whether God gives us war or peace. It is the soldier and the army, not majorities and parliamentary decisions, that have forged the unity of the German Empire. ”

“ The Allied Powers had themselves kindled the popular excitement which provoked this vast development of martial power amongst the French, and first brought their own warlike strength within their own knowledge. ”

“ We are going to Cherbourg to stand by as a reserve force; to Paris to act as a protection against surprise attacks; to Ostend to relieve the Casino; to Antwerp to resist Zeppelins; to the French frontier to guard lines of communication; to Leicester to supervise German prisoners; to Africa to conduct a show of our own; to India, Malta, Gibraltar and Egypt for garrison duty; to the North of Scotland to protect coast towns (which abound in that part) ; and to the right of the Allies' first, the centre of the Allies' second, and the left of the Allies' third fighting line. ”

“ The allied forces fought fiercely to compel the Germans to withdraw. Hand-to-hand fighting, bayonet charges, and general confusion was the order of the day. Thousands of men would creep out of their holes in the ground and crawl, availing themselves of whatever covering presented itself, to some vantage point and there stand up as one man and charge directly into the adversary's ranks. ”

“ When we think of this contest we must think of the forces in support of each Empire. I suppose that, as regards the British Empire in the field, the odds are as twenty to one at least on behalf of the German Army. That is to say, putting your fleet for the moment out of the question, because a fleet cannot fight on dry land—that as regards your Army you are only about as one to twenty of the Germans, and that even with the assistance of your Allies of France and Belgium, you are only able practically to maintain yourselves on the western frontier—that is to say, a case of stalemate. ”

“ Bring into fullest play the Allies' superiority in field guns, and by imposing on the enemy the necessity of constant counterattacks, eliminate in the end his advantage in numbers. The effects of this elimination would be that his power in any event of resuming the offensive would progressively disappear, and that, as the process proceeded, the advantage in numbers would pass to the Allied side, and eventually make an Allied offensive both practicable and successful. ”

“ At this time our army in northern France were holding a sector in the world’s great battle where our regiment, with other American and French forces, faced the German army at the peak of a German salient. At some points the American positions were maintained in the shell holes that pitted the battle ground; and I felt guilty at leaving my comrades when I felt myself fit for duty and there was fighting to be done. ”

“ The armies of Austria, France and Russia, have each an army which, when on a Peace footing, is superior in numbers to our own. Our system is moreover so to speak so thoroughly transparent, that any increase in our effective force can at once be appreciated; the amount of any addition or decrease which we may make in our military force can therefore be most accurately calculated. ”

“ Infantry, artillery, machine-guns, and other branches of the service were awaiting the resumption of the great German drive, by which the enemy were hoping to obtain a victorious decision and give to their brutal government supremacy in the world. ”

“ And were Germany to go to war again with any nation, the same result would be repeated; a victory of the army would be a victory of reaction. So deeply have we sunk, that we are forced to hail a defeat of the army as a happy event in the history of the German people. ”

“ The battle is no longer between the opposing lines of the infantry, for to win a position you must hold it, and to hold it you must have brought up swiftly and safely from the rear bombs, ammunition, wire rations, and a means of entry for the supporting and relieving troops, the area of the battle is no longer the front line, it is behind this that the enemy barrage descends, and over a wide field of fire the German shells are searching for all those who would bring up succour and relief. It is under these conditions that the pioneers must do their work. ”

“ It is like a brain: it gathers useful information of all kinds, studying the latest weapons and methods of warfare, the plans and equipment of the enemy, the country in which fighting is to be done. It regulates the various branches of the army so that the artillery and the infantry shall not be working at cross purposes, but shall help each other. ”

“ At the same time it must be remembered that at peace strength the continental battalion and company are maintained at little more than half their war strength, and the under-officering of European armies only makes itself seriously felt on mobilization. ”

“ And then, of course, in addition to the admirals who wanted war, and the professors who glorified war, and the editors, pamphleteers, Navy and Army League leaders and paid agitators who wrote and talked war, there was the German Army, represented by its corps of fifty thousand or sixty thousand officers, which was the living, ineradicable incarnation of war and with every breath it drew sighed impatiently for its coming. ”

“ Far greater conflicts may lie before us in the near future, and we may have to encounter, not undisciplined peasants, but armies amply supplied with cavalry and artillery—armies which can attack as well as defend. ”

“ They could cut their way through all opposition that we could offer. We have neither the infantry, nor the ar [108] tillery, nor the cavalry, to oppose them, and the artillery we have is of so much shorter range that at no time could we get near enough to the enemy to reach him with our guns.
If war comes between us and any of the Great Powers, the splendid young men of the country—husbands, fathers, sons, brothers, lovers—will have to go to the front and meet the invaders. ”

“ The coördination of artillery and infantry must have been perfect, as you could see when you went over the field where there were surprisingly few French dead and the German dead, though more plentiful than the French, were not very numerous. ”

“ Great difference I know there is, and a diverse consideration to be had, between such a country as France is, strengthened with many fortified places; and this of ours, where our ramparts are but the bodies of men. But I say that an army to be transported over sea, and to be landed again in an enemy's country, and the place left to the choice of the invader, cannot be resisted on the coast of England, without a fleet to impeach it; no, nor on the coast of France, or any other country; except every creek, port, or sandy bay, had a powerful army, in each of them, to make opposition. ”