) * & YEAR 86, NO, 97 (Copyright, 1000, by the McClure Newspaper Syndicate.) The generalship and staff work of the German army was in many ways masterly, and far higher in efficiency and knowledge during the first two years of the war than that of the Brit-} ish, and even of the French. It would be absurd to pretend that Brit- ish generalship was in the early days 4 match for the enemy's. was hardly a general in the British army who had ever handled There more than a divigion of men in the field, and army corps or groups of divisions were unknown to our staff. officers. They had to learn how to move men in masses, whereas the German gen- erals in times of peace were familiar, during autumn manoeuvres, with ar- mies on the full scale of modern war- In strategy and tactics they were trained scientists who had de- voted all their mental energy to the study eof the actual problem of war in which they deliberately engag- ed by the most minute study of every detail which might help forward its fare. success, the In their war colleges and staff schools they had analyzed every alternative plan of attack, every pos- gible method of striking rapidly and effectively so as to destroy their en- emy by weight of numbers upon unprepared positions, and they were certain when they moved their troops toward the French and Relgian frontiers .in July of 1014, that ae- cording to the unalterable laws military 'their hands. And the game science, yet they failed, -------- h was uried of in Germans Ignored the Human Soul. By striking through Belgium, which was almost defenceless against their onrush, they gained their first and fright General known branch what advantage. The Stafr, who ought through their ul F to intelligence was common talk in rench have ' German inilitary circles long before the war, failed to anticipate this nor- thern attack and exposed themselves to its thrust by concentrating all their best troops behind the. eastern fron- tier. years' In spite also of menace against the them, forty the French were utterly unprepared for war of the kind that was to happen, and were desperately short of equip- ment, heavy. guns, ammunition and trasport. They committed many grievous mistakes, and had paid a frightful price for them by the time they had weeded out their older and ungclentifie generals, reorganized their methods of defénce, devoted the whole energy of the nation to the pro- guetfofi of 'war 'material, and gave important commands to younger men of scientific ability. in making these reforms, and Germans had struck deep down into France before they were made..And yét the Germans failed on the western Why 9 To answer that guestion it. essary to take the whole of the Ger- man war plan into They were late the nec- consideration, both East and West, and to analyze a little the peculiar psychology of the German mind. lost the war entirely by reason their other wordd, they had manufac In my opinion they of psyehologhal stupidity, which was the dverwhelming weakness be- hind their mititary technique: <n fu red . a terrible war machine almost perfect in its m echanism, but guided hy men' stone-blind to the soul in human na- ture, 1 Enemy Obsessed with Russian Bogey. Before dealing, however, with that part of the subject it will be well to recall, war, ~The German General 'That anarchy was the revoit of men 16PAGES The 4 \ V-Why the Germ with the. German people, had long been obsessed with the bogey of Rus- sian armies began to move westward they were undoubtedly stricken with fear at the vision of the Russian "'teani-roller." For two years they sacrificed vast numbers of their finest' troops to put their weight against that Russian mass and to rpll it back through blood and mud, gaining spectacular and high-sounding victo- ries which set the joy-bells ringing in Germany, and led to---Bolshevism. who had seen their sons and brothers gent forward in masses, without sup- port of guns, and often without rifles, against German armies with the most powerful artillery in the world and machine gun fire which killed men in swaths It wds the mad and fierce vengeance of mobs against leaders who had governed by bribery ,corrup- tign and treachery, and had sold the botlies of their countrymen to the tor- turers for roubles paid by-Germany, or robbed by Imperial taxation. in spite of its later eruelties, worse than those of beasts, if there is any truth in reports from Russia, the first in- stinet behind the movement of the Bolsheviki was an agonized cry for brotherhood in place of human cru- elty of castes and war lords. The spirit of that ery canght hold of the German troops in Russia, and before the war ended weakened them as de- fenders of German castes and war lords . From a military standpoint the (Terman obsession in Russia di- vided their armies ,and our western front, heavily pressed as it was, did not recover the full weight of German attack, in all available strength, until March 21, 1918 Again and aggin--- it is almost certain--the enemy fouls have broken the western frost and rolled up thes French and British ar- mies if he had just put in that extra bit of weight needed at the exact mo- ment of great success. That he did not do so was partly lack of men, OW-] ing to the adventures in Russia, and partly a military hesitation due to ignorance of our extreme weakness. Her Firgt>Colossal Blunder. The first "colossal blunder of the enemy was in August of 1914, when, his armies were striking down through France in five columns. Gen- eral Von Kluck was commanding the right wing of the German armies and the little British army---the old "'Con- temptibles' --were fighting back from Mons with a French army on their right largely composed of old "Ter ritorials,"" who were not reckoned npon as first line troops, and battal- jons of 'Senegalese and Moroccans, who had not the same "striking" power as the Wrench or British. Von Kluck's army passed through Amiens fn a great tide, after the retreat of the French from Bapaume, which I saw on a tragic night, and then bore down past Beauvais and Meaux to Creil and Chantilly, not far from-Pa- ris. The game seemed easy to him but in his confidence he did not tron. ble to take advantage of one supreme chance which was his, and that was the. cajture of the changel ports. For a little while they were at his mercy. Germans Could Have Had Channel 1 saw the last uniformed = men--- gusiom officers, firemen and police- nen---leave Boulogne, which lay apen to the enemy. Calais nnd' Dieppe were undefended. The British army had moved its base from Doulogne to St. Nazaire, away 'down south. At that time Germany could have seized the coast for nothing, which after- wards they fopght desperately and in vain to get ~~ With that coast in her simply, the early events of the Staff, THE POMP OF YESTERDAY. By Pri is, indeed, one of the finest p work that was . of Br pr i turning out war itish written during _ pulliication was * the book to ey et, iin ce $1.25, det Toronto, BE bane : 7 - Joseph Hocking has been most books, . is based upon] of two aristocratic ¥ "Recessional," and it 38 a stery with ia, purpose. It bands her submafine warfare would has no recollection of ever having heard anything about the war or the causes of it, the speeches have a tremendous effect upon him, and he immediately enlists He is befriend ed by the speaker, Captain Luscombe, front, : 'men, Wh evidently fihd in the story something personal. He also gwakens the inter- est of Lorna Bolivick, daughter of an English baronet, who demands that lie shall inform her of the "of the hero, 5 pening auingy Meanwhile great events aré hap-| i aily Br \ have been a more teghible and dead- ly menace to England, and therefure to France and all of us, But vgn Kluck, acting under the orders of bis General - Staff, drove oteadily' . leaving the coast as fruit to be pluck- ed later, and intending to drive a wedge past Paris, which would then fall into his hands as the best fruit of all. Three things upset his reckon- ing and spoiled his plan. The first was the survival of the little British army as a fighting force when le thought it was annihilated; and the second (and more important) was the genius of a certain French gen- eral named Foch, not then famous in the world; and the third was the spir- itual exultation .of the French troops which lifted them suddenly Irom the despair of their first tragedies and made them certain, with a fine, won- derful faith, that they wopld turn Back the German tide. Foch Speaks Memorable Words, Qn a day when it seeined possible that the whole French line might have to fall back in a further retreat, s0 that Paris herself would be aban- doned to the orgies of a conquering army, Foch in the centre of the French line said, in spirit, if not in those exact words (I was told then by the son of the French Chief-of- Staff): "I am not going to retreat, 1 am going to attack." He attacked late in the evening when the Germans had lit their bivouac fires, believing that the fighting of the day was over, and he sent the Crown Prince's army reeling back from the Marne. The whole German line had to fall back to the Aisne to conform with the retreat in the centre, and Von Kluck's army on the German right, nearest to Pa- ris, had to retreat in disorder, fight- ing bloody rear-guard actions. French Treops Go Forward in Taxis. Marshall Jofffe, quick to realize the wonderful chance, ordered Gen- eral Manoury to attack Von Kluck on the flank with the Army of Paris, which was taken up towards Meaux, as I saw the troops go, in the little red taxicabs from Paris, five men to a cab. The British army, weak in numbers after heavy losses down from Mons and. ,Le Cateau, was still strong in spirit, and they attacked the river Ourcqg and harassed the enemy's rear-guards with their horse artillery in so fierce a way that when I follow- ed across those fields | saw heaps of German dead swept up in piles like autumn leaves and burning in bon- fires after petrol had been poured on them . led That victory of the Marne was the death-blow to Germany's hopes of a quick, certain victory, and after that they knew the war would be a long, costly and uncertain struggle. An November of 1914 and again in April of 1915 Ven Klnck's army in the North tried to smash their . way through to Calais, which they 'had failed to take in their first rush down to Paris, and they found themselves up against the British,who had swung up north into Flanders a Picardy. In the first battle of Ypres they al- most succeeded in smashing their way through the British lines, weak in numbers compared with their strength, and should have done so by just that extra "punch" which so of- ten they failed to deliver when the game was in their hands. So it was also, in the second battle of Ypres; when their first use of poison gas gained a stupefyingg surprise. The English, Irish and Scottish troops, supported for the first time by the stubborn courage of the Canadians, fotight until they were but a thin brown 'living line standing in the past life, and also the rivalry of an- other, is sufficient to keep him from realizing his object. One day, how- ever, at a party, he receives a sud- and goes into action on the western | posit Captain Luscombe, while vis-| some, friends, tolls them the| story of his protegee , and causes] some little excitement in the minds] vse in the life of Paul which is the name KINGSTON. ONTARIO, SATURDAY, APRIL 26, 1919 ans Failed on the Western Front BY PHILIP GIBBS 4 the war in the long run, and by other errors they made their loss more cer- tain." One immense mistake they made was in regard to the psychology and temper of their soidiers and civilian population. They put a greater strain upon them than human natire could bear, and by driving their fight- ing men into one shambles after an- other, and by trying to dope their people by false promises which were never fulfilled, they sowed the seeds of revolt and despair which finally launched them into gulfs of ruin. midst of their dead and wounded, and, again, victory might have gone to the ememy had he known our ex- treme weakness and made use of his own strength to the uttermost. But he hesitatéd to deliver the last attack because of his own fearful losses, and the British held Ypres, and never let go. Thin Brown Living Line of British, The Germfans now made a colossal and enduring error in their war-plan, and by that stupidity lost their su- preme chante of. victory. They es- tablished themselves' in trench posi- tions on the Western front and were conterrt-fo hold the lines in defensive and stationary warfare for more than a year while they devoted their main energies of 'attack on the Eastern front. That gave England the time to build up a pew army on a vast scale, to make guns by thousands, to manufacture high explosives by mil- lions of tons, t6 rally up the young manhood of all her Empire, and to blockade Germany by a world-wide net of sea-power. In the battle of the Somme, during the second half of 1916, after many small and desperate battles before, the British armies in France and Flanders with French troops on their ¢ The "Great Swindle." As early as the autumn of 1916 I began to see signs of revolt among German soldiers against the slaugh- ter fo. which they had to sacrifice themselves, Many prisoners to whom I spoke had abandoned hope of victory even then, and cursed their leaders. In letters which I grabbed from Germaw dug-outs, and in thousands of letters which fell into the hands of our Intelligence officers, there were cries of agony and despair from the civilian people writing to their men in the field. Again and again people writing from many dif- ferent towns used the same phrase 'German War Lords Take Gambler's € British naval blockade was causing to describe the war. They called it "The Great Swindle." Revolution was beginning its murmur, and sol- diers were talking of desertion and beginning to: desert. Then in the spring of 1918 the German Head- quarters Staff prepared to play their last card on a gamblers venture, They believed that at last they held the trump card to redeem all their losses. Russia was out of the war definitely and absolutely, and after the infamous treaty of Brest-Litovsk the Cerman war lords hurried over to the western front nearly all their divisions who had been in the east. They did not know that many of these troops had been converted to the Bol- shevistic philosophy of pacifism. They failed once again to give eredit' to the unbreakable faith and coyrage of the French andl British. They did not believe that the American -4armies would arrive in time to count. The German people knew of the coming offensive, and waited for it with dblood-shot eyes and a kind of last parting hope. The German officers were, mostly, confident of sugcess. The Berman soldiers shrugged 'their shoulders and sald: "It will be an- other shambles." - right took the offensive,smashed their way through a fortress system of trenches thirty miles deep and forty miles broad, and in spite of their own enormous losses, destreged immense numbers of the enemy andl brgke the spirit of the Garman troops engaged against them by the fury of their gun- fire and the unending intensity of their infantry attacks. The (Ger mafis called this slanghter of their manhood "the blood-bath of the Somme," and at last they could stand it no longer antl made their first big retreat in Flanders and Picardy, across a wide . sweep of territory which they laid waste behind them, to the shelter of their great Hinden- burg line which they had been build- ing for a year. _ The British troops did not cease thelr attacks during the whole of the following year (1917), and in'the battles of Arras, Messines; Lens, Flanders and Cambrai inflicted prodigious losses on the enemy, at a fearful price to themselves, draining Germany of her blood. : y % . By this time the war-lords of Ger- many began to take leave of their The first blows struck) against the sences under the desperate strain of| British wore successful. Attacked their jon. They no longer act-| by one hundred and fourteen divi. od on the lawl of military science, |sfons to forty-eight, the Britis line but on the gambler's instinct. With | broke and they fell back in a fight- a most incredible folly they took the - + ea ing retreat with heroic rear guard action; fens and then to the outskirts of Ypres, losing all their gains in two years of costly fighting except the losses they had inflicted on the en- emy's man-power, Then the French line broke at the Chemin des Dames) and they, too, fell back to the Marne, and once again the Germans drew near to Paris. It seemed to them as thoukh at last they had indeed the game in their hands. But it was only ignorance' and stupidity which made them think so. They did not take into considera- tion the genius of Marshal Foch nor the tenacity of the British and French, nor the striking power of the Americans now ready to attack with many divisions, and now rush- ing across the Atlantic in a great tide. The British, though terribly weak. ened for a time, held their lines in- tact against enormous odds "with their backs to the wall,' as Sir Doug- las Haig called upon thém to do. The French troops fought desperately in defence with all their old heroism and faith. And Marshal Foch play- ed the game of strategy with superb skill and, courage For a time he diggipated his Army of prve by supporting the British line \and the Germans, knowing this, took enor- moys risks of striking down in a deep wedge-like salient to the Marne with open flanks, "Foch has no Army of Reserve," they said. ."We can do what we like with him." But as rapidly as he had sent his blue men behind the British khaki he called them down again, borrowed four British divisions, reinforced more by drafts of young boys from England and Scotland--from the last rejerves © of British boyhood-----and brought up the Americans. He had his Army of Reserve and he strack on three sides of the German salient and "smashed the Crown Prince's army like a cardboard box. Germany Knows She Has Lost. Ludendorf knew that night that Germany was lost. It 'was Germany now that had no army of reserve, The Crown Prince had to borrow from the troops of Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria, who had been waiting with twenty-nine, divisions in hand for another smash through the Brit- ish lines, They went into the fur- naee fires, It was the turn of the tide, and it turned against the enemy until he was swept back and engulfed. Three hundred thousand boys of eighteen years of age, the younger brothers of the older brothers who first to the outskirts of Am- » had gone before, were sent out from Ungland add Scotland to fill up the gaps in the British army, and with the Canadians and 'Australians, sup- ported later by three American divi- sions, they began a counter-offensive and fought a battle every day, when they smashed the enemy out of his lines of defence, broke through his yest and strongest defensive system-- the Hindenburg line--captured many great citles-- Lille, Tourcoing, Rou- baix, Cambrai, Tournai, Donai, Val- enciennes, Maubeuge---and entered the little old town of Mons, where the British army had first withstood the shock of German arms---on the morning before the armistice---ended all fighting with the most abject and humiliating surrender of any great power in the history of the modern world. German War Machine Smashed. The Americans-and'the French, up to the time of the armistice, drove the enemy before them hetween the Argonne and Rheims, and the Allied armies oh all parts of the Western front captured hundreds of thou- sands of prisoners, many thousands of guns, scores 'of thousands of ma- chine guns, and vast stores of the en- emy's material of war, so that the German war machine was smashed to bits by November 11th, 1918. Not only was the machine smashed, but the. spirit of the (erman army and of the German people was broken also---broken to the dust-of an une availing despair, Before that morning when German generals crossed the Allied Jines with the white flag of surrender it was re- vealed to them dn & blinding light that they werd Filed." They knew that behind the American divisions already in action against them, and proving heroic quality as fighting men, there was a New World in arms, ready to pour millions of men across the Atlantic in an irresistible tide. They knew also that their own re- serves of manhood were exhausted, that they could call up no more youth for gZun-fodder, and that having failed in their last reckless gamble with fate all was lost. The German war lords, in spite of their military science, their skill in generalship their masterly know- ledge of organization, bad committed enormous blunders and in the larger knowledge of life and war had as blind as bats and as stupid as owls, They lacked material strength in a challenge to the world, and the souls of brave peoplés beat them from the time of those early days when all the odds were In their . man Eirpire had committed - risk of adding the greatest power in tha world---in numbers of men and in potential energy---to their list of ene- mies. With almost deliberate care- lessness they flouted the United States and forced her to declare war. Their temptation was great. The severe suffering by food shortage to the German people and denying them access to raw material which they needed for the machinery of "war. The submarine paign, ruthlessly carried out, would, and did, inflict great damage ritish and Allied shipping, and was a deadly menace to England. But German ealeula- tions were utterly wrong in estimat- fag the amount of time needed to} break her bonds by submarine war- "fare before America could send over great armies to Europe, and the Ger- man war-lords were wrong again in underestimating the defensive and offensive success of the British Navy and Mercantile Marine against sub- marine activities. A By those misealenlations they lost * ns "NL I know. Lh have got your all run down." troubles I have had." "where." worrying too much until you. "I.could not help that. "would worry, too, if you had all the "Perhaps. But I think I have learned a lesson. Worrying does not get you any- "I Do Not Know Just What Is The Matter But I Seem To Be Losing My Grip" You have n treatment ?" nervous system 1 guess you or two before "But how long will I have to take this : "If you could take a rest it would help some, but mark my words you will not be using the Nerve Food more than a week fits, and, then you will not need me encourage you in its use." you begin to see the bene- to