1935-11-11 — Page 7

THE CHINA WAFL PONDAY, NOVEMBER 11, 1935

THE WAR

CAUSES OF THE ENEMY

COLLAPSE

SOME MILITARY AND NAVAL FACTORS INVOLVED

(By Captain B. H. Liddell Hart)

RMISTICE Day has become more a commemoration than a celebration The passage of time has refined and blended the earlier emotions, so that, without losing our sense of personal loss and of quiet thankfulness that as a nation we proved our con- tinued power to meet a crisis graver than any in our annals, we are conscious, above all, to-day of the general kiss to the world and to civilisation. *

The war has become history, and can be viewed in the pers- pective of history. For good it has deepened our sense of fellow- ship and community of interest, whether inside the nation or be tween nations. But, for good or bad, it has shattered our faith in idols, our hero-worshipping belief that great men are different clay from common men. Leaders are still necessary, perhaps more necessary, but our awakened realisation of their common bumanity is a safeguard against either expecting from them or trusting in them too much.

What caused that astonish-, blames the surrender on the "home! ingly sudden collapse and sur front. Many open-minded and render of Germany "which, as diligert, students of the war among by a miracle. so it seemed. lift-the Allies are inclined to

agree ed the nightmare load of war that it was possible from a mili- from Europe? To arrive at ajtary point of view. But again the satisfactory answer it is not naval aspect intervenes. sufficient to analyse the hectic

Military Action

weeks of negotiation and mili- How did victory come? - Here tary success which preceded Nov. 11.

THE ARMISTICE

HOW THE DOCUMENT

WAS SIGNED

HISTORIC CEREMONY STAGED IN RAILWAY COACH

THE most dramatic of all the events of the historic first two weeks of November 17 years ago was staged in a railway coach in one of the thickest spots in the Forest of Compiegne where Marshal Foch had his headquarters behind the Allied times. Here, in circumstances far removed from the trappings of city ceremonies, there was signed the actual Act of Armistice upon which so many destinies hung."

As one reads it to-day the story of the chain of incidents in those few days before November 11. culminating in the remark- able scene in the small hours of the final morning, unfolds itself like the acts of a classic play. It began with the departure of the German delegates from Berlin on the afternoon of Wednes day, November 6 Herr Erzberger was at the head; with him Count Oberndorff (some time German Minister in Sofia), Gen- ̈ eral von Winterfeldt (who had been Falkenhausen's Chief of Staff at Brussels), and Captain Vanselow (an officer of the German navy).

The members of the delega- The Allies, Marshal Foch gation presented their papers sharply replied had no-sue for the inspection of the French proposals to make. Disconcert- outpost officer, and, these for-fed, the Germans asked for direc malities over, they were placed tion as to the form their applica in charge of French staffition should take, and quickly

The historic railway coach in which the Armistice was signed on the morning of November 11, 1918, officers, who had driven up in amended it into a formal request in the Forest of Compiegne, where Marshal Foch had. his · headquarters behind the Allied liper

Armistice Scenes In London

At one o'clock Big |

CRIS

the meantime in two motor-on their part for an Armistice.

Thereupon Marshal Foch slow The whole party then drovely and clearly read out the Allied westwards to the Chatean des terms and conditions, pausing be- military action balks large. Other

Bonhommes, a fine mansion closetween each paragraph to allow the to the Aisne at Francport, near interpreter to translate the French Even in the military sphere we factors contributed. apart from

Choisy-an-Bac, where the Germans into German. need to go back to August 8. the the naval If we do not accept shoold not dis-

were accommodated for the night. #day which filled the German come entirely, we

Severe Terma || unduly the unwilling mand with the conviction of de-count

"I am glad to be able to tell, ham Palace. The news

had the House to accompany him to They were courteously received The Germans, who expressed tribute paid by the Ger-

by the French orderly officers astonishment at the severity feat, and to July 18, which wit-i nessed the visible turning of the mans to the effectiveness of Allied, you that the war will be over at spread through the City like a church.

spark along a train of powder/21 Happiness, however, was a com- dined, and went to bed.

Ithe terms, immediately returned. tide. And if we go back to that and especially British propaganda. eleven o'clock to-day."

The maroons, no longer signals of pelling food.

Early the following morning to the chateau at Francport to date we must go back further. to In the later stages of the war it

A sentence common enough in foreboding, had boomed--with 3 Ben strucks the hour for the first they left the chateau for Reth-confer

Permission was request- directed and inten-its wording. but of mighty im- March 21, for the decline of Ger- was skilfully

gruf

humour and electrifying time since the battles began, and mondes station, on the Compiegne ed (and granted) to send a port.

Its utterance from the effect-a confirmation of the good as

Not far from the courier with a copy of the condi- many's military power is not ex-sively developed.

Yet we are left with the sure entrance to No. 10 Downing-

at a magician's touch the Soissons line. plicable without reference to thel

tidings

streets blazed with bunting and station lay Marshal Foch's train- tions to the German Main Head- consummation of that military conclusion that the success of the street on the morning of Novem

Before the King's house the the stony buildings lit up with headquarters, and some sixty quarters at Spa her Allied armies was chief among the ber 11, 1918, by the then Prime King's people had assembled effort, and consumption of

to brightly-coloured flags. In an yards further down a saloon had

It was ten o'clock on the Sunday immediate causes of Germany's Minister, Mr. Lloyd George, fell co him honour. military resources, in the great!

When Their hour the transformation was com- been prepared for the visitors. morning when the courier reach the ears of the expectant Majesties appeared on the balcony plete. series of ofensives which opened capitulation on November 11.

was a cold, desolate morning ed Spa That conclusion does not neces- crowd like a prophet's blessing the cheering was as tumultuous

His message was tele in the spring of 1918.

Lorry loads of cheering soldiers there had been several days of phoned to Berlin, a conference at We might go back further still. sarily, nor even naturally, imply

For a solemn instant it seemed as it had been in Downing street and civilians, bus loads of gesti-rain, and the ground in the neigh the new Government was held at Indeed, if the historian of the that at the moment of the Armis-

jonce. The seventy-two hours future has to select one day as de tice the German armies were on as though the sudden lifting of The King and Queen were clamor-culating noisy folk of all classes, bourhood was a sea of mud

unexampled tension had ously and loyally welcomed dur-overcrowded taxicabs and · be-

Stage Set

were quickly passing. The --de- cisive for the outcome of the the brink of collapse. Nor that the an

The legates were instructed to accept, World War he will probably choose Armistice was a mistaken conces-paralysed the emotions as well ing their passage through the flagged private cars, all added Se the stage was set.

Then seething City later in the day, and their quota to the general light-first words of the negotiation pro-and, thongh protesting, "they August 2, 1914 before the war, sion as some among the Allies as the physical faculties.

thousand throats there again at the Palace at night, but heartedness Hats were in the per were uttered by Marshal agreed to sign. for England, had yet begun when were so loud in proclaiming at the from a

burst such a noise of relief and perhaps no single scene of that air, bonnets over the mom.

Foch **Qu'est-ce-que vous The curtain was raised again. Mr. Winston Churchill, at 1.25 time.

Joyous celebration went on to destrez, messieurs?” Herr Erzber before the railway coach in the a. seat the order to mobilise i Bather does the record of the rejoicing as London has not heard memorable day was so moving or

so impressively representative of the end of the day-it, indeed, the ger. the German Secretary of heart of the French forest last "hundred the British Navy.

days, when before or since.

the national heart and mind than day could be said to have ended State, answered the Marshal's Shortly after two o'clock in

the.. Navy's Part

thoroughly sifted, confirm the im- The British Empire has done the one at the end of the Mall in in the ordinary sense of the term query in a troubled voice: The morning of Monday, November That Navy

that a great share towards the win-the morning. no memorial lesson of history

at all For many thousands it had come, he said, to receive the 11, Marshal Foch, sleepless and Trafalgar, but it was to do more the true aim in war is the mind ning of the war, and we are now

It was fitting that one of the certainly did not end in sleep at Allied proposals for an Armistice expectants received the German than any other factor towards of the enemy command and Gor entitled to shout" added the first formal events of the day the accustomed hour. For Lo winning the war for the Allies ernment, not the bodies of their Premier. And shout the people should be a service in St. Mar- don as a whole, as the capital of

Was to - wz

on

zaret's Church, Westminster, and the Empire, it could more truth-

For the Navy was the instrument troops, that the balance between of London did. of our blockade, and as the fox victory and defeat turns on mental

In recollection the mind flashes that, after the announcement of fully be said to have ended with of war disperses in the clearer impressions and only indirectly on

cinema-like from the scene in the Armistice articles in the the Royal service of thanksgiving fight of these post-war years that physical blows. That in war, as blockade is seem to assume larger Napoleon said and Foch endorsed, Downing-street to that directly House of Commons by Mr. Lloyd under the dome of St. Pants of

who afterwards in front of Bucking-George, the Speaker should invite the morning of November 12. and larger proportions, to be more "It is the man, not men -and more clearly the decisive counts."

agency in the struggle.

Great Truth

But the intangible all-pervading The reiteration of this great -factor of the blockade intrudes truth is to be found in the war's into every consideration of the last phase. The conclusions of the military situation

German Crown Council of August This, during the last year of the 14 were summed up as follows: war, is studded with "ifs." If "We can no longer hope to break Germany, instead of throwing all the war-will, of our enemies by her military TEKJUICES into a military operations" and "the ob series of tremendous offensives inject of our strategy must be to 1918, had stayed on the defensive | pazalyst

enemy's war-will

the

or even

in the West while consolidating her gradually by strategic defensive.” gains in the East, could she have In other words, they had aban- averted defeat?

doned hope of victory Militarily there seems little holding their gains, and hoped doubt that she could. In the light only to avoid surrender an in- of the experience of 1915, when secure moral foundation Prince the Allies had 145 divisions in the Max pats August 8 in its true West to Germany's 100, and when light when he defines it as "the the German trench systems were turning point of the war. afril and shallow bulwark com- But to develop the conviction of pad with those of 1918, it is failure into the conviction of hope difficult to see that the Allies could lessness required to compel sure have breached them, even if they ender something more was needed. had waited until the indowing tide It came not from the Western of American man-power had re-front, but from a despised “side- stored to them the relative numer-show"-Salonika, long - condemn- ical superiority that they had ex-fed by Allied military opinion and joyed in 1915. V

scornfully ridiculed by the Germans Command At Sen

as their "largest internment Yet as we ask the question, and camp," militarily fndan

optimistic

Back Door Ajar answer difficult, the factor of our With diffenity Cullanmat, the command of the sex comes to mind-flate commander-in-chief there, had; For it was the stranglehold of the persuaded the Allied Governments British Navy which, in default of to allow their contingents and his a serious peace move, constrained successor, Franchet d'Esperey, to "Germany to carry out that felo de try their Inck in an offensive. It rse offensive. She was dogged by war lemched on September 15, by

the spectre of slow: enfeeblement September 21 the Bulgarian front, ending in eventual collapse. Chad collapsed, and on September Another big “11,7 often mooted, 29, with their fores split in two, Is the question whether even the autumn of 1918 Germany con have, avoided capitalation - W the fighting front have collapsed he war had gone on after Nove

11? Was capitulation in or could the German ar

"made good their, zetres

Firm on their own froztí man opinion largely i

to the latter que

the French cavalry at Uskub, and. Milne's British troops on Bulgarian

id soil, Bulgaria capitalated. - The back door to Turkey and to Ens- tría, even to Germany. Izy ajz

"The Supremes Commrmani

amly for a mat

dect

FORIL AND

Hostalities with

aat 100 today

fast

back will be reja

here will

Liga

fat that hour

THE WAR

(Continued from Column 2)

to appeal for an armistice, saying that the collapse of the Bulgarian front had upset all their disposi Itions "troops destined for the Western front had had to be des patched there." This had "funda-

envoys for the concluding dia cussion At its close a general zzove was made to the table bezr ing the fateful document, and in strained silence the names were set down at 5.15 am:. For the Allies. For Germamy."

F.Foch,

R.E. Wemyss.

Erzberger, Oberndorff

Winterfeldt, Vanuciow

At seven o'clock -Marshal Foch

mentally changed", the situation in ordered his car and started for view of the attacks then being Paris

launched on the Western front, for

though these "had so far been It had never been so bad as he had beaten off their continuance must pictured it on September 29. But

reckoned with **-

be

his first impression had now spread

28

Haig's Main Blow

throughout the political circles and This clause refers to Foch's public of Germany. On October general offensive. The American 26 he was dismissed. His impres- attack in the Meuse-Argonne had sions were still spreading begin on September 26, but had the ripples spread when a pebble come practically to a standstill by has been dropped in a pool. the 28th A Franco-Belgo-British Then, for thirty-six hours, the attack had opened in Flanders on Chancellor lay in coma from an the 28th, but if mpleasant did not overdose of sleeping dranght. look really menacing. But on the When he returned to his office on morning of the 29th Haig's main the evening of November 3, - not blow was falling on the Hinden-only-Turkey, but Austria, had burg line, and the early news was capitulated- disquieting.

Revolution

In this emergency Prince Max Next day revolution broke out was called to the Chancellor to in Germmy, and, swept rapidly negotiate a peace move with his over the country. And in these interational reputation for modera last days of tremendous and diverse tion and honour. as its covering paychological: strain the “redden- pledge. To bargain effectively ing" glare behind was accentuated zad without confession of defeat by a fooming cloud on the Lor the needed, and asked, a breathing

where the renewed space of ten, eight, even

days, before I have to

the enemy "But

merely reiterated that

a pont