CONTINUATION OF WAR IN 1917.
_German Sea Raider Busy--British Victory in Mesopotamia
--Russia Dethrones the Czar--United States' Relations
with Germany Severed--Germans Retreat on the West_.
On January 10 the Greek government accepted the ultimatum of the
Allies, providing satisfaction to them without interfering with the
administration of the country or local communications. From this time on
the situation in Greece ceased to be a source of serious trouble to the
Allied commanders at Saloniki.
GERMAN SEA RAIDER BUSY.
It was learned on January 17 that a German sea raider, which had
succeeded in slipping through the cordon of British ships, had been
preying on commerce in the south Atlantic for six weeks. Twenty-one
vessels were reported to have been sunk by the raider, with a total loss
of approximately $40,000,000. Victims of the raider who were landed at
Pernambuco, Brazil, January 18 stated their belief that she was the
steamship Moewe, notorious as a raider early in the war, but later
reported docked in the Kiel Canal. It was said that she left the Canal
disguised as a Danish hay-ship.
NAVAL BATTLE IN THE NORTH SEA.
In a sea battle off Zeebrugge, Holland, on January 23, fourteen German
torpedo-boat destroyers, attempting to leave port, were attacked by a
British flotilla and seven of them were reported sunk.
BRITISH VICTORY IN MESOPOTAMIA.
Victorious advances were made in Mesopotamia during the month of January
by the British forces, who were determined to wipe out the reverse
sustained in the surrender at Kut-el-Amara in 1916. On January 21 it was
announced that the Turks had been driven out of positions on the right
bank of the Tigris, near Kut, the British occupying their trenches on a
wide front.
After a series of persistent attacks Kut-el-Amara fell before the
British advance on February 26, opening the road to Bagdad. The Turkish
garrison of the city took flight, hotly pursued by the British cavalry,
and more than 2,000 prisoners were taken, with many guns and large
quantities of war material. Next day the British defeated the Turks in a
sanguinary battle 15 miles northwest of the captured town, and took many
more prisoners. Bagdad soon fell into their hands, and as the month of
April approached the British were on the eve of effecting a junction
with the Russian army advancing through Mesopotamia.
ON THE EASTERN FRONT.
After many vicissitudes in the fighting on the Eastern front in January,
the Russians struck a smashing blow at the Teuton line on January 28,
tearing a mile-wide gap in Bukowina, close to the Roumanian frontier.
Berlin admitted that the offensives on the Sereth and Riga fronts had
been temporarily stopped, that many prisoners had been taken by the
Russians, and that the German lines had been withdrawn because of
superior pressure. The reorganized Roumanian army was reported ready for
a new offensive in the spring.
The Russian successes were, however, only temporary and the remainder of
the winter campaign was marked by repeated efforts on the part of the
Germans to break down the Russian defenses of Riga on the north, and to
push the Slavs still further back on the south. Late in February the
Teuton forces entered Russian positions in Galicia and also re-took
the offensive on the Roumanian front, raiding Russian trenches in the
Carpathians and blocking all Russian attempts to force the mountain
passes. On February 28 they recaptured most of the peaks in the Bukowina
which were lost to the Russians earlier in the year, and took a large
number of Russian prisoners.
Meanwhile the Russian advance in Persia and Mesopotamia against the
Turks continued unchecked, and events of importance were shaping
themselves in the Russian empire, calculated to have an immense effect
on the conduct of the Russian armies in the field as well as on the
fortunes of the Romanoff dynasty.
RUSSIA DETHRONES THE CZAR.
Early in March, after several days of ominous silence in regard to
events in Petrograd, the news of a successful revolution in Russia
astonished the world. From March 9 to March 15, it appeared, the Russian
people, headed by Michael Rodzianko, President of the Duma, set about
cleaning house with quiet but characteristic thoroughness. Beginning
with minor food riots and labor strikes, the cry for food reached the
hearts of the soldiers, and one by one, regiments rebelled until finally
those troops which had for a time stood loyal to the government of the
Czar and his bureaucratic advisers gathered up their arms and marched
into the ranks of the revolutionists.
The change came with startling and dramatic rapidity. The Duma, ordered
by Imperial rescript to dissolve, refused to obey and voted to continue
its meetings. An Executive Committee was appointed, headed by the
President of the Duma, which after arresting a number of pro-German
ministers of the Czar, proclaimed itself a Provisional Government
and announced its intention of creating a new representative form of
government for the country. With the assistance of the army, it was soon
in control.
Czar Nicholas was promptly compelled to abdicate the throne for himself
and his young son. At first the crown was offered to his brother, the
Grand Duke Michael, but inside of twenty-four hours he declined it, also
abdicating formally. The Czar and imperial family were confined, while
the former pro-German ministers were thrown into prison. The new
Provisional Government pledged itself to conduct the war against Germany
vigorously, and promised the people complete religious liberty and
freedom of speech, political amnesty, universal suffrage, and a
constitutional assembly to determine the form of the permanent new
government. Great Britain, France, and Italy were prompt to recognize
the Duma committee and it was also given enthusiastic support by the
Russian armies in the field.
By March 20 absolute quiet prevailed in Petrograd and throughout Russia.
The Allies were officially notified of the abdication of Nicholas II and
informed by Foreign Minister Milukoff that Russia would stay in the
war with them to the end. Prince Lvoff, one of the most popular men in
Russia, was placed at the head of the Government Constitute and general
political amnesty was proclaimed in a ukase which brought numbers of
political prisoners back to their homes from Siberia, and caused great
rejoicing throughout the country, no longer an empire of the Romanoffs,
who had ruled it for centuries with a rod of iron.
The United States recognized the new order of things in Russia on March
22. A few days later the grand dukes and royal princes of Russia jointly
informed the Government Constitute that they formally associated
themselves with the abdication of Grand Duke Michael and would turn over
to the new Government the crown lands and other state grants in their
possession, thus completing the total abdication of the Romanoff
dynasty and placing the seal of complete success on the most remarkable
revolution the world ever saw--accomplished almost without bloodshed,
for the troops in Petrograd had refused to fire upon the revolutionists
after the first few hours of disturbance in the streets of the capital,
and most of the casualties were among the soldiers themselves.
The Russian revolution, produced in the crucible of war, meant the
overthrow of Germanism in Russia, which had hampered the efforts of its
armies by treasonable neglect, if not worse, and in the opinion of many
neutral observers, destroyed the last chance of a German victory in the
war. The effect of the revolution on Germany was twofold--it darkened
her military outlook, and gave a tremendous impulse to the latent
liberal forces within her empire. Its effect on the war was almost
equivalent to bringing a new nation into the camp of the Allies. Its
meaning to German democracy was thus stated:
"Germany has been taught to believe that the European war was
inaugurated by Russia for aggressive purposes. Germany's democratic
leaders repeatedly pointed to Czarism as the evil spirit dominating
the Entente. The object of the Central Powers was proclaimed to be
the overthrow of the Russian autocratic menace. Therefore the Russian
revolution may profoundly move German democracy. This is probably its
greatest disillusionment since the war began."
CAUSES OF THE REVOLUTION.
To get a clear picture of the conditions that produced the revolution,
it is necessary to remember that from a very early period the
German-born Czarina and the clique of pro-German reactionaries whom
her influence made powerful with the Czar, were bent on ending the war
prematurely in the interests of reaction. The Ministers set up under
these auspices for over two years acted in defiance of public opinion.
Their policy was not obscure: they hampered the army in respect of
munitions, disorganized the country in respect of its distributive
services, brought about artificial famine in a land which is one of the
world's chief food-producers, and themselves, through police agents,
sought to stir up abortive revolts in order that they might plead
military failure and internal revolution as a reason for withdrawing
from the war.
The Russian people foiled them for a long time by magnificent and
much-enduring patriotism. When the government left the army without
munitions, the local authorities--the zemstvos and unions of
towns--stepped in and organized their supply. When police agents tried
to bring about riots and strikes, the workmen's own leaders prevented
their breaking out. When secret negotiations were opened up with
Germany, the Duma blasted them by public exposure on the popular side.
The Duma's demand for sympathetic and really national government was
enforced, first by the Council of the Empire, normally the stronghold of
high officialdom, and then by the Congress of Nobles, which represents
the landed aristocracy.
But with the nobility, much of the bureaucracy, the army, the navy,
the Duma, the professional classes, and the working classes all ranged
against them, the "dark forces" of the empire held obstinately on their
way. The murder of the court favorite, the infamous monk Rasputin,
only intensified the reaction, though its story and sequel showed
significantly how far many members of the Imperial family were from
supporting the reigning head and his consort in the policy which was
jeopardizing the dynasty. But the Czar's political blindness was
incurable. In a kind of panic he got rid of every remaining progressive
minister; a nonentity of no importance from the Czar's personal circle
was made prime minister, and the real power fell to Protopopoff, the
strong man of the "dark forces," who was to see their designs through,
but was the first victim of the popular uprising. As minister of the
interior he defied all Russia, precipitated the revolution, and in his
violent death the career of the "dark forces" in Russia was ended, no
doubt for all time.
UNRESTRICTED SUBMARINE WARFARE.
On February 1 Germany entered upon unrestricted submarine warfare, a
last resort of desperation. Ten ships were reported sunk and eight lives
lost that day. Neutral vessels and belligerents were destroyed without
discrimination, and in the first six days the tonnage of the vessels
sunk by German U-boats was 86, tons, including 45 ships of all
nationalities. The British liner California, formerly of the Anchor
Line, was torpedoed on the seventh day, and sank with a loss of 100
lives. Transatlantic ships were held in New York and other eastern
ports, pending instructions from the Government as to sailing in the
face of the German warning, against which President Wilson had strongly
protested.
RELATIONS WITH GERMANY SEVERED.
Diplomatic relations were broken with Germany on February 2,
when President Wilson appeared before a joint session of Congress and
announced that the German Ambassador, Count von Bernstorff, had been
given his passports, and that Ambassador Gerard had been recalled from
Berlin. War with Germany was then believed to be only a matter of hours,
awaiting the first German overt act. The reserve force of the Atlantic
Fleet was ordered to make ready for immediate service. But the hour had
not yet struck for war.
INTERNED SHIPS DAMAGED BY GERMANS.
Examination of a number of the German merchant vessels interned in
United States ports showed that most of them had been seriously damaged
by their crews to render them unseaworthy, and it was rumored that the
partial wreckage of these ships had been ordered February 1 by the
German government. Twenty-three German ships seized by the naval
authorities at Manila were also found to have received willful damage.
On February 8 the State Department notified all American vessel-owners
that merchant ships under the American flag might arm against submarines
but that no naval convoys would be supplied by the Government. Sailings
of American liners were still held up pending decision about their
armament.
The United States Senate indorsed the stand of the President in the
break with Germany, by a vote of 78 to 5.
On February 13 it was announced at Washington that an advance was made
by the German government, through the Swiss legation, offering to reopen
the discussion of submarine methods. The answer of the United States was
to the effect that the Government refused to discuss the international
situation with Germany until the U-boat warfare was abandoned and the
pledges made in the case of the steamer Sussex were restored. The
Spanish ambassador took over the deserted American embassy at Berlin.
President Wilson, with his cabinet, prepared a bill of particulars
containing the grievances against the German government, with special
emphasis on the refusal of the latter to liberate seventy-two American
seamen taken to Germany as prisoners on the steamer Yarrowdale, one of
the vessels captured in the South Atlantic by the raider supposed to be
the Moewe.
GERMAN PLOT IN MEXICO.
Intense feeling was aroused throughout the United States when it was
learned on February 28 that Germany had suggested to Mexico an alliance
by which war was to be made on the United States if it did not remain
neutral. Mexico was to have German aid to regain the southwestern
territory acquired from it, and to have a share in the ultimate peace
conference. It was to induce Japan to leave the Allies and join in
making war on America. Documentary proof of such plots was said to be
in the hands of the President, but a few days later the German foreign
secretary admitted the scheme as his own and sought to justify it as a
necessary precaution against war. The discovery of the plot did more
than anything else to arouse the American people to a sense of the
danger impending from Germany.
GERMANS RETREAT ON THE WEST.
After numerous minor successes by the British and French on the Western
front, the Germans effected a retreat late in February, which was the
greatest retirement in two years, as they yielded on a front of several
miles on the Ancre to the Allies, including important towns. The growing
superiority of the Allies in artillery had begun to count, and the
retirement, while announced from Berlin as strategic, was undoubtedly
forced by the development of Allied strength. The capture of Bapaume
soon followed. By March 2 the Germans had retreated on a front of
miles to a depth of from two to three miles, and the British were still
pushing forward.
Another extended German retreat began on the West front March 17, the
British and French advancing without resistance for from two to four
miles on a front of 35 miles. Peronne was captured next day and it
became evident that the Germans were falling back to a so-called
Hindenburg line, 25 miles to the rear of their former positions. The
Allied advance continued until more than 300 towns and villages were
reoccupied and some 1,500 square miles of French territory regained by
March 21. The German armies in their retreat devastated the country in
the most wanton manner, even going so far as to destroy fruit trees,
wells, churches, and buildings of every kind. They also drove before
them many of the inhabitants, including women and girls, leaving only
a remnant of the former populations, mostly old and feeble folk and
children, these being left destitute and without food even for a day.
The story of this devastating retreat aroused horror throughout the
world.
On March 25 the French pressed an attack against the whole front between
St. Quentin and Soissons and made progress everywhere. From this time on
the French offensive was active for three weeks, culminating in a great
victory on the Soissons front April 16, in which the German losses were
placed at 100,000.
A GREAT BRITISH OFFENSIVE.
In the week of April 9 the British made great gains in the Arras sector,
capturing German positions to a great depth and taking a total of some
15,000 prisoners and 190 guns of all calibers, some of which were turned
against the Germans as they sought to stem the tide of British successes
by desperate rearguard actions. Notable victories were won by the
Canadian troops in the capture of the hotly contested Vimy Ridge and
other positions during the battle of Arras, as this series of important
engagements was called, even before it was concluded with all the honors
in Allied hands.
For several days after the first dash on Monday morning, April 9, the
British tore through the German defenses on an extended front north and
south of Arras, from the north bank of the River Scarpe to the German
trench system just south of Loos, and straddled the iron line of
Hindenburg by April 13 as far as a point seven miles southeast of Arras.
But success did not stop here. To the south the British progressed on
a front of about nine miles, between Metz-en-Coutre and a point to the
north of Hargicourt The French columns joining the British in this
sector swept forward along with their allies. They attacked with
tremendous vigor German positions south of St. Quentin and carried
several lines of trenches between the Somme and the St. Quentin railway.
These positions were held despite every effort of the Germans to retake
them.
Throughout the length of interlinked chain of advances the fighting was
of the utmost ferocity.
For the first time in the war the British were making sharp drives and
smashes like a skillful pugilist, every one of which contained force
enough to have been considered a major attack in the history of other
wars. In places the attack has shaken loose from the trenches and was
being delivered along the lines of the old Napoleonic strategy.
The British captures of Vimy and later of Givenchy were looked on
as victories of the utmost importance, equal to the storming by the
Canadians of the Vimy Ridge. When this line of hills was firmly in the
hands of the Canadians, they hauled their heavy guns up to the summit
with extraordinary speed and proceeded to batter to pieces the powerful
defenses of Vimy, while they made continual thrusts down the eastern
slopes.
In 1915 Vimy was for a time held by the French under Gen. Foch, but they
were shouldered out with great slaughter by the Germans, who proceeded
to lavish the last details of their military science upon the
fortifications of the town.
Givenchy, too, before which many British dead lie buried, was a
stronghold upon which the Germans counted to stem any advance.
On April 16 the extension of the British attack nearly to Loos
threatened to pocket Lens, just as a loop had been thrown around St.
Quentin, and the fall of this industrial city with its rich coal mines
was considered inevitable. Indeed, credible reports had been received in
Paris that the devastation of the rich city of Lille by the Germans was
well under way, indicating that they contemplated a reluctant evacuation
of the most important center in northern France. At all events, an
immediate ebb in the German tide was necessitated by the British
successes of April 9 to 16. The momentum of Field Marshal Haig's advance
and the successes of the French on their share of the western front
appeared to make a further retirement of the whole German line
imperative--and the great Allied drive had scarcely begun.
SCENE OF THE CANADIAN VICTORY.
An exploration on April 13 of Vimy Ridge, carried by the Canadian troops
in a series of historic charges, showed that the British artillery
virtually blew off the top of it, and the German stronghold which had
resisted all efforts of the French and British during more than two
years of war, was finally forced into such a position by high explosives
that it could no longer resist infantry charges. Walking on the top of
the ridge was a continuous climb from one shell crater to another. Two
surmounting knobs, known only on military maps as numbered hills, had
attracted the fire of the heaviest British guns and had been shattered
into unrecognizable buttes on the landscape.
It was little wonder the Germans made such desperate efforts to hold the
Vimy ridge and to retake certain portions of it by counter attacks which
failed miserably. The ridge stood as a natural barrier between the
Germans and their opponents and was a great protective chain of hills
shielding invaluable coal, iron, and other mineral lands that Germany
had wrested from France in the first onrush of the war in 1914. The city
of Lens, within sight of the British lines, from the ridge, is a great
mining center.
THE FRENCH VICTORY AT SOISSONS.
On April 16 the "big push" of the Allies in France flared into a
continuous battle covering nearly every mile of the long line from the
North Sea to the Swiss border. Between Soissons and Rheims the French
engaged in a terrific struggle, driving forward in a solid mass against
the German lines on a front of twenty-five miles. Their way paved by ten
days of "drum fire," the troops of Gen. Nivelle swept forward, carrying
all of the first line of German positions between Soissons and Craonne.
They also took the second line positions, south of Juvincourt, east of
Craonne, reached the outskirts of Bermericourt, and advanced up the
Aisne canal at Loivre and Courcy.
During these operations the French captured 10,000 Germans and a vast
amount of war material.
The British were continuing their pressure on both Lens and St. Quentin,
but were temporarily held up by a great storm on the 16th. The night
before they captured the village of Villaret, which straightened Field
Marshal Haig's line northwest of St. Quentin, and made further progress
to the northwest of Lens. The prison cages to the rear of Arras were
filled with German prisoners, nearly all of whom were captured in a
dazed condition from the terrific British fire that won the great battle
of Arras.
A TITANIC STRUGGLE FORESEEN.
"The struggle in the western theater of war promises to be a titanic
one," said an eye-witness at British headquarters, April 16. "The Allies
are prepared as never before, both in material and personnel, and are
co-operating with a smoothness which comes from a complete understanding
and thorough appreciation of the work in hand.
"The Germans have more divisions on the western front than would have
been thought possible a year ago, but already a half score of Germany's
best divisions have been smashed to pieces by the British onslaught and
their own unsuccessful counter-attacks. The Bavarian divisions were
sacrificed first, but the Prussian Guard divisions, thrown in to stem
the British flood tide, have suffered such casualties in the last few
days that they will have to be relieved."
The Canadians accounted for a large contingent of Prussian grenadiers
in the fighting about "The Pimple" on Vimy ridge while an engagement at
Lagnicourt April 15 took its heaviest toll both in dead and prisoners
from five German guard regiments.
GERMAN ROUT AT LAGNICOURT.
The rout of the Germans at Lagnicourt, after what they believed to have
been a successful attack, will ever be one of the striking pictures of
the war. Repulsed and running for their own trenches, they were trapped
by the barbed wire entanglements which had been built with such great
strength and thickness in front of them. The boast of the Hindenburg
line had been its belts of protective wire.
Caught within the meshes of this wire, the German guardsmen screamed
madly for help and guidance. Some, like trapped rabbits, scurried up
and down the outer barrier, searching in vain for openings. The British
troops meantime had the greatest opportunity for open field rifle
shooting since the battle of the Marne. Lying flat upon the ground, they
poured bullets into the panic-stricken, gray-coated Germans until each
man had fired a full 100 rounds.
While this was going on the British field guns came into play with a
shrapnel barrage fire which completed the demolition of the entrapped
enemy. It was little wonder that later 1,500 German dead could be
counted, or that 400 guardsmen surrendered with upheld hands and
emotional cries of "Kamerad!"
FRENCH CONTINUE ADVANCE IN APRIL
The French under General Nivelle continued their victorious advance on
the Soissons-Craonne line April 18, crushing the German resistance along
a front of thirty-five miles, and raising the total of German prisoners
taken during the movement to 17,000. Seventy-five guns, including a
number of heavy siege pieces, were captured.