THE COMMAND OF THE ALLIED ARMIES IN THE ORIENT. THE FRENCH TROOPS.
Let us now see how the Chief Command of the Allied Armies at Salonica
was organized. This should have been essentially an inter-Allied
Command. But in practice it always remained a French Command, to
which some liaison officers were attached representing the other
Allied armies. Instead of devoting his attention to operations
exclusively, and particularly to those executed by several Allied
forces in collaboration, General Sarrail, and to a lesser extent even
his successors, was principally occupied with the _Armée française
d’Orient_, although the latter had its own Command and Staff. Sarrail
moreover attended personally to a number of other matters, such as the
police, the Press and postal censorship, trade, archæology etc., which
ought not to have required the attention of the Commander-in-Chief, or
at least should have been delegated by him to subordinates.
General Sarrail came to Salonica from the French front, where he had
commanded the III Army. He had proved himself a gallant soldier, and
had distinguished himself at the Marne and at the first battle of
Verdun. But he was not a good army commander, nor was he popular at
G.H.Q. on account of his intriguing nature. The French Government
wished to get rid of him, and, having recalled him from the command of
the III Army, contemplated sending him to the East to take command of
an expedition which was to have operated in the Dardanelles and in Asia
Minor. But when the impossibility of holding the Dardanelles became
manifest that scheme was abandoned, and General Sarrail was appointed
to command the troops in Macedonia. He at first did not wish to go, as
he regarded that command as inferior to his rank, but he soon saw that
the choice lay between Salonica and Limoges, so that he had to accept.
He therefore reached Macedonia under the shadow of failure, and this
was the initial reason which prevented him from exercising great
authority or personal prestige over the other Allied commanders. His
policy of intrigue increased this lack of confidence in him. In a
certain passage of his memoirs he makes the characteristic admission
that, while he was still in Paris before coming out to take up his
duties in the East, M. Millerand, then Minister of War, enjoined on
him at their last interview “not to frequent members of Parliament.”
He was extremely ambitious and had high political aspirations, so
that from the beginning of his reign at Salonica we find him deeply
involved in diplomatic questions, and he subordinated his whole
military activity to political considerations. He never showed himself
a really inter-Allied commander; he constantly acted in what he thought
were the interests of France, but he understood French interests only
in the narrowest and most exclusive sense, not only to the detriment
of the interests of the other Allies, but also to that of a common
friendly agreement of all the Allies, and consequently even of the
real higher interests of his own country. Many of the far more serious
disagreements which have subsequently developed between France and
her Allies have their remote origins in the bickerings engendered by
General Sarrail’s policy in Macedonia.
In appearance he was a handsome, attractive-looking man, of martial
bearing, in spite of his white hair, and he was affable with everybody.
He affected a slightly exaggerated _bonhomie_ which occasionally
assumed a somewhat vulgar tone, easily degenerating into coarseness.
Nor did he always maintain that dignity which should characterize the
bearing of every officer, but particularly of one invested with such
important functions. He allowed Captain Mathieu, attached to his Staff
(an officer of whom I shall have more to say later) to behave and
adopt a tone towards him at his own mess which scandalized the other
French or Allied officers who were present at these unedifying scenes.
A freemason, an anti-Clerical, of strong Radical-Socialist sympathies,
he had composed his Staff of officers having the same views, many of
whom had no other qualifications for their jobs. The great majority of
the French officers were anything but enthusiastic towards Sarrail’s
military and political conduct; they complained of favouritism in the
matter of promotions for merit, which were reserved for a small clique
of officers in his immediate entourage, and were seldom granted to the
real fighters. He rarely visited the front, save on the occasion of
ceremonies, conferring of medals, official visits, etc. He prepared his
plans of operations in his office at Salonica, where he spent nearly
all his time, even during important offensives.
His amorous relations were the subject of a vast amount of gossip. His
friendship for a Russian lady of high rank reached such a point that
she was allowed to enter his office at G.H.Q. at any moment, even when
he himself was not there and confidential documents were spread about
his desk. The lady in question was actually suspected of espionage,
and apart from this charge, which was probably unfounded, she was also
accused of illicit interference in political and military affairs. In
this connexion she once said to an Italian officer, some time after
Sarrail’s departure; “It has been stated that when General Sarrail was
here, it was I who commanded the Armée d’Orient. Unfortunately, this
was untrue; if I had commanded it, far fewer _bêtises_ would have been
committed.” The greatest surprise caused by General Sarrail was his
marriage with a French Red Cross nurse attached to one of the military
hospitals in Salonica, in the spring of 1917. The affair caused a
considerable scandal, as all Allied officers were forbidden to bring
their wives out to Macedonia, whereas Sarrail not only married, but
kept his wife with him in Salonica.
[Illustration: CHURCH OF ST. GEORGE, SALONICA.
To face p. 58.
]
The absolute want of confidence of the Allied commanders under his
orders in General Sarrail’s military qualities, his position became
ever more impossible. To command an army composed of soldiers
belonging to five different nationalities, two of them indigenous to
the country, each with its own military organization, is at best no
easy task, and only a leader endowed with great tact, a conciliatory
spirit and a keen respect for the national feelings of others could
have done so with success. In a national army the orders of the
commander are obeyed without discussion; but in a force like the
Armée d’Orient the Allied commanders under General Sarrail were
representatives of their respective G.H.Q.’s and Governments, to whom
they could always apply if he gave orders which appeared to them out
of place. Sarrail ever gave the first consideration to the political
effect which this or that event would produce, and he often gave orders
for an operation simply because he believed that it would make a good
impression on the public and on the Press, and consequently on the
world of politicians, even if it were of no real military value. It was
clear that with such a leader, even if he had had military qualities
superior to those which he actually possessed, and if he had had really
abundant resources at his disposal, it would have been very difficult
to carry out an offensive on a large scale with any likelihood of
success. In fact, while the Monastir offensive was only half a success
and produced hardly any results, the offensive of May, 1917 was, as we
shall see, a complete failure. Sarrail’s only real achievement was the
deposition of King Constantine, and that was a political rather than a
military enterprise.
A characteristic side of General Sarrail’s activities was his
commercial policy. He took a lively interest in the promotion of French
economic development in Macedonia, to the detriment, not of enemy
interests, which were non-existent, but of those of the other Allies.
He had instituted a very well-organized commercial bureau, but it was
generally regarded as not quite correct that an inter-Allied Commander
should avail himself of his position as such to develop the trade of
his own country alone. To attain this object he also made use of the
postal censorship, to which he devoted considerable attention. By its
means he learnt which local merchants sent their orders to France and
which to other countries; the latter were not infrequently the objects
of thinly veiled threats and persecutions, inflicted with a view to
inducing them to alter their ways. Matters reached such a point that
the other Governments ended by establishing postal censorships of their
own over the correspondence between Salonica and their respective
countries.
General Sarrail had numerous conflicts with the Italian Command. I
have already mentioned the incidents which occurred in connexion
with the Monastir operations and the transfer of the division. But
incidents were of almost daily occurrence. One day a movement order
concerning our own troops was not communicated to the Italian Command;
another time a communiqué from G.Q.G. on some operation in which an
Italian detachment had greatly distinguished itself failed to mention
the Italians at all. On one occasion the local French or Greek press
was allowed or inspired to print articles attacking and libelling
Italy, while on another the local Italian paper _La Voce d’Italia_
was suspended for having replied in a somewhat violent tone. It might
be thought that the Italians were too susceptible on these matters,
but incidents of this kind occurred with such frequency in connexion
with them that it was impossible to avoid the conclusion that there
was considerable animosity on Sarrail’s part against them. But above
all our Command was convinced that he had no notion of what war in the
Balkans really was. In this it was in perfect agreement with the other
Allied Commands.
With the other Allies too Sarrail’s relations were anything but
cordial. He was in constant disagreement with the British, whose
commander had succeeded in getting himself invested with the rank of
Commander-in-Chief so as to reduce his dependence on Sarrail to a
minimum. Even with the Serbs he was not on good terms. They complained
that French help had come too late to save their country from disaster,
and that the French never forgot to remind them of their debt to
France. They did not wish to take orders in matters of tactics
from the C.A.A., both because their army was commanded by the Crown
Prince who refused to accept a subordinate position, and because they
considered that they knew a good deal more about Balkan warfare than
Sarrail, and in this they were not altogether wrong. They were moreover
irritated by the fact that the French communiqués never gave sufficient
prominence to the actions of the Serbian troops, so that their G.H.Q.
ended by issuing communiqués of its own. Even with the Greeks, to whom,
after the Venizelist revolution, he always spoke “honeyed words” in
public, he was on the worst of terms, as appears from his memoirs and
articles published since the war. The street in Salonica which had been
gratefully baptized “Odos Sarrail” has recently had its name altered.
It can be fairly stated that General Sarrail stands condemned by his
own memoirs more severely than by any outside criticism. The volume
is very interesting and well written, but, as a distinguished Italian
officer stated, “on a background of undeniable truths, he has woven
a tissue of venemous untruths, with which he has sought in vain to
justify his action in the Orient.” His political intrigues, his conduct
towards the Allies, the manner in which he treated many gallant French
officers, such as General Cordonnier--to mention one case alone--all
this appears in the clearest light in his _Apologia pro vita sua_.
The G.H.Q. of the C.A.A. was of course at Salonica. It was, like other
French Army Commands, divided into two main branches--the _État-major
de l’Avant_ and the _Direction de l’Arrière_. The Chief of the General
Staff under General Sarrail was first Colonel George and then General
Michaud. The _Avant_ was divided into four bureaux: 1st, effectives
and materials; 2nd, information (intelligence); 3rd, operations; 4th,
supply and transport. Relations between the liaison officers and
the Command and its bureaux were as a rule extremely cordial, and
for my own part I shall always have the pleasantest remembrance of
them, especially of my connexion with the _Deuxième Bureau_, to which
we liaison officers were for a long time attached; its successive
chiefs (these unfortunately were constantly changing) were regular,
and usually very distinguished, officers of field rank, and the
other members of it were reserve officers, some of them eminent men
in different walks of life--university professors, archæologists,
jurists, etc. With the 3rd bureau too, to which we were afterwards
attached, I always got on well. But it should be added that with the
French Command (advisedly, I call it French, although in theory it
was inter-Allied) there was never that same _camaraderie_ that there
was with the British. With the former we were welcome guests, whereas
the latter treated us as brothers and hid nothing from us. Let me
quote an instance of this difference with regard to the question of
strength returns. It was very important for all the Allies to know
each other’s respective strengths. We naturally communicated ours to
the C.A.A. and the other Commands periodically and in the greatest
detail. To learn the French strength required immense labour and
ingenuity in collecting, collating and completing the figures; they
were communicated to us unwillingly, in an incomplete form and with
considerable delay--it was indeed far easier to learn what were the
enemy’s effectives than those of the French. The British on the other
hand placed their statistical returns at our disposal, showing the
organic strength, the actual strength, the reinforcements asked for
and those known to be on their way out, for each unit and specialty.
Nor did the Serbs or Greeks have any objection to communicating their
strengths to us. It was generally believed that the reason of this
reticence on the part of the French was that, while they maintained
the number of their units unchanged, their effective strength was
greatly reduced, and that they feared that the Allies, especially the
British, might avail themselves of this state of things as a pretext
for refusing to recognize France’s right to the supreme command of
operations in Macedonia. I do not know whether this was the real or
only reason, but the fact in itself is undoubted, and it certainly
rendered co-operation much more difficult than it ought to have been.
[Illustration: TRANSPORT IN WINTER.]
[Illustration: THE ALLIED LIAISON OFFICERS AT G.H.Q., SALONICA.
To face p. 62.
]
The services of the Army were carried out partly by the 1st and 4th
bureaux of the _Avant_, and partly by the _Direction de l’Arrière_, the
latter being for a long time under the sympathetic and jovial General
Boucher. The organization was not perfect, and transport and supplies
were sometimes faulty. The Italian expeditionary force in particular
often suffered from these defects whenever its services had to be
supplied by the French, not on account of any ill-will on the part of
the latter, but owing to the defects of the system and the imperfect
manner in which orders were executed. The French themselves were wont
to say that more time was needed for a letter to go from the _Avant_ to
the _Arrière_ than to ask for and obtain instructions from Paris.
Of the 8 French divisions 5 were Metropolitan (i.e. raised in France
proper)--the 30th, 57th, 76th, 122nd, and 156th--and 3 Colonial--the
11th, 16th and 17th. At first they were all of 4 regiments of 3
battalions each. But subsequently, owing to the reduction of strengths
and also to the general reorganization of the French Army, the
Metropolitan divisions were reduced to 3 regiments each, and the
brigades (which had been of 2 regiments each) abolished. Each regiment
in the colonial divisions comprised 2 white and 1 coloured battalion.
The divisions, as we have seen, were formed into groups, corresponding
to army corps but of somewhat looser formation, of whom there were
at first 2 and afterwards 3, and they also included non-French
troops. Special units were from time to time constituted according
to necessity for special operations, etc. There was in addition the
Cavalry Division, comprising the 1st and 4th Chasseurs d’Afrique and
the Morocco Spahis (coloured), commanded by General Jouinot-Gambetta.
There were also some units not forming part of any division such as
the 2nd bis Zouaves, the Algerian, Annamite, Madagascar, Indo-Chinese
_tirailleurs_, the Koritza gendarmerie, etc.
* * * * *
It was generally admitted that the French artillery in Macedonia was
excellent. In spite of the defective and seldom renovated material the
gunners accomplished wonders, and although the enemy during the early
period of the campaign had a larger number of guns than the Allies, and
was supplied to the very end with guns of heavier calibre and greater
range, the French batteries held their own admirably. The French
artillery officers attached to our force were always on the best of
terms with their Italian comrades, and they learned to appreciate each
others’ fine military qualities.
As regards general education, the French officers were superior to
those of any of the other Allied armies. There was hardly one of
them who had not a literary, political and historical culture which
we should have regarded as above the average, and in this they also
ranked above the British; their conversation was nearly always
extremely agreeable owing to their high intellectual level, wide
range of interests and their keen wit. Their knowledge of foreign
languages on the other hand was very slight; regular officers usually
knew German, and among the reserve officers one occasionally came
across some who for business or other reasons knew foreign languages,
but the great majority only understood French. Personally they were
generally attractive, had good manners, made a great many compliments
and very keenly appreciated any courtesy extended to them. At mess
their behaviour was decorous, and they spoke less loudly than their
Italian colleagues, many of whom invariably raised their voices to add
strength to the arguments they were sustaining. But they had a somewhat
exaggerated idea of the absolute superiority of the French over all
other nations in everything, and they did not hide it; for this reason
they sometimes appeared ungenerous, and succeeded in irritating their
foreign colleagues of all the Allied armies. The officers attached to
the General Staff seldom made any attempt to disguise their weakness
for foreign decorations, and the extremely transparent allusions which
they made to the subjects when conversing with liaison officers or
others whom they believed to have ribbons galore at their disposal
contributed not a little to make the horrors of war quite bearable.
French Staff officers were always under the incubus of the _mot
d’ordre_. One day the word would be passed round that optimism was
to be the keynote, and then one saw nothing but smiling faces,
cheerfulness and confidence in the final victory within a month.
Another day the _mot d’ordre_ was in a minor key; that meant long
faces, black pessimism, _le cafard_, no end to the war in sight, the
Germans invincible, peace goodness knows when and at goodness knows
what conditions. All this had nothing to do with the actual military
events either fortunate or the reverse, but was the result of orders
from above. Similarly, their attitude towards the Allies varied from
day to day, being warmly cordial at one moment and coldly courteous the
next.
But whatever the faults of the French may have been, it must be
admitted that in actual combat they were marvellous. Officers and
soldiers vied with each other in patriotism and courage. When they
were in the front lines no one could fail to admire their dash and
gallantry; their battle discipline was magnificent. On the other hand,
their discipline at the rear and on the lines of communication left
much to be desired, and the behaviour of the soldiers and even of not a
few officers at some distance from the front, especially at Salonica,
often led to unpleasant incidents. Once they were away from the front
these men seemed to forget the respect due to their officers, who
seldom dared to reprimand them even for quite serious disciplinary
offences. They often behaved riotously, got drunk, appeared with their
uniforms in disorder, and it was an unusual sight to see two men
dressed alike. A British officer connected with the officers’ clothing
store told the writer that as long as French officers were forbidden
to wear Sam Brown belts he was constantly receiving applications for
authority to purchase them (they could not be sold to non-British
officers without written authority from the A.Q.M.G.), but as soon as
their G.Q.G. issued a circular removing the ban on that article of
equipment the applications from the French fell off!
Rioting among French soldiers was by no means unknown, and encounters
were particularly frequent between French and Allied soldiers, whereas
other allies seldom had rows among themselves. Even the French camps
were less orderly and well-arranged than those of the British or
Italian troops. Where French and Italian troops were in direct liaison
at the front relations were excellent, and the former often had
recourse to the latter’s assistance in constructing huts.
But it was enough to see a French unit in fighting kit on the march
towards the front lines or returning from them to realize the high
military and warlike spirit of the French nation. Patriotic feeling
was extremely developed among all. “Defeatist” talk, expressions of
sympathy, or complaisant admiration for the enemy, such as were heard
among the officers of some other armies, were unknown, and would indeed
not have been tolerated for an instant. They might, as I have said,
often talk in a pessimistic tone, but anything like sympathy for the
enemy was inconceivable. The tradition of ten centuries of splendid
military history was not belied.
Of the sectors held by the French two were particularly hard--that of
Hill 1248, north of Monastir, and around the city, and the eastern part
of the Cerna loop, which presented features similar to those of our
own sector. The other French sectors were extremely uncomfortable, as
was indeed the whole of the Macedonian front, but less dangerous from
a purely military point of view. The Monastir area was exceptionally
hard, inasmuch as the town exercised a peculiar fascination over the
Bulgars--to them it was the symbol of Macedonia, the Mecca of their
Balkan aspirations; indeed almost the only territory not yet occupied
by them to which they laid claim, and which they had reasonable hopes
of acquiring. They therefore maintained a relentless and vigorous
pressure on those lines in the hope of breaking through and achieving
not only a strategic victory of considerable importance, but also a
highly significant moral and sentimental success. The German Command
at one time was anxious to withdraw from the Monastir area altogether,
but the opposition of Bulgaria to this plan for once prevailed. The
struggle round the town therefore continued with great violence,
and the troops on Hill 1248 had to keep a ceaseless vigil, sustain
perpetual attacks or deliver counter-attacks, and were always under the
fire of heavy bombardments. Monastir itself suffered severely as it
sheltered various staffs, and also many batteries of artillery.
The A.F.O. front was reached by railway to Armenohor (the station
for Florina) or Sakulevo, and thence by road and décauville to the
first lines, but supply trains at night went almost into Monastir.
For the troops west of the Pisoderi pass a “telepheric” line was used
for supplies, but it sufficed only for a small part of the necessary
materials, and the rest had to be conveyed by lorry or cart. The two
divisions in the eastern half of the Cerna loop were supplied by the
same routes as those used by the Italians. The H.Q. of the A.F.O. was
at Florina, a pleasant little town at the foot of the Pisoderi pass,
well watered by many runnels and adorned with trees. The troops of the
_Premier groupement_ (122nd Division and Greek units) were supplied by
the Vardar railway to a certain point, and thence by road.