_All correspondents on June 14 united in the conclusion that the
counterblows of the Allies and the brilliant reaction of the French
from Courcelles to Mery ended the fourth phase of the great German
offensive. Mr. Perris summed up the situation as follows on June 14:_
The front has subsided into actions of no more than local importance.
The five days' battle west of the Oise has ended for the Germans, after
an advance varying from two to six miles, in a very costly reverse,
and for the Allies in a brilliant success of good generalship and
indomitable spirit in the ranks.
Beside the losses of the enemy, the French loss of the Thiescourt hills
and the wooded part of the valley opposite is of little importance.
The offensive which was to give a decision against them is far from
finished, but in relation to the resistance it encounters it shows a
falling, not a rising, gamut of power.
The first push toward Amiens ended in ten days, having entailed upon
the Allies the sacrifice of a tract forty miles deep and serious
casualties. The following attack in the north lasted about as long, but
with much slighter gains. The German success on the Chemin des Dames
brought the Crown Prince's vanguard to the Marne, twenty-five miles
from its starting point, but that it touched much less vital ground is
proved by the transfer of its centre of pressure to the Ourcq Valley
near Villers-Cotterets.
From these results to those of the present week's fighting there is a
marked descent, and this failure occurs in what must be accounted one
of the most critical directions the enemy can pursue. The ambitious
character of his design is now clear. It is not merely to divide the
British from the French army and then destroy one of them, but also by
a single series of converging operations to destroy them both.
His approach to Amiens as the centre of their joint communications
and to Hazebrouck as the door to the Channel ports has been followed
by an approach along four converging lines to the region of Paris,
the centre of French administrative life. In fact, the attainment of
all these objectives would not end the war, for I am sure there is
in France, and there probably is in the other countries concerned, a
deadly resolution that it shall not be ended in any such way; that, if
Paris should be destroyed--which heaven forfend--another capital shall
be found, and that there shall be no surrender while there is an army
on its legs.
This offensive has had two aims--to reach the crescent north and east
of Paris, whence a general attack could be launched, and to draw down,
disperse, and harry the allied reserves preparatory to the final
"Kaiserschlacht," the crowning blow along the whole line. Its relative
failure is a great encouragement.