Mud, Blood and Poppycock: Britain and the Great War (Cassel Military) Page 4

  Schlieffen began to question the assumptions of his two great predecessors. He recognised the strength of the reconstituted French army and its forts along the Franco-German border, but considered that they could be bypassed through Belgium. Schlieffen drew up a new war plan, which he refined as his tenure went on. By the time he retired this scheme had achieved a status verging on that of the laws of the Persians and the Medes.

  The Schlieffen plan assumed that in the event of war Russia would take longer to mobilise than France. Only one German army would defend the frontiers of East Prussia, while three would stand along the Franco-German boundary. The plan assumed rightly that this was where France would attack, and saw no difficulty in these armies giving ground if need be. Indeed, were the French to make headway in the centre, this would be an advantage to the Germans, as making the intended outflanking movement – the revolving door, as he put it – more certain of success. The main thrust would be carried out by four more German armies, the strongest, which would wheel along the Channel coast through Holland and Belgium, pass to the west of Paris and then swing east, pinning the French armies against their own frontier defences and destroying them. This move, employing seven-eighths of all available German troops, would be completed within six weeks; the armies would then move east and deal with the Russians. There were snags: Schlieffen never did work out how to deal with the strong garrison of Paris; and the fact that the Netherlands and Belgium were likely to be neutral mattered not a jot. Schlieffen’s successor was Field Marshal Helmuth von Moltke (1848–1916), known to historians as the Younger Moltke to distinguish him from his uncle of the same name. The younger Moltke made some alterations to the plan. Dutch neutrality would not be violated, and the centre was somewhat strengthened at the expense of the flanking armies. As we now know, the plan did not work; but even if Moltke had not altered some of Schlieffen’s arrangements it is doubtful whether the German army could have marched fast enough, or been resupplied in sufficient quantity, to achieve the objectives laid down. The Germans would face – and did face – demolished bridges and destroyed railway lines, while the French could move along interior lines using their own railways. All this is speculation; the point is that this was a plan for unqualified aggression. All general staffs draw up plans for all eventualities, including those where their nation is the aggressor – indeed they would be failing in their duty did they not – but most have defensive plans too. Germany was, of course, vulnerable on all fronts, whereas France and Russia needed only to consider their eastern and western fronts respectively, while Britain could only be invaded by sea, and her navy was by far the most powerful afloat. Despite this, there can be little doubt that Germany’s intention, formed at least as far back as 1906, was to attack when the time was ripe.

  In 1920 General Erich von Ludendorff published The General Staff and Its Problems, in two volumes. Ludendorff had effectively directed the whole of the German war effort from 1916 onwards, and this work was intended to divert blame for the defeat away from the soldiers and on to the politicians. In the foreword Ludendorff insists that the documents he publishes show that a ‘peace of understanding’ was never obtainable, and that much was concealed from the military supreme command by the Imperial government. We need pay but cursory attention to the apologia, but some of the documents are revealing. Ludendorff was the Director of the Concentration Section of the Great General Staff from 1908 until 1913, when he was moved to the command of a regiment for going outside the chain of command to lobby the Reichstag for an increase in the size of the army. The Concentration Section was responsible for the preparation of the army for mobilisation, and for the direction of mobilisation when it came. Ludendorff was thus in a position to know exactly what ministries and the High Command were planning.

  Included in Volume One is a letter, marked ‘Secret’, from the Chief of the General Staff, von Moltke, to the War Ministry, dated 8 February 1911 (on the subject of ammunition reserves): ‘In the war we shall need rapid and decisive victories…If we prepare for the attack on the French fortresses we shall be ready for that on the Russian also…’8 Moltke says: ‘In the war’, not ‘If war comes’, or ‘If it were necessary to go on the offensive’.

  At least as early as 1910 Germany was preparing to go to war, not only with France and Russia, but with England as well. Ludendorff reproduces a paper dated 1 July 1910, sent by von Moltke to the War Ministry. The report begins: ‘The last war game in the General Staff, which was based on the assumption of a war of Germany against France, Russia, and England, combined with the relevant General Staff ride, in which the problem was an English landing in Schleswig-Holstein…’9 A staff ride was the modern TEWT, or Tactical Exercise Without Troops, where command and staff elements study a problem on the ground without the need to deploy men. The theme of a British landing in Schleswig-Holstein recurs in many of Ludendorff’s documents, and it was thought to be likely on the thirteenth day after British mobilisation. Presumably the German staff thinking was that Britain would use her naval power to effect an invasion. The British Admiral Fisher (1841–1920), First Sea Lord (professional head of the navy) from 1904 to 1910, and again from October 1914,10 regarded the British army as a projectile to be fired by the Royal Navy, and was in favour of a landing somewhere on the Baltic coast in the event of war with Germany. In reality, while British naval superiority could certainly have effected a landing, despite the inshore submarine threat, the regular army could not have provided sufficient men to ensure that any beachhead seized was defended and expanded, rather than being driven back into the sea or simply bottled up and ignored. Moltke saw the threat as real, however, but considered that a further German army could not be made available to deal with it, and that if it came it should be contained by depot troops, those responsible for training and running courses.

  The European powers of 1914 were connected in a series of alliances. Germany had been linked to Austria-Hungary since 1879, and this eventually propelled Russia into alliance with France in 1891. Britain hardly considered herself to be a European power at all. Trafalgar in 1805 had given her command of the seas, and Waterloo in 1815 had made her a world power – indeed the only world power for nearly a century. She had long attempted to ensure a balance of power in Europe, whereby no one country might dominate the Continent, and a main plank of her foreign policy was that no potentially hostile power should control the Rhine delta and the Channel ports, Britain’s access to the Continent. Hence the British interest in Belgium, in any case largely a British creation, whose neutrality Britain guaranteed. Apart from the commitment to Belgium, Britain had long remained aloof from any European alliances, and for many decades her empire and her navy allowed her to do so, until the rise of potential economic and military rivals had forced her to modify her stance. Anglo-Japanese treaties had been signed in 1902, 1905 and 1911 and the Entente with France in 1904. The agreement with France was designed to resolve colonial rivalries in North Africa, but it also prompted much closer cultural, social and diplomatic exchanges than hitherto, helped along by the Francophile King Edward VII. The Anglo-Russian Entente of 1907, agreed with a Russia still reeling from ignominious defeat by the Japanese in 1904–05, removed the Russian threat to India via Afghanistan and brought Britain into the Triple Entente with France and Russia. None of these accords required Britain to involve herself in a European war: they were understandings only, and in any case had originally nothing to do with Europe.

  The blow that sparked off the great conflagration of 1914 was struck in the Balkans, a byword for volatility since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and Turkish rule which, while autocratic and often cruel, had at least ensured the stability of the area. In June 1914 the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, with his morganatic wife the Duchess Sophie, was visiting Bosnia, annexed by Austria-Hungary in 1908. There were many Serbs living in Bosnia and both they and Serbia itself objected to the Austrian presence. Franz Ferdinand and his wife were assassinated in Sarajevo
on 29 June 1914 by Gavrilo Princip, a Serbian anarchist.

  Initially European opinion was sympathetic to Austria. Within the dual monarchy opinion ranged from distress and dismay that the heir should have been murdered, through those who thought Slavs within an empire dominated by German-speakers might now be given more consideration (ironically, Franz Ferdinand had been in favour), to those who saw the killing as an excuse for a showdown that would reassert Austria-Hungary’s great-power status, in decline for many years.

  On 23 July 1914 Austria issued a note to Serbia. The terms were described by the British Foreign Secretary, Lord Grey, as ‘the most formidable document that I had ever seen addressed by one state to another that was independent’. The preamble to the note accused Serbia of conniving at a subversive movement aiming to detach portions of the dual monarchy (Austria-Hungary); tolerating unrestrained language on the part of the press, the glorification of the perpetrators of outrages; the participation of officers and functionaries in subversive agitation; and inciting the Serbian population to hatred of the dual monarchy and contempt of its institutions. Austro-Hungarian investigations had, it was claimed, shown that the Sarajevo assassinations were planned in Belgrade, that the arms and explosives had been provided by Serbian officers, and that the assassins had been inserted into Bosnia by the Serbian frontier authorities. Amongst the demands made by Austria-Hungary were a publication in the Serbian official press, and as a general order to the army, of an admission of culpability in, and an expression of regret for, the assassination. Publications expressing anti-Austrian views were to be banned; all anti-Austrian agitation was to stop and anyone in the education system guilty of spreading it was to be removed. Organisations within Serbia considered by Austria to be subversive were to be suppressed with the assistance of Austrian representatives. Serbian army and frontier officials indicated by Austria as being involved in anti-Austrian activities were to be dismissed; two named officers were to be arrested; anyone on Serbian territory involved in the assassination plot was to be put on trial. In all investigations and subsequent judicial proceedings, Austro-Hungarian officials were to take part. Serbia was given just forty-eight hours to reply.11

  Germany claimed to have had no prior knowledge of the Austrian note. In fact, as Fischer shows, Germany knew very well what was intended and both the German government, and the Emperor personally, had assured Austria of unconditional support in whatever action she chose to take. Frenzied attempts at mediation between Austria, Serbia and Russia (as the self-proclaimed protector of Slavs) by Britain and, belatedly, by the Kaiser, and efforts to localise a conflict if it could not be prevented altogether, came to naught. The German High Command enquired of their opposite numbers in Vienna what their intentions were, and were told that Austria would invade Serbia with six corps. If Russia then intervened those forces would be diverted from Serbia to face ‘the principal opponent’. The British Prime Minister, Asquith, said that if war came, Britain’s role would be confined to that of a spectator.

  From then on events moved swiftly. At 1500 hours on 25 July 1914 the Serbian government ordered mobilisation, and at 1800 hours on the same day the Serbian Prime Minister personally handed his government’s reply, to what was effectively an ultimatum, to the Austro-Hungarian ambassador to Belgrade. The Serbian reply went far closer to meeting Austrian demands than anyone had thought possible. All were accepted save two. The admission and apology would be published in the official press but not as a general order to the army (the Serbian government feared a military uprising if it were), and Serbia could not accept the participation of Austro-Hungarian representatives in the trials that Serbia agreed to convene. The Austrians, knowing that they had a blank cheque signed by Germany in their pocket, chose to take this as a rejection of their demands. The Austro-Hungarian embassy left Belgrade.

  On 28 July Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia. On the following day Germany asked for a guarantee of British neutrality in the event of a European war. Britain had still not decided either way, but to declare neutrality would be to encourage war, and on 30 July she declined to give any such undertaking. Russia ordered partial mobilisation in support of her fellow Slavs on 29 July, and Germany warned that unless this was cancelled, she too would mobilise. On 31 July both Russia and Austria-Hungary ordered full mobilisation, as did Turkey, still smarting after her defeat in the Balkan Wars. On the same day Britain asked France (allied to Russia) and Germany for a guarantee of Belgian neutrality in the event of a European war. This was accepted immediately by France, but ignored by Germany. On 1 August Germany, France and Belgium ordered full mobilisation. On 2 August Britain, in reply to an anxious enquiry, assured France that she would not allow the German fleet to fall on the French coast via the North Sea. On 3 August Germany demanded passage through Belgium, and Belgium made an appeal for help from Britain. Germany invaded France, Belgium, Luxembourg and Russian Poland, and declared war on France and Belgium. Britain ordered mobilisation, and issued an ultimatum to Germany demanding withdrawal from Belgium.

  In the lead-up to the outbreak of war Britain had no wish to become involved, and it did seem for a time that she could remain apart. Britain’s main concern was her empire and her trade routes, and she might have been prepared to make some allowances to Germany in Europe in exchange for colonial concessions abroad. What Britain could not accept, however, was a Europe dominated by one potentially unfriendly power, particularly if that power subjugated Belgium and controlled Britain’s routes to and from the Continent. While two British government ministers resigned over the issue, opinion by early August was that France could not be allowed to be crushed by Germany. If she was, then Germany, with the resources of a defeated France and Russia at her disposal, would pose a threat to the United Kingdom and to the British Empire. Another war would be inevitable, and it would not be a war that Britain alone could necessarily win. In the unlikely event of France winning without the support of the British navy and British money, the opprobrium directed against Britain by her nearest neighbour would not be in the British interest either. Germany had fomented this war; Germany had struck the first blow; Germany had violated neutral countries that were no threat to her. It was necessary, and in the British interest, for Britain to declare war, and at midnight German time (2300 hours British time) on 4 August 1914 she did so.

  Prior to August 1914 the German government’s war aims were global and general, revolving around Germany’s aspirations to great-power status, the need to avoid or break out of encirclement, Germany’s rightful place in the (colonial) sun, and the desire for a blue-water navy. A certain amount of anti-British propaganda appeared in the German press from time to time, including a cartoon showing British soldiers leaping out of the Channel tunnel (one was being considered, from Folkestone to Calais, before the war) and invading Germany via Belgium. The declaration of war concentrated minds wonderfully. As early as September 1914, when a short war and a quick victory still looked certain, the Imperial Chancellor, Bethmann Hollweg, was formulating his government’s demands for the peace conference. In an internal paper he stated his government’s aims as being the security of Germany in the east and the west: to weaken France to the extent that she could never regain world-power status, and to push back Russia as far as possible from Germany’s borders. Germany was to be the centre of a Middle-European economic bloc. The French and Belgian iron-ore fields, and ownership of the factories therein, were to be ceded to Germany. The military were to comment on the advisability of demanding the cession of Belfort, the western slopes of the Vosges and the coastal strip from Dunkirk to Boulogne, with fortresses remaining in French hands to be demolished. The French market was to be secured for Germany, and British trade excluded.

  As for Belgium, she was to be reduced to a German vassal state, economically a province of Germany, and her forts were to be occupied by German garrisons. The Emperor lodged a suggestion that the portion of Belgium bordering on Germany be resettled by deserving NCOs and men of the German army. H
e did not use the expression ‘final solution’ – Germany was still a civilised nation and it would be a further generation before she descended to official genocide – but the existing inhabitants were to be ‘cleared’, and there was no mention of compensation. Grand Admiral von Tirpitz went further: he wanted Antwerp and the Belgian Channel ports to be annexed and used as bases for the German navy.

  When the British government decided to enter the war it was not, of course, aware of the details of German designs for France and Belgium – they had not yet been formulated – but it knew very well that some such plans would soon come to occupy German minds. A victorious Germany, in occupation of the Channel ports and the coastal strip, would pose a threat to Britain that could not be contemplated. Its prevention was not just worth fighting for: it was essential.

  In 1914 there were technically a number of German armies, belonging to the various federal states, but all were under unified command and can be considered as one army. Germany relied on conscription, to which every able-bodied male was liable from the age of seventeen years. The conscript first served three years in the Landsturm, or part-time Home Guard, followed by two years in the regular army and five years on the regular army reserve. From age twenty-seven he served in the Landwehr, a type of territorial force intended to support the regular army, until returning to the Landsturm from age thirty-nine to forty-five. In practice not all eligible men served in the regular army – there were far too many for the army’s requirements – but as this system had been in place since 1895, and similar if less inclusive schemes before it, virtually the whole of the German male population had received some military training. The standing army’s peacetime strength in 1914 was approximately 700,000, with about three million trained adult males available for immediate reinforcement on mobilisation.