behind the screen of the forests of Luxemburg, France might not have known what forces were being concentrated on that frontier, and might have weakened the line to rush troops against Von Kluck. But the French aviators, who are the best in the world, were able to fly over the territory of Germany and Luxemburg where troops were mobilizing, and the information they sent down was sufficiently alarming to keep France from weakening the Franco-German fortress-defended line too seriously. This, again, handicapped France from being able to go to the support of Belgium. The dramatic plan of the crown prince's hammering march to Paris failed absolutely and completely by the successful defense of Verdun.
The Fortresses on the German-French Frontier.
CHAPTER XXVII
BRITAIN—RUSSIA—AUSTRIA
The initial mobilization of Great Britain was a matter as well managed as that of Germany. For precision there was nothing to choose as between them. Yet, comparing the German and British mobilizations, one thing stands out clearly, viz., that Germany was ready and Britain unready, while, on the other hand, Germany had to move 4,000,000 men and England only 100,000. To offset this, Britain had to mobilize stores and supplies, not only for her own 100,000 expeditionary force, but for a large part of the armies of France and for all the armies of Belgium. Even the very motor busses that carried French troops from Paris to the Belgian frontier were largely English, two cargoes of 100 vehicles each being rushed across the English Channel on the same day.
The food question for the Belgian army and for the French armies on the Belgian frontier was acute at the opening of the war, France was ready and prepared to handle any eventuality in the way of supplies that might be needed on the Belfort-Verdun line, but she was not prepared for the conditions in the rear of the Belgian frontier. Britain came to the support of France and Belgium without a day's delay. She rushed food and munitions to the front, and on one occasion Kitchener fed two French army corps, or 80,000 troops, for eleven days without the slightest hitch. A moment's thought will show that this means not only the ability to send food, but also to organize the entire mechanism of the preparing and handling of that food.
This was made possible largely by what was known in Britain as the motor-lorry system, unlike that of any other army, introduced in 1911. Horse transport was relegated solely to the work of distributing, the conveyance of supplies to the areas occupied being performed wholly by motor transport. As the daily run of a motor lorry may be put at 100 miles, it follows that an army could advance fifty miles from its railhead and still be easily served with food and ammunition. Thus, for the first time in the history of war, the British army had devised a system whereby fresh meat and bread could be supplied daily to a distant army. If, as the Germans declared, the British soldier thought more of his food than fight, this desire at least had the effect of keeping the supply system to the topmost notch. The same principle was used for ammunition columns, in no case any of the men from the front being detailed in the work of looking after munitions or supplies. Thus, while British mobilization of men consisted mainly of the expeditionary force of 100,000, the British mobilization of auxiliary columns for aiding the supply system of the Belgian and French army was of a size large enough to look after several corps. By this means, recruits could be constantly forwarded to the field of war, secure in the knowledge that no matter how rapidly men were rushed to the front, the question of supplies was already considered and the requisites were in place awaiting the use of the new troops.
England's mobilization, especially when it is remembered that after the first 150,000 it was all volunteers, was a marvelous thing. How many men were sent no one could tell but Kitchener, and if ever a man was born with a gift for telling nothing, that man is Kitchener. How steadily recruits poured over no one knew. Officially, only enough men were sent to fill up the losses in the 150,000, but before the end of the year England's trained forces were immense. The details of the mobilization of that first 100,000 men (the first group of the expeditionary force) were marvelous. The railroads running to the southeast were put into Government hands, trains were scheduled at twelve minutes' distance apart, to run day and night, every troop train was on schedule, and every one was unloaded and out of the depot in time for the next train to pull in, every transport was at the dock waiting, with another ready to take her place, and the expeditionary force was in Boulogne in less than forty-eight hours after the first mobilization order had been sent out. It is not to be forgotten that Britain commandeered every ship she needed from her huge mercantile marine, and thus had transports not only for troops but also for supplies.
For a moment one may glance at a side issue, but an important one in the mobilization, namely the mobilization of horses. The French bought horses by the thousand in Texas. Yet English farriers inspected them, paid for them, put them in charge of their own men on their own ships, landed them in England or Bordeaux, fed them into prime condition at England's own expense, and then delivered them to the French battle line ready for service. In the first week of the war the total output of the English rifle factories was 10,000 rifles a week (a rifle will shoot well for only 4,000 rounds), by the seventh week of the war there were eleven factories with a weekly output of 40,000 rifles each, and more being built on every hand. In addition to this, between August and December, 1914, English money mobilized—it is the word—rifle orders in the United States to the extent of $650,000,000. It is a matter of knowledge that many of the Russian munition orders were either financed or indorsed by British capital. In a word, while England's military mobilization of her regular troops was rapid and efficient, and while her recruiting of volunteers was the greatest support of the principles of a volunteer army that could ever be imagined, the chief importance and the chief wonder of Britain's mobilization was her mobilization of commerce and of trade. She made it possible for French soldiers to be used at their full power, and France's perennial weakness—supply organization—was supplemented by that very thing which is the British army's chief boast.
It is time, now, to turn to the eastern theatre of war, and there the diplomatic questions underlying mobilization become excessively intertwined. All European powers watch each other like falcons above their prey, in the constant endeavor to discern the slightest sign of unusual military activity. The tornado of conflicting reports at the end of July, 1914, as to which power had begun mobilizing first, as to whether army maneuvers were a cloak for mobilization, as to whether activity in arsenals was not a threat or as to the manipulation of finances, were all due to a single thing—the knowledge that a week's advantage in mobilization might mean a huge advantage, an advantage in position so great that thousands of lives might be lost because of the two days' delay. It has been shown how the conquest of France's richest northern provinces by Germany was due to the difference in speed of mobilization. There was a great deal of misunderstanding on the part of the American public about this very importance of mobilization. "Supposing Russia did mobilize first, or Austria," people said, "what about it? No one has declared war." Mobilization is like two western desperadoes watching each other. They do not wait until the other man has drawn his gun and has them covered, but trouble begins at the slightest move toward the hip pocket. Any move toward mobilization is a move toward a nation's hip pocket.
German Confederation of 1815.
Germany did not dare to let Russia mobilize. Had a large Russian army been concentrated in Poland, had Russia been allowed to intrench herself on the Austrian frontier, had she had the opportunity at the beginning of the war to seize the fortress of Thorn and to secure control of the Vistula River, there would have been little to stop the armies of the czar from marching into Berlin. General mobilization by one power, therefore, absolutely compels countermobilization by another power, and unless diplomatic agreements are speedily made and the mobilization checked, it is a prelude to war.
The diplomatic interpretations of the discussion over mobilization have been dealt with elsewhere, but it may be summarily said here that Austria was the first of the great powers to begin mobilization in the first part of July, in order to frighten Serbia into