Part 16

The Russian expedition in the Dobrudja, which was supported by a Rumanian division and a mixed division of Serbs and Slavs, partially recruited from prisoners captured by the Russians, failed to work in harmony, and the protection of the Rumanian left became, after the capture of Turtekaia, a negligible factor which ultimately collapsed entirely. Thus we see in the beginning that through no bad faith the southern assets on which Rumania depended proved to be of little or no value to her.

There still remained the Russian agreement to cooperate in Galicia and the Bukovina. I can speak of this situation with authority because I had been on the southwestern front almost without intermission since June, and know that there was every intent on the part of Brussiloff to carry out to the limit of his capacity his end of the programme. The success of this, however, was impaired by a situation, over which he had no control, which developed in Galicia in September. It must not be forgotten that all the Russian troops on the southwestern front had been fighting constantly for nearly three months. When I came through Galicia on my way to Rumania I found Brussiloff's four southern armies engaged in a tremendous action. Early in September they had made substantial advances in the direction of Lemberg, and were in sight of Halicz on the Dniester when they began to encounter terrific and sustained counter-attacks.

That the force of this may be understood I would mention the case of the army attacking Halicz. When I first went to the southwestern front in June, there were facing this army three Austrian divisions, three Austrian cavalry divisions, and one German division. In September, at the very moment when Brussiloff was supposed to be heavily supporting Rumania, there were sent against this same army--on a slightly extended front--three Austrian divisions, two Austrian cavalry divisions, two Turkish divisions, and nine German divisions. The army on the extreme Russian left, whose duty it was to participate in the offensive in the Bukovina, had made important advances toward Lemberg from the south, and just at the time that Rumania entered the war it also was subjected to tremendous enemy counter-attacks. For several weeks it held its position only with the greatest difficulty and by diverting to itself most of the available reserves. Something more than one army corps did endeavor to coöperate with Rumania, but the situation I have described in Galicia made it impossible for sufficient supports to reach the Bukovina offensive to enable it to fulfill its mission.

Thus we see that after the first month of the campaign the coöperative factors which alone had justified Rumania's entering into the war had proved to be failures. The arrival of material from Russia was delayed because, after Turtekaia was taken, a new Russian corps was sent to the Dobrudja to stiffen up that front. The railroad communications were bad and immediately became congested by the movements of troops, thus interfering with the shipping of badly needed material. I have since heard the Russian reactionary government charged with purposely holding up these shipments; but I am inclined to believe that my explanation of the cause of the delays in the arrival of material is the correct one.

The greatest mistake on the part of the Allies was their estimate of the number of troops that the Germans could send to Rumania during the fall of 1916. As I have said, experts placed this number at from ten to sixteen divisions, but, to the best of my judgment, they sent, between the 1st of September and the 1st of January, not less than thirty. The German commitments to the Rumanian front came by express, and the Russian supports, because of the paucity of lines of communication, came by freight. The moment that it became evident what the Germans could do in the way of sending troops, Rumania was doomed.

The move of Alexieff and the Russian High Command in the middle of October, which is one of tangible record and not of opinion, should absolutely eliminate the charges of bad faith on the part of Russia, for he immediately appropriated for the support of Rumania between eight and ten army corps, which were instantly placed in motion, regardless of the adverse condition their absence caused on his own front. It is quite true that these troops arrived too late to save Bucharest; but that they came as quickly as possible, I can assert without reservation, for I was on the various lines of communication for nearly a month and found them blocked with these corps, which represented the cream of the Russian army, to make good the moral obligations of Russia to Rumania. In November I had a talk with Brussiloff, who authorized me to quote him as follows on the Rumanian situation:

H.Q.--S.W.F.--Nov. 7.

Rumania is now feeling for the first time the pressure of war and the bitterness of defeat; but Rumania must realize that her defeats are but incidents in the greater campaign; for behind her stands great Russia, who will see to it that her brave little ally, who has come into the war for a just cause, does not ultimately suffer for daring to espouse this cause for which we are all fighting. I can speak with authority when I state that, from the Emperor down to the common soldier, there is a united sentiment in Russia that Rumania shall be protected, helped, and supported in every way possible. Rumanians must feel faith in Russia and the Russian people, and must also know that in the efforts we are making to save them sentiment is the dominant factor, and we are not doing it merely as a question of protecting our own selfish interest and our left flank.

It seems to me that the evidence I have submitted above clears the Allies, including Russia, of any wanton breach of faith toward Rumania, though the failure of their intention to relieve her certainly does not diminish their responsibility toward her in the future.

In the final analysis the determining factor in the ruin of Rumania was the failure of the Allies to foresee the number of troops the Germans could send against them. Their reasoning up to a certain point was accurate. In July, August, and for part of September it was, I believe, almost impossible for the Germans to send troops to Transylvania, which accounts for the rapidity of the Rumanian advance at the beginning of their operations. The fallacy in the Allied reasoning seems to me to have been that every one overlooked certain vital factors in the German situation. First, that she would ultimately support any threat against Hungary to the limit of her capacity, even if she had to evacuate Belgium to get troops for this purpose. For with Hungary out of the war it is a mate in five moves for the Central Empires. Second: the Allies failed to analyze correctly the troop situation on the eastern front, apparently failing to grasp one vital point. An army can defend itself in winter, with the heavy cold and snows of Russia sweeping the barren spaces, with perhaps sixty per cent of the number of troops required to hold those identical lines in summer. It should have been obvious that, when the cold weather set in in the north, the Germans would take advantage of this situation, and by going on the defensive in the north release the margin representing the difference in men required to hold their lines in summer and in winter. Possibly the same condition applies to the west, though I cannot speak with any authority on that subject. Apparently this obvious action of the Germans is exactly what happened. When their northern front had been combed, we find forces subtracted piecemeal from the north, reaching an aggregate of thirty divisions, or at least nearly fifteen divisions more than had been anticipated. The doom of Rumania was sealed.

What happened in the Russian effort to support Rumania is exactly what has occurred in nearly all the drives that I have been in during this war. An army once started in retreat in the face of superior forces can hold only when supported en bloc or when it reaches a fortified line. The Germans with all their cleverness and efficiency were not able to stop the Russian offensive of 1916 until they had fallen back on the fortified lines of the Stokhod in front of Kovel. In the Galician drive against the Russians in 1915, the armies of the Tsar were not able to hold until they reached the San River, on which they fought a series of rear-guard actions.

So it was in Rumania. The Russian corps arriving on the installment plan were swept away by the momentum of the advancing enemy, who could not be halted until the fortified line of the Sereth was reached.

Whether one blames the Allies for lack of vision or not, I think one must at least acquit Rumania of any responsibility for her own undoing. Her case as represented by the King seems a just and sufficient reason for her having entered the war. Her action during the war has been straightforward and direct, and I have never heard of any reason to believe that the King or the Rumanian High Command has ever looked back in the furrow since they made the decision to fight on the side of the Allies. They followed the advice given them as to their participation in the war. They have played the game to the limit of their resources and to-day stand in a position almost unparalleled in its pathos and acuteness. In front of them, as they struggle with courage and desperation for the small fragment of their kingdom that remains, are the formations of the Turks, Bulgars, Austrians, Hungarians, and Germans, with Mackensen striving to give them a death-blow. Behind them is Russia in chaos. German agitators and irresponsible revolutionists have striven in vain to destroy the morale of their army and shake their faith in their government and their sovereign. It is estimated that three million Rumanian refugees have taken shelter behind their lines. Their civil population, or that portion of it which remains, will this winter be destitute of almost every necessity of life.

This, then, is the case of Rumania, and if we and the other Allies have not a moral obligation to the King and Queen and the government of that little country, to support them in every way possible, then surely we have no obligation to any one.

Sentiment, however, is not the only factor in the Rumanian case. There is also the problem of sound policy. In spite of all her distress and her discouragements Rumania has been able to save from the wreckage, and to reconstruct, an army which it is said can muster between three and four hundred thousand men.

These soldiers are well drilled by French officers, filled with enthusiasm and fighting daily, and are even now diverting enemy troops toward Rumania which would otherwise be available for fighting British, French, and American troops in the west.

The Rumanians are the matrix of the Russian left flank, and if, through lack of support and the necessities of life, they go out of the war, the solidity of the Russian left is destroyed and the capture of Odessa probably foreordained.

A few hundred million dollars would probably keep Rumania fighting for another year. It is a conservative estimate to state that it will take ten times that amount, and at least six months' delay, to place the equivalent number of trained American troops on any fighting front.

It is, I think, obvious that from the point of view of sound military policy, as well as moral and ethical obligation, every American whose heart is in this war should be behind the President of the United States without reserve, in any effort he may make or recommend, in extending assistance to Rumania in this the hour of her greatest peril.

* * * * *

Prisoners taken by the Germans were overworked and disciplined with much insolence and cruelty. For infractions of their iron rules the Germans inflicted the severest penalties. The food supplied was insufficient and of very poor quality, so that men might actually have starved had it not been for boxes sent from home through the Red Cross. In the following chapter, a Canadian soldier, who finally escaped after three unsuccessful attempts, describes the life of prisoners and other workers in the Westphalian coal mines.

SIXTEEN MONTHS A WAR PRISONER

PRIVATE "JACK" EVANS

Copyright, Forum, May 1918.

I was in Germany as prisoner of war from June, 1916, to September, 1917.

My story starts with my capture at the third battle of Ypres. The Fourth Canadian Mounted Rifles were in the front line at Zillebeke. We had been terribly pounded by German artillery, in fact, almost annihilated. After a hideous night, morning, June 2, 1916, dawned beautiful and clear. At 5.30 I turned in for a little sleep with four other fellows who made up the machine-gun crew with me. Lance Corporal Wedgewood, in charge of the gun, remained awake to clean it. I had just got into a sound sleep when it seemed as if the whole crust of the earth were torn asunder in one mammoth explosion, and I found myself buried beneath sandbags and loose earth. I escaped death only by a miracle and managed to dig my way out. A giant shell had blown up our dugout. Two of the boys were killed.

"We're in for it," said Wedgewood. "They'll keep this up for a while and they'll come over. We must get the gun out."

The gun had been buried by the explosion, but we managed to get it out and were cleaning it up again when another trench mortar shell came over. It destroyed all but 300 rounds of ammunition. Then the bombardment started in earnest. Shells rained on us like hailstones. The German artillery started a barrage behind us that looked almost like a wall of flame; so we knew that there was no hope whatever of help reaching us.