Part 7 (1/2)
The fall of Warsaw meant the fall of Russian Poland, but Russia was not yet defeated. Von Hindenburg was to be treated as Napoleon was in 1812, The strategy of the Grand Duke was sound; so long as he could save the army the victories of Germany would be futile. It is true that the German armies were not compelled, like those of Napoleon, to live on the land. They could bring their supplies from Berlin day by day, but every mile they advanced into hostile territory made their task harder. The German line of communication, as it grew longer, became weaker and the troops needed for garrison duty in the captured towns, seriously diminished the strength of the fighting army. The Russian retreat was good strategy and it was carried on with extraordinary cleverness.
It is unnecessary to describe the events which succeeded the fall of Warsaw in great detail. There was a constant succession of German victories and Russian defeats, but never one of the Russian armies enveloped or destroyed. Back they went, day after day, always fighting; each great Russian fortress resisted until it saw itself in danger, and then safely withdrew its troops. Kovno fell and Novogeorgievsk, and Ivangorad, then Ossowietz was abandoned, and Brest-Litovsk and Grodno. On September 5th the Emperor of Russia the following order:
Today I have taken supreme command of all the forces of the sea and land armies operating in the theater of war. With firm faith in the clemency of G.o.d, with unshakable a.s.surance in final victory, we shall fulfil our sacred duty to defend our country to the last. We will not dishonor the Russian land.
The Grand Duke Nicholas was made Viceroy of the Caucasus, a post which took him out of the main theater of fighting but gave him a great field for fresh military activity. He had been bearing a heavy burden, and had shown himself to be a great commander. He had outmaneuvered von Hindenberg again and again, and though finally the Russian armies under his command had been driven back, the retreat itself was a proof of his military ability, not only in its conception, but in the way in which it was done.
The Emperor chose General Alexieff as his Chief of General Staff. He was the ablest of the great generals who had been leading the Russian army. With this change in command a new spirit seemed to come over Russia. The German advance, however, was not yet completely checked. It was approaching Vilna.
The fighting around Vilna was the bitterest in the whole long retreat. On the 18th of September it fell, but the Russian troops were safely removed and the Russian resistance had become strong. Munitions were pouring into the new Russian army. The news from the battle-front began to show improvement. On September 8th General Brussilov, further in the south, had attacked the Germans in front of Tarnopol, and defeated them with heavy loss. More than seventeen thousand men were captured with much artillery. Soon the news came of other advances. Dubno was retaken and Lutsk.
The end of September saw the German advance definitely checked. The Russian forces were now extended in a line from Riga on the north, along the river Dvina, down to Dvinsk. Then turning to the east along the river, it again turned south and so on down east of the Pripet Marshes, it followed an almost straight line to the southern frontier. Its two strongest points were Riga, on the Gulf of Riga, which lay under the protection of the guns of the fleet, and Dvinsk, through which ran the great Petrograd Railway line. Against these two points von Hindenburg directed his attack. And now, for the first time in many months, he met with complete failure. The German fleet attempted to a.s.sist him on the Gulf of Riga, but was defeated by the Russian Baltic fleet with heavy losses. A bombardment turned out a failure and the German armies were compelled to retire.
A more serious effort was made against Dvinsk but was equally unsuccessful and the German losses were immense. Again and again the attempt was made to cross the Dvina River, but without success; the German invasion was definitely stopped. By the end of October there was complete stagnation in the northern sector of the battle line, and though in November there were a number of battles, nothing happened of great importance.
Further south, however, Russia become active. An army had been organized at her Black Sea bases, and for political reasons it was necessary that that army should move. At this time the great question was, what was Roumania about to do? To prevent her from being forced to join the Central Powers she must have encouragement. It was determined therefore that an offensive should be made in the direction of Czernowitz. This town was the railway center of a wide region, and lay close to Roumania's northern frontier.
THE GERMAN ATTACK ON THE ROAD TO PETROGRAD
The Russian aggressive met with great success. It is true that it never approached the defenses of Czernowitz, but Brussilov, on the north, had been able to make great gains of ground, and the very fact that such a powerful movement could be made so soon after the Russian retreat was an encouragement to every friend of the Allied cause. This offensive continued till up to the fourth week of January when it came to an abrupt stop. A despatch from Petrograd explained the movement as follows: ”The recent Russian offensive in Bessarabia and Galicia was carried out in accordance with the plan prepared by the Entente Allies' War Council to relieve the pressure on the Entente forces while they were fortifying Saloniki and during the evacuation of the Gallipoli Peninsula.” Russia had sacrificed more than seventy thousand soldiers for her Allies.
During the year 1916 the Russian armies seemed to have had a new birth. At last they were supplied with guns and munitions. They waited until they were ready. In March a series of battles was fought in the neighborhood of Lake Narotch, and eight successive attacks were made against the German army, intrenched between Lake Narotch and Lake Vischenebski. The Germans at first were driven back and badly defeated. Later on, however, the Russian artillery was sent to another section, and the Germans were able to recover their position. During June the Russians attacked all along the southern part of their line. In three weeks they had regained a whole province. Lutsk and Dubno had been retaken; two hundred thousand men and hundreds of guns, had been captured, and the Austrian line had been pierced and shattered. Further south the German army had been compelled to retreat and the Russian armies were in Bukovina and Galicia. On the 10th of August Stanislau fell.
By this time two Austrian armies had been shattered, over three hundred and fifty thousand prisoners taken, and nearly a million men put out of action. Germany, however, was sending reinforcements as fast as possible, and putting up a desperate defense. Nevertheless everything was encouraging for Russia and she entered upon the winter in a very different condition from her condition in the previous year. Then she had just ended her great retreat. Now she had behind her a series of successes. But a new difficulty had arisen in the loss of the political harmony at home which had marked the first years of the war. Dark days were ahead.
CHAPTER VI
HOW THE BALKANS DECIDED
For more than half a century the Balkans have presented a problem which disturbed the minds of the statesmen of Europe. Again and again, during that period, it seemed that in the Balkan mountains might be kindled a blaze which might set the world afire. Balkan politics is a labyrinth in which one might easily be lost. The inhabitants of the Balkans represent many races, each with its own ambition, and, for the most part, military. There were Serbs, and Bulgarians, and Turks, and Roumanians, and Greeks, and their territorial divisions did not correspond to their nationalities. The land was largely mountainous, with great gaps that make it, in a sense, the highway of the world. From 1466 to 1878 the Balkans was in the dominion of the Turks. In the early days while the Turks were warring against Hungary, their armies marched through the Balkan hills. The natives kept apart, and preserved their language, religion and customs.
In the nineteenth century, as the Turks grew weaker, their subject people began to seek independence. Greece came first, and, in 1829, aided by France, Russia and Great Britain, she became an independent kingdom. Serbia revolted in 1804, and by 1820 was an autonomous state, though still tributary to Turkey. In 1859, Roumania became autonomous. The rising of Bulgaria in 1876, however, was really the beginning of the succession of events which ultimately led to the World War of 1914-18. The Bulgarian insurrection was crushed by the Turks in such a way as to stir the indignation of the whole world. What are known as the ”Bulgarian Atrocities” seem mild today, but they led to the Russo-Turkish War in 1877.
The treaty of Berlin, by which that war was settled in 1878, was one of those treaties which could only lead to trouble. It deprived Russia of much of the benefit of her victory, and left nearly every racial question unsettled. Roumania lost Bessarabia, which was mainly inhabited by Roumanians. Bosnia and Herzegovina were handed over to the administration of Austria. Turkey was allowed to retain Macedonia, Albania and Thrace. Serbia was given Nish, but had no outlet to the sea. Greece obtained Thessaly, and a new province was made of the country south of the Balkans called Eastern Rumelia. From that time on, quarrel after quarrel made up the history of the Balkan peoples, each of whom sought the a.s.sistance and support of some one of the great powers. Russia and Austria were constantly intriguing with the new states, in the hope of extending their own domains in the direction of Constantinople.
The history of Bulgaria shows that that nation has been continually the center of these intrigues. In 1879 they elected as their sovereign Prince Alexander of Battenburg, whose career might almost be called romantic. A splendid soldier and an accomplished gentleman, he stands out as an interesting figure in the sordid politics of the Balkans. He identified himself with his new country. In 1885 he brought about a union with Eastern Rumelia, which led to a disagreement with Russia.
Serbia, doubtless at Russian instigation, suddenly declared war, but was overwhelmed by Prince Alexander in short order. Russia then abducted Prince Alexander, but later was forced to restore him. However, Russian intrigues, and his failure to obtain support from one of the great powers, forced his abdication in 1886.
In 1887 Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha became the Prince of Bulgaria. He, also, was a remarkable man, but not the romantic of his predecessor. He seems to have been a sort of a parody of a king. He was fond of ostentation, and full of ambition. He was a personal coward, but extremely cunning. During his long reign he built up Bulgaria into a powerful, independent kingdom, and even a.s.sumed the t.i.tle of Czar of Bulgaria. During the first days of his reign he was kept safely on the throne by his mother, the Princess Clementine, a daughter of Louis Phillippe, who, according to Gladstone, was the cleverest woman in Europe, and for a few years Bulgaria was at peace. In 1908 he declared Bulgaria independent, and its independence was recognized by Turkey on the payment of an indemnity. During this period Russia was the protector of Bulgaria, but the Bulgarian fox was looking also for the aid of Austria. Serbia more and more relied upon Russia.
The Austrian treatment of the Slavs was a source of constant irritation to Serbia. Roumania had a divided feeling. Her loss of Bessarabia to Russia had caused ill feeling, but in Austria's province of Transylvania there were millions of Roumanians, whom Roumania desired to bring under her rule. Greece was fearful of Russia, because of Russia's desire for the control of Constantinople. All of these nations, too, were deeply conscious of the Austro-German ambitions for extension of their power through to the East. Each of these princ.i.p.alities was also jealous of the other. Bulgaria and Serbia had been at war; many Bulgarians were in the Roumanian territory, many Serbians, Bulgarians and Greeks in Macedonia. There was only one tie in common, that was their hatred of Turkey. In 1912 a league was formed, under the direction of the Greek statesman, Venizelos, having for its object an attack on Turkey. By secret treaties arrangements were made for the division of the land, which they hoped to obtain from Turkey.
War was declared, and Turkey was decisively defeated, and then the trouble began. Serbia and Bulgaria had been particularly anxious for an outlet to the sea, and in the treaty between them it had been arranged that Serbia should have an outlet on the Adriatic, while Bulgaria was to obtain an outlet on the aegean. The Triple Alliance positively refused Serbia its share of the Adriatic coast. Serbia insisted, therefore, on a revision of the treaty, which would enable her to have a seaport on the aegean.
An attempt was made to settle the question by arbitration, but King Ferdinand refused, whereupon, in July, 1913, the Second Balkan War began. Bulgaria was attacked by Greece and Serbia, and Turkey took a chance and regained Adrianople, and even Roumania, which had been neutral in the First Baltic War, mobilized her armies and marched toward Sofia. Bulgaria surrendered, and on the 10th of August the Treaty of Bucharest was signed by the Balkan States.