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Plan XVII.
ОглавлениеThirty days of warfare sufficed to prove that the strategy of the French General Staff was defective at every point. When this became apparent Joffre unfairly and ungenerously tried to throw the blame on his lieutenants and their men. But the facts are against him. General Bonnal has succinctly defined strategy to be the art of conception. It is now admitted by all except some of those responsible that the whole conception of the plan of campaign was erroneous.
Germany’s declaration of war did not take France by surprise. For more than a generation she had prepared for the struggle. It is true that during the forty-three years between 1871 and 1914 there had been forty-one Ministers of War; and undeniably such frequent changes were not in themselves favourable to the development of military plans. Yet despite this constant stream of arrivals and departures at the rue Saint Dominique the General Staff continued its work without any great interruption. During the period immediately preceding the war there was, indeed, little or no undue interference on the part of politicians.
France spent more on her Army than did any other country except Germany. From 1872 to 1895 the expenditure of each was about 14 milliards of francs. From 1896 to 1912 Germany spent 16 milliards 875 millions, and France 11 milliards 418 millions. When the difference in population and in wealth is taken into account these figures show the extraordinary effort which France made to keep pace with her traditional enemy.
Unfortunately the money of the French tax-payers produced less than did that collected in Germany. The departmental system of the War Office was complicated, cumbersome, and lacking in unison. The German Minister of War had only four immediate subordinate departments. The French War Office had no less than fourteen, each independent of the other. In an attempt to check the resulting confusion, another branch, the Direction of Control, was created. But this in no way lessened the evil.
However, it is abundantly clear that the war did not take France by surprise. If she was unprepared, it was only in the sense that the General Staff had staked everything on a plan which was humanly impossible; while it counted so absolutely upon the success of that plan that it neglected to take even ordinary precautions to meet the situation which was bound to arise in the event of a reverse.
In 1911 General Michel was Vice-President of the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre, and also the designated Commander-in-Chief of the French armies in the event of war. In February of that year he submitted to the then Minister of War, Messimy (himself a soldier), a plan of campaign, based upon the theory that the Germans would invade France by the left bank of the Meuse, and would execute a turning movement on such a vast scale as would, from the outset, necessitate putting their reserves in the first line. Michel, therefore, proposed taking strategic safeguards against this movement, and also making a much more extensive use of the French reserves than had been previously contemplated. A month later Michel gave a conference in which he criticised and opposed the idea of an offensive à l’outrance, which was then so popular in certain French military circles. He thereby incurred the hostility of the younger members of the Staff as well as some of his own immediate colleagues; while even Pétain, then a colonel, was heard to say that Michel had lost the confidence of the Army.
In July Messimy obliged the latter to place part of his proposal before the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre. He received no support whatever, and Messimy, therefore, forced him to resign the vice-chairmanship as well as the eventual leadership in time of war. It is fair to add, however, that (as appeared later) Michel’s report to the Minister of War was never submitted in full to the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre,[13] and that it was only the suggestions about the utilization of the reserves upon which that body deliberated.
It is questionable whether Michel was a strong man. Messimy never had any belief in his competency. Later, when the war broke out, he was Military Governor of Paris. Messimy said plainly that he thought him to be incapable and demanded his resignation, and when Michel demurred, he threatened to send him forthwith as a prisoner to the Cherche-Midi. But, whatever may be the measure of Michel’s ability, later events proved that his vision of the future was correct. He foresaw both what Germany would do and what was necessary for the protection of France.
Messimy considered appointing either Pau or Galliéni as Michel’s successor. But the fact that both would retire in 1912, on account of age, told against them: although by a special decree Galliéni was later retained on the active list without limit of age, upon the ground that he had held chief command in front of the enemy. Moreover, Pau (who was a veteran of the war of 1870) imposed the condition that he should have the sole power of appointment to the higher commands.
Messimy, therefore, finally offered the post to Joffre, who was already a member of the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre, and who would not come under the age limit for several years. It was a decision which he regretted later. In January, 1916, he wrote Galliéni that he was sorry he had not appointed him instead of Joffre; while his subsequent evidence before a parliamentary committee seemed, upon the whole, to support the view that this was not an empty compliment, but the expression alike of his sincere regret and of his real opinion.
Joffre was an engineer officer. He had served under Galliéni in Madagascar, and had had other colonial experience. But he knew little or nothing of the interior working of the General Staff, and he would have refused the proposal had not Pau encouraged him to accept it. It was Pau who suggested to him that, with the aid of de Castelnau, he would be able to meet the difficulties of the routine which he dreaded. Joffre, therefore, made it a condition of his acceptance that de Castelnau should be named as his assistant; and after twenty-four hours reflection Messimy agreed.
Joffre is, by birth and nature, a Catalonian. His tranquil and unshakable confidence in himself made him regard colleagues (in the true sense of that word) as unnecessary, while his love of secrecy rendered them distasteful to him. As Vice-President of the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre he seems to have been omnipotent. At the meetings he would state at the same time both the question to be decided and his own decision: and it was rare that there was any opposition.
He had never directly commanded any body of troops. He was incapable of directing any operations in the field. In giving evidence after the war, Messimy said it was, of course, known to everyone that it was General Berthelot, and not Joffre, who had commanded the operations. It is also highly improbable that he was able to evolve or draft any plan of campaign. Neither his previous career nor experience give any ground for thinking that he could do so. While his own testimony before the Commission sur la Métallurgie shows that he was hopelessly at sea about the whole matter.
But he was capable of taking a decision upon the advice given to him by the subordinates who surrounded him and in whose attachment to himself he had confidence: and equally capable of holding to that decision with great tenacity. The very fact that he had few original ideas, but an imposing and massive exterior, made him exactly the man whom the General Staff wanted as an exponent of the theories with which it provided him. General Lanrezac has aptly said that Joffre was really not an individual, but a “raison sociale.” It was a firm which bore his name, but in which he was not the most active partner. For the General Staff was dominated by a group of comparatively young and extremely ambitious officers, who were entirely possessed by the conviction that an offensive à l’outrance would win the next war with Germany and that nothing else could; that the conflict would be of short duration[14] and the first battles decisive; which latter opinion was also held by von Schlieffen.
The chief protagonist of this doctrine was a brilliant and determined man, whose name was little known to the public, but who played an important part in shaping the plans of the French General Staff: Colonel (later General) Loyseau de Grandmaison, who was killed at Soissons.[15] In the light of what the war taught, the theories of this heroic, but mistaken, officer make strange reading to-day. There seems to be an almost hysterical strain running through such sentences as: “The least caution in the offensive destroys all its efficacy and loses all its advantages. In the offensive, imprudence is the best safeguard. Only the offensive method can force the victory. It is necessary to prepare it and to prepare others for it. Cultivating with passion, with exaggeration, and even to the smallest details of instructions, all that is marked by the offensive spirit; let us go to excess, and perhaps that will not be enough.”
The instructions issued to the Army, from time to time before 1914, during the period when Joffre was Chief of the Staff, bore out this teaching. For instance, in December, 1913, it was even laid down that artillery should not prepare the way for infantry attacks, but should support them. For, as General Ruffey subsequently testified before the Commission sur la Métallurgie, Joffre “was entirely subjugated by the young men of his entourage, and listened complacently to their views, which were often childish.”
In one sense it is true that only an offensive can lead to a decision. But that dictum does not mean that an offensive will always succeed. The time, to some extent the number of the opposing forces, and, in these days, above all, the comparative artillery strength must be taken into account. But while the French General Staff adopted the doctrine with enthusiasm, it entirely lost sight of these considerations. It might, with advantage, have remembered that after 1870 von Moltke said: “The French never having attacked me, I was obliged to take the offensive myself. But I only did so against my own will, for, in my opinion, I thus obtained less decisive and more dearly-bought successes than I would have been able to get by a method more in conformity with my own ideas.”[16]
While, elsewhere, von Moltke, after referring to the heavy price which had always to be paid for an offensive à l’outrance, added: “I prefer the proceeding which consists in passing to the offensive after having repulsed several attacks.” That, as Lieutenant-Colonel Thomasson has pointed out, is the very method by which Foch eventually won the war.
Even Bernhardt the great apostle of the offensive, has written: “If we want to count upon military successes, we must not forget that attack is infinitely more difficult than ever, and that the assailant, to obtain the victory, needs to have a very marked superiority. It is the task of strategy to assure it.”
It was the greatest fault of the French General Staff, before 1914, that it entirely neglected or ignored that task, apparently believing that material disadvantages could be overcome by engendering, through constant teaching and orders, a spirit of aggression.
Nor did all British military authorities share the blind faith of the French General Staff that an offensive à l’outrance was a sure road to a speedy victory. In August, 1914, Lord Kitchener not only warned the French military mission that the war would be a long one, but he also expressed the opinion that the French plan was dangerous. The French Military Attaché in London wrote to the rue St. Dominique that Kitchener was “entirely opposed to the offensive; if we listened to him we would remain on the defensive and await three successive attacks by the German forces; he is imbued with the principles of colonial warfare and knows nothing of the material and moral advantages of the offensive.”[17]
In 1913 a pamphlet appeared, entitled La Concentration allemande, which, to all intents and purposes, gave utterance to the view and plans of the General Staff. Although it was published anonymously, military circles were generally aware of the identity of the author. But it was not until 1915 that Le Temps informed the public that it was Lieutenant-Colonel (now General) Buat, who had been a professor at the École Supérieure de Guerre, who was then on the General Staff, and who subsequently served throughout the war with great distinction, being Major-General of the French Armies when the armistice was signed.
In order to strike the imagination, Buat pretended that, while travelling in Germany, he had found a copy of the German plan of campaign, which had been left in a railway carriage. According to this, the Germans would enter France with twenty-two army corps—that is, one million three hundred thousand men—of whom nine hundred thousand would belong to the active army and four hundred thousand would be reservists, who would be given only such secondary missions as the occupation of conquered territory. Part of these forces were to come by the right bank of the Meuse. Buat, therefore, concluded that the French forces ought to face north-east on a line extending from Belfort to Mézières. Incidentally, he thus disclosed to the Germans the French plan of concentration. As a matter of fact, the then existing plan XVI is provided for a concentration exactly from Belfort to Mézières, although its successor, the more famous Plan XVII., extended the line to Hirson.[18]
At the same time Buat entirely misconceived both the German plan and the numbers they intended to use.[19] It is true that German authorities had previously written that their forces would be divided into an army of shock and an army of occupation. Apparently Buat (as well as the General Staff) accepted this statement without hesitation. It is impossible to say now whether it was ever sincere or whether it was made simply in order to induce the German people to accept more readily the military taxation and burdens imposed upon them. The probability seems to be that it was the real plan until 1912. But there are many indications that from that time the intention was to use the reservists in the first line immediately. However, the French General Staff accepted the German statements all the more readily because they fitted in with its own conviction that the French reservists would be useless in the first line.
But in the work, Quatre Mois de Guerre, published at the end of 1914 by the French General Staff for the use of the representatives of France abroad, it is calculated that the total German forces mobilised and actually used against the French armies during the first weeks numbered one million four hundred thousand men. The difference (one hundred thousand) between this figure and that in Buat’s pamphlet is not enormous. But the real distinction lies in the use made of these troops. Buat calculated upon a shock army of about nine hundred thousand. As a matter of fact, there were thirty-four corps in the first line. For the reserves were used there from the beginning; and the work which the French General Staff had imagined would occupy them was done mainly by the Landwehr or other troops. The difference, as Lieutenant-Colonel de Thomasson has pointed out,[20] was just equal to the two armies of von Klück and von Bülow, which were destined to pass by the left bank of the Meuse. In brief, the French General Staff made an error of fifty per cent. in estimating the German shock effectives.[21]
Moreover, the General Staff did not think that the Germans would come by the left bank of the Meuse, precisely because it was convinced that Germany would not put her reserves in the first line. Thus one error led to another. “Le commandement français ne pensait pas que le mouvement débordant à travers la Belgique dût s’étendre sur la rive nord de la Meuse, parce qu’il ne croyait pas que les Allemands emploieraient leurs divisions de réserve en première ligne dès le début des opérations.” These are the words of General Mangin, a critic, who, other things being equal, is inclined to hold the scales somewhat in favour of Joffre.
It was, therefore, in vain that Galliéni had warned the General Staff that Maubeuge should be further fortified; and while, apparently, a little more heed was paid to his advice about making greater provision for the defence of the left bank of the Meuse, between Verdun and Mézières, yet the Staff began to study the question so tardily that nothing had actually been accomplished when war broke out.
The tale is the same about heavy artillery. The records of the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre show that Galliéni drew attention to this crying need (as did also General Ruffey and General Dubail) in October, 1913, and again in March, 1914, as he had previously done in 1911 in a report to the Minister of War. No attention was given to these remonstrances. It was thought that the lighter 75 would do everything.[22] It needed a war itself to enforce Galliéni’s contention. In the early days of the conflict nothing was more severely felt and no negligence was more dearly paid for than this lack of heavy artillery. It was only in 1915 that it was finally supplied, and that the necessary officers and men were instructed in its use.[23]
In 1913 Joffre gave a lecture to the former scholars of the École Polytechnique. The text of his discourse, which did not deal much with strategy, was the necessity of preparation in time of peace: “In our days ‘to be ready’ has a meaning which it would have been difficult for those who formerly conducted war to understand. Everything must be organised, everything foreseen. Once hostilities have begun, no improvisation will serve. What lacks then will lack definitely. The least omission may cause a disaster.”
Excellent words. But, in the way of material preparation, Joffre and the General Staff were grossly at fault in respect both to artillery, air armament, and many other minor matters.
It has been contended that the General Staff was restricted because successive Governments would not allow a sufficient expenditure. Naturally there always is, and always will be, some contest upon the subject of expenditure between the Treasury and the heads of the military establishment: it would be an unhealthy sign were it otherwise. But the figures do not show that the French Parliament was niggardly. What is more apparent is that the money was often ill spent. While, in any event it is, in the last analysis, the duty of the General Staff to cut its coat according to its cloth, and not to attempt what it knows, or ought to know, is impossible of achievement on account of lack of means.
But one of the very writers who has advanced this defence of Joffre and the General Staff has written elsewhere, in the same work, that in 1914 French soldiers “were still dressed as they were in 1830, when rifles only carried to a distance of 200 paces, and God knows how many losses were imposed upon us by the képi and the red trousers; we had no machine-guns, few big cannon, and hardly any aeroplanes; our cavalry thought only of brilliant charges, and our cavalry chiefs acted as if they did not know that horses must drink during the day and must rest in their stables at night-time; the majority of our infantry officers were badly trained; the tactical instruction of their units, left at the free-will of each individual when it was made at all, lacked method and intensive training. The steps of progress when the combat was engaged, the necessary infantry period, the permanent use of cover, the close liaison between infantry and artillery, formations diluted to the extreme limit under shell fire, carefully prepared instead of premature attacks, etc., etc., all these practices were forgotten because they were neglected in time of peace.”[24]
Certainly, for the errors enumerated in the latter part of this sweeping condemnation it was the General Staff and those whom it directly commanded which was at fault, and not any Government.
Plan XVII. was defective because it eliminated all idea of manœuvre: and yet it was manœuvre which eventually won the battle of the Marne after the General Staff’s theory of l’offensive brutale et à l’outrance had completely broken down on its first trial. It might possibly have had some chance of success against a weaker enemy. It had none whatever against one who was stronger in numbers and who in all material respects was better prepared.
This blind faith in a short war and a quick victory based on an offensive, and the consequent neglect of any provision for defensive warfare, led to an error of almost incalculable consequences. France drew about 90 per cent. of her ore production and 86 per cent. of her cast iron from the district of the Briey. Yet, incredible as it seems, the plan of concentration did not provide any defence of that region.[25] It was left outside of the territory to be protected. Joffre himself, in giving evidence on this subject, said: “Plan XVII., as well as preceding plans, left the Briey district outside of the zone to be occupied by the covering troops.” The excuse proffered was that Briey was almost under the guns of Metz, and that its protection would have necessitated the investment of that fortified place—a difficult and dangerous operation. But that reply does not disclose the whole story. The report of the Commission sur la Métallurgie en France properly states that “the General Staff considered the problem of the Briey from an exclusively strategic point of view, upon the hypotheses of a short war, with an absolute faith in victory, and without having even contemplated the possibility of a reverse.”[26]
If the General Staff had foreseen a four years’ war it certainly would never have abandoned to the enemy the metal of which France had such sore need. But it could see only one thing—the necessity for an offensive. It did not take even elementary precautions to guard against the effect of a temporary check or defeat. In the result France was obliged to bring metals from across the seas to replace what had thus been given to the enemy. While Germany, on her own admission, was able to prolong the conflict as long as she did because these mines were in her possession. M. Loucheur has rightly said that the loss of Briey for the period of the war was a catastrophe.
The parliamentary commission appointed to examine why Briey was left unprotected drifted somewhat far afield in the course of its inquiry. It was thus that Joffre, Messimy, and others were given an opportunity to make what explanation they could or would of their mistakes of judgment or execution.
To do Messimy justice, he did not seek to diminish his own responsibility as Minister of War during part of the period preceding 1914. He told the Commission that from 1911 the violation of Belgian neutrality had been considered as certain, although it was thought that it would only be partial, and would not affect the heart of Belgium.[27] He admitted that it had been a great mistake not to make more use of the reserves. But he declined responsibility for the circulars of 1913 and 1914, whereby Joffre had authorised commanding officers, in their discretion, to reduce the number attached to each active regiment; and had likewise laid down that reservists should only be employed for secondary duties, such as keeping ways of communication and the guarding of prisoners.[28]
Finally, Messimy said that he thought it was useless to discuss whether, if it had to be done over again, he would “impose upon” Galliéni the post which the latter had “nobly refused” in 1911. He admitted that he was far from being “in rapt admiration” of Joffre, who in August, 1914, had been unable to realise that the German Right was turning his Left, and who after the battle of the Marne had persisted in useless partial attacks; but he summed him up as having a sure if slow mentality, and as possessing many of the qualities of a great chief.
Joffre’s testimony upon the same points differed somewhat from that of Messimy, while it was neither so clear nor so convincing. The questions and answers are worth quoting, if only because they show that his main anxiety seems to have been rather to make no admission of error than to help the Commission by throwing light upon the past.
Referring to the fact that prior to 1914 Joffre had ignored certain warnings, the President of the Commission said :—
“It has been explained to us that the plan of concentration aroused the criticism of several members of the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre, and notably of General Ruffey and General Galliéni, because it did not contemplate the hypothesis of the invasion by the left bank of the Meuse, and especially by Lille.
“Joffre: That greatly astonishes me, since in the General Staff we always had that idea of the attack.
“The President: I did not have that impression when you read your memorandum, for, even allowing for the variant, Plan XVII. places the extreme Left of the French Army at Hirson. . . . It has been explained to us precisely that at the moment when you submitted this plan to the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre General Ruffey and General Galliéni observed that it was disturbing, because in their opinion it was beyond discussion that the invasion of France would be by a large turning movement of the German Army, one which would embrace Lille and perhaps Dunkirk. Do you remember the remarks of General Ruffey and of General Galliéni?
“Joffre: I have no recollection of them, but I do not say that they were not made.
“The President: At the very moment when the Three Years’ law was discussed—and I remember it very well myself—observations were made to you regarding the hypothesis of the invasion by way of Belgium, and the vast movement which was, in fact, executed. Did not that lead you to reflect that Plan XVII. was perhaps not sufficiently prudent?
“Joffre: All that is so vague that I cannot answer you.”
Joffre’s evidence regarding the reserves was equally imprecise. He was indeed forced to admit that he had given orders which allowed a reduction. But when he suggested that all the reserves were utilized, figures were placed before him showing irrefutably that at the outbreak of war the dépôts were crowded with reservists, and that, moreover, there was no provision of rifles for them. Joffre’s only comment was, “I would not dare to contradict you; I do not say either yes or no.”
Equally fruitless were the efforts of the Commission to discover who were the authors of the plan of operations. No one seemed desirous to claim that distinction. Joffre’s testimony is at least curious, if not illuminating:
“The President: Was the plan of operations discussed by the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre?
“Joffre: No, that is not the business of the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre.
“The President: How, then, was the plan of operations elaborated?
“Joffre: The plan of concentration is the function of the plan of operations.
“The President: By whom was the plan of operations elaborated?
“Joffre: By the General Staff of the Army under my direction.
“The President: General de Castelnau has testified that as Sub-Chief of the General Staff he was ignorant of the plan of operations.
“Joffre: I cannot tell you about that.
“The President: Who elaborated the plan of operations, and who collaborated with you in this work if the first Sub-Chief of the General Staff did not have any part in it?
“Joffre: My recollections are too imprecise for me to answer you. If General de Castelnau has told you that he was ignorant of it, it must be so.
“The President: I looked over his deposition again this morning, because this detail had struck me, and I desired to put the question to you?
“Joffre: I don’t remember.
“The President: Who took part in elaborating the plan of operations?
“Joffre: I don’t remember.
“The President: It seems that you ought to be able to remember the officers with whom you worked; it was, in brief, a matter which must have caused you a great deal of worry.
“Joffre: But all the General Staff participated. A plan of operations is an idea that one has in one’s head, but that one does not put on paper.”
The examination on this point proceeded for some time with no further result, until Joffre finally declared, “You are asking me a bundle of things which I can’t answer. I know nothing.”
Much clearer is what actually did happen. The war found the General Staff firm and consistent in its adhesion to the doctrine that an offensive should be persisted in, even if based upon incomplete information. An ill-advised advance was made, and the first practical result of these teachings began to be seen. According to M. Hanotaux (who may be regarded as an official historian of the Grand Quartier Général[29]), “mad bayonet charges were launched at a distance of a mile from the enemy without artillery preparation”; and the ill-regulated spirit of the offensive was one of the causes of the French reverses.
But the General Staff clung to its erroneous preconceptions in the face of facts which convinced everyone else.
In April, 1914, General Lanrezac had been appointed to succeed Galliéni (who had then reached the age limit) on the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre; and the following month he received an order which invested him with the command of the Fifth Army in the event of war. This was the army which, according to Plan XVII., held the French Left. Lanrezac did his utmost to persuade Joffre to give him the First Army (the army of the Vosges), on the ground that as he had been its Chief-of-Staff for five years he was thoroughly familiar with that theatre of operations. When Joffre refused to do so he began to study the situation in the north. He soon arrived at the conclusion that the Germans would unblushingly violate the neutrality of Belgium, and, making the most of that act, would come by the left bank of the Meuse.
After Lanrezac had taken the command of the Fifth Army in August, 1914, he discerned indications which confirmed this opinion. He was convinced that the German Right was stronger than Plan XVII. had anticipated it would be, and that it meant to make a turning movement by the left bank of the Meuse. On August 7th he sent his Chief-of-Staff to communicate this opinion to Joffre. But the only reply he got was that the “responsibility of stopping a turning movement against his Left was not his.” On August 8th Joffre actually issued an order for “an offensive of all forces united, with the Right flank on the Rhine.” The rôle of the Fifth Army was left undecided; but it was to be ready for either an offensive or defensive facing east.
Another order from the Grand Quartier Général, on August 13th, showed that Joffre still thought that the danger lay in the east. On the following day Lanrezac himself went to see the Commander-in-Chief to urge his belief that an overwhelming German attack would come by the left bank of the Meuse. Joffre replied, “We have a feeling that the Germans have nothing ready on that side”; a view likewise expressed by his Chief-of-Staff.
During all this period Lanrezac’s advice was received with equal scepticism, whether he sent it by one of his staff or himself spoke to Joffre. Various incidents show that the General Staff thought Lanrezac was a nuisance, while he thought that they were fools; and that neither took any pains to conceal their respective convictions.
On August 15th Lanrezac was finally allowed to make preparations for the possible execution of the movement towards the north which he had urged as a necessary measure of safety. But even on August 16th Joffre was responsible for a proclamation in which it was stated that the German attack by way of Belgium had “lamentably failed.”[30]
While as late as August 18th or 19th General Berthelot, the real director of operations, telephoned to the Minister of War, Messimy (who was getting anxious about the Left): “The more we have against our Left the better it will be, as it will give us more chance to break their Centre.” For, as Galliéni had discovered when he spent some hours at the Grand Quartier Général on August 14th, Joffre and his subordinates were obsessed by the idea that they would break the German Centre and then make a turning movement against the German Right: an idea which was Napoleonic in its conception, but in nothing else, for it was based upon ignorance of or deceptive information respecting the enemy’s forces and plans.
The battle of Charleroi completed the demolition of the strategy of the General Staff, and forced Joffre to abandon Plan XVII. As Sir John French soon discovered, he was not immediately able to substitute another in its place.
It has been stated that after that engagement the British retreated before the French. But it is now definitely established that the contrary was the case. M. Gabriel Hanotaux has, indeed, written that the British order was given at five p.m. on August 23rd, and Lanrezac’s order only at nine p.m. But he omitted to state that while it was Joffre who telegraphed to the British Commander-in-Chief warning him of the extent of von Klück’s pressure, and announcing the French retreat, the latter retirement had already actually begun at that hour; while the British only commenced to retreat on the morning of August 24th, after fighting all night. French was so much taken aback by this proceeding that when, during a meeting at Compiègne, on August 29th, he was urged to co-operate in a certain movement, he recalled with feeling that only some days earlier the Fifth Army had commenced to fall back hours before Joffre had communicated to him that he had been forced to abandon his plan.
On the contrary M. Fernand Engerand has written that “the retreat of the British followed ours, and did not precede it: it is a duty of loyalty to say so, as also to admit that in the frontier battles the British Army, which its commander put on the defensive, was the only one, besides the French First Army, which could hold the enemy.”[31]
M. Hanotaux, however, has repeated his mis-statements in the face of various corrections. But the eminent academician can no longer be taken as an unprejudiced authority on this subject. In its report the Commission sur la Métallurgie pointed out[32] that he may be regarded as an official historian of the General Staff. As such he might have employed his time to better advantage had he explained how it was that practically at the same time that Joffre advised the British of the danger and of the French retreat, which was then in progress, he telegraphed (at 4.40 p.m.) to Lanrezac in the following terms: “I request you to give me your opinion on the situation and what you count upon doing. You are in touch with Marshal French. How do you regard the situation, and what support is he able to give you?”
The Commission sur la Métallurgie concluded,[33] with great reason, that these two messages are “absolutely contradictory,” and that they give rise to “an obscure point which history will have to elucidate.”
The General Staff subsequently blamed Lanrezac for ordering the retreat (as he did on his own responsibility) and breaking off the conflict of Charleroi. That criticism may be left on one side with the remark that it has given rise to a dispute which bids fair never to be settled. Lanrezac’s supporters contend that by his action he avoided a second Sedan. While the report of the Commission sur la Métallurgie says, without qualification, that “the battle of Charleroi was lost before it was begun; the great merit of the Commander of the Fifth Army was to have dared to prevent it from turning to a disaster and to have taken upon himself to break the battle before the whole left wing of the Allies was enveloped.”
Upon the other hand, Lanrezac’s opponents contend that the battle was never really engaged, and that he avoided it.
Before the war Lanrezac had achieved fame as a military professor. He was one of the oracles of the French Army, although his theories were in contradiction with the doctrine of the offensive à l’outrance, to which the General Staff was wedded. Moreover, as has been shown, he was equally at variance with the views of the General Staff about the German plan of campaign. Events proved that he was right and the General Staff wrong.
On September 3rd Lanrezac was relieved of his command. The reason given by one who apparently spoke for Joffre was that he did not adopt the views of the General Staff, while M. Hanotaux has written that it was because of his lack of liaison with the English. Certainly Lanrezac made an unfavourable impression upon Sir John French, with whom he had several unpleasant clashes. While his ejaculation on August 29th, when Haig (acting under French’s orders) did not give him the support which he had conditionally offered, was something worse than indiscreet.[34] But though French and Lanrezac were temperamentally antipathetic the one to the other, the root of the evil (as Lanrezac has since admitted) was that French, unknown to him, was bound by his instructions never to place himself under the orders of any Allied general, and was restrained by the warning that he could not count upon any great or speedy reinforcements.
In considering the case of Lanrezac, it must be remembered that even M. Hanotaux, the apologist for the General Staff, has written that “from the outset General Lanrezac insistently indicated the danger of a turning movement by Lower Belgium, but the Command was intent upon holding to its conception of an advance against the enemy’s Centre.”
But even if a Commander-in-Chief is wrong in his strategy, he cannot afford to have a lieutenant who is inclined to discuss rather than to execute his orders. It is at least questionable whether Lanrezac, although undoubtedly a great and brilliant military theorist, is capable of leading troops in the field. The late General de Maud’huy proclaimed vigorously that Lanrezac had proved his worth in this respect while he commanded the Fifth Army in August, 1914. Certainly his action in breaking off the battle of Charleroi showed that he was willing to shoulder responsibility. Possibly that course avoided a great disaster. But equally certainly it showed more prudence on Lanrezac’s part than he had exhibited during the earlier days of the campaign, when he urged Joffre to allow him to sally northwards. While I am bound to add that the only member of his staff with whom I have had an opportunity to discuss the matter stated vigorously and in detail that, although Lanrezac’s preconceived theories were undoubtedly right, he impressed him, after the first few days of the campaign, as temperamentally unfitted to command in the field in time of war.[35]
On August 25th Joffre acknowledged the failure of his plan by issuing a General Instruction, stating that it had been found impossible to execute the projected offensive. It is regrettable for his own fame that then and later he attempted to place the blame upon those who had done their best to execute his orders, and who had sacrificed themselves or who had been sacrificed in attempting to carry out the plans of the General Staff. All the generals commanding and their subordinates were not incompetent; nor was there any serious fault to be found with the troops. But the General Staff’s strategy had broken down at all points. All attempts since made to rehabilitate it have been of the weakest nature. The majority of French military critics admit, more or less openly, the vital defects in Plan XVII. They wisely think that there is glory enough for the French Army in the great strategic successes of the latter part of the war. But occasionally some of Joffre’s friends make a feeble effort to prove that the General Staff was not guilty of any faulty dispositions. A recent instance of this kind was an article by General Dupont in La Revue Militaire Française.[36] The whole burden of his excuse may be summed up by saying that the General Staff thought that Belgium would make some compromise with Germany, and that the violation of the former’s territory would only be partial. He advances several interesting reasons which the General Staff had for holding that belief. But he seems to be unaware that he is thereby not refuting the charge of the basic error, but on the contrary is confirming it. Much more to the point is the judgment of Lieutenant-Colonel Grouard, who, in the same number of La Revue Militaire Française,[36] makes the categorical pronouncement that “le haut commandement français avait fait preuve d’un défaut absolu de sens stratégique.”
In giving evidence before the Commission sur la Métallurgie Joffre asserted that the battle of the Marne was the outcome of a plan which he had conceived on August 25th. The report of the evidence shows that the President of the Commission was not disposed to agree with that statement. Nor does it seem to accord with the facts as known. It is on record that after Charleroi, after Joffre had admitted the compulsory abandonment of his offensive, Sir John French tried, and tried in vain, to find out from him what was his new plan. Joffre’s enigmatic reply at St. Quentin, on August 26th, certainly did not correspond to what French had the right to expect. While it was, indeed, French himself who was the first to propose that a stand should be made on the Marne. On September 1st he submitted a memorandum embodying this plan, which Joffre rejected on the following day as being impracticable under existing conditions.
In any event, the necessary precedent of the Marne was the Battle of the Ourcq, which was engaged by Galliéni and the troops which were defending Paris.
It was precisely on August 25th, at 11.30 a.m., that Joffre received an imperative order from the Minister of War (Messimy) that if he was forced to retreat he should detach three corps for the defence of Paris. For the Government, which had been careful not to interfere with the Commander-in-Chief, and which had been kept in complete ignorance by him, began to be alarmed about the safety of the capital; and all the more so because, when Galliéni had spent a day at the Grand Quartier Général, Joffre’s Chief-of-Staff had contemptuously intimated that the fate of Paris was of little account:[37] “Une ville comme toutes les autres.”
M. Maurice Viollette, the Chairman of the Commission sur la Métallurgie, seemed to believe that Joffre had only acted upon compulsion in allotting troops for the defence of Paris, although the latter persisted in affirming that this order had not in any way influenced his conduct. That statement is in absolute disaccord with the report of General Hirschauer (who was sent at this juncture to visit the General Staff) that the order was resented: which is confirmed by Messimy. While opinion is not unanimous, there is no general belief in military circles, either in France or elsewhere, that the retreat was part of a strategic plan which ended in the battle of the Marne. Neither M. Hanotaux’s somewhat ecstatic account, nor the more sober narrative issued by the General Staff some months later, carries any conviction. The latter is a glaring example of a work written with one eye on posterity.[38] An unprejudiced French authority—Lieutenant-Colonel de Thomasson—has pronounced it to be interesting only subsequent to its relation to the battle of the Marne, the account of the initial plan of campaign and of the frontier battles being almost unintelligible and manifestly prejudiced.
In the period between the collapse of Plan XVII. and the battle of the Marne, Joffre’s greatest value as Commander in Chief of the French Armies was clearly shown. For if his primary errors and subsequent obstinacy were responsible for the disasters which delivered to the enemy nine of the richest departments of France and affected the whole course of the war, yet his imperturbable calmness was effective in preventing a difficult and dangerous retreat from developing into something more calamitous.
General Mangin has written that in the battle of the Marne there is glory enough for both Galliéni and Joffre.
Apparently the latter was of a different opinion. For a year later, in 1915, irritated and provoked by the fact that many persisted in giving the major credit to Galliéni, he endeavoured to fix the latter’s rôle by giving him the following citation:—
“Galliéni, Général, Gouverneur Militaire et Commandant des Armées de Paris:
“Commandant du Camp Retranché et des armée de Paris, et placé le 2 Septembre, sous les ordres du Commandant-en-Chef, à fait preuve des plus hautes qualités militaires:
“En contribuant, par les renseignements qu’il avait recueillis, à déterminer la direction de marche prise par l’aile droite allemande.
“En orientant judicieusement pour participer à la bataille les forces mobiles à sa disposition.
“En facilitant par tous les moyens en son pouvoir l’accomplissement de la mission assignée par le Commandant-en-Chef à ces forces mobiles.”
It is indisputable that this citation is ungenerous in its terms. But the bulk of opinion goes further. The general judgment seems to be that it does not present fairly or accurately the part taken by Galliéni, and that it was a deliberate attempt to deprecate what he had actually done. The only permanent result has been an unpleasant impression that Joffre was unduly jealous of anyone sharing the glory.
Galliéni had a letter of service which designated him as Joffre’s eventual successor as Commander-in-Chief. But Joffre told the Minister of War that he did not care to have him at the Grand Quartier Général; and he was therefore left in Paris, doing little or nothing. Later Galliéni was entrusted with the defence of Paris; and from a conversation he had with Joffre by telephone, on August 30th, he got the idea that the latter considered the capital was doomed.
It was undoubtedly Galliéni who first saw the opportunity to check the enemy. In 1920 M. Poincaré disclosed that on September 3rd, 1914, the evening before he issued the order to Maunoury to attack the German flank, Galliéni had telegraphed to the Government at Bordeaux stating that he thought there was a good opening. M. Poincaré added: “It is therefore certain that the Commander-in-Chief of the Armies of Paris had spontaneously, from the first moment, a clear vision of the battle to be engaged.”[39]
On the other hand, Joffre’s General Order No. 48 (which arrived at Verdun on September 4th) referred to a renewal of the general offensive being undertaken “in some days.” This coincides with a complaint attributed to Joffre, that Galliéni’s action had forced him to fight before he was ready to do so. Moreover, in rejecting Sir John French’s suggestion that a stand should be made on the Marne, Joffre had written, on September 2nd, that “On account of events which have taken place during the last two days, I do not believe it possible at present to contemplate a general manœuvre on the Marne with the totality of our forces.”[40]
Undoubtedly had the Battle of the Marne been lost Joffre and the General Staff would have been blamed. It is, therefore, manifestly unfair to seek to deprive them of credit for that victory. But, without Galliéni, there would have been no Battle of the Ourcq; and without the Battle of the Ourcq there would have been no Battle of the Marne.[41] The facts justify Clemenceau, who, on November 11th, 1918, in announcing the Armistice to the Chambre des Députés, said: “Without Galliéni the victory would have been impossible.”
But the real victors of the Battle of the Marne were the men, French and English,[42] who, after suffering for weeks from the dire effects of the false strategy, the faulty preparations, and the imperfect information of the General Staff, did all and more than was asked of them.
Von Klück, in explaining why he changed the direction of his Army, throws this salient fact into clearer relief than does any French writer.[43]
He had followed the theory of the younger von Moltke (which had, indeed, been emphasized at a Kriegspiel a couple of years earlier) that a fortified camp should not be attacked until the armies in the field had been overwhelmed; while undoubtedly Galliéni did not play the game according to the German rule when he himself ventured forth without having been attacked. But while making an allowance for that surprise von Klück said: “If you want the material reasons of our check, look in the newspapers of the day: they will tell you about lack of munitions, about a defective commissariat: all that is exact. But there is a reason which transcends all the others; a reason which, in my opinion, is entirely decisive. It is the extraordinary and peculiar aptitude of the French soldier to recover quickly. That is a factor which it is difficult to translate into figures, and which, consequently, upsets the most precise and far-seeing calculations. That men may stand fast and be killed is an understood thing which is discounted in every plan of battle. But that men who have retreated during ten days, that men sleeping on the ground and half dead with fatigue, should be able to take up their rifles and attack when the bugle sounds, is a thing upon which we never counted. It was a possibility of which there was never any question in our schools of war.”
