12th August 22,000 prisoners and over 400 guns had been captured, and the line had been advanced to a depth of twelve miles, to the old German positions in 1916.
The 8th August was the black day of the German Army in the history of this war, says Ludendorff.[5]
“The Emperor told me later that, after the failure of the July offensive and after the 8th August, he knew the war could no longer be won. The official report of the evening of the 8th announced briefly that the enemy had penetrated our line south of the Somme on a wide front. Early the following morning General von Cramon rang me up from Baden. He informed me that my report had caused great alarm in Vienna. I could not leave him in any doubt as to the serious view I took of the situation. Nevertheless he begged me to remember how detrimentally the blunt admission of defeat must affect our allies, who had placed all their hopes in Germany. This occurred again on the 2nd September.
The impression made on our Allies by the failure on the Western Front was great. The Emperor Charles announced his intention of coming to Spa in the middle of August.”
The great salient the Germans had created towards Amiens was disappearing, and Sir Douglas Haig was faced with the old positions of the opening of the battle of the Somme in 1916. But there was a difference. The situation and his reasoning are succinctly related in his dispatch:
“In deciding to extend the attack northwards to the
area between the Rivers Somme and Scarpe I was influenced by the following considerations.
The enemy did not seem prepared to meet an attack in this direction, and, owing to the success of the Fourth Army, he occupied a salient the left flank of which was already threatened from the south. A further reason for my decision was that the ground north of the Ancre River was not greatly damaged by shell-fire, and was suitable for the use of Tanks. A successful attack between Albert and Arras in a south-easterly direction would turn the line of the Somme south of Péronne, and give every promise of producing far-reaching results. It would be a step towards the strategic objective, St. Quentin-Cambrai.
This attack, moreover, would be rendered easier by the fact that we now held the commanding plateau south of Arras about Bucquoy and Ablainzeville, which in the days of the old Somme fighting had lain well behind the enemy’s lines. In consequence we were here either astride or to the east of the intricate system of trench lines which in 1916 we had no choice but to attack frontally, and enjoyed advantages of observation which at that date had been denied us.
It was arranged that on the morning of the 21st August a limited attack should be launched north of the Ancre to gain the general line of the Arras-Albert railway, on which it was correctly assumed that the enemy’s main line of resistance was sited. The day of the 22nd August would then be used to get troops and guns into position on this front, and to bring forward the left of the Fourth Army between the Somme and the Ancre. The principal attack would be delivered on the 23rd August by the Third Army and the divisions of the Fourth Army north of the Somme, the remainder of the Fourth Army assisting by pushing forward south of the river to cover the flank of the main operation. Thereafter, if success attended our efforts, the whole of both