Once more there could be no suggestion that this connecting link, opened in October, 1913, was wanted in the interests of the ordinary traffic, the needs of which were adequately met by the diligence running twice a day between Malmédy and Stavelot. What was really aimed at was a rail connection with the Belgian system by means of which the troops concentrated in those extensive sidings on the Aix-la-Chapelle-St. Vith line could be poured into Belgium in a continuous stream for the achievement of designs on Belgium or—operating from either the Belgian or the Luxemburg frontier—on France.
In helping to provide this connection, Belgium, as subsequent events were to show, was in a position akin to that of a man forced to dig the grave in which he is to be buried after being shot; but Belgium, we are told, "yielded in this and other matters because she could not resist without support, and no support was forthcoming." There certainly was an attempt to lull possible suspicions by the designation of the Malmédy-Stavelot link as a "light railway." It was, also, evident that the physical conditions of the Weismes-Malmédy branch, with which it was to connect, would not permit of any heavy traffic along it. But the so-called "light railway" was built with the same gauge as the main-line systems on each side of the frontier; the powers obtained in respect to it allowed of trains being run at a speed of forty miles an hour, as against the recognised speed of sixteen miles an hour on light railways proper; while no sooner had the link been established than Germany discarded the defective Weismes-Malmédy branch for the purposes of military transport, and built a new line from Malmédy to Weywertz, a station to the north or north-east of Weismes. This Malmédy-Weywertz branch would, it was understood, be used exclusively for military traffic, and the station at Weywertz was, in due course, provided with its own extensive platforms and network of sidings for the accommodation of troop trains.
We now come to the third chapter of the story; and here we learn that what was happening in the immediate proximity of the German-Belgian frontier was but part of a much wider scheme, though one still designed to serve the same purpose—that, namely, of ensuring the invasion of Belgium by German troops with the greatest facility and in the least possible time.
From Weywertz, the new junction for Stavelot and the Belgian railways in general, the Germans built a line to Jünkerath, a station north of Gerolstein, on the line from Cologne to Treves. Then from Blankenheim, immediately north of Jünkerath, and from Lissendorf, on the south of the same station, there were opened for traffic, in July, 1912, new double-track lines which, meeting at Dümpelfeld, on the existing Remagen-Adenau line, gave a through route for troops from the Rhine, across the Eifel district to Weywertz, and so on to Stavelot for destinations (in war-time) throughout Belgium, Luxemburg, or along the northern frontier of France.
This direct route to Belgium offered the further advantage that it avoided any necessity for troops from the Rhine to pass through Cologne, where much congestion might otherwise occur. It also left the Aix-la-Chapelle-Weywertz route free for troops from Cologne and Westphalia, while a further improvement of the facilities for crossing the Rhine made Remagen still more accessible for troops from all parts of Central Germany destined for Belgium—and beyond.
Reference to the Prussian State Railways official map shows, also, (1) a new line from Coblenz which joins, at Mayen, the existing railway from Andernach, on the Rhine, to Gerolstein, in the Eifel, whence the Belgian border can be reached either via Jünkerath and Weywertz or via Lammersweiler and the Luxemburg station of Trois-Vièrges; (2) the extension to Daun, also on the Andernach-Gerolstein route, of a short branch on the Coblenz-Treves Railway which previously terminated at Wittlich; and (3) several other small lines in the Eifel district, offering additional facilities for the concentration of troops on the Belgian frontier.
So the Malmédy-Stavelot "light railway"—especially in view of this series of new German lines all leading thereto—had become a railway of the greatest strategical importance; and the fourth chapter of the story (though one upon which it is not proposed to enter here) would show how this network of strategical lines, developed with so much energy and thoroughness, was brought into operation in 1914 immediately on the outbreak of war, and, from that time, constituted one of the main arteries for the passage of German troops to and from Belgium and Northern France.