Talking of nationalities, you will further observe that these ships all fly the Union Jack. But they are crowded with American soldiers. There must be thousands of these soldiers. They swarm everywhere—bunched on deck, peering through portholes, or plastering the rigging like an overflow of mustard sauce, which in truth they are. They are more than that. They are a portent. They are a symbol. They are a testimonial—to the Kaiser; for has not that indefatigable bungler by his own efforts brought about a long-overdue understanding between all the English-speaking people in the world?
Above all, they are a direct answer to a particular challenge.
A few weeks ago the Men at the Top in Germany got together and held what is known in military circles as a pow-wow. A condensed report of their deliberations would have read something like this:
“Yes, Majesty, the Good Old German God is undoubtedly on the side of our Army. Still, the fact remains that we have not yet achieved anything, after three-and-a-half years of war, really worth while.… Belgium, Serbia, Roumania, Russia? Yes, no doubt. Each of those countries has now received the true reward of her stupidity and presumption; but none of them ever offered any serious difficulty from a military point of view, except Russia; and the credit for her collapse was due far more to our internal agents than to our external military pressure.… No, Hindenburg, I haven’t forgotten Tannenberg; but you haven’t done very much since then (except get gold nails knocked into yourself), and what you have accomplished has been chiefly under—ahem!—my direction.… No, no, I am not really pinning orchids on myself—not yet, anyway. I am merely trying to be candid and frank: in short, I am reminding you that you are only a figurehead. You know what irreverent people call you—‘General What-do-you-Say!’
“… Yes, Your Imperial Highness, your consummate generalship at Verdun undoubtedly achieved an historic victory over the French; but you will forgive me for pointing out that your casualties were at least twice as numerous as theirs, and that the ground which you captured has since been regained.… Submarines? My good Von Capelle, your submarines are as obsolete as our late lamented friend Von Tirpitz. Justify my statement? In a moment.… Yes, Majesty, the British Army failed utterly to break our line at the Somme, but they and the French took seventy thousand of our best troops prisoner, and we had to execute a ‘strategic’ retirement which lost us about a thousand square miles of French soil. Not much of a performance for the German Army—the German Army—to put up against a mob of half-trained mercenaries! We managed to delude our people into the belief that we had scored a great military triumph in so doing, but the German nation, excellent though their discipline is, are not likely to go on swallowing that stuff forever. You know that, better than most, Hertling! Bethmann-Hollweg knew it too: he was no match for Liebknecht, although he did lock him up.…
“And what of the situation since the Somme? Haig is within ten miles of Ostend, and has captured practically the whole of the Paschendaele Ridge.… The Eastern Front? Nothing matters in this war except the Western Front. What are we going to do about that?… Your Majesty will assume supreme command? Splendid!… And break the Western Front? Colossal! That was just what I was about to suggest. Now for the plan of campaign, which I do not doubt Your Majesty has already sketched out.… Perhaps Your Majesty will permit Hindenburg and myself to remain here a few moments longer, while you unfold it? We need not detain His Imperial Highness the Crown Prince. He is the man of Action: his task will come later. (For Heaven’s sake, Von Hertling, get him out of here, or our two military geniuses will be at loggerheads in five minutes!)
“… And now, Majesty, you suggest—?… That is a superb plan; but it appears to me—I mean, to Hindenburg—that you—we—are rating one of the nations opposed to us too lightly.… Yes, Your Majesty, I know you are going to stand no nonsense from them after the War,—in fact, you warned their Ambassador, most properly, if I may say so, to that effect,—but would it not be a good move, just as a preliminary, to stand no nonsense from them during the War?… Too far away? They can’t get over? Well—here are the approximate numbers of the American troops already in France. And there are a lot of them in England too.… Rather surprising? Yes. Indeed, quite a creditable feat for an unwarlike nation. I shall show these figures to Von Capelle: it will justify what I said about his submarines: in fact, it will annoy him extremely. And there are more coming. They are pouring over faster and faster. I shall tell him that too.… But the Americans have had no experience of intensive warfare? And they have fallen behind with their constructive programme—aeroplanes and artillery? Quite so. And, therefore, taking these facts into consideration, I—Hindenburg—Your Majesty will doubtless decide that our only chance is to concentrate in overwhelming strength, here and now, against one of the two enemy forces at present opposed to us, and destroy that force in detail before the Americans can throw any considerable body of troops into the line.… Expensive? Undoubtedly.… No one has ever succeeded during this War in breaking a properly organized trenchline? Agreed; but only because no one has yet been able or willing to pay the necessary price. The British might have done it on the Somme, but Haig was too squeamish about the lives of his men. British generals are handicapped in their military dispositions by a public opinion which happily does not exist in our enlightened Fatherland. I—Hin—Your Majesty can afford to do it. With all these unemployed Divisions from the Russian Front, we can go to the limit in the matter of casualties.… How many? Well, I think we can afford to lose a million men—say a million.… Yes, indeed, Majesty, your heart must bleed at the prospect; but after all, it is for the ultimate good of Humanity.… ‘One cannot make omelettes without breaking eggs?’ Admirable! Your Majesty’s felicity of phrase shows no falling off, I perceive. And yet the Americans talk of their Woodrow Wilson! Besides, it will be a million less to make trouble for Us after the War. Now, I suppose we are all agreed on the foe to be crushed?… The British? Naturally. The British! The time has come to drive them into the sea. Haig has recently extended his line twenty-eight miles—rather reluctantly, too. He has had to send troops to Italy, and he had heavy casualties in Belgium last autumn. Twenty-seven thousand killed, in fact. Still, without a supreme commander, you cannot blame the various Allied leaders for ‘passing the buck’ to one another, as the Yankees say. We can accumulate troops on his front—veterans from Russia—sufficient to outnumber him by at least three to one. That should suffice, if we stand by our decision about casualties. We will strike hard at his new positions, before his artillery has had time to register thoroughly. We will annihilate his front system of trenches by an intensive bombardment, while our new long-range gas-shells take his rest-billets by surprise and demoralize his Divisional and Corps Reserves. And I think, Majesty, that we have been a little punctilious about things like the Red Cross. After all, hospitals are a mere sentimental handicap to the efficient waging of war. Our new bombing aeroplanes might be instructed to deal faithfully with these, especially as the fool English have organized no preparation for their defence. Yes, I—we—Your Majesty will drive the whole pack of them into the sea this time! The French, isolated, can then be handled at leisure; and with Calais, Boulogne, and Havre in our hands the Americans will find that they have come too late. In fact, we can pick them off as they arrive. Thus it is that Your Majesty, like Cæsar and Napoleon, separates his enemies and then destroys them one by one.… Divide et Impera! Exactly! Most happily put, Your Majesty!”
And it was so—up to a point. Ludendorff’s plan was adopted. The necessary concentration of troops was effected with admirable secrecy and promptitude, and the parallel enterprises of sweeping the British Army into the sea and expending a million German lives were duly inaugurated. The latter undertaking succeeded better than the former: the line sagged and wavered; it was pushed here and there; but it never broke. Still, the strain was terrible, as news arrived of Monchy gone, Wytschaete gone, Messines gone, Kemmel gone; of Bapaume, Albert, Armentières, Bailleul, all gone—little hills and little towns all of them, but big and precious in certain unimportant eyes because of their associations. But the worst news never arrived. Instead, there came one morning the tale of an all-day assault by the Hun, delivered in mass from Meteren to Voormezeele, every wave of which had been broken and hurled back by impregnable rocks of French and British infantry. So disastrous was the failure of that tremendous lunge that the enemy drew off with his dead and his shame for several weeks, and the non-stop run to Calais was withdrawn from the time-table until further notice.
But the matter could not be left here. The Boche had laid a terrible stake on the table, and was bound to redeem it or perish. Plainly he would try again—maybe at some fresh point; but again. Already there were mutterings of trouble on the French Front. That he would break the line—the line which he had failed to break at Verdun in 1916, and at Ypres in 1914—seemed incredible; but he might succeed in straining it beyond the limits of perfect recovery; and if that happened, Ludendorff’s boast that America would arrive too late might be justified.
Hence the present Armada. It is only one of many. Transports have been crossing the Atlantic for months now, but never upon such a scale as this. There are thousands of soldiers in this convoy alone—men physically splendid, with nearly a year’s training behind them. They are going over—Over There—in answer to the call. Russia has stepped out of the scale, so America must step in at once if Prussianism is to kick the beam. Here they are—a sight to quicken the pulse—the New World hastening to redress the balance of the Old.