(7) The troops and diplomatic and consular representatives of Germany and Austria must leave Bulgaria within four weeks.[45]
The secret clauses authorized the Allies to make use of the railways, roads, and other means of communication and transport in Bulgaria for the movement of their troops and to occupy certain strategic points. Sofia was not to be occupied save in exceptional circumstances.[46]
At 22.30 hours on September 29th the Armistice was concluded. It was signed by General Franchet d’Espérey for the Allies and by the Finance Minister, Liapcheff, and General Lukoff for Bulgaria; it came into force on September 30th at noon.
On September 30th the number of prisoners captured by the Allies was not very great, about 15,000 to 20,000 (those opposite the 35th Division did not surrender, as we know, until a few days later). But the Bulgarians had lost about one-third of their artillery; 350 guns had been captured, and many others, which had been abandoned or hidden in the woods and gullies, were found subsequently, and the ammunition dumps had been blown up.
The causes of the Allied victory may be summed up as follows:
1. The great military qualities of General Franchet d’Espérey should be recognized; his able dispositions, based partly on the old plan of Voivod Michich, afterwards elaborated by General Guillaumat, consisted in the concentration in the Moglena sector of a mobile reserve for attack, created even at the cost of withdrawing troops from other areas and leaving them weakly defended. The Moglena sector had been chosen because, as it presented the greatest natural difficulties, the Bulgarians had taken less trouble over its artificial defences. In view of the great scarcity of Allied reserves, those that were available had to be transported from one area to the other according to necessity. This was done in the case of the 122nd French Division and the heavy artillery; as soon as a breach had been made they were transferred to the sector of the A.F.O., but as a matter of fact there was no need of the 122nd Division, because the A.F.O. was able to act on its own account; the division therefore went into army reserve.
2. The admirable dash and excellent discipline and staying power of all the Allied contingents over extremely difficult ground and under a semi-tropical sun, until the rainy season began, when the whole country became a muddy swamp. To the French troops, above all, was due the breach in the enemy front on September 15th; the British distinguished themselves for the magnificent tenacity in their attack on the terrible positions of the Lake Doiran area, an attack, which if it did not succeed, yet contributed very materially, according to the Bulgarians themselves, to the victory; our own troops had the great merit first of having held on for two years on the theoretically untenable sector of Hill 1050, and afterwards of having developed the rapid pursuit of the enemy with an extremely arduous battle at the end, when the Bulgarians were outflanked at Sop, a battle, the continuation of which, was interrupted at the last moment by the Armistice. The Serbians played a valiant part in the attack at the centre, but the outstanding feature of their action was their magnificent and fantastic march towards the Fatherland, regardless of the impervious mountain ranges, extending one behind the other across the line of advance, almost without food, with few munitions and practically no equipment. Inspired by patriotic enthusiasm which was a religious faith, they drove the enemy from height to height, from valley to valley, without troubling to see if they were followed by their supplies, which, in fact, never came up with them. One saw old soldiers who had been detailed as hospital orderlies on the lines of communication, because they were regarded as unfit for active service, abandoning their posts, seizing rifles and haversacks filled with biscuit, hurry forward to join in the pursuit. In every village deserters from the Bulgarian Army, who were Serbs enrolled by force, were discovered, and now rejoined the Serbian Army. When the latter reached Serbia proper, these increases in strength were even more considerable, because there were many Serbian soldiers who had remained hidden in the mountains during the Bulgarian occupation of the country, and who, the moment they saw the liberating army of their brothers arrive, also joined in the pursuit of the enemy. It is said that in the Morava Division, which at the beginning of the offensive numbered only 3,500 rifles in all, one regiment alone, after a few weeks, had no less than 5,000.
CRASHED GERMAN AEROPLANE.
