Another newspaper reported as follows: "The King of England sent a congratulatory dispatch to the King of Belgium upon his victory at Liége; seven German regiments were slain."
At Paris itself a note of the French War Ministry—published on the evening of Aug. 7, Liége having fallen in the early morning of that day—mentions the resistance of Liége and says that the forts are still holding out; that the Germans who had entered the city on Thursday by passing between the forts had evacuated it on Friday; and that the Belgian division that went to the assistance of the city had therefore not even made an attack. The official note concludes from all this that the resistance of the Belgians was seriously disturbing the plan of the Germans, who were building hopes upon a rapid success.
And four full days after the capture of Liége the French Minister at Berne reported officially: "Liége has not yet been taken; the German troops were repulsed."
At Copenhagen the following dispatches were published: "The English and French troops had effected a junction with the Belgian Army and had entered Liége and made many German prisoners, among them a nephew of the German Kaiser."
Similarly at Stockholm: "The Germans had suffered a severe repulse."
Again a dispatch from Paris to Rome: "The Germans had been driven back behind the Moselle and were begging for an armistice; the French had passed Namur and were pressing forward in forced marches, while 500,000 English were falling upon the German flank."
Still another official report from Paris: "Liége is becoming the grave of the 150,000 Germans who are breaking their heads against its walls; the Belgians had taken 3,000 prisoners, who were in a terrible condition; but for their good fortune of falling into captivity they would have starved to death."
In contrast to all this let us take the unvarnished truth as in the reported simple words of the German Quartermaster General:
We are now able to report upon Liége Without doing any harm.... We had only a weak force at Liége four days ago, for it is not possible to prepare for such a bold undertaking by collecting large masses of men. That we attained the desired end in spite of this is due to the excellent preparation, the valor of our troops, their energetic leadership, and the help of God. The courage of the enemy was broken, and his troops fought badly. The difficulties against us lay in the exceedingly unfavorable topography of the surroundings, which consisted of hills and woods, and in the treacherous participation of the entire population in the fighting, not even excluding women. The people fired upon our troops from ambush, from villages and forests—fired upon our physicians who were treating the wounded, and upon the wounded themselves. Hard and bitter fighting occurred; whole villages had to be destroyed in order to break the resistance, before our brave troops penetrated the girdle of forts and took possession of the city. It is true that a part of the forts still held out, but they no longer fired. The Kaiser did not want to waste a drop of blood in storming the forts, which no longer hindered the carrying out of our plans. We were able to await the arrival of heavy artillery to level the forts one after the other at our leisure, and without the sacrifice of a single life—in case their garrisons should not surrender sooner.... So far as can be judged at present the Belgians had more men for the defense of the city than we had for storming it. Every expert can measure from this fact the greatness of our achievement; it is without a parallel....
(Signed) VON STEIN,