The plan which Conrad had conceived and which Falkenhayn had agreed to implement with doubled forces was a striking departure from the traditional German methods which HL had hitherto, with a single exception at Lodz, consistently employed. Instead of a wide enveloping movement directed against the flanks and rear of the enemy, it was a straightforward frontal attack. There was to be a break-through in the centre, or as the French call it, ‘une percée,’ similar to those so often extravagantly bid for on the Western Front. The sector between Gorlice and Tarnow was about 30 miles wide. Behind the Austrian line between these two towns the German Eleventh Army began in early April to assemble. It was finally composed of four German Corps drawn from the French front; the Guard from Alsace, the Xth from the west of Rheims, the XLIst from Chaulnes, and a composite Corps from Lorraine. To these were added the Austrian VIth Corps and a Hungarian cavalry division; in all one cavalry and ten infantry divisions: about 170,000 men. The Eleventh Army had 352 field and 146 heavy guns, and the Austrian Fourth Army behind whom they were forming had 350 field and 103 heavy guns: that is to say a field gun to about every 45 yards and a heavy gun to every 132 yards. Although these proportions were far surpassed by both sides on the Somme in 1916, they represented in May 1915 the greatest artillery concentration yet prepared.
The direction of the Gorlice-Tarnow attack was to be north-east across the foothills between the Vistula and the mountains, and once the Russian line was broken, the Germans would wheel their front until they faced east, thus traversing, as may be seen by the map, the rear of all three Russian armies battling along the Carpathians to the southward. Indeed to make the operation fruitful in the highest degree, or as Falkenhayn expressed it, to improve the ‘harvest prospects,’ he suggested to Conrad that the Austrian armies holding the mountains should ‘give way step by step drawing the enemy after them’ into Hungary. But Conrad ignored the proposal. He could not bring himself to yield Hungarian soil. He had no desire to encourage his armies to retreat. His efforts had usually been required in the opposite sense.
To cover the withdrawal of such important forces from France ‘lively activity’ was prescribed along the entire Western Front. The gas attack at Ypres—not by shelling as at Bolimov, but by the continuous discharge of gas from cylinders—which began on April 22 was the most formidable of these distractive enterprises. The precipitate exposure of this deadly device at a time when no German reserves were at hand to exploit its surprising effects, was one of the debts which the Western allies owed to the Eastern Front. HL were likewise ordered to make a diversion in their northern sphere. They seem to have viewed the Gorlice-Tarnow project with restrained enthusiasm. They had almost come to regard the Eastern Front as their preserve. The arrival of Falkenhayn and O.H.L. as prime actors in these scenes, furnished with the reinforcements for which HL had long pleaded in vain, could scarcely be welcomed. Moreover HL had only one method—a vast outflanking movement from the north. To march between Riga and Kovno and then drive southwards far behind the Russian front, cutting the main railways which sustained it, was their ideal conception. For this the forces were lacking. The most they could offer by way of diversion was a powerful raid by three cavalry supported by three infantry divisions into Courland and Lithuania. This operation began at the end of April and no doubt excited Russian concern.
Hindenburg’s own remarks explain the direction in which his influence was exerted.
‘My Headquarters was at first only an indirect participant in the great operation which began at Gorlice. Our first duty, within the framework of this mighty enterprise, was to tie down strong enemy forces. This was done at first by attacks in the great bend of the Vistula west of Warsaw and on the East Prussian frontier in the direction of Kovno, then on a greater scale by a cavalry sweep into Lithuania and Courland which began on April 27. The advance of three cavalry divisions, supported by the same number of infantry divisions, touched Russia’s war zone at a sensitive spot. For the first time the Russians realized that by such an advance their most important railways which connected the Russian armies with the heart of the country could be seriously threatened. They threw in large forces to meet our invasion. The battles on Lithuanian soil dragged out until the summer. We found ourselves compelled to send larger forces there, to retain our hold on the occupied region and keep up our pressure on the enemy in these districts which had hitherto been untouched by war. Thus a new German army gradually came into existence. It was given the name of the “Niemen Army” from the great river of this region.’47
The Russian forces holding the front against which these dire preparations were progressing, consisted of the Third Army under General Radko Dimitriev, who had hitherto found no difficulty in containing the bulk of the Austrian Fourth Army. The greatest pains were taken to conceal from the Russians the gathering of the storm. All German reconnoitring parties were dressed in Austrian uniforms, and until within a few days of the battle, General Dimitriev was quite unaware of what impended upon him. Still less did he suspect its scale and intensity. The German Staff Officers climbing the hill-tops could see the Russian positions laid out before them as on a map. There were three lines of loop-holed trenches with overhead cover, constituting a single zone of defence. The German reconnoitring parties found the conditions very different from those of the Western Front. No-man’s land was a wide space, three or four thousand yards across, through which occasional patrols wandered by night and in which the inhabitants cultivated their fields by day. The tranquillity of the countryside was broken only by an occasional splutter of rifle-fire or a few desultory shells. The first care of the Germans had been to remove all the inhabitants so that no tales could be told. Meanwhile enormous dumps of ammunition, 1,200 rounds for every field-, and 500 to 600 for every heavy battery were accumulated.
The delicate question of the command was adjusted in the following manner: the Eleventh Army, Austrian and German troops alike, and their offensive were entrusted to General von Mackensen with Seeckt as his mentor. Mackensen was placed under Conrad and A.O.K. But these in turn agreed not to give any orders to Mackensen which had not beforehand been approved by Falkenhayn and O.H.L. And then, lest this procedure should be dilatory, it was understood that in practice O.H.L. would tell Seeckt what to do direct, the formal orders reaching Mackensen as soon as possible through the prescribed ceremonial channel. Thus Austrian dignity was safeguarded, and no inconvenience arose.
The Eleventh Army had taken over the line by April 28, and on the same day Mackensen issued his warning order that the artillery would open on May 1 and that the assault would follow on May 2. The presence of Germans on the front was discovered by the Russians on the 25th, but no reinforcements were asked for by General Dimitriev. Even patrolling and vigilance seem to have sunk to a low ebb. Says Danilov: ‘Our right front with its huge salient had many weak places. The Russian army was at the end of its power. The uninterrupted fighting in the Carpathians had cost it heavy losses. The deficit in officers and men in many units was terrifying. The lack of arms and munitions was catastrophic. In these circumstances the troops could still do something against the Austrians, but were incapable of stopping serious pressure from an energetic and determined foe.’ Such was the situation on the eve of the attack.
The German artillery registration began during May 1, and gradually increased throughout the afternoon and night into a harassing fire to prevent the Russians from strengthening their defences. A two-hours’ pause was made from I to 3 a.m. during the night, to give the German patrols opportunity for reconnaissance, and their engineers time to destroy wire and obstacles. At 6 a.m. on the 2nd, the four-hour intense preliminary bombardment began. At this time the storm troops were already in their assaulting positions, and behind them the successive waves of the attack, together with the field batteries destined to accompany it, deployed. In all ten divisions were marshalled, only the Xth Corps forming reserves upon either wing. The bombardment was crushing, the Russian overhead-cover of earth and sandbags su
pported on logs was everywhere smashed in by the German howitzers and trench-mortars. ‘There was scarcely any reply from the hostile artillery. A few batteries that did attempt it were immediately silenced by overwhelming fire.’ The German infantry instead of hugging the parapet stood upright, and almost unharmed watched the effects of the bombardment. When at 9 a.m. the trench-mortars developed their full intensity, the Russian wire and machine-guns flew into the air. At ten o’clock the trench-mortars ceased firing; the German artillery lifted on to the back lines, and through the dust and smoke, thirty or forty thousand assaulting infantry charged at a rapid pace. ‘Here and there,’ says the German account, ‘loam-grey figures jumped up and ran back weaponless in grey fur caps and fluttering, unbuttoned greatcoats, until there was not one remaining. Like a flock of sheep they fled in wild confusion,’ many to be caught on the next line of wire and there slain or captured.
Only where there were woods near the front line or where, owing to hilly ground, the bombardment had not done its work, was there any fighting. The front position was carried with a rush, and the Russian counter-attacks were hurled back upon their second line. After hard fighting all through May 2 this was stormed in its turn. On the 4th, the IIIrd Caucasian Corps sent from the Russian Army Group reserve attempted to counter-attack, but could do no more than cover the retreat. The Eleventh Army, drawing the Austrian armies on either side forward with them, had now broken completely through the Russian front. Dimitriev’s army was annihilated. His divisions, after another week’s fighting, could scarcely muster 1,000 men a-piece. 140,000 prisoners, 100 guns and 300 machine-guns fell during the whole operation to the victors, while the trenches were choked with dead and wounded. It had once more been proved that the Russian army in its weakened condition could not withstand the troops of any first-class nation. The whole of the Russian Carpathian front now became untenable, and everywhere along 100 miles of hard-won summits and passes, the Eighth, Eleventh and Ninth Russian armies retreated with the utmost speed, yielding up march after march the fair province which they had invaded nine months before and deemed their own for ever.
Meanwhile much had happened at the Dardanelles. The sudden and, as it proved, final cessation of all efforts by the British Navy to force the Straits, which had followed their repulse of the 18th of March, had been succeeded by a cloud of rumours of an impending land-attack upon the Gallipoli Peninsula. Very large British forces were known to be gathering in Egypt and the complete silence and passivity of the fleet betokened extensive preparations for a landing. Meanwhile the Turks under German direction worked feverishly to fortify all possible landing-places, and by the middle of April their army on the peninsula had been raised to eight divisions. Admiral von Usedom with scarcely any armour-piercing ammunition for his heavy guns, only the mines he had already sown and no hope of getting more of either, was fully conscious of his weakness in the face of a renewed naval effort. But the flower of the Turkish army was now gathering on the peninsula and Liman von Sanders, under whose orders stood the valiant Mustapha Kemal, awaited an impending descent by a hostile force with confidence and ardour. Indeed instructed military opinion in Turkish and German circles, as also at Sir John French’s Headquarters, held that the operation of landing an army from open boats on beaches swept by machine-guns and modern rifle-fire was probably impossible. To the German Supreme Headquarters who, knowing the facts, watched the events, it must indeed have seemed strange that the British should be ready to face the appalling risks and sacrifices of a landing, while all the time the main fortress cannons which held the Straits could each count their armour-piercing shells upon a man’s fingers. Perhaps however the British would attack by land and sea at the same time or in quick succession!
On April 25 the impossible was achieved. From earliest daybreak Liman von Sanders received the news of a series of landings and attacks on almost all the practicable beaches. Desperate fighting ensued, into which all the Turkish reserves at the end of the Peninsula were rapidly drawn. On the beaches, and amid the rocky scrub and ravines of the Peninsula a violent struggle at the closest quarters raged remorselessly, and by nightfall on the 26th after a loss of 20,000 men, more than 30,000 British, Australasian and French troops had established themselves upon the Gallipoli Peninsula. The assailants paused to land their artillery and supplies and Liman von Sanders hurried his remaining Turkish divisions to the scene. So critical was his need that he was forced to leave the isthmus of Bulair with its celebrated lines and his sole means of retreat utterly unguarded. On April 28 the British and French troops on the tip of the Peninsula resumed their advance and the furious first battle of Krithia was fought. The Turks withstood the invaders, weakened by their terrible losses and only lightly supported by field artillery, and yielded scarcely a mile of the precious ground. Still it seemed to the German-Turkish command that their enemies had overcome the main obstacle. They had established themselves on shore. All the Turkish reserves were engaged. The Turkish line of retreat could be cut at any moment by a further descent from the sea. No one could tell what reserves the ships might bring, or on what new point they would fall. There was nothing but to fight on stubbornly.
Europe therefore at the end of the first week in May took count of two new events of the first magnitude: the wonderful landing of the Allies upon Gallipoli and the crashing Russian defeat in North Galicia. ‘As had been feared,’ wrote Falkenhayn, ‘the English set foot on the Gallipoli Peninsula on April 25. Italy’s entry into the ranks of the enemy became daily more probable.’ The negotiations between the Allies and Italy had in fact been virtually completed; but the naval and military conventions were still being settled in Paris. The naval arrangements which it had become my duty to conduct on behalf of the Allies presented no great difficulty. Our command of the sea at that time was absolute, and it was easy to give our hoped-for new ally whatever naval aid she might ask. But the essence of the military convention was that the Russians should maintain at least forty divisions in Galicia and should press the Austrians there with all their might. When the discussions began, the Italians might well have expected an immediate Russian invasion of Hungary. Before they ended, they were confronted with the apparition of Gorlice-Tarnow, and the spectacle of a general Russian retreat from the Carpathians. By the middle of May the magnitude of the Russian disasters in Galicia was plain. Moreover, the British attacks on the Aubers Ridge in France, upon which many vain hopes had been built, had also been easily repulsed with heavy slaughter. Everywhere the Germans struck or defended themselves with invincible strength and skill. Far larger Austrian forces would now be available to meet the Italian armies. The military position of the Allies had sensibly worsened.
There always however remained the ding-dong battle on the Gallipoli Peninsula, the military prodigy of the landing, and the apparent certainty that the amphibious power of Britain would enable her to beat down and break up the Turkish Empire with all that that would entail. The two events, the victory and the defeat balanced each other. The negotiations continued. The conventions were signed. On May 23 Italy ordered the general mobilization of her armies and declared war against Austria. At midnight on the 24th the Italian army which had long been on a war-footing crossed the Austrian frontier and a fourth Great Power joined the Allies.
CHAPTER XX
THE FALL OF WARSAW
We have now to chronicle the flood of disasters that the victory of Gorlice-Tarnow opened upon the Russians. During the whole of the summer and autumn of 1915 they had to face the almost ceaseless attack of nearly 40 German divisions and of nearly the whole of the Austrian armies. Already weakened in quality and structure by the injuries they had received, and in the worst phase of their munition supply, the armies of the Czar presented an 800-mile front to the successive German thrusts which now here, now there, broke the line or forced deep and rapid retirements. The consequences of such defeats wherever they had occurred, endangered the life of Russian armies far beyond the reverberations of the cannonade. We have th
e spectacle of the German warrior setting himself with prodigious energy to beat the life out of the Russian giant. The summer campaign of 1915 was the only time when very large German forces maintained a continuous, unrelenting offensive against the Russian front. Dragging along the Austrian armies with which they were often interspersed, the Germans marched forward into Russia, upon the kind of plans which had long been Conrad’s dream, but which the armies of the Dual Monarchy could never have executed.
The tale is one of hideous tragedy and measureless and largely unrecorded suffering. Considering the state of their armies and organization, the Russian resistance and constancy are worthy of the highest respect. The strategy and conduct of the Grand Duke, bearing up amid ceaseless misfortune, with crumbling fronts, with congested and threatened communications, with other anxieties still further in rear, which most military commanders are spared, fills a chapter in military history from which a future generation of Russians will not withhold their gratitude. He yielded provinces; he yielded cities; one after another he yielded river lines. He was driven from Galicia; he was driven from Poland; in the north he was driven far back upon Russian soil. He gave up his conquests; he gave up Warsaw; he gave up all his fortresses. The whole defended front broke under the hammer. All its railways passed to the service of the invader. The entire population fled in terror and agony before the advancing storm. When at last the autumn rains choked the roads with mud, and winter raised its shield before a tortured nation, the Russian armies, extricated from their perils, stood along a still continuous line from Riga on the Baltic to the Roumanian frontier, with a future before them from which the hopes of general victory were not banished.
The easterly advance of the German Eleventh Army from the scene of its victory carried it by the end of May to Przemysl. The Grand Duke determined not to squander troops in the defence of the fortress. When the German and Austrian columns lapped it on both sides, the two army corps which it would have required to stand a siege withdrew towards Lemberg and other battlefields with which we are familiar. An attempt by the Austro-German Südarmee under Linsingen to envelop the extreme Russian left came to naught. Indeed it was decisively thrown back by a heavy counter-stroke. Meanwhile large Russian reinforcements drawn from their centre and north gathered in the path of the conquerors. Progress became slower and at the beginning of June the assailants paused for rest and reflection.
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