Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1913-01-08

their favor in the negotiations to have
Adrianople in their possession.
The Bulgarian treatment of the cor
respondents is one of the many 1ndl-
cations that the Bulgarian staff did
expect at one time to take AdrianopIe
by storm.
1t was argued by serious CORE
spondents who did not feel that they
ought to waste their time or the
money of their papers in idleness, that
the Bulgarian government ought not
to have received any correspondents
at all. But this was not logic to the
government. The press represented
public opinion. 1t could serve
purpose, and all the college professors
in the land who spoke any foreign
language found their work in the COM
mon cause, no less than grandfather
found his in driving an OK cart and
the women in making bread.
The plan was well thought out, and
the regulations, which would fill col
umn, left nothing that occurred TO
officers or college professors out OF
consideration. No mention was to be
made of the wounded, nor even OF the
weather, if it were bad, for bad wealth
er might tell the enemy that the roads
were bad.
While many an imaginary account,
because it had the similitude of nara
tive which characterizes all convinc-
ing fiction, was hailed as real war
correspondence, the Bulgarian stan,
when 1t came to actual reports Eek
elusive of massacres), was scrupulous-
ly exact and exasperatingly late and
brief.
All praise by the press kept the
ball of the prestige of victory rolling.
1t helped to convince the powers and
the Turk that the Bulgarian army was
| irresistible. The stage climax of the
whole campaign would be the fall of
Adrianople. Therefore were the cor
respondents moved to Mustapha
Pasha, just Lule Burgas was being
won; and Constantinople, being then
supposedly defended only by a de-
moralized army, which could not make
stand, every report from Mustapha
Pasha which showed that Adrianople
was on the point of capitulation added
to the stage effect of Bulgarian tri-
umph
Turks Defy thu Bulqars.
AS the first Bulgarian army drew
near the Tchatalja lines, the mise en-
scene was complete; but Nazim Pasha,
making use of the elapsed time to for
tify the Tchatalja lines, rather than
submit to the humiliating terms Of
fered, babe the Bulgarian hosts
come on"
Success had turned the heads even
of the Bulgarian staff. They had
begun to think that the old fighting
quality was out of the TURK, and so
willing was the Bulgarian infantry to
undergo slaughter that it was only a
case of recording another charge of
| flesh against shrapnel and automatic
gun fire, and the day was won.
Alas, an old principle of war, deal
ing with an impossibility Of the same
order as squaring the circle in mathe-
mates, was now to bring generalship
back from the clouds to solid earth.
You can take strong positions In
front only with time by sapping and
mining and all the weary operations
of a siege, as the indomitable Grant
learned by the failure of his first rush
attack at Vicksburg and the indom-
table Nogi learned BIZ the failure of
the first rush attack at Port Ar
thur
In a week any army that has spades
and a few Of the resources of mate
rial which should be part of the store
house at its base should make such a
position as that of the series Of rising
hills back of Tchatalja fully tenable
against any but Fiege attack, unless
there was room for flank attack.
Turks Turn the Tables.
And the breadth of the position
open to infantry approach in any at
tempt at storming was only 16 miles,
while from either sea side of the mar
row peninsula the Turkish navy could
bring INTO play more powerful guns
than any Demetrieff had at his dis
posal
At the same time there is to be kept
in view the generally accepted tenet
that you must not send infantry
against any well entrenched position
until its batteries are silenced or it
is known that they can be kept under
control during the infantry attack
by a well concentrated fire of your
own batteries.
Demetrieff used his guns for a day
in trying to develop the strength and
location of the enemy's batteries. But
the Turks would not be drawn. At
last the tables were turned
Meanwhile Adrianople also was tell
ing You may discuss as much as you
please whether the original plan of
the Bulgarian staff was to mask this
fortress or to take it by storm, the
fact remains that the only result was
to mask it, and the lesson was that
any garrison in the rear of an advan-
cling army, though it is held securely