The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1918-09-11
FRENCH MIND VS.. GERMAN
MACHINE.

iaHh II. kolinOuiuS, our ARREST war
in his copyrighted week
Iy review for the New York Tribune
Association, gives great space to dis
cussion of the superiority of French
genius over the more ponder |
Gus German system. The French mind |
is master of the German machine. To |
quote Mr.. Simonds:
''There have been three great crises
of the western front and thus of the
war. Each time victory for Germany
would have won the continental phase
of the war. But each time French
military genius has risen to the high
est level and the result has been Ger
man defeat. But in each case the ex-
ploitation of victory has waited upon
the coming to France of sufficient num-
bers to supply the weight France could
not furnish. Three times, however, thel
fate of the world has hung upon the
issue of a clash between French and
German military genius, and in each
case the German has lost. Here. is
final answer to the claim still advanced
of the invincfbility and the superla
tive ability of German high command. ="
In the first. battle of the Marine the
German hordes were stopped at the
very gates of Paris As Mr.. Simonds
reasons when the Germans were driven
back, had they waited but few DAYS
to reorganize and reeoup they could
have struck again and gone to Paris
They stepped too long In the CORE
spondent s own words: "The French
people call the Marine "miracle.' IT,
was not miracle, because it was the
result of the cool, essentially French
logic, which conceived, ordered and
executed the battle plans. But, at the
least, the losing of the Marine was
miracle. Even at this day it is hard
to see how the Germans lost, not n
battle, but the campaign, or why they
threw away the decisive advantage
which they had acquired by Sept. in
mad rush south of the Marine But
they did, and after four years the es
sential facts set forth at the Marine
stand unamended, unmodifed All the
| Germans failures have been repeti-
tions of the Marine; all his opportuni-
ties have been thrown away in the same
fashion. 1t is only four years since
the Marine was fought, but it has al
ready become remote and most of its
chief features legendary. Joffre is a
| marshal and a memory. Moltke the
| younger is dead-perhaps of broken
heart. Kluck, Bulow, Hansen have
| disappeared from the battle line. If
| the Crown Prince remains, it is as a
battered figurehead. On the French
side Gallieni, who recognized the mo-
ment and the opportunity when Kluck
exposed his flank to Paris, is dead
Maunoury, who delivered the first blow
is blind and retired. Franchet d 'Es-
| percy is in Greece. Sarrail has disap
peared. Castelnau still commands OF
the Nancy front; only Foch remains
a present power-but what a power!
| & At the very bottom of things the
first battle of the Marine was the test
between two vilizations-between the
civilization of the savage heart and
the scientific brain and the civilization
which is the common heritage of thu
western and democratic nations. The
contrast was as great, the Issue as UNI
mistakable, at the Marine as at Mara
thon, the German idea as deadly t.
western civilization as was the Persian
the victory in France and within tn,
/. hearing of Paris as significant in hu
man history as that other triumph thu
/, news of which was, according to leg
, end, brought to Athens by messen
ger who could run the short distane,
in a few hours