The Bottineau courant. (Bottineau, Bottineau County, N.D.) 1895-1929, 1918-09-19


The French army. toe, was generally
belittled. and the Russians wer be-
ieved to be absolutely negligible. The
French army val 20 poorly equipped.
It was pointed out, that the officers
had to 90 to the field In patent-leather
boots, and on the Russian front, only
the arst-line men had guns, the others
being armed with clubsl
Eventually, officers and soldiers re-
turning from the western front on fur
Tough or passing through the country
en- route from one front to the other
brought the report Of the defeat before
Paris. : Soldiers who participated In
that disastrous retreat wrote from the
new trenches to their friends and rel
atives telling Of the terrible expert
ences they had undergone. when they
went for days with nothing to eat but
raw potatoes and turnips which they
picked from the fields.
When these reports finally spread
through Germany the people began to
realize that their generals In the west
were not meeting Nth che same success
that Won Hindenburg had had in the
east and Won Hindenburg became the
idol Of the people Immediately, q fact
that was very distasteful to the high
command.
The kaiser's dislike Of Won linden
burg was Of long standing. He had
never forgiven that general for the mis-
take he made during military maneuv-
ers In peace time when by q brilliant
stroke Of strategy he had succeeded In
capturing the kaiser's forces, including
the kaiser and his whole staff
have referred in a previous chapter
to the kaiser's unbounded confidence
after the italian collapse in 1917.
SNOW, we've got the al1iesI" he e1-
claimed, with an air Of conclusiveness
which emphasized the optimism he
displayed.
After the capture Of Roumania, he
exhibited a similar degree Of exulta.
ton. He believed that In that achieve
ment he had successfully solved the
food problem-the enc cloud which
constantly darkened the kaiser's hort-
zon.
"Now the allies will never succeed in
starving u.s." he said to me in my Of
fee shortly after the Roumanian drive.
with Roumania In our pockets and
Servia already ours, their wonderful
agricultural possibilities will supply
our food needs and foil our enemies
efforts to starve us. Indeed, they had
better look out for themselves. Don't
forget we have a monopoly on the
potash mines Of the world. Without
proper fertilization, American crops
will go on decreasing and decreasing
and they won't get any potash until we
get ready to let them have It'll"
The failure Of the Zeppelins from a
military standpoint was undoubtedly a
great disappointment to the German
people at large, who had counted so
much upon them to bring disaster to
England, but 1t cannot be said that the
kaiser shared their chagrin. On the
contrary, I have reason to believe that
he expected very much from that
arm of his military force except as it
might be useful to t~errorize the civil
population.
A day or two after Zeppelin's death,
in 1917, a patient Of mine, a lady, hap
pened to remark that 1t was too bad
that the count had not lived to see the
triumph Of his invention, and when I
saw the kaiser shortly afterwards I
repeated her remark to see what he
would say.
II am convinced that tho count lived
long enough to see all that the Yep
pelins were capable of accomplishing"
was his only comment. It recalled the
answer he had given me some years
before when both Zeppelins and air
planes were In their infancy and I had
asked him which held the greater
promise. I'VE do not know. Time
alone will tell" was his reply.
The last time I %conversed with the
kaiser was on November 28, 1917. Up
to that time we had sent v 10000
troops, according to the figures which
have since been revealed by Secretary
Baker. According to the kaiser's in
formation, however, we had only 3d.
600 men in France at that time and
he was Of the opinion that we would
never have many more.
"America is having a fine time try
ing to raise an army" he declared
satirically. II hear that 1900 mutinied
the other day In New York and re-
fused to get on a transport, and q
town In the Northwest composed prin-
cipally Of citizens Of Swedish blood
refused to register at ALL We are get
ting excellent information about all
conditions in America"
Shortly before this had come the rev.
Citations from Washington Of the in
trigue Of Count Won Luxburg, the Ger
man minister to Argentina, and I knew
where the kaiser vas getting the in
formation he referred to. In nearly
every case, It appeared, the kaiser's in
formants were misleading him.
Both before and after we entered