Forest City press. (Forest City, Potter County, D.T. [S.D.]) 1883-19??, 1919-01-02

LIN eiIu SOIlCSIllIdlSo upon IL nex
best effort, Britain did likewise with
her fleet. And surely such comparison
Will not be to the disadvantage of the
British.
AS TO the British army the great
thing we all have TO remember is that
it vas created after the war began and
after the best of the officers and men
of the British regular army had been,
in the main, killed in the opening pat
ties. 1t was thus deprived of exactly
the elements that it most needed for its
own training.
In the face of these handicaps. in the
face of the still further obstacle due to
the fact that the enemy was in the field
and that he had to be held, a task re-
quiring all that was left of British off,
GERS and regulars and demanding new
troops before they were ever partially
trained, the British managed to build a
great army. without which victory is
ever impossible.
Napoleon found. when the veterans
he had inherited from the wars of the
revolution We're gone. he could not win
victories of the sort which he had won
in the earlier campaigns. But he never
bad to impoverish an army or a system.
The British had to do both.
Handicaps Overcome.
1t was always impossible in four
years to fashion an instrument as per-
feet as that machine Quilt by the Ger
mans as the result of a full century of
patient and uninterrupted effort. We
also misunderstood the facts in the
early period OF the war, when the great
ness of the danger inevitably provoked
impatience and invited unjust
sons. But it is not by comparison that
we can fairly measure the British
achievement in their army building.
They started with next to nothing.
when the structures of their allies and
enemies We're practically complete. =
With all their handicaps. with all the
limitations imposed by the situation.
they built a great army, frequently vic
torious. sometimes defeated, suffering
the same disappointments which came
to Grants army in 1864 after it had at
last become convinced of it's superior
ity. sharing this disappointment with a
ration equally blind to certain truths
but gaining in power and efficiency up
to the hour when it broke the strongest
lines OF the enemy. manned by the best
of the surviving troops of the foe, and
began a march to victory, which was
only halted by the white flag of the
kaiser's generals.
L mr. the fair measure of British
military achievement is a contrast be-
tween what Britain has done and what
military men, Germans. for example,
pelleVed n could do four years ago,
"hen the kaiser challenged England
as We'll as France and Russia. And
nothing is more certain than that. had
the Germans comprehended that the
British army would play the role it has
played, they would never nave risked
British entrance into the struggle. You
get the full measure OF German
ment In all the official German com
ments on British operations from the
First Somme onward. For them the
British. despite manifest nj recog-
nized limitations, were steadily doing
the impossible.
What British Did.
Perhaps there is no better summary
of what the British army achieved
than is supplied in the bald state
ment that the British army occupied
Mons on August Fl. 1914. and reoc-
cupied it on November 10. 1918. In the
time that separates the two dates the
German army wore out. it broke itself
against British and French defense.
and 1t was incapable of meeting French.
British and American attack. And in
all the time from French's retreat to
Haig's last advance British military
contribution to the sum total of allied
resources increased steadily.
I think we shall some day rave the
final measure of British military
achievement when the archives of the
Great General Staff in Berlin are
able to see exactly what British mill
tary contribution was estimated at by
those who risked the world war. Mean
time the British army hardly needs
praise. and, being British. will unques-
tionably resent 1t.
Among the many stories Of Yankee