The pioneer-review. [volume] (Philip, Haakon County, S.D.) 1920-current, 1922-06-29
DISASTER OF 1917
Inside Secret of the Great World
War Now Revealed.
Crushing Defeat Of the French Armies
Under General Nivelle Due to
That Leaders Overconfidence.


That Leaders Overconfidence.
The Revue de Paris is printing
month by month, the fullest account
yet given of the greatest disaster sus-
tanned BY the allies on the western
front during the war. This was the
defeat of the French armies under
General Nivelle between Keims and
scissors on April 16, 1917 The ac-
count is given by NJ. Painleye, who
was the French war minister at that
time, though he only came into office
when the plans for the battle We're
complete and their execution almost
inevitable. Nj. Painleye often has
been attacked for his own action be-
ferc and after The squash 81 ne speaks
as a party to a case. Still, more Of
what he says is only new in the sense
that it has not been fully published
before, though it was substantially
known to the French and British gen
eral staffs within u few weeks Of tile
calamity. The French attack, com
monty known at the time as the Chem
in DIES DANES attack, was to be the
main blow Of the Franco-British of
fensive fors the year. Sir Douglas
Haig. placed Professionally and with
some qualification under the supreme
command of Nivele, was to attack on
April from near Arras in the north
to our right flank near st. Quentin in
the south.
Our part of the work was to draw
off the German strength from the crit
ical point, to kill and be killed and
keep Ludendorff busy rather than to
penetrate far. The whole scheme was
Nivelle's Nivelle had been made com
mander in chief in succession to Joffre
the Christmas before, TO the exclusion
Of Foch and petain. Nivelle was at
the moment the latest fashion in gen
erals. French political feeling that
winter was in n state of reaction
against the .Somme schOOl'-the
school of .Foch and Haig. the "limited
objective" school. the school which re-
stricted the depth of infantry advances
to ground on which artillery had quite
ruined the enemy's defense. Nivelle
represented new "Verdun school" of
swifter, deeper advance. He had sue
ceeded at Vaux and Douaumont few
months before, by making his men
advance in way that the "Somne
school" would have thought reckless
because they or their predecessors had
tried it in 1915 and found it disas-
b,,t III. FL Chi IN
had changed; it had gone back to the
more slashing fashions of 1914 and
1915; Foch and -Haig were back num-
| bers, Nivelle was the man. and wis
| dom would die with him. So he was
| given the whole Franco-British often
| siye In 1917 to mold at his will.
His mind was completely made up
by New Years day, 1917. He had not
a shadow of doubt, from then on, that
The would be able to drive straight north
ward from Reims towards Brussels,
| behind the German front, cutting off
| the German northern armies To any
one, soldier or statesman, who sug-
| gested doubt or an extra precau-
| tion he said, in effect, Leave it to me
| I pledge you my word we shall vim
| To infect the troops with his own op-
| timism he circulated freely among
| regimental officers full written details
of the plan of attack, the date, the at
| lacking strength, everything. This was
| done in January. Within a fortnight
the enemy knew. it all. Ludendorff in
| his book of memoirs tells us how Il
German raiding party captured, in the
| pocket of dead French captain of
| the second division, the French plan
| Of battle. The Germans had now two
months in which to fit up as an abat-
! toir the ground which Nivelle meant
| to capture first. They drew back their
| whole line between Arras and the Brit
! ish right, fulfilling the great part of
j the intended British division. Then
they sent down to the Reims scissors
| front the troops thus economical.
/ Then they rugged up on the -high flats
of yauclerc and Craonne, where the
chief hopes Of Nivelle's coming attack
centered, such an aggression of ma
chine guns and quick-firing> guns, hood
ed with concrete and metal. ~as no
| troops ever had to face, before or af-
ter Manchester (Eng.) Guardian.