By this time in the war, there were men from all over the world taking part, but you know
what?
They weren’t just men from the warring nations, thousands of men from nations that were not
at war were fighting in Europe, including many thousands of Americans.
I’m Indy Neidell; welcome to the Great War.
Last week saw the introduction of the new British weapon- the tank, as it rolled across
the Germans at the Somme.
The Irish also had some luck there, and on the Italian Front and the Salonika Front the
Allies began new offensives.
Here’s what came next.
Well, the end of that offensive on the Italian front came this week.
It was the 7th Battle of the Isonzo River, and had begun last week with heavy Italian
casualties.
The objectives of the battle were to break through on the Corso, but also to take Mount
Rombon and the Bovec basin.
For the first few days of the week, the Italians attacked again and again, but they didn’t
make any significant gains, and when they did gain land, counter attacks drove them
back before they could dig in.
Thing is, in the attacks this week, Austrian casualties kept pace with Italian and by the
time Italian Army Chief of Staff Luigi Cadorna called off the battle the 17th, Austro-Hungarian
General Svetozar Borojevic von Bojna’s army was pretty ragged.
Italian production had created a big artillery gap between the two, Austrian food supplies
weren’t up to snuff, and the Austrian draft was sending middle-aged men to the front lines
after minimal training.
But still, they defended well.
In the assault on Mount Rombon the 16th, for example.
This mountain is high in the Julian Alps and the peak was held by two Bosnian battalions
of the Austrian army.
The initial artillery exchange resulted in small casualties for the Bosnians, and early
and fairly demoralizing ones for the Alpini- the Italian mountain troops.
The assault that followed was a complete failure.
Well, the whole battle was a complete failure, even though I have to point out that losses
were only a few thousand more for the Italians than the outnumbered and outgunned defenders.
But in this war defense pretty much always had the advantage.
Here’s a couple of other things Cadorna did away from the battlefields (White War).
Colonel Douhet, Chief of Staff of the Carnia Corps, who would later shine under Mussolini,
was very critical of Cadorna, and was appalled by his ineffectiveness.
He also corresponded with government ministers.
In July he gave one of them an assessment of Cadorna, saying his thinking was 45 years
out of date, the idiotic concept of the frontal assault had killed the country’s best soldiers,
the insistence on holding every piece of conquered territory regardless of losses was ridiculous,
and that Cadorna had no strategic vision.
This was all pretty much true, but Douhet was not very discreet.
Another missive in late August arguing that the capture of Gorizia in the 6th Battle of
the Isonzo had not helped Italy’s strategic position at all found its way into Cadorna’s
hands.
He had no doubt who was the author and Douhet was arrested, court-martialed for breaching
confidentiality, and jailed for a year.
Also, the press and the public gave General Luigi Capello a lot of praise for the capture
of Gorizia, so Cadorna banished him to a post on the Asiago plateau.
(SEGUE 1) It wasn’t just the Italians that were charging
this week; over at the Somme it was the Canadians.
The Battle of Flers-Courcelette was in full swing this week, coming to an end on the 22nd.
Now, Britain had used tanks for the first time as the battle began last week and though
they mostly had mechanical problems, they and the creeping barrage and nearly collapsed
the German defenses, and by the time the battle ended, after a week of fighting in rains that
turned the whole area into a swamp, the British had advanced several kilometers and even taken
some of the German third lines.
In fact, they took about twice the amount of ground they’d taken on July 1st when
the battle began, for about half the casualties, just under 30,000.
The Canadian Corps saw action at the Somme for the first time the 16th.
There was actually a very famous charge that day by Private John Chipman Kerr.
It’s chronicled like this: “Although his finger had been blown off he sprang from shelter
and raced along the top of the trench, shooting down the enemy bombers from traverse to traverse.
His astonishing onslaught proved the last straw for the badly shaken Germans and 62
unwounded prisoners surrendered.
Having delivered his captives at a support trench, Kerr returned to action without troubling
to have his wound dressed.”
He won the Victoria Cross for his efforts.
A side note- he was one of 14 volunteers from a single family.
I’ll talk about a couple of other individuals today for a change.
On September 17th, 1916, a young pilot named Manfred von Richthofen won his first official
aerial combat over Cambrai.
He would soon gain fame as the Red Baron, the deadliest ace of the war.
He had already seen action dropping bombs on the Eastern Front, but dogfighting was
new to him.
Richthofen wrote in his diary soon after the event (Gilbert), “My Englishman twisted
and turned, flying in zig-zags.
I was animated by a single thought: “the man in front of me must come down, whatever
happens.”...
At last...
my opponent had apparently lost sight of me...
In a fraction of a second I was at his back with my excellent machine.
I gave a short burst of shots with my machine gun...
Suddenly I nearly yelled with joy, for the propeller of the enemy machine had stopped
turning.
I had shot his engine to pieces; the enemy was compelled to land...”
The British plane was unable to reach allied lines and touched down near a German squadron.
Richthofen landed as well and ran over to the enemy plane.
Not only was the engine damaged, but both pilot and observer were severely wounded.
The observer died at once, the pilot a bit later.
Richthofen placed a stone on the pilot’s grave.
His star career was just getting going, but another Starr’s career came to an end this
week.
A soldier named Dillwyn Starr died the 16th.
He was American.
He had volunteered in 1914 and drove ambulances for the French, then British armored cars
at Gallipoli, and then transferred to a British Guards regiment.
There were 32,000 Americans who had gotten around British army regulations and managed
to serve.
One of those regulations listed categories of people not allowed to enlist under any
circumstances.
Number 6 on the list was, “a foreigner”.
There was also a development behind the lines on the Western Front this week.
On the 16th, German Chief of Staff Paul von Hindenburg gave orders for a semi-permanent
defense line built miles behind the front.
This would become the H indenburg Line and would be a fortified zone that could stop
any allied breakthrough of the front lines.
But if you want to know what some of the Allies thought about the chance of that happening,
here’s a quote from French General Émile Fayolle about the Somme, (Strachan), “This
battle has... always been a battle without an objective.
There is no question of breaking through.
And if a battle is not for breaking through, what is its purpose?”
And over in southeastern Europe the Central Powers were trying for a breakthrough of their
own.
In Romania, where a Turkish and Bulgarian force was attacking under General August von
Mackensen, perhaps the best German field commander of the war.
On the 17th in Dobrogea, Russo-Romanian forces had fallen back from Rasova to Tuzla, and
their situation seemed grave.
But General Alexandru Averescu had taken command there a day earlier with reinforcements and
new Russian troops had arrived as well, and now they attacked Mackensen.
The fighting was heavy, particularly at Rasova on the Danube and if Mackensen had taken it,
he could’ve flanked the Romanians and cut off communication between Dobrogea and the
rest of Romania, but he didn’t take it, and by the 19th was forced to retreat.
And a couple of notes to end the week: on the 19th, the Belgians occupied Tabora, capital
of German East Africa, and on the 22nd Hejaz surrenders to forces of the Arab Revolt.
And the week ends, with battles ending at Flers-Courcelette and in Northern Italy and
the Germans pushed back in Romania.
And the soon to be Red Baron’s career takes off.
And Dillwyn Starr died.
Just one more man.
But one more American man.
32,000 Americans served in the British forces.
That’s a lot of men, and they were doing so totally illegally, from British, American,
and even German perspective.
You know, I’ve said before that while this war had lots of enemies, it didn’t really
have a bad guy.
Neither the Central nor the Entente Powers were the good guys.
But obviously, a great many men 100 years ago didn’t agree with me, for they went
to a war that was not their war and gave their lives for a cause that was noble to them.
Think of them
for a moment.