17th, precipitated a violent German counter-attack.

(b) Meanwhile in the central sector a lucky French attack had won Hill 132 north of Soissons, January 8th, but General von Kluck had quickly returned the attack with two German army corps, and not only had forced the French back to their old position across the Aisne River, but for a time had seriously threatened to capture Soissons. Further east, in Champagne, the French during the month of January captured Perthes and a near-by hill of some strategic importance; the attack was renewed in February with strong artillery support; but only painfully slow progress was made towards the east-and-west railway which General Joffre hoped to cut. On the Argonne ridge the French aimed chiefly to cut the railway to Apremont, but the fighting was indecisive.

(c) On the eastern sector, on the extreme right wing, the French Alpine Chasseurs de scended from the Vosges heights into the Thur Valley and captured the Alsatian town of Steinbach, January 3rd. Other French forces menaced Muelhausen. The Germans, however, retaliated by expelling the French from their advantageous position on a shoulder of Hartmannsweilerkopf, January 19th. In the last week of March the French regained a foothold on Hartmannsweilerkopf, and throughout April and May the mountain was alternately claimed by French and by Germans. The fighting on the snow-clad slopes of the Vosges was picturesque; but the really important efforts of the French in the eastern sector were directed against the wedge which the Crown Prince had thrust into the French line at St. Mihiel, not far south of Verdun. As there was no possibility of breaking the strong apex of the wedge by frontal attacks on St. Mihiel and Camp des Romains, the French endeavored to press the sides of the wedge together, with the hope that if the wedge could be considerably compressed, the German forces at the apex, finding their communications imperiled, would be compelled to withdraw from St. Mihiel. The French position at Verdun would thereby be immensely strengthened. In February, therefore, the French began their attack by capturing the village of Les Eparges on the northern side and the Bois le Prêtre on the southern side of the wedge. On April 5th the attack was resumed against the strongly fortified German position on the heights behind Les Eparges. During four days attack and counter attack left the result in doubt, but finally the French victory was assured, February 9th, and the heights of Les Eparges remained in French possession. About the same time, General Dubail brought heavy pressure to bear against the southern side of the wedge. Small advances were made, but the main object, to destroy the wedge, was not achieved.

To sum up, by the middle of April the Allied offensive in the West had made small local gains "nibbling" at the German lines, but had failed to accomplish any strategically important object, either in the movement toward Lille, in the advance against the Champagne railway, or in the attack on the St. Mihiel salient. In the fourth week of April "the war of attrition" in the West, that is, the gradual "nibbling" at the German lines and the gradual depletion of the German forces, was suddenly interrupted by a spectacular German counter-offensive at Ypres,

which developed shortly after the capture of Hill 60, near Ypres, by the British. The battle of Ypres will be described in a subsequent paragraph; for the present the situation in the Russian theatre of war commands attention.

(2) Winter Campaigns in Poland and East Prussia: January-February.

At the beginning of the year the Russian armies were strung out in a battle line almost 900 miles long. The centre of the Russian line, under General Ruzsky, was strongly entrenched in Russian Poland, behind the Rawka and Bzura rivers, with the strong fortresses of Novo Georgievsk, Warsaw, and Ivangorod along the Vistula River, forming an almost impregnable line of defense upon which the Russians might fall back if hard pressed. The right or northern wing of the Russian army, likewise under Ruzsky's general command, stretched northeastwards to the north of the Narew River, and through the Masurian Lake region of East Prussia, to the Niemen River. The left or southern wing of the Russian army, under General Ivanov, included General Ewarts's army on the Nida River, west of Kielce, Gen. Radko Dmitriev's army in Galicia holding Tarnow behind the Donajetz and Biala rivers, General Brussilov's army holding the northern approaches to the Carpathian Mountain passes, General Selivanov's army besieging the isolated Austrian fortress of Przemysl (on the San), and General Alexeiev's army operating in Bukovina. Opposing the Russian right wing were four German army corps in East Prussia; the Russian centre was confronted by strong German forces under Von Mackensen; on the left wing was General Dankl's depleted army west of the Nida River; south of that, General Woyrsch's army west of the Donajetz; and the extreme Russian left flank in the Carpathians was harried by the Austrian Archduke Eugene from the south. Since their disastrous defeat in East Prussia (see YEAR Book for 1914), the Russians had devoted their attention chiefly to General Ivanov's campaign in Galicia, which constituted a threefold menace: (1) to the invaluable grain-growing plains of Hungary, across the Carpathians; (2) to the important Galician city of Cracow; and (3) to the strategically and industrially important German province of Silesia. The Russian centre meanwhile rested on the defensive in Poland, and the right wing, during January, contented itself with cavalry attacks upon the railway communications north of Tilsit. The Teutonic plan of campaign was to deliver frontal attacks on Ruzsky's army before Warsaw, in order to compel the Russian generalissimo, Grand Duke Nicholas, to reënforce his Polish line at the expense of his Galician forces. The plan had been successfully put into operation in October, 1914, when the Russian armies were approaching Cracow, and it forced the Russians to retire to the San River. It had been tried at the close of November and early in December, to check the renewed Russian advance on Cracow. Again, in the third week of December, 1914, General von Mackensen had furiously assailed the Russian centre just at the time when the Russian campaign in Galicia seemed to be developing favorably. For a fourth time the plan was put into execution in February, 1915, in the hope that a strong German attack in Po

land would compel the Russians to retire in Galicia and to abandon the siege of Przemysl. Having prepared the attack by a terrific bombardment of the Russian lines west of Warsaw, General von Mackensen launched his attack, with 140,000 men, on a seven-mile front opposite Bolimov, 40 miles west of Warsaw. On February 1st, under cover of artillery fire, and in the face of a blinding snow-storm, the German infantry masses recklessly rushed the first-line trenches east of the Rawka River. On February 2nd the Russian second- and third-line trenches were taken. On February 3rd and 4th the German troops advanced five miles along the railway towards Warsaw. The attempt to pierce the Russian line seemed to have met with brilliant success, well worth the heavy cost in casualties. Russian reënforcements, hastily rushed to the front by rail from Warsaw, arrived on the spot towards the evening of February 4th, just in time to save the Russian line. Mile by mile the German assailants were forced back over their newly-gained territory, until by February 8th the Germans had been pushed back on the Rawka.

THE GERMAN ATTACK FROM EAST PRUSSIA. While von Mackensen was attacking west of Warsaw, von Hindenburg was preparing a surprise for the Russians in East Prussia. During the first week of February he concentrated nine army corps in East Prussia to hurl against the Russian Tenth Army, which consisted of four army corps under Baron Sievers. On February 7th von Hindenburg delivered the first blow: a German army advancing eastward from Tilsit along the southern bank of the Niemen, thrust itself between the two northernmost Russian army corps. The 20th Russian corps, consisting of 30,000 men under General Bulgakov, which had been holding the line of the Angerap River, was thus exposed to a fatal flank attack from the north. General Bulgakov's retreat speedily became a rout, and the 20th was annihilated in the forest-belt north of Suwalki. The northernmost Russian corps having continued its retreat towards Kovno, General von Eichorn, commanding the extreme right wing of von Hindenburg's line, crossed the Russian frontier and occupied Mariampol, February 12th. Meanwhile von Buelow, directing the German attack on the two remaining Russian corps in the Masurian Lake region, completely cleared East Prussia and pressed forward against the Russian fortresses of Grodno and Ossowietz. By February 20th, however, the remnant of the Russian forces the Germans claimed to have cap tured 75,000 men and 300 guns-had entrenched itself along a line running southward from Kovno parallel to the Niemen, well in front of Olita, Miroslav, Drusskeniki, and Grodno, and bending southwest along the northern bank of the river Bobr, north of Ossowietz, and continuing to the north of the Narew. General von Eichorn, continuing to press forward in the north, won on February 20th a foothold on the eastern bank of the Niemen north of Grodno and reached a point only 10 miles from the WarsawPetrograd Railway. Simultaneously von Buelow began to bombard Ossowietz. Both on the Niemen and on the Bobr (at Ossowietz) the Germans encountered such stubborn resistance that they fell back, in March, towards their own frontier.

THE BATTLE OF PRZASNYSZ. The attack on the

Niemen and on the Bobr rivers had expelled the Russians from the Kaiser's "beloved" province of East Prussia; it had furthermore drawn General Ruzsky's attention to his extreme right. In the hope that the Russian forces west and north of Warsaw had been depleted to reënforce the Bobr and Niemen lines, von Hindenburg now swiftly struck at Przasnysz, between Ostrolenka and Mlawa, 50 or 60 miles north of Warsaw. The admirably laid-out strategic railways of East Prussia would enable him suddenly to shift the weight of the East Prussian attack from the east to the west. By an unexpected stroke he would cross the Narew River southeast of Przasnysz and cut the Warsaw-Bielostock-Petrograd Railway to the south of the Narew. Warsaw could then be encircled and invested. The Russian army which in January had moved northwestward along the Vistula to within 40 miles of Thorn, and had been pushed back in February to Plock and Raciaz, 60 miles northwest of Warsaw, would be compelled by this flanking movement to retreat in hot haste; if von Hindenburg moved swiftly enough the Plock-Raciaz army might be enveloped and destroyed. On February 22nd, just as the attack on the Niemen and on the Bobr was expiring, two German army corps from the direction of Soldau and Willenburg (on the southern border of East Prussia) began their march southward on Przasnysz. At first things went splendidly. Przasnysz was captured on February 24th to gether with about half of the brigade which had been left to defend the town; Krasnosielce was occupied on the way from Przasnysz to the fortress of Ostrolenka; the only real resistance was encountered at the hands of a single Russian division which stubbornly held its ground on the ridge southwest of Przasnysz. But on the evening of February 24th Russian reënforcements began to arrive from Ostrolenka, Rozan, and Pultusk. The gallant defenders of the ridge, after battling for almost two days against overwhelming odds, were now relieved. Przasnysz and Krasnosielce were recovered on February 27th. Ten thousand Germans were captured, according to the Russian statement. By February 28th the Germans were in full retreat towards the East Prussian frontier. The three phases of the German winter campaign in Poland and East Prussia may now be summed up: von Mackensen's desperate frontal attack on Warsaw had been thwarted; East Prussia had been cleared of invaders; and a brilliantly conceived flank attack on the Russian centre had met with disaster.

(3) The Russians in Galicia and Bukovina: January-April.

It has already been explained that one of the principal motives for the German offensives in Poland and East Prussia was to relieve the pressure on Austria-Hungary. At the beginning of January General Brussilov's Russian army on the northern side of the Carpathian ridge was threatening to penetrate through the central Carpathian passes (Dukla Pass, Lupkow Pass, and Uzsok Pass), south of Przemysl and to pour down the converging valleys of the mountain streams into the valley of the Theiss and the Hungarian plain.* Simultaneously Russian troops were overrunning Bukovina, which commanded the * See sketch map on p. 715.

southeastern end of the Carpathian barrier. The Russian force in Bukovina was only 15 or 20 thousand strong, but it succeeded on January 6th in capturing the town of Kimpolung, at the southern extremity of the province; the northern part of Bukovina had been held by the Russians since September, 1914; on January 17th the Russians gained the pass of Kirlibaba, leading from the southeastern part of Bukovina westward into Hungary. With the Russians successfully occupying the very provinces -Bukovina and Transylvania-which Rumania coveted for herself, Rumania was likely to enter the war and coöperate with the Russians, turning the eastern flank of the Carpathian ridge, while the Russians swarmed over the central Carpathian passes. The situation called for strenuous and immediate action on the part of Austria-Hungary. The supersession of Count Berchtold by Baron Stephan Burian, a friend and compatriot of the Hungarian premier (Count Tisza), as foreign minister of the Dual Monarchy, January 13th, was interpreted as a sign of the Emperor's determination to defend Hungary at all costs. While von Hindenburg prepared to distract the attention of the Russians by attacks in Poland (supra), Archduke Eugene of Austria marshaled his forces in three great armies for a supreme effort to secure the Carpathian ridge, relieve the hard-pressed garrison of Przemysl, free Bukovina, and intimidate Rumania. In the second half of January the campaign was launched. The first Austrian army, under General Boehm-Ermolli, moved up into the three central Carpathian passes (Dukla, Lupkow, and Uzsok) with the object of advancing north to the relief of Przemysl. The second Austro-German army, under the command of the German General von Linsingen, operated from Munkacs northward in the passes east of Uzsok. The third army, comprising both German and Austro-Hungarian troops, was led by General von Pflanzer against the Russians in Bukovina. General von Pflanzer made rapid progress. Kirlibaba Pass was retaken; the weak Russian defense of Czernowitz succumbed on February 18th; and the Austro-Germans turned northeastward into Galicia, passing Kolomea, and holding the important railway centre of Stanislau (70 miles southeast of Lemberg) for a brief space, until they were forced back on Kolomea, March 3rd. General von Linsingen, however, failed dismally in his attempt to advance from Munkacs toward Lemberg. Even more disappointing was the result of General Boehm-Ermolli's campaign against the central passes: after two months of bitter battles in the snow-bound mountain defiles, the Russians at the end of the third week of March still held the Dukla Pass and the northern entrance to Lupkow.

FALL OF PRZEMYSL. The culminating failure of the Austrian counter-offensive and the crowning success of the Russian Galician campaign in the spring of 1915 was the surrender of the Austrian fortress of Przemysl, March 22nd, which had been besieged by the Russians ever since Nov. 12, 1914. The situation of the beleaguered garrison had become alarming early in March, 1915. After a breach had been effected by the Russians in the outer ring of defenses, March 13th, General von Kusmanek had ordered a last desperate sortie, March 18th. This failing disastrously, he destroyed the re

Y. B.-23

maining stores of ammunition, and surrendered the city, March 22nd. By the capture of Przemysl the Russians won 120,000 prisoners, about a thousand guns, and less important stores of small arms and ammunition. More important still, the railway leading westward from Lemberg through Przemysl to Tarnow and Cracow was at last cleared, and General Selivanov's army of 100,000 men was released for aggression elsewhere. The Russians profited by their improved position to renew the offensive in the Carpathian passes, and by the end of April they were in possession of the Carpathian crest for 75 miles, commanding Dukla, Lupkow, and Rostok passes, and were fiercely attacking Uzsok Pass.

(4) The Dardanelles: February–June.

THE NAVAL ATTACK (FEBRUARY-MARCH). Of the three great aggressive movements by which the Triple Entente hoped, during the first three months of 1915, at the same time to weaken their enemies and to convert Italy, Rumania, and Greece from hesitant friends into active allies, two have already been described, viz., the Anglo-French offensive in the western theatre of war, and the Russian advance in Galicia. The third, the attack on the Dardanelles, although of secondary magnitude in respect of the forces engaged, was of primary importance both as regarded its immediate strategic aims and its indirect political consequences. Forcing the Dardanelles, the British Admiralty had every reason to believe, would be a difficult and hazardous operation. To be sure, a British squadron under the command of the gallant Admiral Duckworth had accomplished the feat in 1807; but since then ineffective, antiquated fortifications in the straits had been replaced by the most modern and scientific defensive works; expert German advisers had directed the emplacement of formidable batteries to command the approach by land and sea; and 14-inch Krupp guns would now be trained on an invading fleet. But if the hazard was great, the stakes to be won were still greater. Once through the Dardanelles straits, a victorious fleet would have Constantinople at its mercy, and Turkey, if not totally eliminated from the war, would at the very least be cut in two and gravely crippled. All serious danger of Turkish attacks on Egypt, Persia, or India would have been obviated. The Russian armies in the Caucasus region could be partly withdrawn and sent to reënforce the line in Poland. Moreover, the straits being opened, Russia would at last find a free outlet for her stores of wheat. The guns and ammunition of which the Russian army was in sore need could now be freely and cheaply imported by way of the Dardanelles, as fast as the factories of France, England, and America could turn them out. The moral effect of the capture of Constantinople would be tremendous. Not only would it put new life into discouraged patriots in France, Russia, and Great Britain; not only would it be an object lesson teaching awe-struck respect to the Mohammedan millions in Egypt and in India; it would also, by increasing the probability of the Entente's ultimate victory, hasten the decision of Italy to join the winning side. But most important of all, it would probably bring the Balkan nations into the war on the side of the Entente; wavering Greece and

wide, and was defended by forts at Cape Helles and Sedd-el-Bahr on the tip of the Gallipoli Peninsula, on the northern side, and by forts Kum Kale and Orkanieh, on the southern or Asiatic side. At Sedd-el-Bahr there were six 10.2-inch guns; at Cape Helles, two 9.2-inch guns; at Kum Kale four 10.2- and two 5.9-inch

guns; and at Orkanieh two 9.2-inch guns. On February 19th, the fleet began a heavy bombardment of these outer forts. As the batteries on shore were enormously outnumbered and outranged by the guns of the battleships, the Turks made no effort to reply to the bombardment, until in the afternoon, when the British Admiral Carden (who was later superseded by De Robeck), thinking he had put the forts out of action, ordered his ships to steam in close to shore in order to clinch the victory. Twilight came before either the forts or the ships could score any important success. The second attack on the four outer forts was delivered on February 25th. This time the superiority of the Allies' guns was utilized with greater effect. The Queen Elizabeth, safe out of range of the land guns, rained 15-inch shells on the Turkish gunners at Cape Helles. The Agamemnon, the Irresistible, and the Gaulois shelled the forts with comparative safety from a somewhat shorter distance, the only casualty being the loss of three men killed and five wounded on board the Agamemnon, caused by the bursting of one welldirected Turkish shell. About noon the Vengeance, Cornwallis, Suffren, Charlemagne, and a little later Triumph and Albion, steamed in close to the forts; by evening the last Turkish gun had been put out of action. The next day, landing parties were sent ashore to blow up the remains of the Turkish forts which had been silenced the previous evening; at Kum Kale the landing party was surprised by Turkish troops and forced to beat a hasty retreat. Again on March 4th a landing party was repulsed at Kum Kale. However, the fleet had little more to fear from either shore of the entrance to the straits, as the big guns of the four forts had been put out of action. Trawlers had swept the first few miles of the channel clear of mines, northeast of Sedd-el-Bahr and Kum Kale, so that battleships could now venture into the lower end of the straits, in order to bombard the forts situated 14 or 15 miles from the entrance. These forts, Kilid Bahr on the western shore and Chanak on the eastern shore, located at a point where the channel narrowed to about three-quarters of a mile in width, were the central defenses of the Dardanelles. Here the German advisers of the Turkish government had planted their 14-inch Krupp guns. The four

For the sake of so momentous a victory, the British Admiralty risked a powerful fleet in the attack on the Dardanelles. During February the warships which had been watching the Dardanelles since the beginning of the war were reenforced by new arrivals, until, at the time the principal attack was delivered, Vice Admiral John Michael De Robeck could command 13 British battleships-including the newly-constructed super-dreadnought Queen Elizabeth with her eight 15-inch guns, besides the Inflexible, Agamemnon, Cornwallis, Vengeance, Triumph, Irresistible, Albion, Ocean, Lord Nelson, Prince George, Majestic, and Swiftsure. In addition, the French Rear Admiral Guépratte had the French battleships Bouvet, Suffren, Gaulois, and Charlemagne. Altogether the Allied fleet mounted, besides the powerful 15-inch guns of the Queen Elizabeth, almost 70 12-inch guns and an even greater number of secondary guns. The first task which the Anglo-French fleet set itself to accomplish was the reduction of the outer forts of the Dardanelles. The entrance to the Dardanelles is about two and three-eights miles