Once more the Russian advance in Galicia was resumed. (Vol. III, 264.) Russian armies never again approached Cracow, but they did come to the Dunajec line, while to the south they began the slow ascent of the Carpathians (Vol. III, 261-264), across which raiding forces of Cossacks had several times passed. They also concentrated against the fortress of Przemysl, the last Austrian stronghold along the San. This campaign endured throughout the winter. Finally Przemysl, with a garrison of 125,000 men, surrendered in early March (Vol. III, 249-257), and Russia was at last free to strike either at Cracow or through the Carpathians for the Hungarian Plain. Her decision to go south was probably influenced by the great victory of the Serbs at Valievo. While German aid was taking pressure off the Austrians a new Hapsburg thrust had been delivered at Serbia, Austro-Hungarian troops had passed the Drina and penetrated deeply into Serbia, Belgrade had fallen, and the end of Serbia seemed in sight. But new Russian attacks having compelled Austria to recall many of her troops, the remaining Hapsburg forces in Serbia were almost destroyed in the bloody defeat of Valievo in December. (Vol. II, 325-357.) To offset this the Germans soon won one more great victory in East Prussia, at the Mazurian Lakes, where another Russian army was well-nigh destroyed by the quick-marching, bettertrained German troops. And this victory beat down another Russian invasion of East Prussia and, as it turned out, closed the period of immediate peril for the German territories in the east. In March and April the Galician campaign reached its climax in the bloody battles of the Carpathians and Russian armies seemed slowly but surely pushing their way over the mountains and descending into the Hungarian Plain. (Vol. III, 235-276.) It was at this moment that Italy had chosen to enter the war on the allied side, and there was every reason to believe that Rumania would follow. THE BATTLE OF THE DUNAJEC Instead there came a sudden and tremendous German victory which was to prove the prelude to more victories and to a summer of unparalleled success for German arms. This victory was won at the Battle of the Dunajec-named Gorlice by the Germans-which may well rank with the Marne as the second great struggle of the war, since it saved Austria, brought Russia to the edge of ruin and wholly transformed the horizons of the conflict. (Vol. III, 264-276.) It will be recalled that at the outset of the war the German General Staff had to choose between two possible operations, an offensive against France or an offensive against Russia. It had chosen to attack France and had lost the campaign. It had in addition failed measurably in its defensive against Russia and the result had been the loss of most of Galicia with the incidental Austrian disasters. But the campaign in the west had resulted in the occupation of advantageous positions far within French territory and in the conquest of most of Belgium. Now the German General Staff was again able to decide whether it would turn its entire energies for the summer of 1915 against France or against Russia. If it chose to attack Russia there was solid reason for believing that neither in munitions nor in numbers would the Allies in the west reach a point where they would become dangerous before autumn and between May and October Germany could hope to put Russia out of the war, particularly as Germany knew what the rest of the world did not, that Russia was at the end of her munitions, and her long and terrible campaigns in Galicia, together with her defeats in East Prussia, had temporarily much reduced the fighting value of her armies. Accordingly Germany decided to get east and put Russia out of the war as she had undertaken nine months before to go west and had tried and failed to put France out of the war. But she was again faced with the fact that failure would expose her to new perils, this time on the west. For her first attack Germany selected the point in the Russian line between the Vistula and the Carpathians, about Tarnow, where the Russian line stood behind the Dunajec River. If the Russian line should be suddenly broken here, the German General Staff might hope to sweep up all the Russian armies which were facing south and endeavoring to push through the Carpathians. Just about May 1, 1915, the blow fell and Germany, massing hitherto unheard-of numbers of heavy guns on a narrow front, and using untold ammunition, not merely routed, but abolished Radko Dmitrieff's army (Vol. III, 267-276), and moved rapidly in on the rear of the Russian Carpathian armies. With difficulty these extricated themselves and retired behind the San. (Vol. III, 276.) But they were unable here to withstand Mackensen who had assumed command in all this field, and fell back first upon Lemberg and then upon the Volhynian triangle of fortresses within the Russian frontier. Przemysl fell, Lemberg was lost and Dubno and Lutsk, two of the three Volhynian fortresses, fell. (Vol. III, 276-312.) Having thus disposed of the Galician armies, Mackensen turned northeast from the San, struck at Lublin and Cholm (Vol. III, 357-365), and through them at Brest-Litovsk, far in the rear of the Russian armies in Poland. At the same time Hindenburg in East Prussia moved south, aiming at Grodno and Vilna, also behind the Warsaw front (Vol. III, 256-361), while a third Germany army invaded the Courland and aimed at Riga. (Vol. III, 337.) The Russian armies in Poland were thus threatened with complete envelopment; they were caught between the closing jaws of the pincers, which were Mackensen and Hindenburg. For a certain time it was not clear whether the gigantic double thrust might not result in the capture of the whole Russian army in Poland. But this did not happen. Warsaw was evacuated (Vol. III, 356), Ivangorod, Novo Georgievsk, the fortresses along the Bobr-Narew-Niemen barrier fell (Vol. IV, 176-181), but the Russian armies drew back upon Riga, Vilna, and BrestLitovsk. (Vol. IV, 186-188.) At Brest-Litovsk there was only a brief halt and then the Russians resumed their retreat upon Pinsk and the Pripet Marshes. Behind the Dvina from Riga to Dvinsk the northern army stood fast. But the central armies, retiring upon Vilna, were nearly trapped and once were actually cut off by German cavalry. (Vol. IV, 193-223.) By September the great campaign approached its end. The Russians at last took root on a line from Riga, through the Pripet Marshes to Rovno and thence to the Rumanian boundary. (Vol. IV, 184-255). The czar sent the grand duke to the Caucasus and took command himself (Vol. IV, 188), an allied offensive in the west in Champagne and Artois (Vol. IV, 52-81) made sudden demands upon German man power, as the Russian advance in East Prussia and Galicia had taxed German man power in the days of the Marne, and so, by October, it was plain that the second great German effort had also failed. Russia had not been destroyed, she had not been put out of the war for any long period; Russian armies were to resume the offensive the following June. As in the west, Germany had conquered wide territories, she had taken fortresses, provinces, vast numbers of prisoners and guns, but a decision had escaped her. She was still confronted by the certainty that at some future time all her foes, superior in numbers and munitions, would beat upon all her fronts at once. But she was no longer able to push eastward to follow the pathway of Napoleon and meet a Russian winter on the road; moreover the situation in the Balkans demanded attention and the Italian offensive along the Isonzo, as well as Anglo-French pressure in the west, also claimed notice. Early in the spring the Anglo-French fleets had made a desperate and almost successful attempt to force the Dardanelles. (Vol. III, 423-437.) Their failure had been followed by a land |