GREAT BRITAIN.--Britain was not expected to take an active part in the struggle, and if she did the affairs of Ireland, the Suffragette movement, and the general decadence of the nation would prevent a whole-hearted prosecution of the war. A small force only could be sent to Europe; it would be swallowed up in the "bewildered collapse," and no reinforcements could be spared. The extent of the miscalculation is shown in Mr. Lloyd George's speech in the House of Commons on July 3, 1919, in which the Prime Minister stated that the British Empire had put 7,700,000 men under arms, had raised 9,500,000,000 pounds in taxes and loans, and had suffered upwards of 8,000,000 casualties on land and {17} sea. It was also shown that during the last two years of the war the British armies had borne the brunt of the heaviest fighting on the Western Front in France and at the same time had destroyed the armed forces of the Turkish Empire in the East. The risk of compelling Britain to take part was undertaken, and the first great strategical blunder of the war was committed. AMERICA.--In the third year of the War America had gradually been brought into the arena, and a further miscalculation arrayed the hundred millions of a free and united nation against the autocracies of Central Europe. LORD ROBERTS.--Other brains than German had considered the possibility of an armed conflict in Europe. For many years Lord Roberts had advocated universal military service in the United Kingdom, as a procedure beneficial in itself, and imperative on account of the clear intentions of the Headquarters Staff of the German Army. "Germany strikes when Germany's hour has struck," was his warning note, and although apparently unheeded by the nation, his warning was not without effect upon the training of the Regular Army.