New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 1, No. 1: From the Beginning to March, 1915, With IndexVarious
History
New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 1, No. 1: From the Beginning to March, 1915, With Index
Various
World War, 1914-1918
Early last year, in the course of some comments which I made upon the
slighting remarks about our army by Gen. von Bernhardi, I observed: "It
may be noted that Gen. von Bernhardi has a poor opinion of our troops.
This need not trouble us. We are what we are, and words will not alter
it. From very early days our soldiers have left their mark upon
Continental warfare, and we have no reason to think that we have
declined from the manhood of our forefathers." Since then he has
returned to the attack.
With that curious power of coming after deep study to the absolutely
diametrically wrong conclusion which the German expert, political or
military, appears to possess, he says in his "War of Today": "The
English Army, trained more for purposes of show than for modern war,"
adding in the same sentence a sneer at our "inferior colonial levies."
He will have an opportunity of reconsidering his views presently upon
the fighting value of our oversea troops, and surely, so far as our own
are concerned, he must already be making some interesting notes for his
next edition, or, rather, for the learned volume upon "Germany and the
Last War," which will, no doubt, come from his pen. He is a man to whom
we might well raise a statue, for I am convinced that his frank
confession of German policy has been worth at least an army corps to
this country. We may address to him John Davidson's lines to his enemy:
Unwilling friend, let not your spite abate.
Spur us with scorn and strengthen us with hate.
There is another German gentleman who must be thinking rather furiously.
He is a certain Col. Gadke, who appeared officially at Aldershot some
years ago, was hospitably entertained, being shown all that he desired
to see, and on his return to Berlin published a most deprecatory
description of our forces. He found no good thing in them. I have some
recollection that Gen. French alluded in a public speech to this
critic's remarks, and expressed a modest hope that he and his men would
some day have the opportunity of showing how far they were deserved.
Well, he has had his opportunity, and Col. Gadke, like so many other
Germans, seems to have made a miscalculation.
*Germans Untried in War.*
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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