War without End The First World War


War without End

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By summer, 1918, the war had been going for four terrible years

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and the end seemed nowhere in sight.

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Unless we can look ahead and plan for 1919,

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we shall be in the same melancholy position next year as we are this.

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Do the means of beating the German armies in 1919 exist?

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Have we the will power?

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Since spring 1918, the Allies on the Western Front

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had been battered by German offensives.

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But in August, the Allies secretly assembled a strike force

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in northern France.

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100,000 men of the Australian and Canadian Corps

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were backed by 400 tanks...

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..1,900 planes,

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2,000 guns,

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three cavalry divisions.

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General Sir Henry Rawlinson,

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British commander at the Somme in 1916, had learnt from the past.

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He embraced new ideas.

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The close combination of men and machinery.

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The importance of achievable goals.

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My only difficulty will be to get enough divisions

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and to keep the thing secret.

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Rawlinson aimed his assault at a weak 12-mile sector

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of the German line, east of Amiens.

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He had the French in support to the south.

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General Erich Ludendorff, joint commander in chief of the German army,

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neither knew of an attack, nor feared one.

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We wish for nothing better than to see the enemy launch an offensive.

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100,000 infantry stand grimly, silently.

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All feel to make sure their bayonets are locked.

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The section officer counts the last seconds.

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The speed was terrific.

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Within a few moments of the Huns running from our tanks and infantry,

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our guns were coming up into new forward positions.

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It was glorious to be in the rush of an advance.

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The Allied attack sent the Germans reeling.

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By nightfall, Rawlinson's 4th Army had advanced eight miles.

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They killed and seriously wounded 9,000 Germans

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and captured 18,000 more.

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Ludendorff declared 8th August the "Black Day of the German Army".

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General Paul von Hindenburg steadied him,

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but both knew the Battle of Amiens was the beginning of the end.

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Mighty as Germany looked on the map,

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her armies on the Western Front were near the end of their tether,

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exhausted, hungry, fed up.

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Their generals had given them neither clear aims, nor adequate supplies.

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The Germans had lost nearly a million men since March.

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Ludendorff blamed the home front for spreading defeatism.

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I was told of behaviour, which I openly confess,

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I should not have thought possible in the German army.

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Whole bodies of men had surrendered to single soldiers.

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Germany's problems went beyond poor morale.

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She had lost a string of vital battles.

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The battle of the factories and technology.

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Germany had built just 20 tanks, the Allies, over 4,000.

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She had lost the battle of manpower.

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A quarter of a million Americans were pouring into France every month.

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She had lost the battle of command.

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The Allies worked together under the leadership by Marshal Ferdinand Foch.

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But Ludendorff's generals despaired of his lack of strategic plan,

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and some feared for his mental health.

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Great crisis this morning, very nerve-racking.

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Ludendorff is a bundle of nerves. It's never his fault.

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He looks everywhere for scapegoats.

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After Amiens, Foch orchestrated a series of attacks

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up and down the German lines -

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first French, then British, now American.

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The Germans fell back under the rain of blows.

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While the Allies pulled together, the Central Powers were tearing apart

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In Austria-Hungary, a third of a million soldiers had deserted.

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The people at home were starving.

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The multi-ethnic empire was splintering,

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its Poles, Czechs and Bosnians

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saw defeat as their chance to pursue independence.

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In mid-September, the Austrian Emperor Karl told the Kaiser

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he wanted to negotiate with the Allies.

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The Kaiser begged him not to.

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I cannot refrain from expressing astonishment and sorrow

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that you even think of this.

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You must know how destructive this course of action is.

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But Karl had already sent his proposal for talks to the Allies

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and they just threw it back in his face.

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Another great empire allied to Germany was dying.

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The 600-year-old Ottoman Empire was a spent force.

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Britain was driving the Turks out of Mesopotamia, Palestine and Syria.

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They were now fighting for their lives, not for Germany.

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Then the third link in Germany's alliance chain started to give way.

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Germany needed Bulgaria to hold the Balkan Front.

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But by September 1918, a huge Allied force had gathered in Macedonia.

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If the Bulgarians folded, the Allies' way would be clear to Austria-Hungary

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The Bulgarians were dug into these trenches, their morale cracking.

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Crown Prince Boris was almost attacked by his own soldiers

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when he visited the front.

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We are naked, barefoot and hungry.

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An empty knapsack does not guard a frontier.

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The First World War had begun in the Balkans,

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with Serbia as the tinderbox.

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Now, as part of the Allied force, she was in at the kill.

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And for the Serbs it was personal.

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In 1915, the Bulgarians had helped kick them out of their homeland.

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Here was the Serbs' chance for revenge.

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The heavy artillery made the Bulgarians crawl into shelters.

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Excitement made my hair stand on end, my blood was up.

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The Allies smashed through the Bulgarian lines and rolled north.

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On 28th September, Bulgaria sued for peace.

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When he heard this, Ludendorff suffered a fit,

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collapsing to the floor, foaming at the mouth.

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The next day, he learned the Allies had breached the Hindenburg line

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along the St Quentin Canal,

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Germany's last fixed line of defence on the Western Front.

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Two days later, on 1st October,

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Ludendorff summoned his senior staff to his headquarters in Spa.

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Among them, Colonel Albrecht von Thaer.

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Ludendorff stood up. His face was pale and full of deep worry.

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He said it was his duty to tell us

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our military condition was terribly serious.

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Bulgaria has already been lost.

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Austria and Turkey are both at the end of their strength.

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Any day now, our Western Front could be breached.

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Therefore, the Supreme Army Command demands

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that a proposal for bringing about peace be made without delay.

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Ludendorff's stark decision to ask for an armistice - or cease-fire - was a terrible shock.

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Generals quietly sobbed.

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When Ludendorff left the room, Thaer followed him.

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I grabbed his right arm with both hands and said,

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"Your Excellency, can it be true?

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"Is that the last word? Am I awake or dreaming?"

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I was completely beside myself.

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He remained calm and gentle and said to me with a deeply sorrowful smile,

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"Unfortunately, that is how it is, and I see no other way out."

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To the German people in October 1918,

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the prospect of an armistice seemed heaven-sent.

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A great sigh of relief escapes from the lips of the tormented nation.

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"This means peace" you can hear at every corner of the streets,

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and "Peace" smiles in the eyes of every shop girl

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in the baker's or grocer's

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Germany's soldiers had kept her politicians in the dark

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about the string of military disasters.

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So the news that they wanted an armistice came as a bolt from the blue.

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The deputies were absolutely broken.

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Ebert turned white as a sheet and didn't utter a single word.

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Another looked as if he'd had an accident.

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The secretary is believed to have left the room, saying,

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"The only thing left to do is to shoot one's self in the head."

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But peace talks were still a way off.

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First, the terms of the cease-fire would have to be settled.

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Germany approached US President Woodrow Wilson,

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asking him to broker the armistice with the Allies.

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They chose him because he had already proposed a peace plan - the 14 Points.

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French PM Clemenceau was unimpressed.

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14 points?

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The good Lord has only ten.

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Wilson's points were an idealistic package of liberal principles,

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including rights to national self-determination

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and a League of Nations to watch over it all.

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Germany believed Wilson would secure a fair deal for them on this basis.

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We are ready to be just to the German people,

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to deal fairly with Germany, as with all others.

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To propose anything but justice to Germany would be to renounce

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and dishonour our own cause.

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But Wilson also insisted Germany had to admit defeat and democratise.

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Britain and France did not want to talk about a new world order

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until the war was over.

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While the politicians argued, the fighting raged on.

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Germany's U-boats continued to sink Allied ships in the Atlantic.

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And as her armies retreated across France, they looted and laid waste.

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14-year-old Yves Congar had kept a diary throughout the German

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occupation of his home town of Sedan.

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He longed for freedom,

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but dreaded the price the French would have to pay for it.

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So here it is,

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the great moment we've spent four years waiting, hoping, begging for.

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And yet it brings with it the horror of bombing,

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gas, fire, perhaps death.

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We may never see friends again,

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many might be killed, the town destroyed.

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Our one great hope is an armistice.

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The First World War did not go quietly.

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The final months were more lethal

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than the trench war of past years had been.

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Men now had to leave the safety of trenches and cross open ground,

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with little place to hide from sweeping machine-gun and shellfire.

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British casualties in autumn, 1918 were higher than those a year before,

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during the terrible battle of Passchendaele -

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the epitome of trench slaughter.

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And the closer to peace, the harder it was to bear the losses.

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It was a slaughterhouse,

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just a mass of mangled flesh and blood.

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Bob's head was hanging off.

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You couldn't tell which was Harris and which was Kempton.

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What was left of them was in pieces.

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We knew the enemy was beaten.

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After three years in France and the end so near,

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Bob, killed.

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Harris, who had left a young bride, killed.

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Jimmy Fooks, whose time was nearly up, killed.

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Kempton, who also was due for leave, killed.

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General Haig had seemed careless with his men's lives

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at the Battle of the Somme in 1916.

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Now, he argued for stopping the war without a total defeat of the Germans

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The British alone might bring the enemy to his knees,

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but why expend more British lives, and for what?

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French General Charles Mangin insisted this would only store up

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trouble for the future.

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No, no, no! We must go right into the heart of Germany.

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The Germans will not admit they were beaten.

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It is a fatal error and France will pay for it.

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But, with winter setting in,

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any invasion of Germany would have to wait till spring 1919.

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By then, the Germans might have renewed their strength.

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Marshal Foch believed France would get what she wanted by negotiation.

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No need to battle on to Berlin.

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So the Allies set out to achieve on paper

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what their armies had not done in the field -

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obtain Germany's unconditional surrender.

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Foch chose to meet the Germans in Compiegne,

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45 miles north-east of Paris,

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in a secluded forest through which a railway line conveniently ran.

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In his train, on 8th November, Foch handed the armistice conditions

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to politician Mathias Erzberger, leader of the German delegation.

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Erzberger was visibly shaken by the terms Germany would have to accept

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just to obtain a cease-fire.

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Germany would have to evacuate Belgium and France,

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surrender her fleet and pay compensation.

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The Allies would continue their blockade, disarm the Germans

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and occupy the left bank of the Rhine.

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Germany was being forced to capitulate.

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Meanwhile, the country Erzberger represented was falling apart,

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its cities swept by revolution.

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SHOUTING

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The German people, exhausted by war and hunger,

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wanted democracy in and the Kaiser out.

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CHEERING

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But it was the German army which forced the Kaiser to abdicate.

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He asked his generals to turn the army against the people,

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but the generals refused.

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The army will return home in good order under its generals,

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but not under the command of Your Majesty.

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It no longer stands behind Your Majesty.

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The Prussian dynasty of Frederick the Great was over.

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The next day, the Kaiser slipped into exile in Holland.

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He would live long enough to hear Germany had beaten France in 1940.

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He never accepted that, in 1918, his army had been defeated.

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For 30 years, the army was my pride.

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Now, after 4.5 brilliant years of war, with unprecedented victories,

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it was brought down

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by a stab in the back from the dagger of the revolutionaries

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at the very moment when peace was within reach.

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CHEERING

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Most Germans rejoiced at the news that the Kaiser had gone.

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I felt as if a heavy weight had suddenly been lifted from my heart.

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This definitely means the armistice will be signed.

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Back in the forest at Compiegne,

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Erzberger now represented the German Republic.

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At 5am on 11th of November, he signed the armistice.

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Hostilities temporarily cease 11:00 today

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when all offensive action will cease.

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Present outpost line to be maintained and no troops to pass

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east other than road etc reconnaissance and working parties.

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No conversation with enemy to be allowed.

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The most remarkable feature was the uncanny silence.

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The war was over.

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Peace and safety was a new thing. It could not be grasped in a moment.

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A dreadful blow. I was just beginning to enjoy it.

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No more slaughter.

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No more maiming.

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No more mud and blood.

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No more shovelling bits of men's bodies and dumping them in sandbags.

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No more writing dreadfully difficult letters to next of kin of the dead.

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A strange and unreal thought was running through my mind.

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I had a future.

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It was the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.

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CHEERING

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A great cheer arose all along the line.

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We could hear the men a thousand yards in front raising holy hell.

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The French, behind our position, were dancing, shouting

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and waving bottles of wine.

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We were stupefied to see crowds of Boches

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running over between the minefields,

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their hands up and yelling like mad.

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They were crazy for cigarettes and chocolate.

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We had burned rice our boys wouldn't eat and they fell on it like wolves.

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Our soldiers were choked with emotion.

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I thought about my family,

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about all the women of France...

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..except those who are alone and who cry.

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BELLS TOLL

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CHEERING

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One great wave of joy swept round the world

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and found its way to every nook and cranny.

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No-one was more delighted than our African soldiers,

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who cheered themselves hoarse.

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Everybody came out, disabled old men, old women in slippers

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and housewives, leaving lunch on the stove.

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I wept with joy. 5,000 Indian soldiers lit their torches.

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The hilltops burst into fire with scores of bonfires.

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I found myself arm in arm with soldiers I had never seen before.

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I forgot where we went, toured the streets, and sang and sang.

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The significance of what it means was overwhelming -

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peace.

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People whose lives were shaped by the war went home,

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people the world did not yet know.

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Ernest Hemingway, Bertolt Brecht,

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Harold Macmillan, Vera Brittain,

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Charles de Gaulle, Josef Tito, Benito Mussolini,

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David Ben-Gurion, Mustafa Kemal.

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And one of the most insignificant of them all, for now, Adolf Hitler.

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The German armies in France and Belgium headed home.

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How we had looked forward to this moment.

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We used to picture it as the most splendid event of our lives.

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And here we are now, humbled, our souls torn and bleeding.

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But we can be proud of our performance.

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Never before has a nation, a single army, had the world against it

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and stood its ground.

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We protected our homeland.

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They never got into Germany.

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In mid-December, 1918, the first German troops arrived in Berlin.

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The people welcomed them as an army with no cause to feel ashamed.

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The men wore green laurel wreaths over steel helmets.

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The machine-guns were garlanded with green branches.

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Many a soldier had a child or sweetheart

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on his flower-wreathed horse.

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A feeling of confidence, of fresh hope in the future

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seems to have returned with the troops.

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Germany's new Republican chancellor

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Friedrich Ebert reinforced the dangerous illusion

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they were not beaten in this war.

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I salute you who return unvanquished from the field of battle.

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The Allies were in no doubt who had beaten whom.

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Allied troops moved into Germany and began their watch on the Rhine.

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The German fleet was surrendered to Britain,

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and the Allies travelled to Paris to dictate the terms of the peace.

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US president Woodrow Wilson crossed the Atlantic

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to put his idealism to the test.

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We have used the great words "right" and "justice".

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Now we are to prove whether or not we understand them

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and how they are to be applied.

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But the world had not stood still

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between the end of the war and the start of the peace talks.

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CHEERING

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On 22nd November 1918,

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the Belgian King Albert came home in triumph to Brussels.

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Occupied lands had been won back.

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The French repossessed Alsace-Lorraine.

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What a moving welcome!

0:30:120:30:15

The people were so happy and smiling.

0:30:150:30:18

Some were pale and cried while they greeted us.

0:30:180:30:21

They speak pure French. They really are French, all those locals.

0:30:210:30:27

We were treated like victors, like saviours.

0:30:270:30:31

These scenes confirmed that France and Belgium

0:30:430:30:46

had been liberated from an evil grip,

0:30:460:30:49

that this was a victory for the Allies.

0:30:490:30:51

And in eastern Europe, new nations arose out of shattered empires.

0:31:010:31:07

They didn't wait for the peace conference

0:31:070:31:10

to bring self-determination.

0:31:100:31:12

They tore down all signs of foreign rule and put up new frontiers.

0:31:120:31:17

Poland carved a vast territory out of Germany and Russia.

0:31:200:31:25

Czechoslovakia took land from Austria and Hungary.

0:31:250:31:30

And Serbia realised the aim she had started the war over

0:31:300:31:33

by founding her own Slav super-state.

0:31:330:31:36

The peace talks would recognise these new nations -

0:31:380:31:41

they did not create them.

0:31:410:31:42

CHATTER

0:31:450:31:48

27 countries met in Paris to divide the spoils and define the peace.

0:31:480:31:54

The losers were not invited.

0:31:540:31:56

We are going into these negotiations with our mouths full of fine phrases

0:32:000:32:05

and our brains seething with dark thoughts.

0:32:050:32:08

The big decisions were made by the Council of Four -

0:32:100:32:13

Prime Ministers Orlando of Italy, Lloyd George of Britain,

0:32:130:32:17

Clemenceau of France, and US President Wilson,

0:32:170:32:21

All liberals, but with different agendas and forceful personalities.

0:32:220:32:27

Arguments between Lloyd George and myself were so violent

0:32:280:32:33

Wilson interposed between us with outstretched arms,

0:32:330:32:36

saying pleasantly, "I have never come across such unreasonable men."

0:32:360:32:41

Clemenceau wanted Germany restrained for the sake of French security.

0:32:450:32:51

Orlando wanted more territory for Italy.

0:32:510:32:55

Lloyd George looked beyond Europe to safeguard the British Empire.

0:32:550:33:01

Wilson wanted his new world order, with justice and democracy for all.

0:33:010:33:06

But, first, there was the little matter of settling the war

0:33:060:33:10

and that would force Wilson to compromise his ideals.

0:33:100:33:13

The Big Four did not go into the talks

0:33:180:33:21

planning to pin guilt for the war on Germany.

0:33:210:33:25

But when they realised how much the war had cost,

0:33:250:33:27

they looked for someone to foot the bill.

0:33:270:33:31

France owed billions to Britain and America for financing her war.

0:33:310:33:35

Britain couldn't afford to waive the debt and America wouldn't,

0:33:350:33:39

so the Allies turned to Germany.

0:33:390:33:43

She could only be made to pay if she accepted blame for the war,

0:33:430:33:47

so the Allies included a clause pinning guilt on Germany.

0:33:470:33:51

German accepts the responsibility of Germany and her allies

0:33:540:33:59

for causing all the loss and damage to which the allied,

0:33:590:34:02

and associated governemnts,

0:34:020:34:04

and their nationals have been subjected

0:34:040:34:07

as a consequence of the war imposed upon them...

0:34:070:34:10

by the aggression of Germany and her allies.

0:34:100:34:13

On 7th May, 1919, the German delegation came to collect the treaty

0:34:190:34:24

expecting an even-handed settlement

0:34:240:34:27

infused with Wilson's sense of fair play.

0:34:270:34:29

They were horrified by what they read -

0:34:310:34:34

440 articles beating Germany into submission.

0:34:340:34:37

The Germans protested so vehemently,

0:34:400:34:43

particularly against the requirement to admit war guilt,

0:34:430:34:45

that Lloyd George worried the Allies had gone too far.

0:34:450:34:49

A member of his own delegation, the economist John Maynard Keynes,

0:34:510:34:56

was openly critical.

0:34:560:34:58

Forcing Germany to pay could ruin Europe, politically and economically.

0:34:580:35:03

The policy of reducing Germany to servitude for a generation,

0:35:060:35:10

of degrading the lives of millions, should be abhorrent and detestable.

0:35:100:35:16

But Clemenceau believed the terms were fully justified

0:35:200:35:24

and Wilson's line had toughened.

0:35:240:35:25

He had wanted to treat Germany fairly

0:35:270:35:30

but, as a liberal, he was appalled by the way she'd waged war.

0:35:300:35:33

And, as President of the US, he wanted America's loans repaid.

0:35:330:35:38

It is a good thing the terms should be so hard

0:35:410:35:44

so Germany may know what an unjust war means.

0:35:440:35:47

If the Germans won't sign, then we must renew the war.

0:35:470:35:51

Germany did sign, on 28th June 1919, in the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles

0:35:570:36:03

five years to the day after the Sarajevo assassination

0:36:030:36:06

that had triggered war.

0:36:060:36:08

The settlement was far from perfect.

0:36:120:36:16

The much-touted principle that people should govern themselves

0:36:160:36:22

was not applied outside Europe and imperialism was condoned.

0:36:220:36:25

But Wilson achieved his goal,

0:36:250:36:29

the creation of the first global forum, the League of Nations.

0:36:290:36:32

In the event, the Allies wound up with the worst of both worlds.

0:36:340:36:39

The Germans paid little in reparations

0:36:390:36:41

and the League of Nations proved powerless to force them.

0:36:410:36:46

The Versailles terms left some Germans,

0:36:460:36:48

like future Nazi Rudolf Hess, smouldering with resentment,

0:36:480:36:52

with disastrous consequences.

0:36:520:36:54

The only thing that keeps me going is hope for the day of revenge,

0:36:550:36:59

however far off it may be.

0:36:590:37:01

I wonder whether it'll happen in my lifetime.

0:37:010:37:05

Marshal Ferdinand Foch felt the Allies hadn't been tough enough

0:37:080:37:12

and realised the world would have to go to war again.

0:37:120:37:16

This is not peace, it is an armistice for 20 years.

0:37:160:37:22

He got it wrong by just 65 days.

0:37:220:37:25

Men were killed in the war's final hours,

0:37:380:37:41

whose last letters did not reach home for weeks.

0:37:410:37:44

Men like Marius Saucaz who wrote to his father in Morocco.

0:37:460:37:50

Dear Dad,

0:37:540:37:56

if I were to die in a future attack, don't cry. There's no point.

0:37:560:38:01

I would only be doing my duty and would die, like many others,

0:38:020:38:06

for a noble cause, a great ideal.

0:38:060:38:09

I am proud to be your son and I want to tell you today,

0:38:110:38:13

because who knows what the future holds.

0:38:130:38:18

I love you more than I have ever shown you.

0:38:190:38:22

Love and kisses, Marius.

0:38:220:38:25

Around 10 million soldiers were killed in the war,

0:38:340:38:38

prompting Lloyd George's sardonic comment.

0:38:380:38:41

When I look at the appalling casualty lists,

0:38:410:38:44

I sometimes wish it had not been necessary to win so many victories.

0:38:440:38:49

The tidy rows of crosses sanitise the deaths.

0:38:550:38:57

They often cover mass graves,

0:38:590:39:02

with a man represented by the part that could be found and identified.

0:39:020:39:07

Verdun in France has a huge vault full of bones...

0:39:070:39:11

..some of the millions posted missing in the war,

0:39:150:39:18

the place and circumstance of their death unknown.

0:39:180:39:21

No-one is certain how many civilians died...

0:39:240:39:27

women, children and elderly caught in the mayhem of the Eastern Front

0:39:270:39:32

in the flight of the Serb nation in 1915,

0:39:320:39:36

in the Armenian massacres...

0:39:360:39:39

in occupied France and Belgium.

0:39:390:39:42

Then, in 1918, influenza broke out,

0:39:440:39:47

eventually killing 20 million

0:39:470:39:48

soldiers and civilians around the world.

0:39:480:39:51

20 million men were wounded by the war,

0:39:550:39:57

of whom several million were badly mutilated.

0:39:570:40:00

The French called one category the "gueules cassees" -

0:40:060:40:10

the "broken faces".

0:40:100:40:11

Some were given human masks to hide their wounds.

0:40:160:40:19

New faces, new legs, new arms.

0:40:270:40:30

New minds were more difficult.

0:40:360:40:40

No-one really knew what to do with the victims of shell shock.

0:40:400:40:45

Soldiers with a range of disorders were filmed,

0:40:450:40:48

including 19-year-old Private Preston - his memory blank -

0:40:480:40:52

responsive only to the word "bombs".

0:40:520:40:55

Over the decades, the suffering and dying and the sense of futile waste -

0:41:030:41:07

central themes in the war's poetry -

0:41:070:41:10

came to dominate our perceptions.

0:41:100:41:14

Come back, come back,

0:41:140:41:15

you didn't want to die.

0:41:150:41:18

And all this war's a sham, a stinking lie.

0:41:180:41:22

And the glory that our fathers laud so well

0:41:220:41:25

A crowd of corpses freed from pangs of hell.

0:41:250:41:30

MUSIC: Brass Band plays "Abide With Me"

0:41:300:41:32

But in its immediate aftermath, when memorials went up around the world,

0:41:400:41:44

the First World War was not seen

0:41:440:41:46

solely in terms of senseless slaughter.

0:41:460:41:49

Their designs and inscriptions defined the war in positive terms,

0:41:520:41:57

for defence against aggression,

0:41:570:42:00

for love of one's country,

0:42:000:42:02

for glory.

0:42:020:42:05

So much hardship,

0:42:050:42:07

so much heroism

0:42:070:42:09

and now such overwhelming glory.

0:42:090:42:12

Anything after this can be no more than an anticlimax.

0:42:120:42:17

Germany too celebrated victory where she could.

0:42:190:42:24

A gigantic monument was built in 1927 at Tannenberg

0:42:240:42:27

to commemorate Germany's triumph over the Russians in 1914.

0:42:270:42:31

It was inaugurated by Field Marshal Hindenburg.

0:42:340:42:38

The war may have been lost, but the dead were proclaimed as heroes,

0:42:400:42:43

the struggle itself honoured.

0:42:430:42:46

Though the aim for which I fought was not to be achieved,

0:42:480:42:51

we learnt once and for all to stand for a cause

0:42:510:42:55

and, if necessary, to fall as befitted men.

0:42:550:42:58

Many Allied memorials spelt out the values felt to be at stake

0:43:030:43:06

during the war.

0:43:060:43:07

In the stained-glass window in Canterbury University, New Zealand,

0:43:110:43:15

the Central Powers are depicted as the dragon of brutality and ignorance

0:43:150:43:21

The Allied troops have humanity and justice on their side

0:43:210:43:25

and are naturally victorious.

0:43:250:43:27

The years after the war were defined

0:43:360:43:38

by the search for significance in the loss.

0:43:380:43:42

National symbols, like the Cenotaph and the Unknown Warrior,

0:43:420:43:45

helped answer the question in so many people's minds -

0:43:450:43:48

what did all the suffering mean?

0:43:480:43:50

In 1920, the body of an unidentified British soldier was exhumed in France

0:43:540:43:59

and transported home.

0:43:590:44:01

SEAGULLS SQUAWK

0:44:040:44:07

On 11th November, the unknown warrior was brought to Whitehall.

0:44:110:44:15

He did not seem an unknown warrior.

0:44:200:44:23

He was known to us all.

0:44:230:44:25

He was "one of our boys".

0:44:250:44:28

To some women, he was their own boy who went missing.

0:44:280:44:33

To many men wearing ribbons and badges,

0:44:370:44:40

he was "one of their comrades".

0:44:400:44:43

It was the steel helmet, the old tin hat,

0:44:560:45:00

lying there on the crimson of the flag, which revealed him instantly.

0:45:000:45:06

Herbert Thompson had lost his eyesight in the war.

0:45:090:45:13

He could not see the proceedings, but he could feel them.

0:45:130:45:16

There was ineffable sadness and melancholy,

0:45:180:45:22

yet a message of inspiration and hope,

0:45:220:45:25

as if the spirit of the unknown soldier

0:45:250:45:28

had whispered "Courage, brother. Hope on."

0:45:280:45:32

I felt with my comrades almost ashamed I had given so little,

0:45:320:45:36

while he who was sleeping by us had given all.

0:45:360:45:39

Vera Brittain had served in France as a nurse during the war.

0:45:510:45:55

She lost her fiance, two close friends, her only brother.

0:45:550:46:01

She went back in 1921.

0:46:010:46:03

At Amiens, we stood in the dimness of the once threatened cathedral.

0:46:100:46:15

We looked up with reminiscent melancholy

0:46:150:46:19

at the still boarded stained-glass windows smashed by German shells,

0:46:190:46:22

realising, with surprise, that in my mind,

0:46:220:46:25

anger and resentment had died long ago,

0:46:250:46:29

leaving only an everlasting sorrow and a passionate pity.

0:46:290:46:35

The First World War had achieved its basic aim

0:46:400:46:42

of containing German and Austrian militarism, at least for the moment.

0:46:420:46:47

It moved Europe from the age of empires to the era of nation states.

0:46:480:46:52

CHEERING

0:46:520:46:55

It gave eastern European peoples independence.

0:46:550:46:59

It gave a sense of national identity to Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

0:46:590:47:05

It helped Russia become the first communist state

0:47:050:47:08

and launched America as a world power.

0:47:080:47:12

The ideas for which men fought have proved lasting -

0:47:140:47:18

democracy and liberalism, religious faith and nationalism.

0:47:180:47:20

GUNFIRE

0:47:230:47:26

But the First World War solved few of the grievances

0:47:290:47:32

over which it was fought.

0:47:320:47:33

We live with its unresolved consequences in the Middle East,

0:47:330:47:37

the Balkans, Ireland.

0:47:370:47:38

It wasn't the war to end all wars,

0:47:400:47:42

not just because it left dangerous loose ends,

0:47:420:47:45

but because it bequeathed the world a terrible message -

0:47:450:47:49

that war can affect change,

0:47:490:47:51

that war can fulfil ambitions, that war can work.

0:47:510:47:55

The battlefields were tidied up, or ploughed over or just abandoned.

0:48:010:48:07

But they held their grip on the soldiers who had fought on them,

0:48:070:48:10

on those who dared go back.

0:48:100:48:12

I saw again with a pang of anguish the trenches, damp and muddy,

0:48:160:48:20

and was surprised to have lived there for four years.

0:48:200:48:25

So moving because of the endless silence,

0:48:250:48:28

the gloomy, barren, deserted look.

0:48:280:48:30

Old churches pierced, chipped, ripped open,

0:48:350:48:39

and barbed wire everywhere.

0:48:390:48:42

Life resumes, things remain the same.

0:48:460:48:50

We are the only ones who have changed.

0:48:520:48:54

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