October 13th, 1915

- At noon today British artillery commence a preliminary bombardment of a six-thousand-yard stretch of the German line north of Loos, the target of today's attack.  Most of the fire is concentrated on German trenches, machine-gun posts, and barbed wire, though 114 guns concentrate on German artillery positions identified by aerial reconnaissance over the past several days.  The lengthy preparation has also allowed the British to move up and deploy gas cylinders, which are opened at 150pm.  The wind carries the gas in the desired direction along the entire line except at the north, where the wind direction would have pushed the gas down the British trenches instead of across No Man's Land.  Ten minutes later at 2pm, whistles sound and four divisions of the British 1st Army go on to the attack.  To the north, 2nd Division of I Corps advances north of the Hohenzollern Redoubt against a trench known as Little Willie, while 46th Division of XI Corps, fresh after being redeployed from the Ypres salient, assaults the German redoubt itself.  IV Corp's other division - 12th - is to seize The Quarries to the south of the redoubt, while 1st Division of IV Corps moves against a stretch of the German line on the Lens-La Bassée road.

The British attack north of Loos, October 13th, 1915.

The gas, however, did not have a noticeable effect on the German defenders other than to warn them that an attack was imminent.  Moreover, the preliminary bombardment had not succeeded in knocking out the German artillery, which open fire on the British infantry in the open as they cross No Man's Land.  As a result, the British suffer heavy casualties before they even reach the German line.  On the northern flank, only one officer, a Lieutenant Abercrombie, and one soldier actually make it into the Little Willie trench, and when Abercrombie sends the other soldier back to ask for support, the latter is wounded and the message never arrives.  On his own, Abercrombie wages what amounts to his own private war against the Germans, putting a machine-gun post out of action with his grenades.  With no bombs remaining, Abercrombie manages to return to British lines unscathed, his success notable for its audacity but otherwise without significance on the larger battle.  To the south, 138th Brigade of 46th Division advances over ground partially sheltered from German view, and are able to break into the Hohenzollern Redoubt.  Efforts to secure Fosse Trench beyond, however, fail as the division's other brigade - 137th - fails to get into the Big Willie trench, leaving the forward elements of 138th Brigade exposed to flanking fire.  Further south, 35th Brigade of 12th Division gains a foothold in the southeast corner of The Quarries while elements of 37th Brigade seize 250 yards of Gun Trench, and both brigades are able to hold off German counterattacks.  On the other hand, the attack of 1st Division is an abysmal failure - artillery fire fails to break the German wire, and the attacking infantry, trying to work their way through the few gaps in the wire, come under withering fire and take heavy losses.

British artillery bombards the Hohenzollern  Redoubt as gas drifts towards the German lines, October 13th, 1915.

Overall the British attack has achieved certain tactical successes, capturing and holding toeholds in the German line from the Hohenzollern Redoubt to Gun Trench.  However, these positions remain precarious and further attacks will be needed simply to consolidate the British gain, to say nothing of driving beyond the German lines attacked today.  The four British divisions, meanwhile, have taken significant losses, and the commander of XI Corps decides that 46th Division suffered sufficient casualties as to necessitate its withdrawal from the line, and this evening he orders the Guard Division back to the front in its place.

- To the south near Vimy Ridge, the German Guard Corps, after a series of counterattacks, manages to retake the trenches at the Five Crossroads west of Givenchy today.  Meanwhile, meeting with Joffre today, Foch argues for a resumption of the attack, given that 'only a bound' can gain the crest of Vimy Ridge.  He argues that the attack of the 11th had broken down due to insufficient artillery support - the heavy artillery of 10th Army had fired 73 000 shells prior to the September 25th assault as compared to only 21 600 shells prior to the 11th.  Joffre, however, replies that he does not have the ammunition to give, and moreover that the most recent failure has shown that 10th Army does not have the ability to make another big push.  Joffre thus instructs Foch to halt further major assaults, only attacking to consolidate the gains won west of Vimy of Ridge over the past three weeks.

- Joffre's order to Foch effectively brings the French fall offensive to a close, given that the French commander-in-chief had halted operations in Champagne on the 7th.  The French have gained ground in both Champagne and Artois - up to four kilometres in the former and up to two kilometres in the latter.  However, the ground seized confers no great strategic advantage, and is a far cry from both Joffre's objectives and the possibilities that appeared to exist in the first days of the attack.  Especially in Champagne, the initial French attack broke through the main German defensive position, driving several kilometres in a matter of hours while inflicting heavy losses on the defenders.  The failure to follow up this success and push through the reserve German line after the 25th highlights once again that the true tactical difficulty on the Western Front is not the initial attack but the follow up; that poor communication, delays in reserve forces moving forward over broken ground, and difficulties in coordinating artillery fire in a fluid engagement all combine to impair subsequent assaults.  In both regions the French had fired almost 4.4 million light and over 800 000 thousand heavy artillery shells, but only on the first day, when they had been firing on German defences that were well-known and whose position had been precisely known, had the bombardment had a decisive effect.  In the following days, when the artillery was firing on unfamiliar, and in some cases unknown, German positions, the bombardment had been much less effective.  It points to the necessity of accurate knowledge of enemy defences and where artillery fire is needed during battle, but the delays in communicating by foot across the former No Man's Land renders this exceedingly difficult.  Overall, the small French gains in Champagne and Artois had come at the cost of just over 190 000 casualties, including 30 000 dead, 110 000 wounded, and 50 000 missing in action.

On the German side, 6th Army in Artois lost just over 50 000 while the casualties of 3rd and 5th Armies in Champagne numbered just over 80 000.  The battle had a notable impact on Falkenhayn; in the first days of the fighting, as the battle hung in the balance and French breakthrough appeared possible, he was acutely aware of how he had stripped the Western Front of reserves for his earlier campaign in Russia and the ongoing operation against Serbia.  When Lieutenant-Colonel Gerhard Tappen, OHL's operations officer, met Falkenhayn on the 27th, he found the German chief of staff 'very dejected'.  However, as the German armies have held on over the next three weeks, Falkenhayn draws different conclusions from the course of the fighting.  Despite Entente superiority in manpower and material, the achievement of operational surprise, and the reduction of German reserves, the British and French had been unable to break through the German lines.  It confirms Falkenhayn's emphasis on the importance of constructing multiple trench lines to contain enemy assaults.  More importantly, Falkenhayn concludes that if an attacking can not achieve a breakthough in such propitious circumstances, a breakthrough is not a realistic possibility given the conditions of the war on the Western Front.  This informs not only Falkenhayn's defensive outlook; instead of attempting to break through Entente lines in the future, another strategic objective will have to inform future German offensives.  Moreover, the failure of the French fall offensive serves to reinforce Falkenhayn's poor opinion of the French army, believing it to be approaching the end of its strength.  These two threads, comprising the key lessons Falkenhayn takes from the fall fighting in Champagne and Artois, will figure decisively in the course of the fighting in 1916.

- In Serbia the storm portented in yesterday's weather has engulfed the region.  It is a Kossava, an autumnal weather sytem that comes up from the southeast, bringing heavy rains and high winds.  Though the storm had been expected, its intensity takes the Germans by surprise.  On the Danube and Save Rivers waves reach six feet high and more, and parts of the islands on the rivers flood.  By the end of the day the raging torrents have destroyed or rendered unusable all of the bridges that German and Austro-Hungarian engineers built across the rivers since the offensive began.  This effectively cuts the German and Austro-Hungarian forces on the southern banks off from their supplies and heavy artillery on the northern bank.  Further, the heavy rains turn the dirt roads of the region into impassible mud.  The conditions makes a pause in the offensive to resupply and await better conditions an obvious option, and General Gallwitz of the German 11th Army argues for precisely this course of action.  Mackensen and Seeckt, however, speed is of the utmost priority to prevent the Entente forces recently landed at Salonika from moving north and reinforcing the Serbian army before it can be defeated in battle.  Moreover, despite the successes to date the bridgeheads of the two armies are still almost twenty miles apart, and creating a continuous front will put more pressure on the Serbs.

On the ground, the next objective of the German XXII Reserve Corps and the Austro-Hungarian VIII Corps of the Austro-Hungarian 3rd Army are the Avala Hills, but when they advance today they encounter well-developed defensive positions manned by the Serbian 1st Timok, 2nd Timok, and 1st Morava Divisions.  In the poor weather and advancing over difficult terrain, the attackers make minimal progress.  To the west, additional attacks by the Austro-Hungarian XIX Corps failed to secure significant gains yesterday, and today Mackensen orders the corps to leave only enough soldiers to hold the bridgeheads and redeploy the rest east to cross the Save River at Big Zigeuner Island where it can take its intended position on the western wing of the Austro-Hungarian 3rd Army.  On the front of the German 3rd Army, despite Gallwitz's reservations, the German 107th Division attacks east of Požarevac, fighting its way through a Serbian defensive line at Kalidol, while X Reserve Corps seizes the high ground at Lipovac.

Meanwhile, the Bulgarian government formally severs diplomatic relations with Serbia today, a prelude to the planned invasion of the country tomorrow.  General Zhekov, chief of the Bulgarian general staff, has deployed two armies - 1st and 2nd - along the country's western frontier with Serbia.  To the north, 1st Army, consisting of 6th, 8th, 9th, and 1st Divisions, is deployed east of its ultimate objective, the de facto Serbian capital at Niš.  To the south, 2nd Army, with 3rd and 7th Divisions, is push westwards into the Vardar River valley and sever the railway linking Niš and Salonika, thus preventing the rapid movement of Entente forces at the latter into Serbia.

October 4th, 1915

- In the Champagne artillery of the French 2nd and 4th Armies commence their preliminary bombardment of the German lines, in support of the infantry attack scheduled for the morning of the 6th.  Once the French soldiers go over the top, 4th Army's artillery will utilize a rolling barrage to support the advance.  Though the French had started using this technique in May, this will be the largest rolling barrage they have yet undertaken in the war.   The rolling barrage is an attempt to avoid the communication issues that plague the modern battlefield, and in particular make it exceedingly difficult for advancing infantry to communicate to artillery batteries in the rear their position and enemy strongpoints that require bombardment.  In a rolling barrage, the artillery fires according to a strict timetable, whereby they would fire on the first enemy trench line right up to the moment the infantry advance, and then shift their fire at precise intervals to enemy positions progressively behind the front.  The timing is intended to always keep the artillery fire just ahead of the advancing infantry, so that enemy positions are hit just before the infantry attack them.  In this way, the infantry always knows, via knowledge of the timetables, exactly where friendly shells will be falling.  In the absence of direct communication, the coordination of infantry and artillery is to be accomplished by scripted synchronization.  It requires, of course, that the infantry advance at the planned speed - they cannot go faster, lest they march into their own artillery fire, and if they are held up, they will find their artillery support shifting to targets further away, leaving the immediate defenders unmolested.  The rolling barrage, if perfectly executed, has the potential to be an elegant solution to the problem of battlefield coordination; the issue, of course, is whether such perfect conditions can ever be found in the chaos and devastation of No Man's Land.

- This evening the Greek parliament debates the imminent Entente landing at Salonika and Greek diplomatic relations with both sides.  Prime Minister Venizelos gives a fiery speech defending his policy, stating that his government would honour the Greco-Serbian convention and protect the southern flank of the Serbian army.  He also denounced his opponents, and in particular argued that it would be unconstitutional for King Constantine to ignore the will of the people (which conveniently, in Venizelos' mind, matches his own aims).  The Greek parliament gives Venizelos' government a vote of confidence by a majority of twenty-seven.

- Since the entry of the Ottoman Empire into the war eleven months ago, the record of its defense of Mesopotamia has been one of dismal failure.  Again and again, British Indian units have managed to best the local Ottoman forces, which after the First Battle of Kut-al-Amara have fallen back towards Baghdad.  Concluding that the reinforcements are required to rescue the situation in Mesopotamia, Enver Pasha has already ordered 45th Division to the theatre, though it arrived too late to participate in the First Battle of Kut-al-Amara.  To augment this division Enver today orders XVIII Corps, consisting of 51st and 52nd Divisions, to Baghdad.  These two divisions have been on the Caucasus front as part of 3rd Army since April, and have significant combat experience fighting in a wide range of climactic and topographical circumstances.  These formations are a far cry from the existing Ottoman forces in Mesopotamia, in particular 35th Division, whose morale has been sapped by a steady diet of defeat and retreat.

May 20th, 1915

- In Britain the events of the past few months - the use of gas at Ypres, the sinking of Lusitania, and the bombing raids of Zeppelins - have nurtured an anti-German hysteria that needed little encouragement in the first place.  Today the magazine Flight argues that Germans in Britain must be rounded up and interned, as otherwise they may light fires to direct Zeppelin bombing raids at night.

- After a three day delay caused by poor weather, the first of the new methodical attacks, as ordered by General Foch, are launched today in Artois by the French 10th Army.  Preceded by a heavy artillery bombardment, French infantry advance several hundred yards, and the newly-won ground is to serve as a jumping off point for further attacks.

Meanwhile Joffre, for his part, issues instructions to his subordinates instructing them that it is vital to place reserves as close to the front lines as possible.  He hopes in future to avoid a repetition of the fighting on May 9th, when infantry of Pétain's XXXIII Corps managed to reach Vimy Ridge but were pushed back due to reserves being deployed too far behind the front line, allowing the Germans to push the successful infantry back off the high ground.

- The German threat to the inner flanks of the Russian XXIV and III Caucasian Corps diminishes today when 56th Division, acting in accordance with Mackensen's orders to consolidate control of the bridgehead over the San River, pulls back behind the Lubaczowka River.

On the Russian side, General Dimitriev of 3rd Army, who has had to watch his command crumble under two and a half weeks of near-constant German pressure, is dismissed today, replaced by the commander of XII Corps.

- Owing to exhaustion, the fighting between the western wings of the Russian 9th and Austro-Hungarian 7th Armies in the eastern Carpathians dies out today.  Neither side has accomplished its objectives, though in the larger picture this favours the Austro-Hungarians, in that the Russian attacks here have not forced them to pull additional forces away from the San River fighting to hold on to the Bukovina.

- As scheduled, at 2pm this afternoon the Italian Chamber of Deputies is called to order.  Prime Minister Salandra introduces the bill by which parliament will cede full financial powers to the government in the event of war; in practical terms, parliament is being asked to give the government the authority to go to war.  Salandra also gives a brief address, emphasizing the perceived violations of the Triple Alliance by Austria-Hungary, both by going to war without consultation in July 1914 and by failing to provide territorial compensation for aggrandizement in the Balkans.  Foreign Minister Sonnino then presents diplomatic telegrams outlining the course of negotiations with Austria-Hungary up to the denunciation of the alliance on May 4th; to Sonnino's credit, the telegrams are only heavily edited, as opposed to being outright forgeries.  After brief discussion, the bill is passed by a margin of 407 to 74; most of the opposition comes from the Revolutionary Socialists and deputies from the rural south, where neutralist opinion is strongest.  At 7pm Salandra adjourns Chamber, and the deputies depart singing the Garibaldi hymn.  This outburst of enthusiasm for war is the last echo of the 'Radiant Days of May'.

- For the past four weeks, the Ottoman city of Van has been the scene of bitter fighting between Armenian insurgents and the Ottoman garrison.  The Armenian population has been besieged, but have been able to hold off efforts of the Ottomans to crush the rising.  In response, the local governor pushed tens of thousands of Armenian refugees into the city in the hopes of causing starvation, while thousands of Armenian prisoners have been murdered.  This takes place, of course, while wholesale massacres have been taking place in the countryside.

As the desperate clash at Van has been ongoing, however, the Russian army has been approaching from the east.  Three days ago, the Ottoman forces lifted their siege of Van, and today elements of the Russian army arrive at the city.  The Armenian population is jubilant at the arrival of their saviours, and the Armenian elders of Van offer the Russian commanding general the keys to the city, and in return the Russians appoint the leader of the Armenian defence committee, Aram Manoukian, governor of the region.  Freed from the yoke of Ottoman oppression and the threat of massacre, the Armenians take violent revenge.  Now that they have the upper hand, it is the turn of Ottoman prisoners to be murdered.  Armenians also torch many of the important buildings of Van, seen as symbols of Ottoman tyranny.

The fall of Van, moreover, serves to reinforce the paranoia of the leadership of the Ottoman Empire regarding the Armenian population.  It is all the easier now to see the Armenians as a mortal internal threat to the survival of the empire, given their apparent cooperation with the Russians.  It accelerates efforts to deport and exterminate the Armenian population throughout eastern Anatolia.

- At the height of the Battle of Sarikamish in December, Russian forces had evacuated Persian Azerbaijan, but after the crushing victory achieved in the battle had returned, reoccupying Tabriz at the end of January.  According to the terms of the Anglo-Russian Convention, northern Persia was within the Russian sphere of influence, and considering its proximity to the Ottoman Empire it is seen as a southern extension of the Caucasus front and the Russian government is eager to secure effective control of the region.  Two days ago, a Russian banker was murdered in Isfahan, in the centre of Persia, and the Russian government uses the episode to justify the dispatch of additional troops to protect Persian interests in northern Persia, the detachment landing at Enzeli today.  However, the proximity of Enzeli to Teheran - just over a hundred and fifty miles separates the two - raises fears among German diplomats that the Russians may attempt to seize control of the government and the country as a whole.

April 19th, 1915

- Today Joffre circulates a memorandum to his army commanders outlining the proper conduct of offensive operations.  The objective of a major attack, writes Joffre, is to achieve a break through, and that once an assault has begin it is to be continued until the the German line has been decisively ruptured.  This is to be done via continuous attacks, whereby pressure on the Germans is to be maintained by constantly sending more units into the attack until the strain becomes so great that the line breaks.  The memorandum also compares the proper conduct of an offensive to a symphony, in which a wide range of parts have to work together harmoniously under the direction of the commanding officer if success is to be achieved.

March 31st, 1915

- After the directive of the 29th regarding the defensive of current positions, today OHL issues a second directive regarding the training of reserves which emphasizes the importance of offensive training.  To do so, successful operations, such as the Battle of Soissons, are to be studied in detail, while training camps are to be established which include mock fortified positions on which units can practice assaults.  The directive also states that the mission of the first line in an attack is to break through the enemy line; it will be the responsibility of subsequent waves of infantry to exploit the breakthrough.

- The Russian air force has lagged behind its opponents in innovation, with one very notable exception: the Il'ia Muromets bomber, a creation of the young and very talented designer Igor Sikorskii.  This massive aircraft was an unparalleled marvel of technical engineering; propelled by four engines, it is capable of carrying a crew of three for a five-hour flight with two machine-guns and a half-ton of bombs.  In a reconnaissance flight conducted today, one Muromets flies 533 kilometres at between 3200 and 3600 metres altitude.

Perhaps not surprising given the Russian war performance to date, the Muromets has been criminally underappreciated by army headquarters, including a ban on further production issued in October 1914.  Only by circumventing the army was Sikorskii able to have a squadron of Muromets formed under the patronage of the owner of the Russko-Baltiiskii aircraft company, allowing for the true value of the Muromets to be demonstrated.

The Russian Il'ya Muromets bomber.

- In the Carpathians, the main Russian attack over the past two days has fallen on the centre and right of the Austro-Hungarian 2nd Army.  Crucially, they have broken through the front of XIX Corps, forcing 41st and 37th Honved Divisions to fall back (the former having suffered 60% casualties, the latter reduced to two thousand riflemen).  The situation of 2nd Army is perilous - only fifteen hundred reserves remain available to plug holes in the line - and its commander orders preliminary planning for a withdrawal southwards out of the Carpathians if necessary.

- When Emden's landing party stops at a watering hole at 11am this morning, they are met by an Ottoman patrol of eighteen sent from Djidda to escort them the remaining distance to the town.  At 4pm they depart, the path carrying them away from the sea and through numberless flat sand drifts topped with grass.  After nightfall, a group of Bedouins, numbering about twelve or fifteen, are sighted in the distance before disappearing, which the Ottoman escort takes for robbers.  This causes little concern to the Germans, given that their party numbers fifty and carries with them four machine guns.

- Munitions production in Canada has been hindered by the lack of a pre-war armaments industry which could have been expanded once hostilities began.  To circumvent this limitation, a shell committee has been established by Sam Hughes, the minister of militia, to place orders not for complete shells, but rather individual components, allowing manufacturers to focus on those components which they already have some skill in producing.  The result is that by today 155 factories employing 25 000 are engaged in shell production in Canada.

March 29th, 1915

- OHL issues today a directive to the German armies on the Western Front regarding the maintenance of defensive positions.  In order to allow current lines to be held with as few infantry as possible, particular attention is to be paid to greater use of barbed wire, the construction of bombproof shelters of reinforced concrete, and the expansion of communication trenches, rear positions, and supporting positions, as well as the preparation of plans for the defensive use of artillery.  Simultaneously, OHL requests all units to undertake detailed reconnaissance of enemy lines, should an offensive be ordered.  It is hoped that thorough planning and preparation will ensure success on the attack and the defense.

March 2nd, 1915

- Today the German General Staff instructs VIII Corps to form a special Assault Detachment, or Sturmabteilung, of soldiers drawn from engineer battalions.  The detachment is also assigned twenty experimental cannons from Krupp, designed to be sufficiently lightweight as to allow infantry to bring them along as they crossed No Man's Land.  For the next several months, the detachment is develop tactics on the use of these 'assault cannons' at the Wahn artillery range near Cologne.

- The commander of the Austro-Hungarian 4th Army expresses his extreme reluctance to attack, as requested by Conrad, based on insufficient forces, difficult terrain, and low morale.  Conrad's reply today is to simply wave away the concerns; the relief of Przemysl is paramount, and thus all problems in the way of this objective are dismissed because they need to be if it to be achieved.  Conrad threatens to take 8th Division away from 4th Army if it does not attack, and, faced with a diminuation of his commander, 4th Army commander relents and begins preparations.

Further east, Russian attacks break through the lines of 42nd Honved Division, belonging to XIII Corps of General Pflanzer-Baltin's force.  His left wing now faced with envelopment, he has no choice but to pull XIII Corps back to the Bystrzyca Solotwinska River.  Though the retreat, undertaken after nightfall, is successful, it ends any hope of Pflanzer-Baltin's forces cutting behind the Russian forces holding Südarmee and forcing a general Russian retreat.  General Brusilov's rapid concentration of reinforcements in the eastern Carpathians has thus turned back the one successful Austro-Hungarian advance of the winter months.

The position of Südarmee and Planzer-Baltin's army group in the eastern Carpathians, March 2nd, 1915, illustrating the retreat of the latter's
left flank in the face of Russian pressure.

- Today a redesign of the standard hand grenade used in the Austro-Hungarian army is ordered, as inexperienced soldiers who attempt to use the current model have a tendency to blow themselves up.

- Writing to the Admiralty today, Admiral Carden reports that he expects to break through the Dardanelles and reach the Sea of Marmara in two weeks, provided that the weather cooperates.  Tonight, however, a second effort by the converted trawlers to sweep the mines in the straits fails when they once again flee in the face of heavy fire from shore batteries.

February 26th, 1915

- In the Argonne, the German IV Reserve Corps seizes a section of the French trench line southwest of Malancourt, and the fighting is notable for marking the first use of flamethrowers in combat during the war.  The Germans had developed flamethrowers in the decade prior to the war, and on January 18th, 1915 a Flamethrower Detachment was formed under Captain Bernhard Reddeman consisting of volunteers, many of whom had been firemen in civilian life.  The Detachment refined flamethrowers, producing a larger model with longer range but which required installation and a smaller model capable of being carried by a soldier as he crossed No Man's Land, and pioneered tactics for their use.  Near Malancourt the attack was directed at a point where the German line was within forty metres of the first French trench, and Reddeman's soldiers were able to install several of the larger models.  When the attack began, the flamethrowers shot jets of fire into the French position, and even though most of the defending infantry had not been burned, the shock of the unexpected terror paralyzed them and allowed the attacking German infantry, including several soldiers carrying the smaller model into battle, to capture the enemy line with light casualties.

- In the Carpathians, the only significant Austro-Hungarian success achieved since late December has been on the far eastern part of the line, where General Pflanzer-Baltin's forces have been able to undertake a moderate offensive.  This accomplishment, however, has not resulted in a decisive Austro-Hungarian advance - the Russians opposite Südarmee have refused to budge, and General Brusilov of the Russian 8th Army is mobilizing reinforcements to block further advances by Pflanzer-Baltin.  Moreover, while the supply situation is tenuous along the entire front, it is particularly problematic in the far east, where only a single rail line supports Plfanzer-Baltin's army group.

The position of Südarmee and Pflanzer-Baltin's army group, February 26th, 1915.

Conrad, however, is obsessed with the besieged fortress of Przemysl, and relieving its garrison before it can be forced to surrender to the Russians in March.  Thus, despite the terrible weather and the exhausted and depleted state of the Austro-Hungarian army, he is determined to launch another offensive.  He has tasked 2nd and 3rd Armies in the centre of the Carpathian line with breaking through the Russian lines, and overrules the misgivings the commanders of both armies have.  For one, the Austro-Hungarian divisions are significantly understrength, and the replacements that have arrived are poorly trained and ill-prepared.  Further, the weather remains terrible, hindering movement and resupply, while the new units that Conrad has sent to the two armies are disorganized and have been committed to fighting piecemeal.  Finally, much of the two armies have been fighting constantly on the defensive, with no time to prepare for offensive operations.

Despite the difficulties, Conrad is insistent - Przemysl must be relieved.  The only concession he makes to reality is a slight delay, to allow roads closed by bad weather to be cleared.  The offensive is now scheduled to be launched tomorrow, regardless of whether 2nd and 3rd Armies are actually capable of achieving success.

The position of the Austro-Hungarian 2nd and 3rd Armies, February 26th, 1915.

- At the mouth of the Dardanelles the British warships send a number landing parties ashore, each consisting of about fifty Royal Marines guarding about thirty sailors, the latter tasked with destroying Ottoman artillery pieces.  They methodically go through each of the abandoned forts, blowing up fifty guns with explosive charges and effectively clearing the way for the Entente squadron to enter the straits.  Incidentally, one of the landing parties reaches the village of Krithia, four miles inland of the southern tip of Gallipoli Peninsula, which constitutes the high tide of the entire Entente amphibious operation to come - at no point between April and December will Entente soldiers again reach Krithia.

With the outer forts neutralized, attention turns to the inner defences.  Inside the mouth of the Dardanelles the passage widens to four and a half miles, guarded by five forts on the north shore and four on the south shore, augmented by a numer of mobile howitzer batteries.  Fourteen miles upstream is the Narrows, where the channel is less than a mile wide, and where the Ottomans had concentrated their largest artillery pieces.  The Narrows is also guarded by several hundred mines, laid out in ten lines from the Narrows to Kephez, the latter located just over halfway from the entrance of the Dardanelles to the Narrows.

Today the pre-dreadnoughts pass the ruined outer forts and begin to engage the western-most forts inside the straits.  It becomes quickly apparent to the British and the French that the mobile howitzer batteries are the most effective Ottoman defence - well-concealed, they are difficult to hit, and when the pre-dreadnoughts find the range the howitzers are simply moved to another location.  The shells from the howitzers cannot penetrate the armour of the pre-dreadnoughts and are little more than a nuisance, but the difficulty in elimination them highlights the limitations of naval gunfire against land targets.

- Intellgence reaches the Entente commanders in central Africa that the Germans forces in their colony of Kamerun have been deployed to defend Ngaundere, in the northern highlands, instead of Jaudre in the west.  The French governor-general of Equatorial Africa, however, dismisses the report, and continues to insist that the French and British concentrate against Jaudre.

January 26th, 1915

- At midnight the crippled battlecruiser Lion, towed by Indomitable, arrives at the mouth of the Firth of Forth off Edinburgh on the Scottish coast.  The tow is transferred to tugboats as several hours of pumping is required to remove enough water from Lion to allow it to reach the naval base at Rosyth.  Through a thick fog, and with Beatty on the bridge, Lion passes under the Firth of Forth Bridge in the morning, and are greeted by cheering crowds lining the span.  Lion will ultimately be sent to Armstrong's shipyard at Newcastle upon Tyne, and will spent several months replacing armour plates.

- Similar to his German counterpart yesterday, Joffre circulates instructions today emphasizing the importance of a second line of defences in case the enemy breaks through the first trench line.

- The Austro-Hungarian offensive in the Carpathians has failed to make satisfactory progress.  Despite limited progress, General Szurmay's group has not reached its objectives, which holds back V Corps on its left, while X Corps remains incapable of resuming the offensive.  Further, Südarmee has made less progress than what had been hoped for.  Meanwhile, on the other side General Ivanov of South-West Front concludes that the time is right for a counterattack, and Russian forces attack the Austro-Hungarian VIII and III Corps.  Ivanov is also able to convince Grand Duke Nicholas to transfer XXII Finnish Corps from 10th Army opposite East Prussia to South-West Front.

The position of Südarmee on January 26th, 1915.

January 25th, 1915

- This morning the heavy-damaged battlecruiser Seydlitz limps into the harbour at Wilhelmshaven, and after pumping out six hundred tons of water, it enters dry dock to begin what will be an extensive and lengthy repair.  The devastation wrought by the explosion of the two aft turrets on Seydlitz does have one benefit, as the Germans realize just how potentially destructive a fire in a turret can be.  In particular, they are acutely aware of how narrowly they avoided disaster; if the fire in the turrets had ignited the main magazine as the result of a 'flash fire', as the phenomenon is named, the warship would have ceased to exist.  The conclusion drawn is that the turret must always be isolated from the magazine, even while ammunition is being hoisted from the latter to the former.  To do this, automatic doors are to be installed on all German dreadnoughts and battlecruisers designed to close immediately after a load of ammunition has passed them by.  Through this, it is hoped that the destruction wrought by a 'flash fire' will be limited only to the turret initially struck.  It is a vital insight that the Royal Navy, having no warship damaged by a flash fire, is entirely ignorant, an oversight for which several thousand sailors will pay with their lives in seventeen months time.

The damaged German battlecruiser Seydlitz returning to port after the Battle of Dogger Bank.

- In Britain construction of the battlecruisers Renown and Repulse begins today as the keels are laid down.  The design of the two warships was done at the insistence of Admiral Fisher, who views Renown and Repulse as embodying a further evolution of battlecruiser design; namely, even higher speed with even less armour.  The two will have six 15-inch guns and the remarkable maximum speed of 32 knots, though this is accomplished at the expense of armour - they are more thin-skinned than any other dreadnought or battlecruiser afloat.  Fisher does nothing by moderation, and if he is wants to trade armour and armament for speed, then there is no length to which he is not willing to go.

- Admiral Fisher sends a memorandum relating his views on the proposed attack against the Dardanelles to Prime Minister Asquith today, with a copy to Churchill.  The First Sea Lord argues that any subsidiary operations play into Germany's hands, as the margin of superiority in the North Sea is vital to naval supremacy, and any losses, even of second-rank warships, can have an impact.  Though Fisher asks that his memorandum be circulated to the War Council, Asquith, on Churchill's advice, refuses.

- Though held by the French during the Race to the Sea, the town of Albert is within easy shelling distance of German artillery on the other side of the front line.  Today, a German shell strikes the top of the Basilica of Notre Dame de Brebières in Albert, causing the statue of Mary holding the baby Jesus to lodge in a horizontal position that appeared to defy logic and gravity.  The 'Leaning Virgin', as it will be known, becomes a familiar sight to Entente soldiers marching to the nearby front, and both sides believe that whomever will cause the statue to fall will lose the war.

The Basilica of Notre Dame de Brebières in Albert, with the 'Leaning
Virgin' poised as if in mid-air.

- Falkenhayn issues further instructions to his army commanders on the Western Front regarding the defense of German lines.  While he authorizes the construction of reserve lines and fortifications , he emphasizes that every effort must be expended on holding the first trench line, and the additional defences are only to be utilized in the case that the front trench is penetrated.  Further, any lost ground is to be the target of an immediate counterattack.

- In Galicia the offensive by the Austro-Hungarian 3rd Army and Südarmee continues to make little progress.  X Corps of the former has seen its attack on the Russian lines fail and is ordered to cease offensive operations so that the few reserves available to 3rd Army can be sent to the east wing in an effort to find a way forward.

January 7th, 1915

- Joffre meets today with President Poincaré and the French Council of Ministers today, and when operations in the Balkans are discussed, he voices his adamant opposition.  For the Commander-in-Chief, the decisive theatre of the war is and always will be the Western Front - any transfer of units from France to elsewhere risks disaster in the homeland, while victory in the war necessitates the defeat of Germany, France's strongest opponent, whose army is massed in occupied Belgium and France.  Victory can only come by crushing the German army, and since the German army is on the Western Front, that is where the war must be fought.  Joffre also highlights the logistical difficulties of deploying and supplying a large force in the Balkans; as he emphasizes, the Serbs have difficulties keeping their army of only a hundred thousand supplied.  When the Minister of War supports Joffre's objections, the Balkans operation is set aside - the prestige of the victor of the Marne is still sufficient to ensure that he is able to dictate grand strategy to the politicians who are, at least nominally, his masters.

- In a circular to the German armies on the Western Front, Falkenhayn observes that Entente offensives have been directing artillery fire behind the first German trench line to prevent them from bringing up additional infantry to the front during infantry attacks.  To combat this, Falkenhayn emphasizes the importance of constructing protective trenches behind the first line of defence to provide cover for infantry during enemy bombardments.  This reflects the continued learning process on the Western Front, as both attackers and defenders adapt to trench warfare and a new tactic implemented by one side leads to a counter-tactic devised by the other in a constant struggle for supremacy between the offensive and defensive.

- Conrad replies to Falkenhayn's message of yesterday, arguing that there is nothing that Austria-Hungary could provide that would satisfy Italy's appetite, writes that the 'entire political situation particularly in the East and in the Balkans is entirely dependent on the military situation with Russia.  Without a decisive success against Russia, even a major success in Serbia will be ineffective.'

- The German merchant steamer Choising, carrying the landing party from Emden, arrives today at the Straits of Perim between the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula and the Horn of Africa, where the Red Sea empties into the Indian Ocean.  The steamer has had an uneventful journey across the Indian Ocean, only sighting other merchant ships along the way, and now the German crew seeks to enter the Red Sea, in order reach Ottoman territory.  Choising waits until sunset before entering the Straits, in order to avoid any British patrol ships in the narrows.

The southern Red Sea during the First World War.

November 30th, 1914

- To both sides on the Western Front, the trench system is both unprecedented and unexpected - neither side thought they would be fighting such a static war, and indeed expectations remain that trench warfare is but a phase which will soon pass.  In the meantime, as both sides try to find tactical solutions to the problem of attacking trenches, they first draw on their experience and pre-war training, which suggests that trench warfare is most similar to the conduct of sieges, the latter involving prolonged fighting before extensive defenses.  Thus in the initial months of trench warfare both sides attempt to apply the tactics for conducting sieges to operations on the Western Front.  For example, today Joffre issues a communication to all army commanders instructing them to dig their trenches to within 150 yards of the German lines.  This is precisely what the standard approach to siege warfare is, and Joffre hopes the order will have the same benefit - the closer the infantry are to the enemy when they attack, the less time it will take them to cross the killing zone between the lines and reach the enemy positions.  While the order reflects the fact that generals did look for ways to break the deadlock that did not involve the repetition of the same tactics over and over again, it also is indicative how these same generals were in many ways prisoners of their own experience and training, whereas the conditions of trench warfare required entirely new ways of thinking on the battlefield.

- A British fishing trawler in the North Sea makes a remarkable discovery when it hauls in its catch - a lead-lined chest in amongst the fish.  The chest is from a German minelaying destroyer which had been sunk off the Dutch coast on October 17th, and within the chest is a treasure worth more than gold to the British Admiralty.  It includes secret charts of the North Sea showing the operational grid the Germans use to plot the location of warships, and a codebook intended for communication with warships overseas.  These two finds, in combination with earlier breakthroughs, allow the British to decypher German wireless signals, a vital advantage to the war at sea.

- As the Russian 3rd Army continues to advance westwards towards Krakow, the Austro-Hungarian Chief of Staff issues orders today for another offensive.  Despite the battering 4th Army has taken in recent weeks, Conrad orders it back on to the attack - the movement of the Russian 3rd Army has opened a gap between it and the Russian 8th Army in the Carpathians to the southeast, and his intention is that the southern wing of 4th Army will move into this gap and then pivot northward to hit the southern flank of the Russian 3rd Army.

- The Serbian army completes its evacuation of Belgrade today as elements of the Austro-Hungarian 5th Army approach the city.  General Potiorek has ordered his other units to halt, both to recover from the recent fighting and to resupply.  The retreating Serbs had thoroughly destroyed transportation infrastructure as they retreated through November, and the Austro-Hungarians have outrun their supplies and are encountering all manner of shortages.

- Orders are issued for a detachment of Indian Expeditionary Force D, including two and a half infantry battalions, to embark on four river steamers, where they will be escorted by two warships and two armed steamers up the Shatt al-Arab.  Their orders are to land on the riverbank opposite of Qurna, clear that side of the river of the enemy, and then move on Qurna itself.

- Ayesha sets a course westward into the Indian Ocean and, satisfied that the schooner is leaving for good, the Dutch warship De Zeven Provincian halts its pursuit.  The German crew are sailing to a point in the eastern Indian Ocean where they hope to rendezvous with a German merchant ship.  While at Padang it was impermissible for any of the crew to meet with sailors from the German merchant ships alongside, First Officer Mücke happened to say several times quite loudly that his ship would be at this point in the Indian Ocean for several weeks.  His hope is that one of the German merchant ships, motivated by patriotism, will meet them there and allow Ayesha's crew to transfer to the steamer for the next stage of the journey back to Germany.