November 10th, 1914

- This morning General Plettenberg requests that the attack to be launched by Winckler's Division and 4th Division be delayed by one day - heavy mist over the past twenty-four hours has prevented necessary to plan the operation.  General Linsingen agrees, and the advance of his Army Group is postponed until tomorrow morning.

The delay, however, does not apply to the German 4th Army to the north, and thus today heavy assaults fall on the Entente line from Langemarck northwards.  The most substantial is undertaken by elements of 4th Ersatz Division and 43rd Reserve Division against Dixmude, which had been bitterly fought over in late October.  A heavy German artillery bombardment begins at dawn, and by 740am German infantry are advancing.  There follows a long day of hand-to-hand fighting in which the Belgian and French defenders are slowly but relentlessly forced back.  At 330pm German units enter the town itself, and its defenders withdraw westward over the Yser Canal, the Belgians dynamiting the bridges before the Germans can seize them.  The loss of Dixmude is a setback, but not the disaster that its capture would have been in late October, given the flooding of the Yser to the north.  Moreover, the Belgians and French are able to establish a new defensive position on the west bank of the Yser Canal, and no German breakthrough is achieved.

The Germans achieve other small gains on the front of 4th Army - they occupied a crossroads northwest of Bixschoote, the village of Kortekeer Cabaret, and some trenches west of Langemarck.  However, these attacks have nowhere achieved a decisive breakthrough - everywhere the Entente forces have been able to retreat to new lines of defences - but they have achieved one other indirect objective.  As the attacks develop over the day, General Foch concludes, not entirely unreasonably, that this is the major German push in Flanders designed to cover the redeployment of units to the Eastern Front.  Moreover, the intelligence available today appears to bear this out - the units assigned to 4th Army for today's attacks have all been correctly identified, but the presence of Plettenberg's corps on the Menin road has been missed.  Thus, under the impression that the attacks north of Ypres are the main offensive, the remaining reserves of the French XVI and IX Corps, plus the French 6th Cavalry Division near Zillebeke, are ordered northwards by Foch, reducing the reserves available south of Langemarck.  Further, the British experience only the normal amount of German shelling, and thus have no idea of the storm that is about to break over them tomorrow.

The Western Front in northern France and Belgium, November 10th, 1914.

- The assembly of General Mackensen's 9th Army is completed today, with six corps now concentrated between Thorn and Posen.  The rapid redeployment of 9th Army has once again demonstrated the strength of German logistics - eight hundred trains were used over the past week in the operation.

The redeployment of the German 9th Army, November 3rd to 10th, 1914.  Also note the position
of the Russian armies opposite.

November 9th, 1914

- The French 11th Division arrives today south of Ypres, and assists an attack by the French XVI Corps against the enemy lines near the Comines Canal.  This time the French are able to make minor progress, pushing the Germans ever-so-slightly back from Ypres.  Elsewhere the Germans keep up a regular bombardment on the British and French lines, but few infantry attacks are undertaken.  Writing to Lord Kitchener, Field Marshal French states that Joffre has told him that he believes the Germans have already begun to withdraw corps to ship to the Eastern Front, but that Germans might launch two or three more sharp attacks to cover the redeployment.  Once again the BEF commander is precient in a manner not altogether anticipated by himself.

On the German side Plettenberg's Corps comes into the line in preparation for the attack by Army Group Linsingen, along with 4th and 6th Armies, scheduled to begin for 7am tomorrow.

- After having their plans interrupted by the October Battle of the Vistula River, the Russians once again are aiming to invade Germany.  Under the authority of General Ruzski's North-West Front, 2nd and 5th Armies are to advance from central Poland and invade Germany in the general direction of Breslau.  The southern flank of the advance is to be covered by 4th Army, while the northern flank is held by General Rennenkampf's 1st Army.  However, despite being responsible for the invasion of Germany General Ruzski remains concerned about East Prussia, and the potential for a German sortie eastwards or southwards.  He has 10th Army covering the east, and insists that the focus for 1st Army should be covering southern Poland.  The latter thus has only a single corps - V Siberian - on the southern bank of the Vistula River to maintain contact with 2nd Army as it begins its advance.  Due to typical problems with supply, the invasion is scheduled to begin November 14th.

Planning for the operation has rested on the assumption that the German 9th Army remains in the area of Krakow, and the Russians have completely missed the ongoing redeployment of 9th Army to Thorn; today Stavka informs North-West Front that at least five to six German corps remain north of Krakow just inside the Russian border.  Thus the Russians are unaware that 9th Army will shortly be to the northwest of their invasion route, not the southwest.

- This morning the German light cruiser Emden appears off Direction Island, located in the Cocos Islands.  Here is located a key station where telegraph cables from Australia to India and Zanzibar meet, and the captain of the Emden has decided to destroy them.  A heavily-armed landing party of fifty, led by First Officer Helmuth von Mücke is put ashore, where they encounter the civilian workforce of the station, and proceed to destroy the cables.

The luck of the Emden, however, has finally run out.  The head of the cable station had previously established other lines for precisely such a scenario, and used them to send out a distress signal - 'SOS, Emden here.'  By coincidence, the large convoy carrying the volunteers from Australia and New Zealand to Europe is only fifty-five miles north of Direction Island, and they receive the signal.  The Australian light cruiser Sydney is despatched, and comes across Emden.  Sydney is three knots faster, two thousand tons heavier, and has larger armament than Emden, making the outcome a foregone conclusion.  Emden puts up a strong fight, at one point knocking out Sydney's automatic fire-control, which lessened the accuracy of the latter's salvoes.  Nevertheless, after two and a half hours, Emden is a burning wreck, and its captain deliberately runs it aground on the reefs off North Keeling Island.  Over a hundred and fifty sailors had been killed, and the remaining two hundred and thirty became prisoners.

The voyage of the German light cruiser Emden.

As Emden is crushed by Sydney, the landing party under First Officer Mücke can only watch.  As soon as Sydney had appeared, he realized that his ship was doomed and that within the next day or two they would come for his landing party.  One option was simply to surrender, which was unpalatable.  A second was to attempt to hold the island against a British landing, which would be doomed in the long run.  The third alternative sat at anchor near the jetty at Direction Island - the three-masted wooden schooner Ayesha, a civilian merchant ship.  As the battle is concluding, Mücke orders his men to transfer two months' supplies from the island to the schooner, and the fifty men of the landing party cram aboard.  Sydney spends the afternoon taking on the prisoners from Emden, so Ayesha is able to slip out of harbour by nightfall and escape.  The prospects for Mücke's detachment are bleak - not only are the practically surrounded by British colonies with dozens of British warships already at sea in the search for Emden, Mücke discovers that Ayesha does not even have any charts of the area.  He sets course eastwards, hoping to land somewhere in the Dutch East Indies.  Thought Emden's cruise is at an end, the saga of Mücke's detachment is just beginning.

November 8th, 1914

- The weather at Ypres today is cloudy with poor visibility, impairing the ability of artillery observers to accurately direct fire on enemy positions.  Despite this, the Germans keep up a steady, if somewhat less accurate, bombardment of the Entente lines.  The Germans also continue to launch infantry assaults to pin and wear down the British and French defenders, the most heaviest of which is launched by elements of the German 5th and 30th Divisions just north of the Menin Road which close up to but are unable to take the grounds of Veldhoek Chateau.

During the morning Field Marshal French and General Haig attend a conference at General Foch's headquarters at Cassel.  Foch is typically optimistic, but both French and Haig emphasize the danger of the German advance near the Comines Canal towards Ypres, which threatens to cut off the British I Corps.  Foch replies that orders have been issued to retake the ground lost over the past few days, but is unable to promise any additional units to support the British lines.  The French launch a number of attacks all along the line, but once again are repulsed by the Germans.  Meanwhile the BEF commander writes to Kitchener today that the pressure on his force can only be alleviated either by French reinforcements or, as he feels is more likely, the redeployment of German forces to the Eastern Front.  The latter reflects the thinking of Joffre as well, in that ongoing pressure from the Russians, as evidenced in the failed German offensive in Poland in October, will compel the Germans to move forces east.  While this is both a reasonable conclusion to draw and one that reflects the pressure that Falkenhayn is under at this time, it also means that the British and French view the primary means of salvation for their position at Ypres to be a decision by their enemies to abandon the attack, as opposed to any successful effort on their part.  It is a potentially dangerous assumption to make if the enemy will further attacks, which is, of course, precisely what the Germans will do.

Behind the German lines, preparations continue for the offensive operation now planned for November 10th.  Winckler's Guard Division and 4th Division are formed into a corps under the command of General Karl von Plettenberg, and his corps plus XV Corps are joined together to form an army group commanded by General Alexander von Linsingen.  Army Group Linsingen is to attack north of the Ypres-Comines Canal, the focal point of the offensive and where the breakthrough is to occur.  Army Group Fabeck is to remain on the ground secured in recent days to the west of the canal, and is to both attack itself and support Army Group Linsingen's attack on its northern flank.  The entirety of 4th and 6th Armies are to also make a maximum effort to assault the British and French lines.  Falkenhayn knows that everything must be poured into this attack for, as he informs the Kaiser today, the army is exhausted and will be unable to undertake another offensive in the near future.

- The German retreat from the Vistula River at the end of October uncovered the northern flank of the Austro-Hungarian armies that had advanced to the San River, and as such they have been falling back to the line they began from.  This has placed the fortress of Przemysl at risk, and today, for the second time in the war, it finds itself cut off and besieged by the Russians.

Over the past week, as the likelihood of Przemysl being isolated has become apparent, the Austro-Hungarians have prepared for a lengthy siege.  For six days trains arrived at Przemysl every fourteen minutes, delivering food and supplies sufficient for six months.  However, as with much of their war effort, the Austro-Hungarians have botched the resupply of Przemysl.  The food and supplies sent to the fortress assumed a garrison of 85 000, when in reality it has swollen to 130 000, and the calculations left out entirely the 30 000 civilians which ought to have been evacuated instead.  Moreover, as the Austro-Hungarian 3rd Army retreated past Przemysl, it plundered the garrison's food stocks.  The upshot is that when Przemysl is encircled again today, it is actually in worse shape to withstand a siege than it had been when it had been relieved on October 9th.

- Austro-Hungarian forces attack the Serbian 2nd Army in the foothills of the Cer mountain range, advancing for once under considerable artillery support.  The Serbs fight desperately to hold their positions - as the Austro-Hungarians advance uphill, they resort to rolling down logs and boulders, throwing rocks, and firing flare pistols.  Under the weight of numbers, however, the Serbs are forced back as the weakened condition of the Serbian army begins to show.

At the same time, a conference is held between the Serbian government and its high command.  General Putnik emphasizes the deteriorating state of the army, and raises for the first time the question of a negotiated peace.  Prime Minister Pašić, however, urges continued resistance and threatens resignation if an overture for peace is made.  The resolution of the meeting is to continue resistance to the Austro-Hungarian invaders.

- The battlecruisers Invincible and Inflexible arrive this afternoon at the British naval base at Plymouth.  Both warships are placed in dry docks to have their bottoms cleaned while machinery is repaired and coal, ammunition, and supplies are load not only for themselves, but for the warships they are to join in the South Atlantic.

- Having fled from the Pacific through the Straits of Magellan, Glasgow and Canopus arrive this morning at Port Stanley.  They spend the day coaling, assisted by seventy volunteers from among local fishermen and sheep farmers, and at 6pm depart for the River Plate to rendezvous with Defence.

November 7th, 1914

- The weather turns for the worse today on the Ypres battlefield, with falling temperatures and heavy mist.  A French counterattack by XVI Corps scheduled for 930am this morning to recapture Zwateleen does not occur until mid-afternoon, and makes no progress.  As a result, Foch fires the commander of XVI Corps, a move after Joffre's heart.  In the British lines Haig  is appalled to learn that a number of I Corps' battalions abandon their forward defences under shellfire, returning only at night, and during the day several dozen soldiers are found behind the lines moving as quickly as possible away from the battlefield.  Though morale in the BEF overall has held, given the constant combat over the past few weeks it is not surprising that for some the breaking point is almost at hand.

Meanwhile the Germans launch several infantry attacks along the line, but are everywhere repulsed.  From the Entente side the attacks appear senseless and uncoordinated, but they are a part of the larger offensive operation, in that attacks now serve to pin down Entente forces so they cannot be redeployed to meet the main attack in a few days.  Where the Germans do not attack they continue their artillery bombardment.  Also today two Guards brigades arrive today, having marched from Arras, and are to be formed into a division named for its commander, General Arnold von Winckler.

- The Austro-Hungarian 5th and 6th Armies secure bridgeheads across the Drina River.  Despite fierce resistance the Serbian 1st and 3rd Armies are forced to fall back.

- Sidney Sonnino, the new Italian Foreign Minister appointed to replace the deceased Antonio di San Giuliano, is favourable to the cause of the Entente, as he reveals today in a conversation with the British Ambassador.

- In Egypt war with the Ottoman Empire is announced today, but because of pre-emptive measures taken in recent weeks there are no widespread pro-Ottoman demonstrations nor any significant organized opposition among nationalists.  Further several hundred Egyptian officials with nationalist leanings have been arrested or exiled, and the parliament has been prorogued.  The British are determined to maintain their control over Egypt.

- At Tsingtao, the Japanese prepare for the final assault on the German defences.  Yesterday they had seized the trenches defending the forts on the three hills above the city, and today they are to capture the forts themselves.  A furious artillery bombardment opens this morning, but after counter-fire from their own batteries the Germans raise the white flag.  Given the Japanese success to date and ammunition shortages, there is no prospect of holding the final forts.  So methodical and effective has been the Japanese advance that a siege the Germans had expected would take six months has been completed in six weeks.  The other combatants would do well to study the Japanese method of conducting offensives in conditions of trench warfare - of course, that would require acknowledging the Japanese as their intellectual equals, which for racial reasons is obviously not in the cards.

November 6th, 1914

- At Ypres German attacks are concentrated along the front on both sides of the Ypres-Comines Canal on the southeastern face of the salient, while elsewhere there was the now-regular steady artillery bombardment.  Taking advantage of a thick morning fog, the Germans attack into the woods west of Hollebeke, pre-empting a French attack scheduled for later today.  In the confusion caused by the fog several French cavalry battalions panic, and the Germans are able to advance almost a mile, seizing the entire woods west of Hollebeke, allowing the Germans to advance to within three thousand yards of Ypres.  On the north side of the Canal, the Germans take the French by surprise and pierce the line in three places, allowing the Germans to seize the village of Zwarteleen a mile southeast of Zillebeke.  It takes a counterattack by the British 7th Cavalry Brigade to restore the line.  Though the Germans have not broken through, they have driven a wedge into the junction of the French and British lines, and Haig is now concerned that his I Corps is at risk of having its southern flank turned.

- The Admiralty issues a public statement today on the Battle of Coronel.  It emphasizes that the engagement appears to have been fought with the most bravery, but that without Canopus Craddock’s squadron would have been significantly outgunned.  It establishes what will be the Admiralty line on Coronel - depicting Craddock as epitomizing the bravery and courage of Royal Navy officers, while simultaneously implying that he alone bears responsibility for the defeat by deciding to accept battle without Canopus present.  This, not coincidentally, absolves the Admiralty leadership themselves of responsibility by denying the very significant role their confused signals to Craddock played in the weeks leading up to Coronel.

- General Oskar Potiorek issues orders today for another attempt at invading Serbia, the third of the war to date.  The continued existance of Serbia, to say nothing of the terrible defeats the Austro-Hungarians have suffered at their hands, have undermined the prestige of the Dual Monarchy, potentially decisive in the ongoing efforts to convince the other Balkan states to join the war on their side.  Potiorek's plan is similar to the first two invasions - 5th and 6th Armies will cross the Drina River in the northwest of Serbia, with the aim of advancing to initially Valjevo and ultimately Niš, dividing Serbia in two.

One advantage the Austro-Hungarians would have is that the condition of the Serbian army was deteriorating.  The soldiers were exhausted, food was in short supply, and munitions were even scarcer, such that most of the time the Serbian infantry was fighting with no artillery support at all.  While Britain and France were eager to aid the Serbian defence, the difficulties of sending supplies to a landlocked combatant prevented significant aid from getting through.  General Putnik's strategy was thus to place 'the Serbian national mud between the enemy's fighting line and his supplies.'  Even before the invasion, he has withdrawn his forces in the northwest of the country to the foothills of the Cer mountain range, so as to be out of range of Austro-Hungarian artillery fire.

The third Austro-Hungarian Invasion of Serbia, November to December 1914.

- The Ottoman frontier with Russia is guarded by 3rd Army, consisting of three corps - IX covers the northern portion of the border and XI the southern, with X in reserve further west.  Today elements of XI Corps assembling at Hasankale and Köprüköy launch a counterattack against the Russian column advancing on the former.  However, given the heavy snow and rain and the lack of reconnaissance, they were unable to turn the Russians back.

- From August the Admiralty has been expressing concern about the security of its oil supply from Persia, which reaches the Persian Gulf by pipeline at Abadan Island and where the major refinery is located.  Abadan Island is on the far western portion of Persia's coast, adjacent to the Ottomen Empire's outlet to the Persian Gulf at the Shatt al-Arab.  In the event of war with the Ottomans, Abadan Island would be an obvious target.  Moreover, concern had also been raised by the India Office regarding the importance of demonstrating British hegemony in the Gulf and not allowing an Ottoman challenge to undermine the authority of British rule over its Muslim subjects.  As such, Indian Expeditionary Force D had been formed, consisting of an infantry brigade, and was dispatched to the Gulf in October, arriving in Bahrein on the 23rd.  As war became increasingly likely, it planned to undertake a landing at the Ottoman fort of Fao on the Shatt al-Arab where it meets the Persian Gulf.

This morning the transports carrying IEF D are off Fao, escorted by the pre-dreadnought Ocean.  The small Ottoman garrison puts up a brief resistance, exchanging fire with Ocean for an hour before, being heavily outnumbered, they withdraw northwards from Fao.  By this afternoon landing parties have secured the village and fort at Fao, the first step in the Mesopotamian Campaign.

The opening moves of the Mesopotamian Campaign, 1914.

- The British landing at Fao is not the only Entente move of concern to Persia.  Today Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Sazonov states that Russia will continue to occupy Persian Azerbaijan, suggesting that the easiest route by which the Ottomans can invade the Russian Caucasus is through Azerbaijan, as opposed to the mountain passes on the Ottoman-Russian frontier.  The war thus makes Russian involvement in Persia even more essential in the view of Petrograd.

- The German East Asiatic Squadron returns to Más Afuera in the Pacific.  While Scharnhorst, Gneisenau, and Nürnberg had called at Valparaíso, Leipzig had stayed offshore, and had managed to seize a French merchant with 3600 tons of Cardiff coal.  The sailors start working on distributing the coal to each of the warships of the squadron.

November 5th, 1914

- In Flanders General d'Urbal recieves instructions from General Foch that, as per communications from Joffre, the possibility of a decisive breakthrough north or south of Ypres had all but disappeared, given the time the Germans have had to entrench in their current positions.  Conversely, indications at present suggest the Germans have themselves abandoned hopes for a breakthrough.  Instead, it would be preferable to withdraw troops from the fighting to reconstitute reserves for the French army elsewhere.

The one thing Foch does not do is order d'Urbal to cease his attacks on the German lines.  In the absence of such orders, attacking is precisely what d'Urbal does.  For his efforts today precisely no ground is gained, and indeed Hill 75, just to the west of Messines, is captured by the Germans today.

On the British front it is finally possible this evening to relieve 7th Division and 3rd Brigade, 1st Division, replacing the former with battalions drawn from II Corps and the latter with 6th Cavalry Brigade.  7th Division epitomizes the struggles faced by the BEF and the losses they have suffered.  It has been in near-constant combat, and under continual shelling, since October 19th, and of the 12 522 officers and men who comprised the division when it landed at Ghent on October 12th, only 4149 men remain when it is pulled out of the line today, which includes 2000 soldiers sent as reinforcements over the past month - its commander has been heard to joke darkly that he is a divisional commander without a division.

Nevertheless, the prevailing mood at BEF HQ is that the worst has now past.  Field Marshal French and his corps commanders meet today to discuss the disposition of the BEF over the winter and the provision of leave arrangements.

This optimism, of course, is completely unfounded, as Falkenhayn has determined to make one last push at Ypres.  Today 4th Division, one of the units designated as reinforcements for the offensive, begins detraining today at Lille.

The Battle of Ypres, October 5th to 9th, 1914.

- Today the British government declares the entire North Sea a war zone, and that all vessels entering these waters do so at their own risk.  Ostensibly the move is a response to the laying of German mine fields in the North Sea, but in practice it is a further step in tightening the blockade of Germany - by declaring the North Sea a war zone, the hope is that all neutral traffic would use the Dover Straits where it could be inspected for contraband, a much easier process than patrolling the gap between Scotland and Norway.  Again the British government is undertaking a delicate balancing act - the needs of the Admiralty must constantly be balanced by the Foreign Office's concerns with the impact on neutral opinion.

- This evening the British battlecruisers Invincible and Inflexible depart Cromarty Firth on the west Scottish coast, where they had been a part of Admiral Beatty's Battlecruiser Squadron, en route to Plymouth, where they are to have machinery replaced and take on supplies prior to departure for the South Atlantic.  Their redeployment is the brainchild of Admiral Fisher, just as the ships themselves were a result of his vision of modern naval warfare expounded upon during his earlier tenure as First Sea Lord.  He believed that speed and firepower was paramount, and envisioned the battlecruiser being able to catch everything it could sink and escape from what it couldn't.  In practice this meant having the main armament, but not the armour, of a dreadnought, which gave it several knots advantage over the latter.

In sending them to the South Atlantic they are to form the cornerstone of the British effort to find and sink the German East Asiatic Squadron.  The two battlecruisers are faster than Spee's armoured cruisers, and with heavier main armament is able to fire larger shells over a distance significantly farther than Spee's own main armament can reach.  In other words, they are the perfect weapon to annihilate the German squadron and avenge Coronel - it is the Royal Navy equivalent of stacking the deck in its favour.  Indeed, this is one of the core missions Fisher had envisioned his battlecruisers undertaking - hunting down and sinking enemy commerce raiders.

Of course, the admirals losing Invincible and Inflexible are not pleased about the redeployment.  Beatty is aghast at losing two of his precious battlecruisers, and while Admiral Jellicoe can understand the logic behind the move, he is all-too-aware that it further reduce the British margin of superiority in the North Sea shortly after the loss of the dreadnought Audacious.  The next several months will constitute the closest the German High Seas Fleet will come to parity with the British Grand Fleet.

- All other options exhausted, Britain and France today declare war on the Ottoman Empire.  Simultaneously, the British announce the formal annexation the Ottoman island of Cyprus, which they have occupied since the Congress of Berlin in 1878.  Though this does little more than make de jure what has long been de facto, the action outrages public opinion in Greece, given the substantial Greek population on Cyprus and the belief that the island belongs to them.

The Entente powers are also cognizant of the potential for unrest among the Muslim population of their colonies as they go to war with the preeminent Muslim state in the world.  In an effort to neutralize the issue, the governor-general of French Algeria issues a proclamation that differentiates between the Young Turk rulers of the Ottoman Empire, who are seen as puppets of Germany, and the Turkish people as a whole.

- The Russian declaration of war on the Ottoman Empire yesterday opens a new front in the war, as the two empires share a frontier in the Caucasus.  The terrain here is rough and broken, dominated by the Caucasus and Taurus mountain ranges, and the poverty of the region was such that at the best of times the peasants were barely able to feed themselves.  Two railways on the Russian side approached the border, but their configeration was based on commerce, not defense, while on the Turkish side the nearest railway to Erzurum, the principal Ottoman city in the Caucasus, is 640 miles away.  The weather is also terrible, winter lasting from early November to between late March and May, with snow of two metres in the valleys and temperatures falling below minus twenty degrees centigrade.

All of this combines to convince the Russians that there is little risk of Ottoman invasion.  Indeed, the primary Russian focus is internal, not external - the region has always been a troublesome colonial frontier for the Russians, and groups such as the Georgians continue to agitate and organize to fight for independence.  To this end the Russian I Caucasian Corps, the main Russian force responsible for the region's defense, has been ordered to secure the line Bayazit-Eleskirt-Id, just inside the Ottoman border, this constituting a shorter front than if the corps remained on the Russian side of the frontier.  However, this evening General Georgii Bergmann, who commands I Caucasian Corps and desires glory on the battlefield, orders in his own initiative a further advance to Hasankale on the main road to Erzurum.

The Caucasus Theatre.

- At Tanga the German defenders now number 1500, but Colonel Lettow-Vorbeck is uneasy.  Though the British were repulsed yesterday, he is aware that they had managed to penetrate into Tanga before doing so, and is concerned that a more concerted and determined British advance might yet succeed.  Further, though the enemy advance on Longido failed on the 3rd, he is conscious that he has only three companies there should the British go back over onto the attack.  At 5pm, he concludes that Tanga can no longer be held, and begins preparations to withdraw.

As it turns out, however, the British had beaten him to the punch.  After the debacle of yesterday the soldiers of Indian Expeditionary Force B were hopelessly demoralized, and their commander convinced that victory was impossible.  Thus the British evacuate their forces from the beachhead near Tanga, a process complete by 320pm.  Such was their haste to evacuate that they left all of its heavy supplies behind, among which were eight machine-guns, 455 rifles, and half a million rounds, a vital contribution to Lettow-Vorbeck's force given the difficulties of resupply from Germany itself.  The entire British operation, from first to last, has been a disaster, giving the Germans a notable victory and, for now at least, bringing a halt to offensive operations against German East Africa.

Indian dead on the beaches near Tanga, November 5th, 1914.

November 4th, 1914

- At Ypres the day is cold and wet, mist turning to rain in the afternoon.  The British and French notice a distant lessening in the frequency of German infantry attacks, though German artillery bombardments continue, while French attacks, as in prior days, effect no change to the front line.  General Haig informs Field Marshal French today that 1st and 7th Division of I Corps desperately need to be relieved, as so heavy have been the losses, particularly for the latter, that they simply cannot hold a continuous trench line.

On the German side, Falkenhayn officially orders 6th Army to make one last push at Ypres, focusing on the line north of the Ypres-Comines Canal.  He hopes that with reinforcements a final attack will finally achieve the success that has eluded him on prior occasions.

- The raid on Yarmouth yesterday has an unfortunate coda for the Germans today.  A portion of the High Seas Fleet had left port and patrolled the Heligoland Bight yesterday in case they were needed to support or rescue Hipper's battlecruisers.  Overnight, however, there was a dense fog that prevented the warships from re-entering Wilhelmshaven.  At dawn today the armoured cruiser Yorck receives permission to proceed to Wilhelmshaven for repairs to its fresh-water tanks.  The fog is still so thick that it is impossible for the warships to see each other, however, and a change of current takes the unsuspecting Yorck into a defensive minefield.  It strikes two mines within a minute and rapidly sinks, and two hundred and thirty-five men drown.

The German armoured cruiser Yorck, lost today in a friendly minefield.

- The German occupation of almost all of Belgium has put an immense strain on the food supply of the latter's civilian population, as prior to the war three-quarters of all food consumed in Belgium had to be imported.  The perspective of the German government is that Belgium should continue to rely on imported food - why should they have to take responsibility for feeding them?  The counterargument of the British is that by conquering the country the Germans had assumed responsibility of the civilian population, and if food was allowed to be imported Belgium there was no guarantee that it would not be diverted to the German population.

The solution to the impasse was the formation of the Committee for the Relief of Belgium.  Headed by American mining magnate Herbert Hoover, the Committee took over responsibility for the feeding of the Belgian population by supervising the importation and distribution of food, ensuring that such supplies were not expropriated by the Germans.  Today the first food supplied by the Committee arrives in Brussels, helping to stave off starvation over the coming winter.  The Committee also makes the international reputation of Hoover, and propels him to the American Presidency.

- In London the first reports of the Battle of Coronel reach the Admiralty this morning, through sparse accounts that appear in the German press.  Though the Royal Navy makes no public comment, orders are immediately dispatched to British warships in the South Atlantic to converge, in preparation for the German East Asiatic Squadron moving around Cape Horn.  As a result, Rear Admiral A. C. Stoddart, who had been send to command the new squadron formed in the South Atlantic in October (as stated in the Admiralty's October 14th message to Craddock), will have four armoured cruisers, a force roughly equal in strength to Admiral Spee's.  However, after the humiliation of Coronel, no one at the Admiralty is interested in a fair fight.

- Without any sign from the Ottoman government repudiating the attacks undertaken by Admiral Souchon's warships on October 29th, Russia formally declares war on the Ottomans.

- At noon today Indian Expeditionary Force B begins its advance overland from its landing beaches to the town of Tanga.  The advance is as badly managed as everything else to do with this expedition.  Its commander had decided not to unload his artillery believing he could rely on the light cruiser Fox, but its captain, still fearful of mines, refused to approach close enough to Tanga to provide fire support.  The day is hot, and units lose touch with each other in the dense bush, only to stumble onto German positions at ranges under fifty yards.

The right of IEF B, comprised of its best units, manages to fight its way into Tanga itself, but the left comes under heavy fire and is halted.  One battalion on the left breaks and flees, and the rest on the left move northwards towards the more-successful right.  Thus despite British forces in the town itself, Colonel Lettow-Vorbeck is optimistic that his plan will work, and at 430pm orders his reserve company to hit the British southern flank.  The striking power of the maneouvre is muted, however, when a second company simply follows the first into the British position, instead of extending the German envelopment of IEF B even further westwards.

By nightfall confusion reigns on the battlefield.  In an effort to regain control of their units, German company commanders order their buglers to sound a recall.  The British commander, however, misinterprets this as signalling an imminent German charge, and believing himself defeated, withdraws his force back towards the landing beaches, even as the Germans also pull back to reorganize.

The British approach to Tanga and the German flanking maneouvre, November 4th, 1914.

- At the start of the war, the German light cruiser Karlsruhe was in the Caribbean, and since that time has attacking Entente shipping, capturing eighteen merchants.  Its run of good fortune comes to a sudden end today, when near Barbadoes Karlsruhe is blown in half by an internal explosion, most likely caused by unstable ammunition.  Its fate remains unconfirmed for months, until the survivors return to Germany, and for many weeks ahead the Admiralty continues to fear and plan around the existance of Karlsruhe.