ABSTRACT
The Russian Empire succumbed to internal strife. Italy incurred a crushing defeat in October-November 1917. People sustained grave set-backs in March-April 1918. And now in May-June 1918, France was smitten by a stroke at the Chemin-des-Dames, threatening Paris itself, which was not relieved until the successes in Champagne and the battles of the Marne in July. In the end, Pershing succeeded in concentrating his forces in an American Army as he had always desired. The author envisages the possibility of the French Army being smashed and cut off from them, the enemy demanding as a condition of peace the handing over of all the ports from Rouen and Havre to Dunkirk, and, in the event of a refusal, the remorseless hammering of the Army by the whole German Army. The Allied naval authorities, therefore, had decided to reinforce that fleet and three French battleships had been despatched as their share.
