armies withdrew steadily before the victors. They had opened hostilities on August 4, 1914, in Belgium and France. Four years and four days later, on August 8, 1918, they began to retreat, a beaten host. Despite some talk of treason, the more critical Germans now begin to doubt the military capacity of Ludendorff, and to admit that the offensive of 1918 was foredoomed to failure.
From June onwards the successes of the Italian army and the overthrow of the Bulgarians helped to weaken the offensive spirit of the Germans; while, by the autumn (October 24—November 8) Austria was thoroughly worsted and her army demoralized. The Bulgarian disaster had an especially demoralizing effect upon Austria since she had begun the war in the Balkans for the Balkans, and defeat in the Balkans hastened the Allied triumph. Both in Austria and Germany disintegration was apparent in the field and on the “home front”; and both Powers were compelled to sue for an armistice and peace. Yet, untrustworthy as ever, Austria-Hungary made peace proposals to the Allied belligerents on September 14, without the consent of Germany, and asked that Allied delegates, empowered to discuss all questions, might be sent to a neutral country. Clemenceau answered the Austro-Hungarian offer in the French Senate on September 19 by saying that no negotiations were possible between right and wrong, while the Foreign Minister, M. Pichon, transmitted Clemenceau’s speech to Vienna through the Swiss Minister. President Wilson likewise rejected the offer, declaring that, inasmuch as the United States had frequently expressed its views on peace in the clearest terms, it could accept no proposal for a Conference. Even more negative than the substance of this reply was its form-sixty-six words in all—a cutting and by no means unintentional terseness. Indeed, the German and Austrian press thought the American answer contemptuous.
Bulgaria capitulated finally on September 21 and concluded an armistice with the Allies on September 29, the very day on which the German military command requested the Government to sue for an armistice and peace. The Allied Governments, too, were weary, especially the French; and in England the pacifist movement was growing. Readiness for peace was general. We, for our part, were prepared for peace negotiations and our people at home had realized the situation. The gathering of all the oppressed Austrian peoples at Prague in mid-May 1918, on the occasion of the jubilee festival of our
