JOHN WILLIAM JONES
202859
LANCE CORPORAL HAMPSHIRE REGIMENT

Beginning of the end - August-October 1918
Each failed German offensive contributed to an increasing erosion of the German Army's morale and effectiveness. The successful first American offensive action of the War on the 28th May 1918 on the other hand, was a boost to the Allies. The use of over sixty tanks by Australian troops on the 4th July marked another milestone. By maximising the use of these tanks the village of Hamel was recaptured at a cost of only 1000 Australian and American casualties. By the 6th August, Ludendorff had retreated back across the Asine and ordered that the German forces should now adopt a policy of strategic defence.

The Allies sensing Ludendorff's failure launched a new operation to drive the Germans away from Amiens. Using tactics employed at Hamel, the Allied forces made use of over 120 tanks as well as various forms of armoured transport and aircraft. The attack commenced on the 8th August. Ludendorff was to call this day " the black day of the German Army in the history of this war. " Amiens was taken by the Allies. Ludendorff offered his resignation to the Kaiser and Hindenburg, but they rejected it. The Kaiser, Wilhelm II, however, agreed with Ludendorff that the War had to be ended.

Along the Western Front the Allies continued their attacks, driving the Germans back as they went. By the end of August, most of the ground won by the Germans since April had been retaken. By the start of September Ludendorff ordered a German withdrawal to the Hindenburg Line - a move many of his military advisors had been suggesting for some time. Around the middle of September the Allies managed to break through the strong defences in front of the Hindenburg Line and were now in a position to attack the Line itself. Since the 8th August Haig's forces had advanced 25 miles along a 40 mile front. The advance was not however a walkover - as the 180,000 losses testify.

At the end of September the Allied armies finally broke through the Hindenburg line with its formidable defences. On the 28th September, Ludendorff told Hindenburg that Germany must sue for peace and request an armistice immediately. Following much political wrangling in Berlin, requests for peace were sent by Germany and Austra-Hungary to President Woodrow Wilson on the 4th October.

The Allied advance continued in October. Cambrai, Lille, Ostend and Zeebrugge. By the 20th of the month the Allies were at the Dutch border. Behind the scenes there was increasing pressure being put on the Germans to call a halt to hostilities. Wilson had replied to the German requests for peace by stating that the Allies would only negotiate if Germany evacuated all occupied territory, ended its U-boat campaign and in effect surrendered unconditionally. Ludendorff could not envisage germany's total humiliation by these terms and replied, without consultation with the German Government, that Wilson's terms did nothing to bring forward the end of the War and merely served to heighten German resistance. The Reichstag reacted furiously to Ludendorff's telegram and he eventually resigned on the 26th October.