First British Blood

August 26, 1914

On the 21st of August, on the western front, the advancing German Army has encountered the French near Charleroi.  The British, taking up their places on the battle front, move up to Mons eight miles west, to cover the French flank.  Immediately, they are brought into action defending the Mons canal, four skilled and experienced divisions facing six German.

General Alexander von Kluck commands the First Army at the German right.  He knows it is up to him to wheel south and make quick work of France, so German attention can be refocused to the east.  It is his preference to move further west around the flank of the BEF, but he has been commanded to remain in close contact with the Second Army to his left.  Therefore, he opens with artillery against the seasoned British troops standing in his way.  A major opportunity for an early German victory, based on maneuver rather than toe-to-toe slugging it out, is lost.

Given that the French line to the right of the BEF has made a "strategic retreat", the British Army has no choice but to do likewise.  Pulling back while engaged in an intense battle is a recipe for military disaster, but the British pull it off.  Sir John French saw the withdrawal as a betrayal of the British by the French Army.  Relations between the allies, never very cordial, begin to fray badly.  On August 26th, the British Army makes a desperate stand in the way of the Germans at La Cateau, where 55 thousand Brits slow the advance of almost three times as many Germans.

Along the rest of the front, French practitioners of "always forward" thinking have been throwing themselves at German artillery and machine guns, with predictable results.  Terrible losses are already forcing the French high command, in the person of General Joseph Joffre, to consider digging in and holding on.

On the 23rd of August, Japan comes in and declares war on Germany.

Strangely, Serbia, the proximate cause of the conflagration, has been almost forgotten in all the hubbub.  The Austrian Army, after some initial success, has been pushed back out of Serbia.  Poland to the north (Germany's sacred Prussia) is understood to be the site of the real battle with Russia.