And so we come to the evening of the 26th of September.  Along these hill-sides, where we stand, on the west side of the Canal du Nord, lay Sir Julian Byng and the Third Army.  To his right, on the south-east, was General Rawlinson, facing the strongest portion of the Hindenburg line, with two American divisions, led by Major-General Read, under his command; while on his left, and to the north, the First Army, under General Home, held the line along the Canal du Nord, and the marshes of the Sensee.

The most critical moment in the campaign had arrived.  For in the assault on the Hindenburg line heavy risks had to be run.  It is clear, I think, from the wording of Marshal Haig’s dispatch, that in respect to the attack he took a special responsibility, which was abundantly vindicated by the event.  The British War Cabinet was extremely anxious; the French Generalissimo was content to leave it to the British Commander-in-Chief; and Sir Douglas Haig, confident “that the British attack was the essential part of the general scheme, and that the moment was favourable,” had the decision to make, and made it as we know.  It is evident also from the dispatch that Sir Douglas was quite aware, not only of the military, but of the political risk.  “The political effects of an unsuccessful attack upon a position so well known as the Hindenburg line would be large, and would go far to revive the declining morale, not only of the German Army, but of the German people.”  This aspect of the matter must, of course, have been terribly present to the mind of the British War Cabinet.

Moreover, the British Armies had been fighting continuously for nearly two months, and their losses, though small in proportion to what had been gained and to the prisoners taken, were still considerable.

Nevertheless, with all these considerations in mind, “I decided,” says General Haig, “to proceed with the attack."[6]

  [6] The italics are mine.

There lie before me a Memorandum, by an officer of the General Staff, on the Hindenburg line, drawn up about a month after the capture of the main section of it, and also a German report, made by a German officer in the spring of 1917.  The great fortified system, as it subsequently became, was then incomplete.  It was begun late in 1916, when, after the battle of the Somme, the German High Command had determined on the retreat which was carried out in February and March of the following year.  It was dug by Russian prisoners, and the forced labour of French and Belgian peasants.  The best engineering and tactical brains of the German Army went to its planning; and both officers and men believed it to be impregnable.  The whole vast system was from four miles to seven miles deep, one interlocked and inter-communicating system of trenches, gun emplacements, machine-gun positions, fortified villages, and the rest, running from north-west to south-east across France, behind