You can't fight a war on certainties.

If it succeeded, excellent.

If it failed, I would catch the devil.

Dangerous to us, the attack also would be dangerous to the enemy.

Lieutenant General Hunter Liggett,

Commander, First Corps,

American Expeditionary Force,

from his memoir,

AEF,

10 years ago in France.

... Hey folks, welcome to the battles of the First World War podcast, episode 75, breaking the Argon.

Light on admin notes this time. Shout out. This episode goes to listener Johan from Sweden.

Thanks for the nice email man and photo of a Swedish sunset. I hope to get over there someday. That's really about it. So back into the line. If you are able to follow along with Google Maps

for this episode, you want to get yourself

to Exermont, France.

Okay, and I will spell, that is spelled E-X, E-R-M-O-N-T.

As we have talked about before, by the 30th of September, the majority of the frontline divisions of the American First Army were worn out after four days of fierce combat.

There had been little to no resupply of desperately needed food, ammunition, and

replacements for the thousands of dead and dying doboys lying in the shell-torn French

fields of the Meuse. One division, the 35th, had, for all intents and purposes, disintegrated. It was now being hastily relieved

by the veteran First Division. The American Expeditionary Force and First Army Commander General John

J. Blackjack Pershing had grudgingly accepted that his forces needed time to reorganize and resupply before he could batter them against the iron wall of the German defenses before them.

...