100 Years Ago - Jerusalem and Russia

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/register/the-military-situation-a-brief-review-bn53td978

december 14, 1917

The military situation: a brief review

(By our Military Correspondent) Everyone is well aware that owing to the disintegration of Russia and the Italian defeats the enemy has the power to assemble on the front in France larger forces than ever. There are now some 150 German divisions in the West and 79 in the East, but from the latter there are being withdrawn all men of 19 to 35 years of age for service on the Franco-British front. A garrison of second-grade troops may be retained on the Russian front, while all the German forces fit to fight are concentrated in the West for a decisive blow.
It will be during the next six months that our danger will be greatest. We must expect half a million fresh fighters at least, and many more guns, with aircraft to match. Such reinforcements would not be enough to make sure of victory, but they would demand on our part corresponding measures. We cannot safely reckon on a need of less than a million men for maintaining our existing forces in the field during 1918, assuming that future losses and waste equal those of the past two years. The sources open to us other than the annual class of youths of 18 are, first of all, Ireland; the second is an extension of the age limit to 50; the third, and most important, is the withdrawal from non-essential and even some essential, industries of the younger men, and the fourth is the dispatch to the front of youths of 18.

By a vigorous application of all these, recruiting means we can carry on until the United States presents her Armies in force. In round figures, we have roughly two million men in France and one million in other theatres of war. When we add our bayonets and guns in France to those of the French, Americans, Belgians, and Portuguese, the resulting fighting strength, compared with that of the enemy, is not adequate to promise victory. It never has been. Our victories in Palestine and Mesopotamia have been due to the fact that we have given to two brilliant commanders the forces, superior to the enemy, necessary for victory. Our forces in France have never had this. In sending so many troops to these distant theatres, we have made a bad use of force.
A reconsideration is necessary now. It avails us nothing to occupy Jerusalem and Baghdad, if in the main theatre we are not successful.


https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/register/the-british-in-jerusalem-xv2tdldfk

december 13, 1917

The British in Jerusalem

The dispatch from General Allenby which was read yesterday by the Prime Minister to the House of Commons is an earnest of the spirit in which the British occupation of Jerusalem and the control of the Holy Places will be organized. The British Commander made his entry accompanied by the Commanders of the French and Italian detachments and the Military Attachés of France, Italy, and the United States.
Unlike the bombastic and spectacular entry of the German Emperor — who, though in reality a Cook’s tourist, rode into the city in the theatrical guise of a conqueror, and proceeded to preach a political sermon in a German church — General Allenby and his companions were on foot, and made no effort to impress spectators. No effort was needed. The measures taken spoke and will speak for themselves. The British Military Governor has organized the supervision of the Christian Holy Places, and is keeping in touch with the representatives of the Latin and Greek Churches. Around the Mosque of Omar has been placed a military cordon composed of Indian Musulman officers and soldiers, and the area within the cordon is under Moslem control. No non-Moslem can pass this cordon without joint permission from the Military Governor and the Moslem in charge of the Mosque. At Bethlehem and on Rachel’s Tomb guardians have been appointed, while the hereditary custodians of the Moslem Pious Foundations at the gates of the Holy Sepulchre have been requested to continue their duties in remembrance of the magnanimous act of the Khalif Omar, who, on taking Jerusalem, respected and protected the special sanctity of the supreme Christian shrine. News travels fast in the East, and we imagine that the tidings of the just and tolerant spirit that has informed the British Commander’s dispositions will quickly spread through every community.

Equally happy are the words of the proclamation addressed by General Allenby to the inhabitants. It announces the maintenance and protection, “according to the existing customs and beliefs” of every sacred building, monument, holy spot, shrine, traditional site, endowment, pious bequest, or customary place of prayer, of the “adherents of three of the great religions of mankind”.