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Show RUSSIA WAS NOT PREPARED FOR WAR At the beginning of the war, as is now well understood, tho Russians had not planned an Immediate offensive Their policy was to defend their frontiers while their huge strenrth was mobilizing. The rush on ParfcfiS tho West, however, threatened the! cause of the Allies, and almost over ' night the Russians decided to embark i on a hastily planned offensive in East Prussia. The impetus of this atack swept the Russians through the favorite fa-vorite province of the Kaiser, and in ten days the Unter den Linden was filled with panic-stricken refugees that , had fled before the avalanche so sud- J denly launched from the East At a if critical moment in the "West, when the I German vanguard was almost within U sight of the Eiffel Tower, 'the Ger- mans shifted an important body of i1 troops from the West of protect tho East from Russian inroads. The Rus- j sians say that six corps were sent to j1 East Prussia, while the French claim it was but four. But the figures are j not material. "What we know is that after their departure for the East ' came the battle of the Marne and the I turning point of the war. f The Russians paid for this by the I loss of almost their entire East Prus- ? faian army, but they say their sacrifice f saved Paris. History, no doubt, twh i establish the facts, but on the evidence J available at present thelf claim seems A' logical and will, I believe, be ultimately ultim-ately credited to them as their first ! great contribution to the Allies' cause t This single phase of the war alone proves that there is such a thing as vlctoiy in defeat when that defeat was achieved by the enemy at the cost of the weakening of another front and the consequent victorv of an j ally in a more strategical- important I theater of operations. The loss of East Prussia and of one entire arniv was a mere drop in the bucket of ' j Russia's sacrifice, while, on the other I hand, the failure of the Germans to j take Paris in 1914 promises to stand out of the war as one of the great turning points in the world's hlstorj. '-So '-So much for Russia's first entrance i Into the European theater of opera- tlons. " . |