This first day's fighting on the Marne revealed one of France's
chiefest needs--heavy artillery. The French light quick-firing gun
was a deadly weapon, but France had neglected the one department
of artillery in which the Germans had been most successful--the
use of powerful motor traction to move big guns without slackening
the march of an army. General von Kluck's artillery was impregnable
to the French. Indeed, the Germans could not be dislodged from the
Ourcq until the British Expeditionary Force sent up some heavy
field batteries. It was then too late for the withdrawal from the
Ourcq to be of any serious consequence in determining the result
along the battle front.
The afternoon of that day, when the Zouaves were driving the Germans
across the Ourcq with the bayonet and were themselves effectually
stopped by the German wall of artillery fire, General Joffre and
Sir John French met. At last the British commander received the
welcome news from the generalissimo that retreat was over and advance
was about to be begun.
"I met the French commander in chief at his request," runs the
official dispatch, "and he informed me of his intention to take
the offensive forthwith by wheeling up the left flank of the Sixth
Army, pivoting on the Marne, and directing it to move on the Ourcq;
cross and attack the flank of the First German Army, which was
then moving in a southeasterly direction east of that river.
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