From the time Russia joined the counteroffensive, almost everyone agreed that the Germans would end up with defeat.

In fact, all countries except Germany felt so, and even many German civilians felt that their country was not far from defeat.

But the only one who disagreed with this was the German government, or rather the Hindenburg and Junker aristocracy, who controlled the German government.

Under Hindenburg's planning, a huge death-defying counterattack was about to begin, and it also determined whether Germany won or lost, at least that's what Hindenburg felt.

In order to win this war, the Germans can be said to do everything they can. Almost all civilian factories gave way to military factories, and the government called on all the people to go to the military factories and be produced by the troops on the front line.

As a result, the production speed of German military factories has increased several times, from tens of millions of rounds of ammunition per month to nearly 200 million rounds of ammunition per month.

Although this did basically satisfy the attrition of the front-line army, there was also a problem for Germany, that is, the domestic economy had been destroyed by the war, and Germany's development had been disrupted because of the war.

Even if there is an unconditional peace, it will take at least a decade for Germany to restore its pre-war situation and economy.

This situation also made the German junta even more frenzied, and they firmly believed that Germany could not lose, and instead pinned their hopes on a decisive battle to save Germany with a miraculous victory.

The biggest piece of bad news for Germany was that the Allies maintained absolute numerical superiority over Germany on both the Eastern and Western Fronts.

The German army fully understood the power of crowd tactics, and even though Germany's battle loss ratio was as high as 1 to 3, and even in some areas as high as 1 to 6, the Allies still smiled.

After all, Germany is currently consuming the colonial population of Britain and France, and Russia, which has no shortage of population at all.

But the Germans consumed their own native population, and every German death was a weakening for Germany.

In August 1917, the first month of the all-out counteroffensive, the Allied and German battles set a new record of more than 2 million casualties in a single month, with an average of more than 80,000 wounded or killed each day (the battle began on 6 August, but it was only 25 days).

Although only more than 500,000 of these 2 million people were German casualties, there is no doubt that the German government has begun to fear such enormous attrition.

With Germany losing a tenth of its strength in just one month, how long will the remaining four million troops be able to hold out?

The bad news for the German government was that the armies supporting and exchanging with Austria-Hungary combined were more than 30 divisions, which was more than 500,000 fighting troops.

Austria-Hungary had no contact with Germany before its surrender, which also put the German army in a very dangerous position after the surrender of Austria-Hungary.

Fortunately, Austria-Hungary did not directly join the Entente, otherwise it would be a question whether the more than 500,000 troops could be kept.

You know, the former German army was under the control of Italy, and further north was the territory of Austria controlled by Austria-Hungary.

It was not a simple question to get this German army back to Germany through the territory of Italy and Austria-Hungary in succession.

The Entente were clearly aware of the existence of this German army, which was frequently harassed by the Italian army, and aided by a small number of Balkan troops and American troops, and this German army was dragged into Italy and had no way to return to the country.

If the German government could not provide any reinforcements to support this army, then there was a high probability that the German army would be surrounded and annihilated.

But there was no way, at present almost all the German troops were deployed on the eastern and western fronts, and Hindenburg and the German General Staff had less than 300,000 reserve troops in their hands.

300,000 troops to rescue 500,000 troops, this is a bit whimsical to think about.

If 300,000 troops could have saved the German army group, it would have returned to Germany long ago.

It was not just the predicament on land, the German navy was cowering in the harbor and did not dare to go out at all, because beyond the North Sea and the Baltic Sea, a large number of Allied fleets were patrolling jointly.

The submarine tactics that Germany had used so often were largely unused, and because of the entry of the United States, the Allies had enough warships to protect merchant ships.

Although one or two merchant ships were occasionally attacked by German submarines, such an attack was already an itch for the current Allies, but it would also intensify the hatred of the Allies towards Germany, and in disguise increase the funds that Germany would need to pay reparations after the defeat in the future.

In addition, every once in a while, Allied bombers bombed German cities or dropped some leaflets to persuade them to surrender.

The armies of the German front, cities and factories in the rear, were among the targets of these bombers and aircraft.

The random bombing not only disturbed the order of these cities, but also the large number of leaflets distributed on the planes also disturbed the minds of these Germans.

Even the Germans, who had supported the war before the war, could not help but question from their hearts at this time, and even began to question the decisions of the government and the military in this war.

Because the chief of the General Staff at this time was Hindenburg, Hindenburg was under considerable pressure.

But fortunately, there were two previous chiefs of staff, Moltke Jr. and Falkingham, who also took on a considerable part of the pressure.

It's just that because Hindenburg is still active in German politics, he is under the most pressure.

Because of the harassment of these Allied planes, coupled with the frequent defeats in the front-line battles, the prestige of the military junta headed by Hindenburg has dropped a lot.

There were even quite a few high-ranking military officials who were not Junkers who began to complain, saying that it was precisely because of the blind command of the General Staff that Germany was currently facing the predicament.

These people demanded that Hindenburg return power to Kaiser Wilhelm II and not let Germany go further down the wrong path.

In fact, compared with the more extreme Junker aristocracy and military government, during the reign of Wilhelm II, the German government was still more sensible.

What's more, Wilhelm II was not a staunch warlord. Interest groups represented by Wilhelm II, they are more like equalizers. Although they hope to win the war, they can also accept the loss of the war.

After all, for Wilhelm II, his own throne is the most important thing. Like Hindenburg, who directly overthrew Wilhelm II and the government, talented

It was the greatest threat to the German imperial power and government.

Although there are already some voices in the military and civilian population, Hindenburg will definitely not pay attention to the doubts of these people.

What a joke, Hindenburg managed to empty the rights of Wilhelm II and gain de facto rule of the junta.

It was impossible for him to give up his rights to Wilhelm II because of the remarks of some people in the country.

After all, Wilhelm II was overthrown and complained, and as the culprit of all this, Hindenburg was definitely one of the people that Wilhelm II hated.

Dare to return the rights to Wilhelm II, and Hindenburg will wait to be liquidated by Wilhelm II!

Although it seemed that it was the Germans who were in crisis, the attrition of the Allies was also enormous.

Only half a month after the start of the war, the Russians again asked Australasia for help, asking for more weapons and equipment.

If it had been before, Arthur would have found a way to drag the Russians down and create greater benefits for himself.

But now, Arthur didn't even think about it and directly agreed to the request of the Russians. There is no way, even if Australasia does not sell weapons to Russia, there is still an American saliva staring at the arms trade of various countries.

If Australasia refuses this order, the Americans will definitely step in and take over the order.

Rather than letting the Americans make money, it is better for Australasia to work hard to make this money itself.

What's more, a stronger Russia is also a good thing for Arthur, at least the Russian monarchy should be able to maintain for a while.

Arthur was well aware that the greatest threat to the Russian monarchy was the workers' union in Moscow.

What the Russian Provisional Government wanted was a constitutional monarchy, which Arthur was able to accept.

After all, a constitutional monarchy is also a monarchy, and a prestigious monarch can still hold a certain amount of power, such as Queen Victoria before.

Even a constitutional monarchy can hopefully be transformed into an absolute monarchy, and a monarch with prestige and deep love among the people can do it.

But if it were to be transformed into the republic that the workers' federation wanted, and to restore the monarchy, it would be basically impossible.

After all, not everyone wants to have a king above them for no reason, and this king will also take part of the government's money, and even command himself arrogantly.

On September 1, 1917, Hindenburg's carefully planned counteroffensive finally came.

The southern front of a million Germans broke through the defenses of the Entente, mainly through the defenses of the Italian army, and even approached the Marne at one point.

You know, Paris is just below the Marne, just over 100 kilometers from the German front.

This German counteroffensive made the Entente a little panicked, and if Paris fell, it would not be a joke, and the blow to the Entente was unparalleled.

After all, a considerable part of the 10 million Allied troops on the Western Front were contributed by the French.

If the Germans did succeed in their sneak attack and forced the French to surrender, it was questionable whether the remaining Allied troops would be able to withstand the German attack.

In order to support the French and at the same time to serve the mood of the French government and people, the British urgently announced that they would support another 500,000 troops on the Western Front.

Italy, under pressure from the Entente countries, increased its troops by 200,000 to block the German attack.

At this time, the nearly 2 million reserve troops previously set aside were useful.

With the orders of the Allied General Command, the reserve forces entrenched along the Marne and behind Verdun began to move frequently with the intention of driving the Germans back to their original front.

The end result was good, on the banks of the Marne, 70 kilometers from Paris, millions of Allied troops successfully held off the German attack and pushed the German army back more than 20 kilometers.

The outbreak of another offensive and defensive battle in Paris was avoided, which also made the entire Entente and France especially relieved.

At the same time, it also made all the Entente countries understand that the Italian army was unreliable as the main point of attack, and even affected other fronts.

The Allied General Headquarters immediately decided to mobilize 300,000 Australasian troops from the northern front and 300,000 Italian troops from the southern front.

With the well-developed transportation network in Belgium and France, the change of up to 600,000 troops can be completed in almost two weeks.

In order to stabilize the front line during the change of defense, the Allied General Command decided to increase the offensive on other fronts during the change of defense, and at the same time sent a large number of reconnaissance aircraft to determine the movements of the Germans.

Of course, there are up to 500,000 reserve troops ready to go to the front line to fill any gaps that arise due to the change of guards.

At the same time, the Allied General Command also asked the Russians to increase their offensive on the Eastern Front, and the Germans had no intention of launching a surprise attack like before.

Under the counterattack of millions of reserve troops, it took more than half a month to successfully drive the raiding German army back to the front line.

The Australasian army and the Italian army also completed the change of defense in this half a month, and the Australasian army became the main attack point of the southern front.

This was a difficult task for the Australasian army, after all, on the northern front, it was possible to play behind the British, as a supporter.

But the southern front was a mix of French, Italian, Balkan and American troops, plus the Australasian army, which had just completed the change of defense, and there was nothing wrong with saying that it was a universal camp.

And the Australasian army, as the main point of attack on the southern front, faced the greatest counterattack by the German army.

This also means that the Australasian army will not avoid casualties, and the casualties will not be as few as before.

However, as long as Germany can be defeated, all the sacrifices will be worth it.

At present, almost all the belligerents are longing for peace, and Arthur is also looking forward to the distribution of Australasia's post-war benefits.

Why not sacrifice a Germany to make all the countries of the Entente happy and Australasia strong?

3800 words for the second update, ask for a monthly pass, ask for support!

(End of chapter)