Even though it was frustrating, he accepted that armies sometimes moved with maddening slowness, in particular over difficult terrain and when looking for an enemy that wasn’t visible but might pop up at any time. The crown prince also knew von Moltke the Elder’s dictum that even the most careful and well thought out plans fell apart when an attempt was made to implement them. So be it. It was sometimes referred to as the “fog of war.”
The prince had divided his forces into three very unequal prongs. In the east, along the Texas border, it was virtually an all-Mexican show. They wanted Texas back and they could have it. Already swarms of less than well trained Mexican soldiers were streaming into Brownsville and Laredo. Good, he thought. It would keep them out of his hair. He had little respect for Mexican President Carranza and even less respect for Carranza’s army. In the crown prince’s opinion, Texas was a sideshow, intended to siphon off American responses while the conquest of California took center stage.
Thus, the remaining two prongs were given over to California. Planning and execution of the invasion of California were handicapped by the miserable terrain south of the American border. The Mexican border to the west was interrupted by the Sea of California and the wastelands of the Baja Peninsula; there was absolutely no good place for a large army to assemble on the Mexican side. There was plenty of land but it was barren and there were few decent roads and no trains. Bringing in food and ammunition could only be done with great difficulty. He’d managed to get a brigade of two infantry regiments and one detachment of cavalry assembled at the squalid Mexican city of Tijuana, but that was all the area could support. That brigade was now moving cautiously northward towards San Diego. Too cautiously, in the prince’s opinion. Despite some nibbling attacks, it was beginning to appear that the intelligence they’d garnered was incredible but correct—there was no significant American military presence in and around San Diego. German airmen had attacked what might have been a belated attempt to build some defenses near Los Angeles, but there was much that was puzzling about that incident.
Geography dictated that the main German thrust come from the south and east of the California coast. German forces were massed south of the border near the town of Mexicali. They had begun to cross the border and advance patrols had penetrated a number of miles. Better, they had connected with the railroad line from Yuma to San Diego. This would facilitate the movement of troops over the low mountains that shielded San Diego. Both the army and the navy needed a port to gather supplies, and taking San Diego was an admirable solution.
The crown prince was also thrilled to be out of Mexico. It was a stinking island of corruption in a sea of incompetence. The Mexican Army was a joke, and the Mexican government a prime example of brutal incompetence and criminality. It galled him to have to pretend to accept that packet of filth named Carranza as a head of state. The crown prince’s father was a true head of state. His father was the head of a vast empire as were the others in his extended family, such as the Czar of Russia and the King of England. Mexico was a joke in comparison. And when the United States was defeated, Imperial Germany would truly be the only major power in the world and perhaps Germany’s Second Reich would indeed last for a thousand years, just like the First Reich.
The prince and his staff frequently wondered just why the French had tried to establish an empire in Mexico sixty years earlier and, more important, just how had the wretched little brown people managed to defeat the French? The few Mexican Army detachments he’d included in his assault on California would function as rear echelon guards and supply soldiers, providing they didn’t steal too much. They would also serve as cannon fodder, he decided mirthlessly, should such situations arise. He would not waste the lives of good German soldiers. Mexicans were another matter entirely.
The German armies would advance north and west into California, after first ensuring that the army was entirely over the border, in proper position, and with sufficient supplies. While he agreed that there would be minimal defense from the Americans, he didn’t feel like handing them even a small victory on a platter. The ambush of that probing cavalry force was still on his mind. If the cavalry commander hadn’t been killed, he would have been court-martialed for stupidity. According to the German embassy in Mexico City, the American press was making much ado about what the crown prince thought wasn’t even worthy of being called a skirmish.
There were other differences between Mexico and the United States. For instance, the signs in the United States were in English, which he could read, instead of Spanish, which he couldn’t. Also, the homes and businesses were neater and more prosperous looking, and why not? As much as he disliked the citizens of the United States, they were far preferable to the dirty and illiterate people of Mexico.
He hoped he and his army would never have to return south of the border, except, perhaps, for a victory parade or a well-deserved vacation. Both he and his father knew how close Germany had come to defeat along the Marne River near Paris in September of 1914. The German Army had suffered grievously in a bloodbath of monumental proportions that was all the more terrible because it was so unexpected. The ability of modern weapons to slaughter soldiers had been horribly underestimated.
Before the 1914 war was completely over, German armies had suffered nearly six hundred thousand casualties. He shuddered. A hundred thousand casualties a month could not be sustained by any nation. Therefore, there would never again be a war on the European continent between the major nations. Modern killing was just too efficient. Such sustained losses might also result in a revolution, such as the ones that were ripping apart the Russian and the Ottoman empires.
Therefore, Germany would seek its conquests elsewhere. First had been Mexico and now California. It had taken four years of planning and action to initially bring in a small force to Mexico, have it accepted by the pliant Wilson, and then enlarge it with every ship that docked. Now the man who would be Kaiser Wilhelm III had an invasion force of a quarter of a million that, once they got organized and onto California soil, would advance inexorably and take San Francisco. It would be the final and crowning jewel in the reign of his father.
The kaiser, the prince, and his generals all vowed never again to repeat the mistakes of 1914. The prince would not divide his forces. He would not allow his generals to ignore or disobey orders. He would insist on constant communications between his units, unlike the way the kaiser’s generals operated in 1914. They would use telephone, telegraph, couriers, and pigeons if necessary to maintain contact.
Nor would he take the Americans for granted. Even though it seemed that there was little in the way of organized resistance, the crown prince recalled just how desperately the French had fought before finally collapsing. The prince would also ensure that his forces had the bulk of their supplies within reach before advancing. That might mean a slower advance than the generals in Berlin, including his father, might wish, but it was the prudent way to conquer.
Finally, the army had learned its lesson. There would no longer be attacks by massed ranks of infantry. The Americans might not have the large numbers of machine guns and artillery that his Germany Army had, but what weapons they did have could prove deadly. His force was limited in size and reinforcing it would be difficult; therefore, he would not waste lives.