The Magnetic Storm Page 270

“Nordlicht, nicht wahr, Herr Leutnant?” he began, thinking no doubt that the phenomenon was an ordinary form of Aurora Borealis, — the northern lights, — in other words, a magnetic storm, that would be over soon.

“Dummes Rindsvieh”… snapt the Herr Leutnant, who knew better by this time. Indeed he was to know still more at once, for while he was speaking there came to his ear a low dull roar, a sound he had heard once before, way back in 1914 when the Germans had retreated very much in a hurry beyond the Marne.

Panic seized him. Yes the sound was unmistakable. The German army once more was in full retreat — no it was a rout — a panic-stricken rabble that made its way back.

Like lightning the news had spread among the men at the front that uncanny things were afoot, that all communications had been annihilated with one stroke, that no orders could be sent or received except by prehistoric couriers, that the Grosses Kommando was cut off from the army, and that in short the German army as far as communication was concerned, had suddenly found itself a century back.

For what had happened to von Unterrichter that morning, had happened on a large scale not only to every one along the front, but all over Germany as well! Every train, every trolley car, every electric motor or dynamo, every telephone, every telegraph had been put out of commission. With one stroke Germany had been flung back into the days of Napoleon. Every modern industry, every means of traffic — except horse-drawn vehicles — were at a standstill. For days the German retirement went on, till on the fifteenth day, the entire German army had retired behind the natural defenses of the Rhine, the victorious Allies, pressing the fleeing hordes back irresistibly.

And it must have been a bitter pill for the German high command to swallow when they saw that the Allied fliers were constantly flying behind their own lines and that as the Allies advanced, their automobiles and their trains seemed to run as well as ever behind their own lines. But no German succeeded in flying an aeroplane or in running an automobile. That mysterious force obviously was trained only against the Huns, but was harmless behind the Allied lines. Nor did the Germans find out to this date what caused their undoing.

Peace having not been declared as yet, I cannot, of course, divulge the full details of the scheme of just how the Germans were finally flung across the Rhine. That, of course, is a military secret.

But I am permitted to give an outline of just what happened on that memorable morning, when the German “Kultur” was flung back into the dark ages where it belongs.

But first we must go back to Tesla’s laboratory once more, back to that evening when “Why” Sparks first overwhelmed Tesla and his companions with his idea. This is in part what Sparks said:

“Mr. Tesla! In 1898 while you were making your now historic high-frequency experiments in Colorado with your 300-kilowatt generator, you obtained sparks 100 feet in length. The noise of these sparks was like a roaring Niagara, and these spark discharges were the largest and most wonderful produced by man down to this very day. The Primary coil of your oscillator measured 51 feet in diameter, while you used 1100 amperes. The voltage probably was over 20 million. Now, then in your book, High Frequency Currents, among other things you state that the current which you produced by means of this mammoth electric oscillator was so terrific that its effect was felt 13 miles away. Altho there were no wires between your laboratory and the Colorado Electric Light & Power Co., five miles distant, your “Wireless” Energy burnt out several armatures of the large dynamo generators, simply by long distance induction from your high frequency oscillator. You subsequently raised such havoc with the Lighting Company’s dynamos that you had to modify your experiments, altho you were over five miles away from the Lighting Company.*

“Now then, if in 1898, twenty years ago, you could do that, why, WHY cannot we go a step further in 1918, when we have at our command vastly more powerful generators and better machinery. If you can burn out dynamo armatures 13 miles distant with a paltry 300 kilowatts, why cannot we burn out every armature within a radius of 500 miles or more.

“The primary coil of your oscillator in 1898 was 51 feet in diameter. WHY cannot we build a primary ‘coil’ from the English Channel down to Switzerland, paralleling the entire Western front? This is not such a foolish, nor such a big undertaking as you might think. My calculations show that if we were to string highly insulated copper wires one-quarter inch thick on telegraph poles behind the front, the problem would become a simple one. Ordinary telegraph poles can be used, and each pole is to carry twenty wires. Beginning three feet above the ground, each wire is spaced two feet distant from the next one. These wires run continuous from the sea to Switzerland. Moreover, every ten miles or

* The above occurrences as well as the cited experiments and effects of the Tesla currents are actual facts checked by Mr. Tesla himself, who saw the proof of this story. — Editor.