Western Front
Somme: French capture Castel-Auchin Farm, northwest of Montdidier. Foch asks Haig to be ready to attack in Flanders from La Bassee canal north to liberate Bethune mining district. Haig demurs citing ‘water-logged’ terrain, counter-proposes early advance ‘
east and southeast of Amiens, so as to disengage that town and the railway’. Foch agrees and reveals that Debeney (French First Army) is ‘
studying an offensive with the same objective’. Petain letter to Haig: ‘
I have the honor to request a more complete participation of the British Army in the burdens … weighing on my armies for 3 1/2, months: either by … at least 3 divisions or by an attack launched before 18 July on a suitable part of the front.’ Ludendorff's 5th offensive postponed to July 15.
Australian and American soldiers in a trench in the Villers-Bretonneux Area:
https://twitter.com/CenturyAgoToday...076367215783936
Eastern Front
Czechoslovaks capture Kazan (on River Volga).
Southern Front
Albania: French advance on both sides of River Devoli; Austro-Hungarians retreat.
Asiatic and Egyptian Theaters
Siberia: Czechoslovaks control Siberian Railway east of Penza.
Naval and Overseas Operations
Japanese Japan’s first dreadnought battleship, the 21,900t,
Kawachi destroyed by internal explosion in Tokuyama Bay, 500-700 casualties.
The
Kawachi herself:
https://twitter.com/CenturyAgoToday...317770021699585
Settsu, sister ship of the first Japanese dreadnought battleship
Kawachi from 1911:
https://i0.wp.com/ww2-weapons.com/w...ettsu.jpg?ssl=1
Political, etc
Germany: Count von Hertling in Reichstag on Belgium as a pawn.
Prussian Upper House expels Prince Lichnowsky.
Colonel Bauer note to Ludendorff ‘We will win if the Homeland no longer stabs the Army in the back.’; repeats the view to Düsseldorf Industry Club on July 20.
United Kingdom: Announcement of Allied force on Murman coast.
Denaturalisation Bill passes first and second reading in House of Commons.
‘
Propaganda is advertising …’, by Northcliffe.
Australia: Mr. Huges, Australian Premier, re: no return of German Pacific Islands.
Minor Allies: Haiti declares war on Germany (see June 16th, 1917).