WHY GERMANY LOST.

Auckland Star, Volume L, Issue 70, 22 March 1919, Page 5

WHY GERMANY LOST.

UNDER-RATED THE BRITISH.

LOSSES IN MARCH OFFENSIVE, A FIGHT OF DESPAIR. PARIS, March 21. A German officer, writing to a former prisoner of wax in Germany, throws light upon the collapse of the Herman army. He states that the collapse was not due to the revolution. Discipline had considerably deteriorated during the last year of the war, especially among the troops on the eastern front. These went unwillingly to the western front. Headquarters no longer had influence at the War Office, so Ludendorff, after many disputes, took matters into his own ' hands. j There was also a lack of fresh battalion leaders, and war weariness was constantly met with. The first great mis- ! take Girmany made was under-rating j Englishmen as land |fighters, and the I second mistake was the under-rating cf i America's capacity to build ships and ' raise an army. | The writer says: "We got false in-! formation from our navy, which \\»s ! thoroughly spoilt by the great fuss made j over it, from the Kaiser downwards, ami by the. injudicious distribution of dis- j tinctions to suhmnrine [>ommm«R>rs, who j I reported larger sinkings than was tin; ca3e. Thus the army and the- stall" I worked on a wrong basis. Our navy I was unable to disturb the American j transports. When this truth was I realised we had to take the offensive ! earlier than we had planned and before I the army was sufficiently trained. A-> j a result we lost 180,000 men in the first offensiv", and Germany had scattered j her troops in every theatre of war instead of having every man at the dej .'isive point. Our offensives at Soissons, Mont Kemmel and Rheims were mi*er- j able attempts. After the failure at ! Rheims, Ludendorff lost his nerve an<*. j risked all upon a throw. Then followed 1 a fight of despair. The moment to try j for peace had now slipped by. The Allies never lost their stubbornness. The revolution was not the cause, but the result of defeat. When the American leaflets had undermined our confidence, the use of tanks completely broke it down. Order is entirely Incking in German | finances, and there is no money to spare for the efficient preparation for a world- i war. The organisation of the revolution besran a year prior to November last without the help of Russian Hoi- ; shevik capital, but Inter, when the Kiel ' mutiny occurred, a large portion of the troops at the front and at homo was already infected. — (A. and N.Z. Cable.)