NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 16211, 14 May 1918, Page 7

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

j There is a noticeable tendency on the part of a number of America's public men to adopt a somewhat mpro flamboyant, tone in their utterances about the war and America's part therein. It would bo silly t-o cavil at what, after all, is onlv America's way of interpreting vocally the energy which sh e is now putting into the prosecution of the war. But we confess that we find Mr Joseplitis Daniels s rhetorical cable to Sir Eric Gcddes somewhat irritating. Mr Daniels was possibly the most unsuit- *, e ,, ciail * or *' le l of Secretary of uie ->avy that America could have had. Mis whole efforts in the earlier years ot his administration appeared to bo spent m checking the wish of those who wanted the United States to have a navy adequate to its increased and increasing responsibilities. His pacifist and sentimental proclivities—he is repoited to have declared on one occasion that the day on which Congress passed ? V °i e a ulnc^rc <l more chaplains for the Navy was the proudest of his ''J 0 niade him a perfect misfit in the Navv Department. He says now that ■ °f the American Navy is Full speed ahead." We can quite believe it, for the war lias altered the viewpoint of even Mr Daniels, but the available speed and cfticienc}' of the Navy would have been much greater if someone else had occupied his position in the years immediately preceding America's entrance into the war.

One passage in the weekly statement by "a high authority," which wo published yesterday, will have been read with curiosity, not wholly unmixed with uneasiness. Referring to the British withdrawal from Es Salt, 2o miles from Jerusalem, on the eastern side of tlio Jordan, tho writer said:—

General Allenby's decision to retire to his original bridgeheads east of the Jordan was not influenced by the loss of nine guns, but was entirely due to tho fact that his operations had been delayed at the moment when success depended on their rapidity, and tlius he could not obtain tho results at which he aimed."

No information is given as to the cause of the delay, or what wero the results at which General Allenby aimed. It is an unpleasant fact that this is the second withdrawal from the same position in less than two months. It was first captured by tho Londoners and the Australian and New Zealand mounted brigade on March 2oth, after three days' fighting, and the mounted men, with tlie Carnal Corps, advanced still further, reaching tho Hedjnz railway, and destroying some miles of it, both north and south of Amman.

Jt was an excellent performance throughout, especially in view of the remarkable difficulties experienced by the attacking force. "From the Jordan Valley," we are told, "the road to Es Salt winds up from 3000 to 4000 feet. The town lies between steep hills at the mouth of a pass flanked by hills which a itjw determined men could hold against overwhelming numbers. It is hardly possible to conceive a position of greater •strength or more easily defended." Added to this, the weather was extremely bad, heavy thunderstorms alternating with dense mists, impeding the progress of our troops. Nevertheless, wo won tnp place, captured some hundreds of prisoners, and drove the Turks and Germans northward.

Then to everybody's amazemont came the news that our troops had withdrawn from Es Salt and Amman and a statement by tho War Office that our operations east of tho Jordan had been merely a raid. * Unless military terms have altered their meaning tho attack and capture of these two placcs could not bo adequately described as a raid, particularly since our occupation of Amman would have been of material assistance to tho Arabs of tho Hedjaz fighting the Turks further south. A circumstance that might account for the withdrawal was the sudden Turkish offeus'ivo on the coastal sector of Palestine, -which may have oompelled General Allenby to withdraw his troops to positions nearer the coast. But this does not account for tho second attack on Es Salt and its subsequent abandonment for the second time. This movement looks as though the Turks had been able to concentrate larger forces in that area than wero expected. The position is unfortunate, because the hanging-up of the advance in Palestine must aftect to some extent the success of our Arab allies, and because it may affect prejudicially tho progress of the Mesopotaniian force. There is nothing in the cables to warrant anxiety—we are thoroughly established in Jerusalem —but further news will be awaited with deep interest.

A recent message from Washington says that the authorities have discovered Count von Bernstorff's code, by which he directed spies, and that thousands of messages are now decipherable. This is by no moans the first secrct German code that has been deciphered by clever American investigators. Somewhere in Washington is the man who dragged to light the code by which towards tho end of last year many German conspiracies in America and Europe wero unmasked. He revealed the French Premier Caillaux's political intrigues and thus led to his being charged with treachery to his country. He uncovered, as one' writer put it, "the stark skeleton of Gorman's Central and South American dominion ambition and rattled it before the world. Ho caused the recall of Count von Luxburg as German Minister to Argentina, and impeached the integrity of the Swedish ambassadors to Mexico and Argentina.

After secret agents intercepted the codo messages from Luxburg to Berlin, some of them via Count von Bernstorff of "Washington, it fell to this person to fathom their secrets. Not only were they couched in German, but also in tho German code, which the Kaiser's craftiest diplomatic agents spent years in building up. Obviously there was moro than one codo. Probably von Bornstorff used one with which to communicate with agents outside tho States and .another for thotv) he employed in America itself. The real authors of some of the plots which led to explosions in munition works fires in ship yards, and so on, should now be in eome danger of paying the penalty of their crimes.