PROGRESS OF THE WAR

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 183, 23 April 1918, Page 4

PROGRESS OF THE WAR

Widely-extended aerial attacks on railway junctions in rear of the enemy lines are practically the only important activities in the Western theatre reported at time of writing. The general absence of events is not, however, without a positive significance. There is little doubt that at the present stage timo for preparation is so much more valuable to the Allies than to the enemy that the latter has every incentivo to press his offensive without intermission. The pause now in evidence, therefore, emphasises the damaging effect of the defeat which the Germans suffered last week when they attempted to open out the flanks of the Lys salient. _ They are presumably at a standstill for no other reason than that they are under the necessity of reinforcing and reorganising their shattered divisions and in other ways amplifying and renewing their preparations for attack.

Tiie opinion expressed in a Paris message that the Germans have engaged themselves too deeply in the salient north of x the La Bassce Canal not to persevere in their attempts to break through is plausible. In its present shape thq salient is an exposed area, costly to hold, and his success in creating it is of value to the enemyj only as a step towards tho further and greater achievement of breaking through the Allied line. A renewal of the attacks in which ho fared so badly on Thursday and Friday last seems therefore to be tho enemy's only alternative to falling back towards his original front. Observations j which bear closely upon the position ' reached in the northern battle-area aro made by General Fbeytag-Lor--INGHOVEN, Deputy Chief of the-Ger-man General Staff, in his notorious book, Deductions From the World War. Discussing the conditions of attack in the West, he remarks that, "What has to bo done is not only on a comparatively limited front to break in upon the enemy with concentrated masses—these masses will immediately bo exposed to outflanking on both sides—but to force .in a more or less considerable part of the enemy front, ancl then to develop strategically the break-througii which has succeeded tactically." In tho first phase of his offensive the enemy seemed for a time to have prospects of penetrating the Allied front and "developing strategically the break-through," but' in the northern battle-area be is held up at an inconclusive stage. He has "broken in upon the enemy with concentrated masses," hut as matters stand ho is solidly held in front and dangerously menaced' on either flank. This is a condition of affairs which he cannot afford to accept passively a moment longer than is absolutely necessary, and in view of tho enormous expenditure of lives at which ho has achieved his present advance his natural course will lio to make unsparing efforts to clear his flanks and continue his drive towards the coast.

The_ somewhat startling announcement is mado by a, correspondent at Rotterdam that certain demands made or ahout to lie made by Germany will force Holland to take one side or the other in the. war. That similar predictions have been falsified in the past- does not necessarily mean that the one now made is unfounded, but it is doubtful if Germany has much to gain—she will, of course, look at the matter from 110 other, standpoint,—by forcing Holland into the war. ft is by no means certain in any case that Holland would elect to take Germany's side, lint if she. did her value to that country as a base of

supply would lie diminished. Germany has long coveted I lie .Dutch ports, but it she is in fact now hrin.v.'in.i pressure upon Holland it is p iimnbly in the hope of enlarging her present seriously depleted reservoir of man-power. Holland has shown little enough sympathy with the Allies, but if she is left any freedom of choice in the matter alliance with Germany is likely to present, few attractions.