THE WAR

Evening Post, Volume XCIII, Issue 89, 14 April 1917, Page 4

THE WAR

Professor Bidou confirms -a - currentsuggestion that the Germans intend to. abandon position warfare in the west for a war of manoeuvre. He also confirms a current deduction that the immediate purpose of the short successive retirements is- to elude the British heavy artillery. When the British heavies and their ammunition are brought with great labour into an attacking position, the Germans will, he thinks, step back again, and thnsigainxseveral weeks before the guns can be mewed iip and prepared for-the new attack.. Progress backward, if continued longvenough, means, defeat, and ultimately overthrow.; but the enemy..'s*-eottnter-&ssets wflT be a shorterfront and time for the submarines to complete (if they can) their job. On paper there -is something to be eaid'.for the German argument, but it will •prob,abry be found in practice that no army can be saved by; repeated baefcstepping -and side-stepping. In fact, the object attributed v to Hindenburg—a war of manoeuvre—is in itself a confession that the.<back-stepping is not in»itself a-policy but a transition stage to rsomething eke.

That "something.else" is, as;indicated,, -an offensive with masses Of manoeuvre '. troops, which are being trained in open -work with little regard, to permanent . entrenchment. It would "be quite unwarranted to assume that the'trainers of the new British armies, or of an.important ■ section of them, have failed to attend to the same need. Besides special training, Professor Bidou makes the point that Germany is equipping with special artillery of a medium and mobile nature, in preference to the cumbersome heavies, and distinct from the lighter ■ .-field guns. What the British position. in medium guns is we'do not know, but it is as v little likely to be neglected as is the manoeuvre training. Such a development as Professor Bidou indicates contains nothing of magic and probably little of mystery. What is new is the .statement that the arming with medium. i guns will be consummated on the enemy side in June. Before then the battle may be right off the Somme and on the Belgian side of the watershed. There is one thing mom important than what -tb,9-§Re»y- is geJung-tPr do, and that is

what our own side is going to do. At present indications we are likely to do it first. ...

The enemy's new Drocourt-Queant line is a reserve line drawn through the lower country, and screening Douai. The Queant end of it is threatened by the British from Croisilles. Between Croisilles and Queant is BuDecourt, where the British were -driven back by a counter-attack, in which the enemy lost heavily but recovered the ground. At the Drocourt end of the line the British threat is from Vimy ridge, but there is a good deal of ground to cover here before, the British confront- Drocourt and turn the enemy's Lens position. First of all, the British on Vimy ridge must capture Givenchy-en-Gohelle (northward of the ridge) and the Vimy villages (Petit Vimy and Vimy). That will not take long when the guns are in position, but to move heavy guns takes time. Midway in the Drocourt-Queant line is the region of the river Scarpe. Progress is reported north of the Scarpe, and south of it the Cojeul line has been extended, our captures here having added the villages of Heinenel, Wancourt, and Guemappe to the previous ones (Monchy and Henin-sur-Coje.ul). The city of Arras is now doubly insured against destructive attack.... During Monday and Tuesday six German divisions lost prisoners to such an amount that no division lost less than one thousand. From that fact it is easy to deduct the sorry condition of those- six divisions.

.Vigorous British attacks and advances between Cambrai. and St. Quentin, and by the French south of St. Quentin, show that the Hindenburg " line is nowhere being allowed to rest. French strategists believe that the line is definitely turned by the last successes south of St. Quentin. As usual, £he Germans are destroying a city that they cannot hold. Meanwhile, the artillery activity in the Western Champagne does not. abate. Everything points to fresh German retirements, more hurried than those preceding them.

American money can do much for theEntente; so can American ships, both naval and mercantile; The American Bear-Admiral Simms, on a. mission to London to arrange for naval co-opera-tion with the Admiralty, is the'officer who advised his own 'Naval Board, after the Battle of Jutland, that the sinking of three British battle-cruisers in that battle did not mean a condemnation of battle-cruisers. He considered the losswas due not to the demerits of the battlecruiser principle, but to the application of it; and his report indicated an adverse opinion of the British strategy at Jutland. Now that a German raider has been sighted ofi Yucatan, the American warships in the. Caribbean Sea will have something to do. Not less important is the American shipbuilding scheme. Mr. W. M. Hughes lately stated that ships were being sunk faster than British shipbuilding can replace {hem. Now the United States promises to come to the rescue with wooden ships of 2000 tons and upwards built at. express speed, under the direction of MajorGeneral Goethals. ■ Wooden ships are a reversion to, first principles, but no doubt will be engine-propelled. The scheme is' most promising. .It will ease the! demand for. steel, and will help the British Vulcan, who has. naval construction as well as mercantile shipbuilding crowding in upon his busy yards.

Though ruthlessness is.setting the world against Germany, the destruction of two more hospital ships is announced today ; and one was sunk without warning. Spain appears to be on the brink of a diplomatic breach with Berlin. Uruguay is similarly placed, and Brazil has broken, despite the German menace in her southern provinces. Brazil has seized German merchantmen and is arming hey own. , Norway's thoughts run in a similar direction. . In- the allied State of Bulgaria anti-Germanism is also active, and General Sarrail has conveyed, per aeroplane, to the Bulgar soldiers some stirring information of riots in their own country and of German platoons shooting civilians in the streets of Sofia.

A resolution of the Workmen's Committee infers that the Russian Provisional Government has dropped annexation ideas, and calls on all belligerents to do likewise. Meanwhile an army deputation demands the dissolution of the committee because- ii is anti-disciplinarian; tc> which the Socialistic Minister of Justice, M. Kerensky, replies that the committee is "necessary to secure the full programme of the democratic revolution." Reluctant tib antagonise either side, the Provisional Government adopts a policy of compromise and patience, and hopes for the best. v

At a time' when there is doubt as to the preparedness of tlhe New Russia for the summer campaign, it is reassuring to recall what the staunch General Brusiloff stated to an interviewer on the eve of the New "Year.- Russia, said the • General, would not be able to develop all her forces before'the-spring of 1917, *but Russia would then possess the greatest and'*completest army in her history. Throughout 1916 Russia, had had to •' fight witS. a notable inferiority in war material and heaVy guns, but in 1917 she would find herself mistress of material quite equal to that of her adversaries, while at the same time disposing an extraordinary superiority of' men; and this advantage would continue to grow in her favour until the end of the war. General Brnsiloff added that, in his personal view, even from the beginning of the war the adversaries of Russia had never had tfhe smallest possi-bility-of winning a decisive victory, but that, while these adversaries continued to. report ' a succession of victories in the field, it would bedifficult to persuade* ' them that ■ they' were ■ certain-- to be de- '• 'feated.

It was,-of'course, prior to^the revolutioninat General Brusiloif sounded this confident note. But even then he was ■Dot blind to the disadvantages Russia. suffered under the reactionaries; and it is still an open question whether the army's efficiency will be anj less under the revolution. While the revolution may have affected, discipline, reaction handicapped- munitionment and fostered treachery; and General Brusiloff's apparent preference of the new regime to the old seems to indicate. fairly well which of the two evils appears to him to be the lesser. Brusiloff has a soldier's habit of loyalty, without being blind to the defects of his political controllers. Last year, referring to the "dark" forces in' Petrograd, lie is said to have told the war correspondents at his headquarters: "Not a line can you write from' here —not a message will go forth till something happens. In Petro-' grad they have a switchboard with connections with Berlin." The date of this, remark is given as April, 1916. Yet, despite his disquieting knowledge concerning things in Petrograd, he plunged almost at once into the 1916 offensive, and from May to August made great advances in Bukpwina and Galicia, also towards Kovel, where the point of his salient was maintained west of the Stochod-until-the German attacks within, the last fortnight. Russia's Stochod. losses are but a fractipn of _those inflicted on the Austriaas and * Germans from May to August. Unfortunately, the latter -month found ttoe Russian , southern armies pretty near the end of .their.resources, and tlieyuw.ere unabje, : .to

rescue Rumania in September, October, and November. Probably when thetruth is known the Rumanian collapse will be found to be mainly the result of munitional deficiencies due to Germanophile influences exerted in high places in'< the Russian capital. \