NOTES ONJHE WAR

Evening Post, Volume CXXXV, Issue 151, 28 June 1943, Page 5

NOTES ONJHE WAR

AXIS MAN-POWER

STRAIN BY ATTRITION

With the weight and tempo of the Allied air offensive in Europe ever increasing until it has reached, if not passed, the calculates proportions for crippling1 the enemy's war machine within months, the effect- of this war of attrition on Germany particularly may be discussed. It has now become a struggle, in. Hitler's words, to see which side will tire ffrst. •If the weight of bombs dropped by the Allies on Axis objectives lias attained the norm set by some experts of 10,000 tons a week, which, if maintained on the average, would-be sufficient in the opinion of ■ these experts to knock Germany .out in six months, the Allied air losses given by Mr. Elmer Davies, of the Washington 0.W.1., as, 173 for last week, are also more than equal to the loss of an average of 600 planes a month regarded by the experts as expendable. The present Allied - air operations may perhaps be regarded as. partly, an experiment to test out the theory of all-out air warfare, L'victory through air power," and partly as a preparation for the "second front in. Europe," so urgently sought for so long by the Russians. Discussing Germany's capacity, after the failure of the blitzkrieg, to wage a war of attrition, Peter Saar in the New York "Nation" says that a protracted war of- attrition leaves but one chance of victory for Germany—the undermining of the enemy's morale, the collapse of his home, front. This , is no longer a problem in strategy; it is a matter of speculation. Saar continues: "A war of attrition forces Germany constantly to conquer new supply bases for the ever-growing needs of that war. But every such move reduces its man-power reserves, so that in the event of a prolonged war and superior enemy strategy, the moment must come when the Reich no longer has enough hands to hold and utilise what it has conquered." Frustrated Hopes. A blitzkrieg, a short, sharp, and , victorious war, is the only form of war adapted to the geographic, . economic, : and military situation of Germany. Her three successful wars in the brief . period between 1864 and 1871—the : wars against Denmark (1864), Austria (186.6), and France (1870-71)— were all , blitzkriegs—fought and won in a few ! months. It w:.s intended by the GerL man High Command to; make World . War I a blitzkrieg, to be ended by the . occupation of Paris before Christmas, . 1914. The Battle of the Marne, of t course, settled that point, and Ger- . many was beaten, after fifty-two . months, in a war of attrition. Similar hopes in this war were frustrated first . m the west in the summer of 1940* by I th-> Battle of Britain, and, second, in > the east by the tough resistance: of the ' Russians in 1941. ;. Germany is now in the later stages , of a war of attrition just as she was in 1918. At that time there was a proposal to give up the.Ukraine, occupied after the Peace of Brest-Litovskv with the Soviet, and transfer the divisions there to the Western Front. Ludendorff said no. "The Supreme Command," he said, "marched into the Ukraine because we needed the region for the implementation of our war economy. ... If we withdraw, the situation of our war industry will gravely,deteriorate." Hitler finds himself in the same situation now. He said, in a speech late last year on the Caucasus offensive, "We were mainlyinterested in obtaining the great space for the purpose of rendering it usable for our warfare." That is why Germany clings so desperately to the Ukraine and the Donbas today. Losses Then and Now. In the last war at the Armistice after fifty-two months' fighting Germany alone of the Central Powers had lost 2,000,000 Germans out of a total of 13,250,000 mobilised during the four and a quarter years. This was 15.1 per cent, of the German effectives, and did not include prisoners or those incapacitated by wounds or disease. The man-power reserves had been used up in a war of attrition. In this war Germany, with the larger population of 79,000,000, including Austria and Sudetenland, had about 17,000,000 mea of draft age between, 18— and ' 45, theoretically available:; In 1941 nearly1 half of this number were soldiers in arms'—say,:B,ooo,ooo men;:: This was the army when Russia was attacked in the expectation of another blitzkrieg. Expectations were upset by the tenacity of the Russian opposition, and in a war of attrition Germany has suffered casualties largely exceeding those of the whole of World War I. With all the enlistment of foreign labour for German war industry and the enrolment of., women to relieve men for active service, Saar concludes that the position of Germany today is very much as it was in 1918. Hitler has declared: "We must hold everything and must wait to see who tires soonest." The Allied aim must then be to give him no breathing spell in, 1943.