NOTES ON THE WAR

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 64, 16 March 1945, Page 4

NOTES ON THE WAR

IN RETROSPECT

CAMPAIGN IN WEST

On both the Western and Eastern Fronts of the war in Europe the comparative lull in events, noted yesterday, continues. In a sense there is a similar lull in the war against Japan. Not that fighting has ceased in either theatre—far from it. But the present activities do not constitute major operations or general offensives. In the West the Allies are finishing off certain jobs that must be done to avoid hitches like the Ardennes counter-offensive at Christmas or the German Come-back towards Budapest and the Danube on the Eastern Front. But the prospect of an early end to the war in Europe—earlier than many anticipated at the New Year—is now bright enough for Mr. Churchill to drop his reluctance to prophesy by telling the Conservative conference that the war "might well be over before the end of the summer, or even sooner." At this point in the pause of major operations it is worth while looking back a few months. The Ardennes counter-offensive, now a matter of history, upset many prophets and optimists and gave rise to equally unbalanced jeremiads. It was &n inevitable reaction from the overweening confidence of the latter part of 1944, when the Western Allies had swept over France with what should have been suspected as ominous ease. Even the leaders then Were openly committing themselves to utterances on the probable date Of victory, utterances which now seem fantastic at such a stage. At the beginning of December, Hanson Baldwin, never a super-optimist, felt compelled to issue a warning in one of his commentaries in the "New York Times." "The most pertinent fact about the war in Europe and the Pacific," he said, "is that there has been no decision, and there are no prospects of an early one. Nearly every „ week since the general Allied offensive started in Europe on November 16, there have been reports of 'breakthrough' and 'smashing' victories. But there have been no breakthroughs and there have not yet been smashing victories. . . . In other words, there is still a war to be won; the battles of decision are still to be fought, and a bloody and, probably, a long road still lies ahead. But the public, falsely buoyed up by our summer successes in Europe and by the early .exaggerated reports of Philippine successes, is just beginning to realise this, and to settle back into the rough groove of war." Oties from Leaders. For this "tide of over-optimism" Baldwin blames partly newspapers for the use of expressions that "often convey a .totally false impression" of a particular battle. "But," he adds, "fundamentally the papers and the people have taken their cues from their leaders, and especially from their military leaders." He quotes as examples Admiral Halsey's famous prediction about the end of the Japanese war; General Arnold's claim to have "destroyed" most of Germany's economy many times, and his similarly confident assertions about Japan; General Mac Arthur's communiques "often prematurely and overly optimistic"; even General Eisenhower's expressed hopes of ending the European war in 1944, and General Marshall's committing to print in December last the opinion that "before this statement is published (on December 7) hostilities might have terminated in the European theatre." The references are to American military leaders, but Field-Marshal Montgomery has been equally outspoken. The truth is that the British and American military leaders —the Russians have made no such definite dated predictions— seem to have overlooked, in the exhilaration of a long spell of success, the age-old dictum that war, of all phenomena, is the most unpredictable in its evolution. A Veteran's Dictum. When the Ardennes counter-offen-sive reached its high-water mark in sight of the Meuse on December 28 General Peyton C. March, veteran U.S. Chief of Staff in World War I, on his eightieth birthday (December 27), recalled that on his previous birthday he had said that victory in Europe in 1944 was "not on the cards." General March suggested anyone could start estimating how long the war in Europe would last when the Germans had been driven back to' their border again. "When they have been driven back to the border," he said, "start figuring how many divisions and how long; it took. Then you will get an idea of how long the war is going to last in Europe. A people fighting on their home soil is far different from an army defending occupied territory." Clausewitz Quoted. General March waved aside any comparison of Rundstedt's Ardennes drives with Ludendorff's 1918 thrust on the Somme. He said that Ludendorfr expected to win, but he declared his disbelief in any such enemy expectations from the Ardennes operation. Hanson Baldwin agrees that the comparison, though "tempting," is "distinctly dangerous." He adds: "It must be underscored and emphasised and reiterated that Nazi fanaticism knows no surrender, and the German home front and the German army are today under most rigid Nazi control. Karl yon Clausewitz has always been the apostle of German military philosophy, and more than ever before Nazi domination of the German mind makes this passage from yon Clausewitz pertinent: "'No State should believe its fate, that is, its entire. existence, to be dependent on one battle, no matter how decisive it be. If it is beaten, the calling forth of fresh forces and the natural weakening which every offensive undergoes in the long run may bring about a turn of fortune, or assistance may come from abroad. There is always still time to die.' "This is a credo of last-ditch resistance, and even if the German counteroffensive is stemmed and the Nazi tide should recoil upon itself we shall probably face a bitter enemy defensive, a last-ditch resistance." This appeared on December 27; since then much has happened. The British and Americans have reached the western last ditch" of the Rhine and crossed it at one point; the Russians are on the eastern "last ditch" of the Oder and across it over a wide stretch. ■S }yhole question is now: "What will the Germans do?" Will they at last recognise that the situation is quite hopeless and yield, or will they I stul fight on? On the answer depends the date of the end of the war