FOUR MONTHS’ WAR

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20143, 12 January 1940, Page 12

FOUR MONTHS’ WAR

REVIEW IN BRITAIN GROUND FOR CONTENT NAZIS ON DEFENSIVE LONDON, Dec. 31. The year 1929 has seen, a record output of legislation. There have been 120 Acts of Parliament in Britain, half of them in the last six months. This is due to the change from peace to war, and compares with 72 Acts in 1938. A survey of four months of war entitles the Allies to the satisfaction that there have not yet occurred land battles involving slaughter on the scale of Ypres, Verdun, the Somme, or Passchendaele. The naval position is thoroughly encouraging. The Allies have certainly. done better than during the same period of the last war. If they can maintain the same proportion between the destruction of submarines and the losses of merchant shipping, the position of the Allies in the future will not become worse. The British blockade is proving effective, and British seaborne commerce is safer than that of neutrals. While the most daring prophet hesitates to predict whether 1940 will see the end of the war, there is _u welter of speculation. Several main facts of the war stand out. First, the defensive character of Germany’s strategy.’ Secondly, the ineffectiveness of the air arm as an independent weapon. Thirdly, the poor condition of the German railways. Some military observers —pointing to the fact that the Italian Foreign Minister, Count Ciano let the cat out of the hag by declaring that Italy and Germany had agreed that Germany required live veers, while Italy required three years, to prepare for a major war—predict that Germany will continue her uncharacteristic immobility on the Western Front throughout 1949. Mutual Bombings

Seeing that mutual bombing have so far been confined U) warships and naval depots, it is impossible to predict how the enormous Empire Air Force now being created will he used. Germany, which ordinarily one would expect to he the first belligerent to embark on the indiscriminate bombof cities, still refrains possibly because she wishes to retain her Air Force intact for co-operation in an Army offensive. *

The majority of commentators envisage that intense lage-scale air warfare is inevitable within two months.

German military authorities will receive a shock over the report ordered on the condition of the railways. The first inkling of the had state of the railways came when the heavy traffic necessitated by the speedy transportation of troops from Poland to the West failed to adhere to schedule. The series of railway accidents since the outbreak of war has proved that replacement steel for lailway lines and iron for sleepers have been diverted to munition factories and shipyards.

Rolling stock has been allowed to deteriorate and decrease. Timber and steel for carriages and locomotives have been rationed in favour of Army purposes. Iron repairs on. bridges have been neglected. Thus Germany, in striving to conserve stocks of ores has unwittingly lengthened the time required to move reinforcements when these are hurriedly needed. Rumours persist that Grand Admiral Raeder, Cbmmander-in-ChicT of the Navy, is wantin'? new naval bases, and continues to urge an Army move into Holland to take bases. The Army leaders oppose the move, and alternately suggest that the Navy get an Arctic base, enabling it to attempt to close the north-west passage between the Shetlands and Norway. Russia sd far has parried the suggestion that she should supply such a base.