Grim, Calculated Mystification Game

Northern Advocate, 26 April 1944, Page 6

Grim, Calculated Mystification Game

(Special) LONDON. April 25 "Looking to the second front as the summit of the conflict, the Atlantic democracies have had to pass steads lastly through the grinding ordeal of patience,’’ remarks Mr J. L. Garvin, in the Sunday Express." "It is coming to an end. There may be some weeks yet; there may be but a few days, or some first flash of Allied action may come any moment like a thunderclap from the clear sky. It is a grim game of calculated mystification. At the bottom of it there is no uncertainty of mind, but the opposite. The western war chiefs base themselves on the precision of their secret timetable and definition of their whole strategical programme. To keep the enemy on tenterhooks is their business. To be prepared for anything—or even nothing—in this last test of waiting, is ogr business." Mr Garvin adds that the banning of diplomatic privileges must not be taken as an unmistakable sign that the zero hour, in the greatest sense, is near. Must Be "Marne Gap” "Liberator” in "The Observer.” commenting on gaps in the Nazi defence, says to the puzzlement of the public we are still told that, despite thenlosses, the Germans have 300 divisions in the field—almost the same number with which they started out to Moscow three years ago. He adds: “Somewhere the Germans are short of troops and the nominal strength of their divisions does not reveal it. Somewhere on the vast German perimeter, there is a "Marne Gap,” which the Germans will not be able to close when they are engaged fully and simultaneously on all fronts. This is the essential purpose of a two or three front attack; it must expose the enemy’s Achilles Heel; this is the aim of invading armies that stand in wait; this is what German propaganda is now trying, with all its might, to hide.”