Exhilarating Effect Of Sweeping Advance

Northern Advocate, 21 August 1944, Page 2

Exhilarating Effect Of Sweeping Advance

(Special)

LcNDON, > August 20,

Events in France have had an exhilarating effect on the public here Just as tne tall of Prance in the black days ot 1940 was tne preluae to a long, bitter struggle, so now tne impending liberation presages the orighter days ot history.

One ot the chief queries is how soon victory will come. "Tne Observer," in a leader, comments that the glorious news of the last week must not make us forget logic in the joy ot a triumph achieved.

‘•We still have about eight weeks’ campaigning weather before us,' tne paper says, "if we can keep up the present splendid rate of progress we may move in mat short tune to complete the liberation of France. Whether we can also oear a sufficient part or tne Low Countries to relieve London from the threat of bombardment, cannot yet De guaranteed. "That we can also mount a fullscale invasion ot Germany is, while real, organised German resistance remains, improbable. The tenacity of this resistance is a question mark. Nor do prospects look very different oh the eastern front. Political Weapons “The Russians, held ai present, may wen hepo m a renewed offensive, lo onve ' the Germans from me rest of i-oiand. perhaps mast Prussia, before tne mud ciogc operations, but ihe possibility or another winter offensive so much runner from their bases is anotner crucial question. Merely on the ground of milhary logic, then, an organised, military war might, well drag on and no terms can be set to tin following guerilla war as long as Nazi leadership keeps its grip.” "Military icgic at tins stage is not by any means everytning," tne article adds, "and urges that the Allies must look to political weapons as well to ' help icshorten the war.” “Liberator,” in “The Observer,” thinks that Germany is doing ail she can to gam time, for that is all sne can gain. German scientists are undoubtedly working hard and fast to complete something which ine Germans hope will re-establish tile equilibrium that will make possible a negotiated peace and escape from complete disaster. Playing For Time “Liberator" continues: “It is now obviously m Hitler’s interest if he can make the Allied advance expensive in tune, just as it is in the Allied interest to give no opportunity to do so. It would upset all Nazi plans for the final phase of me war, for their own fighting retreat into the Reich, if they are unable to preserve a large part of the German Army intact.” “Liberator" adds that as a result of the fighting in France, the German Army can move, can fight in small parties, and can resist stubbornly in places, but it is still no longer a “Grande Armee.” “That is the big news of the day, bigger even than the imminent liberation of Paris.” he says. What Faces Germans "The German High Command we may lie certain, will shirk no expense in blood to buy this ability to concentrate and delay. That is the issue at Paris this week-end, that above all. Can the combined Allied armies and can the air force*} .assisting' them, prevent such a German concentration? "Today this is more important even than the annihilation of part of the German forces. If von Kluge gets no opportunity to disengage and reassemble ii is forces, other roads beyond Paris—even more decisive—will lie open to the Allies.” Mr .1. L. Garvin, in the “Sunday Express," considers that the position of the Germans is already hopeless in all Franco south of tile Middle Loire and . Upper Seine. Through all that sipace they are preparing to quit in haste. It means the abandonment of three-quarters of the country and it is not believed by expert opinion that Hitlerism can constitute another army in France capable of resisting the -March of the Allies. Mr Garvin adds that though the Nazi death fight is still sinister, its .last resources are being ground to exhaustion. Russia’s accumulating weight is impending. If we could visualise Europe as a whole with air superiority and control of the waters round it, we should see two things—the majestic progress of the Allies towards nil annihilating triumph and the spectacle of a convulsive Hitlerism bleeding to death.