THE NEW OFFENSIVE SPIRIT

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXIII, 9 December 1940, Page 4

THE NEW OFFENSIVE SPIRIT

THE swift manoeuvres of the new British army, reported on Saturday, make good reading. Many phases are naturally secret and the special correspondent of “The Times,” who watched the exercies, wishes he could tell us more, but enough has been said to show that the British strategists have adopted the new offensive technique completely. Quick movement—three-hundred miles were covered in seventy-two hours— “softspot” tactics by motorised units and effective air and ground co-opera-tion were features of the exercises, while the report speaks of “hushhush” co-operation between the air and land forces. We can only guess at what that may be, but observers who watched it thought it good.

The basis of the manoeuvres was also satisfying. It was assumed that the corps had made a successful new B.E.F. landing two days before moving into action. This may be taken as a pointer to fresh operations by land when the time is opportune and shows what is now generally known: that the British army is preparing to do to Hitler what Hitler has been seeking for some months now to do to Britain. He has a magnificent army but has been unable to get it where he wants it because he lacks the two essentials, control of the sea and control of the air. Control of the air did not enter into past campaigns beyond the last war, but seapower is an age-old problem. It confronted Napoleon a hundred and thirty years ago in just the same manner in which it confronts Hitler today. The great Corsican assembled an army near Cape Griz Nez, and twice embarked his troops aboard the vast fleet of flat-bottomed boats he had assembled to carry them across the Channel; but on each occasion he found it impossible to proceed very far because of the presence of the British Fleet in the waters of the Straits. Finally he abandoned the project altogether, and marched his troops away. Where Napoleon failed, what chance of success has Hitler?

Meantime, the British, while not under-estimating the threat of invasion, are not waiting for Hitler to come to them but are preparing to go to him. If he comes they are ready to receive him; if he does not then he must still meet the combined and ever-growing strength of the Allies. In the recent manoeuvres the bold assumption was made that a landing on enemy territory had been accomplished prior to the offensive. It is an axiom of conjunct warfare that the essentials to this are command of air and sea where the operation takes place. Britain commands the sea and she hopes to have just as definite command of the air before she embarks on offensive action. Thus she appears to have more of the requisites for a successful invasion than Germany possesses, because she has those essentials lacked by both Napoleon and Hitler.