THE FALL OF ANTWERP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVI, Issue 17167, 22 May 1919, Page 7

THE FALL OF ANTWERP.

FRENCH'S EXPLANATION.

BLAME PUT ON KITCHENER. Australian and N.Z. Cable Association.

(Recti. 5.40 p.m.) LONDON". May 20. Continuing his account of the campaign in 1914 Lord French offers further criticisms of Kitchener in connection with French's efforts to effect a speedy move north when the fall of Antwerp was imminent. He says: ' Kitchener did not make things easy for me. He was keenly desirous of influencing the course of operations. His telegrams quickly followed one another, each containing directions regarding the local situation of which he could know little. For instance, he told me he was communicating with Joffre and the French Government. I was not aware of what was passing between them. At the same time he was urging me to make what I knew to be impracticable suggestions to , Joffre. I must repudiate any reS sponsibility for what happened in the north during the first 10 days in October.'' French states that when he was in Paris he discussed with Kitchener the Antwerp expedition. The Minister for War explicitly told him that the British there were not under his command, and " will not for the present be considered part of your force." " I certainly would have made different dispositions of these troops," says Lord l'rench, ' and regret that I must record my deliberate opinion that the best which could be done throughout a critical situation was not done owing entirely to Lord Kitchener's endeavour to unite in himself the distinct roles of Cabinet Minister and Commander-in-Chief." Lord French quotes a telegram in which he even demanded whether ! General Rawlinson regarded himself as under his orders, and proceeded: " When Antwerp was threatened I Kitchener, unknown to me, ananged | with Joffre to send one or two French territorial divisions to act with the British marine?." li was perfectly clear that the operations for the relief of Antwerp should never have been directed fiom London. They actually had no 1 intluciKi' on the fate of Antwerp, and could equally well have protected the Belgian retreat from a safer and : inorf effective direction. The expedition might have saved Lille by 'landing on September ■> at Calais or 1 Boulogne, and deploying six or seven days later in the Valley of the L.vs. I It might also have, saved Ostcnd arid even Zecbrugge.