PROGRESS OF THE WAR

New Zealand Times, Volume XL, Issue 8986, 8 March 1915, Page 4

PROGRESS OF THE WAR

• The effects of fhe Dardanelles bombardment are galvanising the Turk, who is calling in his forces from all sides for the defence of his capital. His ally also feels uneasy, for he has sent a crowd of German officers to help in the defence of the Gallipoli isthmus and peninsula, drawing them, according to an. Amsterdam message, from the western front. ‘ The Turk is described to-day as having given up all hope of a successful defence of the Dardanelles. One account even declares that he is taking guns off some of the forts and erecting them in haste on the islands in the Sea of Marmora. That looks like forlorn hope, for if tho guns are not fit to resist where they are, they will not be made fit by being shifted to another place. They are probably bringing the biggest guns they have from some other place than the Dardanelles. "

The Turk - is, according to a Bucharest message, u-SK.ng for naval assistance. It seems unlikely, because anyone knowing the naval position would know that it would be useless to ask for naval help from Germany or from Austria, for he would know that the big fleet of the one is bottled up in or about the Kiel Canal, and that the small fleet of the other is ditto in , Pola, neither having the smallest chance of getting out to the assistance of any place so ’far from their' places of refuge as the Dardanelles. But then it is probable that the Turk does not know the truth. He has been fed with the publications of the German ■ Truth Society, which represent the High Seas Fleet as masters of the situation, dominating a cowering Britain, which is being rapidly • choked to death by the irresistible strength of the navy, of hlood and iron. The Turk is being rapidly disillusionised on the point. Germany sends him a few martinets to help, his army to resist the _ fleet, and Austria advises him to shift his capital Somewhere, anywhere, bidding the poor wretch to depend trustfully on the “sweet bye-and-bye.” His temper is likely to be bad, and tho scarcity of food, which is making tho turbulent population of tho capital very discontented, will not mend matters. ,

Military help from tho Austro-Ger-man side for the siege of the capital is clearly out of tho question. It is not only that tho Russian army ol the Carpathians is stubbornly defeating all attempts to drive it back. That re* presents tho failure of the Austro-Uer-man strategy for the defeat of the Russian.. menace. of Silesia and. Hungary, which is becoming daily more pro* hounoed, and therefore a stronger pro* hibitiou of all movements in the diroo* tioh of Turkey. To-day, however, there is an equally significant Item of nows. It tolls ol a large french loan to various of tho smaller States, end one of those is Greece, which means that it is more than probable that the front of any possible expedition to* wards Turkey from Austria will be barred by half a million Greeks, while its rear is threatened by the possibility of a Russian invasion of Hungary. In the event of tho Russian defeat, the Greeks will ho in position to dispute tho road. la tho event of Russian Vie* tory the Greeks will bo able to march for Constantinople, swelling the forces assembling for the attack on the Turkish capital.

There might bo also iho possibility ot an Italian army coming into Unoi But the first operation of any Italian army, should Italy come into the war, would probably bo in the Trontino. The national desire to that effect would naturally bo irresistible.

The report of Admiral Carden, commanding the blockading fleet, enables ns to understand the Turkish fears on the subject. There is a good deal of detail in it of damage done to forts, of discoveries of gan positions, and the shelling of them, the clearance of the entrance on either side, and the steady sweeping of the mines, notwithstanding the bad weather prevailing on the water. Of all these the most suggestive is that the big ships are bombarding the forts in the Narrows, and Negara is especially mentioned by the Admiral. This is half-way up the channel, and the reason for the rapid progress is contained in the Admiral’s statement that the 15in guns of the Queen Elizabeth have done some very satisfactory work. That the other ships, British and French, are also doing good work he has made equally dear. Progress is, on the face of it, exceedingly rapid.

The German admiral commanding the Turkish fleet has brought his ships to the scene of operations, and the Goehen is apparently not of the number. Her absence from the list reminds us of the severe handling which

she got from the Russians in the Black Sea a few weeks ago, which was reported to have quite destroyed her usefulness, tho damage being beyond tho power cf any Turkish navy yard to make gcad. Her companion ship, the Breslau—in the famous escape early in the war wnich caused the court-martial of a Britisn admiral, which failed to get at any explanation of that disaster —is wirn Aami. ah Suchon. Being a light cruiser, she qae do nothing but look on at the bombardment. Indeed, the whole squadron flying the Crescent is nothing but a row of “ dead-heads” enjoying tho drama of the bombardment of the Dardanelles performed by a mixed Anglo-French-Russian company. If the Turks could have had the two battleships which Britain commandeered off the stocks at tho start of the war, and tho American obsoletes which tho Greeks managed to buy in spite of tho Turkish remonstrance, they would hawe. made a bettor showing. Even then their squadron could not have hoped to alter the fate of the bombardment.

There is nothing in the report of the land force under General d’Amadc. Neither is there any' mention of the Turkish army of Essad Pasha. It is to this army that the German officers from tho western front are supposed to be going. At tho rate at which tho bombardment* is progressing it is possible they may he in time only for superintending the Turkish army’s retreat. A rumour has reached here to the effect that tho Australasian contingent has had warning to be ready for some enterprise by the first of March. The date is past, but the enterprise is still interesting. More so indeed than ever in consequence of the news that the Turkish army of the Sinaitic Peninsula has been recalled to Constantinople in a hurry. This, if true, leaves tho forces in Egypt at liberty to detach considerable strength for tho Constantinople expedition.

The Admiral has reported one very suggestive fact- It is the attack on Smyrna by a strong squadron of his ships. Ho describes this as “a necessary incident of the main operations.” Another incident perhaps also necessary is the destruction of the oil depot at Saida, by, the French battleship Jaureguiberry, on the Ralestme coast. Wo can, only surmise that the Allies have determined to harass the flank of any force coming near the seashore on the march from Palestine towards Constantinople, and to land forces nearer Constantinople to intercept any troops hurrying to the defence of tho capital, an operation easily enough performed from Smyrna. The horizon is clearing about this attempt bn tho Turkish capital, which now begins to, loom very large as a comprehensive, wide-reaching, serious invasion.

The German press seeks to make discord among the Ali.es by deo*ar*ng that'Britain is-pressing on to Constantinople to gelt possession bolero the Russians dan ornve. •'■hey 19*" get that a Russian war vessel is wswi the bombarding fleet, fully (repreoeutng Russian interests. Their taunt, however, breaks down before the fuel that the operation in hand 1»_ evidently of vast magnitude, requiring considerable land forces. Of these only a small proportion has yet come mto view, and it is well within tho bounds of possibility that avßuMtian way will b© brought up to fill a considerable place allotted to- it. The Allies understand one another too woll_ to go about a great operation of this kind without previous agreement on all possible points. • • •

The submarine blockade adds, there seems every reason for believing, threo to the list of German submarines sunk, In Germany, the reception of the news will b© certain to bo followed by an outbreak of national fury like that which was caused by Admiral Bootty s great victory ovdr the second of the coast raids. That fury did not cotise any further attempts at raiding by the fast big cruisers of the High Setts Blest, This one will net bring back these sunken pirates from the vasty deep. Such disasters are enabling Germany to epoll out the moaning of n twilley el attrition. Their attempt to do eo against the British Navy was a ghastly failure from their point of view, ae their losses in tonnage amounted t© about five times the losses they Inflicted on the Brltsh Navy, In the case of the submarines, their spelling shows signs of being no more successful. • • • When von Tlrpits gave out the German intention of sweeping the trade of Britain away entirely by the Use of submarine craft, he seemed to speak with the authority of one who possessed a new and more formidable type of craft than anything known to the back number calling itself the British Navy. None of these superior vessels have yet come out of the Admiral's sleeve, and if wo are to believe the French Minister for Marine, these craft, if they exist at all, will be in no greater hurry to came out of that harbour of mystery than is the German High Boas Fleet ready to come but Into the North Bea, Indeed, M, Atigagneur declares he has quite positive information that there are no such craft. The assurance is good, as tho secret services of France are to be depended upon. But It was hardly necessary to prove the submarine blockade te be futile. The blockade has already done that lor itself. Never has such a big failure followed a bluff so colossal, or so quickly, ■• • •

The American press has taken the opportunity to run amok at the British retaliation for this futile blockade. It does bo on the very untenable ground that the retaliation is as barbarous os the blockade. Conspicuously is that wrong, because, as Mr Asquith put it so well the other day, “we do not propose to assassinate -die German sailor ” or any others. Effective blockade has been always in aooord with civilised usage. For example, take the case of a besieged city—would the American press demand for American vessels carrying food the right to enter the port of such a place, blockaded by the fleet of a belligerent and surrounded on the land side by his army? Of course, the demand would be scouted by every country. Britain is only making blockade effective in that sense. It hits the great money-making interests which control the bulk of the American press, and as a matter of course the press howls. But the right of effective blockade remains. What is more the American public which ceased to clamour when it discovered that the whole uproar against the “ search ” of the British cruisers was put up by a hand of contraband smugglers, evading fraudulently the rules of neutrality, will have just as little sympathy for the money-making persons who are

making tho press squeal in l i- 1 tercsts.

A message makes the bald statement that certain German admirals say that the strain on tho submarine crews is so great that tho blockade ■ftiil bo suspended for a week. It is a clumsy excuse for the complete failure of the blockade. Before they began, the Germans knew just as well as the British, and French and other people who use submarines, what the strain of submarine work is, and they Know that whatever it is it never puts a stop to such a work. Hitherto that work was honourable. The moment the Germans tried to have it done under dishonourable circumstances it failed. Why? Because the crows refuse to do such dirty work; not being pirates and assassins. Only the other day an admiral offered larger rewards than ever, putting the men on the level of bravos who are hired to do murder. If the work was so dreadfully arduous, why was that reward offered? Yesterday the admirals were urging the men out to do more killing. To-day they suspend the blockade because it is too arduous. It will take a good deal to persuade tho world that the men have not refused point-blank, on account of tho dishonour. 'lt is not the danger that deters them, because the German submarines have faced the danger cheerfully enough when the work was honourable. just as ours and the French and the Russians do. The stoppage of the German work clearly points to refusal to face a dishonour which is being execrated by mankind everywhere in good set terms. If we are right, we shall hear no more of the submarine blockade, of course. All these stories, which are fair subject of comment, may he untrue. If so, the blockade must be regarded as breaking down by reason of the impossibility of the service assigned to the submarine division of the German Navy. We confess, however, that we should like .to believe feat the Gorman sailors have adminiSbred a pract’cal rebuke to tho War Lord and his officers • * * Count Beirnstorfl regrets the Asturias incident, on the ground that the Bed Cross marks were not sufficiently illuminated. It is. nt all events, a pica that tho line of barbarism is drawn to exclude hospital ships.

Two items of the Petrograd news to-day require confirmation. One is the semi-official statement that tho Germans have captured Grodno; the other that the Austrians have evacuated Czernowitz. The first is unlikely, because the Russian advance is described by a “ Times ” correspondent at Warsaw as uniform and irresistible, which it certainly could not bo it tno Germans had out the chief Warsaw railway line. Tho second is itnprobabiofor tho present, ns tho Russians are described only as crossing tho Lukwa river after capturing Stanislovo, though they wore reported some days ago as being within throe miles of tho Bukowian capital. At that distance they would not have been content With merely reporting the evacuation, they would have marched into the place •aid so.

Tho improbability of the capture of Orcdno is suggested by tbe hews of the great disaster inflicted on the German right Wing invaders at Kierzek, which at last seriously threatens their communications. The frontier there is the most vulnerable point, for it offers no natural obstacles to the advance of an army as tbe Masurian Lakes do at the other end. At the Same time, fiS the Germans are pressing tbe siege of Ossiewioz not far south and west of Grodno, tlie menace on their right must be regarded as not sufficiently developed to nave affected their sense of security of their line.

la tire Carp;: the long battle has apparent?;, l .nitrated tat© a great struggle for . Dakin Bass. It is the most important of all the passes, the key, indeed, to tho whole Chain, and the Austrians are directing _ their main effort there, with groat vigour, hut fruitlessly. • ,* . • On the Western front, tho progress of the Allies continue© steady. It is getting time fdr the groat effort to bring up the reserves and decide the long battle. That operation is probably facilitated by the failure of tho submarine black ado, and encouraged by the suggested food riots reported from Germany this morning. It it true that the 11 Cologne Gasotto " is reported to havo published statistics prering (hat the labour market and the railway returns are evidence of very sound economic conditions in Germany. But the statistics are accompanied by the food riots, which seem to remind us that sound economic conditibnfl may _he found in conjunction with a scarcity of food.

There is a suggestive item this morning. Germany is reported to have asked the United States to take oyer her diplomatic affairs. _ At once one asks what nation or nations ore likely to cease diplomatic relations with Germany P Italy is on the verge of war, and Greece has accepted a loan from France, and changed her Ministry. There is food for speculation here.