PROGRESS OF THE WAR

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIII, Issue 10088, 30 September 1918, Page 4

PROGRESS OF THE WAR

To-day the reports show greater progress than anything done during the four years of the war. The progress reported by the Allies and admitted by the enemy covers the crumbling of three enemy fronts —the West front from the North Sea to the Moselle, the Balkan front of over 200 miles, the Palestine front from the Mediterranean at Acre to the Hedjaz railway, east of the Jordan. Wherever the eye turns on the map it is arrested by the serious, in some cases spectacular, defeat of the Central Powers. The great day is dawning on which all the patriotic optimism ■ of four years will bo more than justified, on which the utter defeat of the etale-matofs and the blind disciples of the . doctrinaire Bloch will be made manifest, on which further mischief by the pacifists will be impossible.

In tho midst of the reports of this great series of victories we get tho statement that the great railway strike in Wales lias practically oildcd, and we have tho suggestion that it was engineered by pacifists. This will probably bo #ie subject of inquiry, and.it inquiry leads to court-martials and executions, it will only bo tho punishment that disloyalty may legitimately expect in war. Tho subject is nasty, whichever way you look at it. If it is true that pacifists got in such a shrewd stroke which might have been fatal to tho armies in the very moment of victory, it is deplorable, on the one hand, that there should be in tho country such hideous treason, and, on tho other, that the workers should have been so easily deceived into playing tho game of treason. If it is not true that pacifists did this dirty work, then what is there that can excuse a strike at a moment when so much depends on tho smooth working of tho national transport.

Tho details of tho great Macedonian offensive aro not as copious as might bo wished, but tho Bulgarian Government has made it possible to understand tho gravity of tho enemy’s situation without going into details at all. The request of that Government for an armistice is quito enough to prove that tho armies are in desperate straits. Tho request has, of course, been refused. It was tho treachery of Bulgaria that caused tho Serbian disaster, and gave the Balkan corridor to the Central Bowers. 'The natural consequence is that tho Bulgarian Govorn-

mont cannot bo trusted for a moment. A Government with that record would certainly use an. armistice for the iniprovement of its military position. To have ’given an armistice would have been to throw away tho victory-, and make certain of a long war. Berlin, well aware of the position, proclaims that the request for an armistice is not supported by King or Cabinet. The statement is not worth tho paper on which it is printed, and does not conceal the decisive character of tho Bulgarian defeat. The Bulgarian representatives will be allowed to talk about peace, but the Allies will go on hammering the life out of the Bulgarian armies.

One detail that came through by Saturday- mornfsig is very illuminating, for it shows that the assault on the long Bulgarian lino was general, and according to a comprehensive tactical plan. While French, Serbian, and Greek troops assaulted Jesof’s armies, on the left, and Serbians drove the wedge up tho Vardar Valley which reached Ishtip and Veles, the British and Greek troops on the Doiran front attacked the formidable Belachitza range with such weight and determination that not a man could be sent by the enemy to help his centre and right. This assault was not a containing action. It was intended to break through, and, by a great feat of arms, it did break through, driving the enemy towards Stvumnitza, in the valley of the river of the same name, and eventually capturing the place. By that time the attack by the wedge in the Vardar had developed, and the enemy’s line been broken in two. The Allied left got into Prilep at the same time, and seized position after position for many miles in the mountain region between Monastir and TJskub, threatening Jesbf’s flying army with dire disaster. Tho shock to the Bulgarian armies not only sent them reeling backwards in confusion, losing prisoners, guns, and stores in vast quantities, blit shook the Austrian lines in Albania so terribly' that the Austrian armies find themselves compelled to retire from Albania and Montenegro towards Serbia. An armistice would have suited the enemy wonderfully well. The chances are that the destruction of the Bulgarian central armies will endanger the retiring Austrians very seriously by envelopment of overwhelming forces.

Tho British advance against Oambral, reported briefly on Saturday, was the expected development of Sir Douglas Haig’s tenacious offensive against tho Hindenburg line. What is most significant about this assault is that it is made partly by a new army, the Ninth. one of those which General Maurice said had not yet had a. say in the fighting. The assault advanced by Saturday on a thirteen-mile front, crossed seven miles of the Hindenburg line (that is. smashed so much of that formidable proposition that was going to bo defehded to the last man), including five miles of the canal which was going to stop all the tanks for evermore, and got within three miles of Camhrai. The next report shows it on the Douai. Cambrai road, which looks very like a break through. Of course there is a large tale of prisoners, guns and stores. One wonders at the same time what the German engineers did with the canal waters with which they were going to stop the British advance with a prohibition line of cold water. There must have been a slight exaggeration about that; perhaps tho last manifestation of the grovelling before the groat German military' machine which has been such a‘marked feature of this war.

This advance has readied up close to Cambrai, retaking everything lost in the German counter-attack of last November, besides getting past the Douai-Cambrai road. Bourlon and the Bourlon Wood are in its hands, and there is an unconfirmed report that Cambrai has been abandoned. This offensive was strongly resisted by the enemy, but the resistance was overcome by skilful leading and determined fighting I and very quickly. The blow for which recent advances towards St. Quentin were the preparation has been smartly delivered, and is still in progress. The tanks and 'air men contributed splendid service, and the engineers did splendid work in throwing bridges over the canal under heavy shell fire, bridges fit for transport, ensuring the maintenance of the great thrust.

Far to the north the Belgians and British have opened another powerful offensive, which has captured Poelcapello, and outflanked Passchendaele. The objective is clearly to sweep the enemy off the Flanders ridges north of Ypres, and turn him out of West Flanders. The naval forces arc cooperating hy bombarding Ostcnd and Zeobruggc. This will bring the remainder of the enemy’s linos in the occupied country into violent action. The illuminating comment of a correspondent is that Marshal Poch is bringing the whole of his forces into action from the North Sea to the Moselle, and henceforth big smashing blows will bo the order of the day. Apparently, to judge by the defeat of the enemy at all points'(the Belgians have, already 5000 prisoners), he is unable to reinforce any of the sectors attacked, and will ho driven from all his positions in due course.

The Franco-Amorlcan offensive, briefly alluded to in Saturday’s telegrams, turns - out to have been a vast sarpus lor t'e e-oinv. He had expected a resumption of the American advance on the iMotz side of Verdun, and had prepared accordingly, concentrating reserves to meet tho assault. Tho assault opened surprisingly well. The new American army, which had never been in action, moved out with tho precision and swing of veterans, after a tremendous preliminary bombardment, preceded by tanks and helped by the ascendancy of its air squadrons. The young soldiers from Kansas, Pennsyl. vania and Missouri mot the Prussian Guards and shock troops, and after a sharp struggle stormed them out of all thoir positions. Between the Mauso and tho Argonuo they penetrated to an. average depth of seven miles, a groat military feat, and for troops of their ago and standing a record. When wo consider the perfection of staff woric required by such an advance, tho steadiness and initiative of the infan. try, tho skill of the artillery, the air forces and tho tank crews, we can have no difficulty in concluding that tho performance must have dumbfounded tho Prussian martinets, who believed and declared that it was imnosaible to train Hoops—American or other—in time to ho of any use in the present crisis of tho war. Tho reality, coupled with the failure of the submarines to take any toll whatever of the 300.000 men crossing the Atlantic every month, sounds the knell of German hope.

The French on their side of this great surprise attack have done their

share, with a penetration deep into tho enemy’s strong lines of the Chamjjague. On Saturday night this penetration averaged five miles. Early last evening the prisoners of these Allies on both sides of the Argonne had reached big figures. The French attack was described as on tho line of the battlefields of the autumn of 1915, where some of the hardest fighting of the war was done, between the Suippe (16 miles east of Reims! and the Tourbe, near the western edge of flTo Argonne. Tho two attacks (French and American) between the Suippe and the Meuse account for forty miles. Tho 15-mile stretch from the Suippe to Reims brings the distance up to the 55 miles assigned by tho American correspondent, Mr Bell Price, to the offensive. Why did this correspondent assign that distance to the -assault which other correspondents described as on a front of 40 miles.' the actual distance covered by tho operations between the Suippe and the Meuse? The only reason for the discrepancy we can think of is that probably the Chicago man regards the Reims-Suippe sector as about to be added by the advance of General Gouraud’s army.

These reverses have had their effect in Berlin. The destruction of tho Turkish armies of Leman-von-Sanders in Palestine; the phenonmenal collapse of the whole Austro-Bulgarian defence, from the Adriatic to the Aegean; the new French-American drive, with its deep penetration, coming so soon after the German disaster (at the hands of American troops) of St. Mehiel; the swift British advance with a new army between Cambrai and Douai, with its sinister development of tne battle operations menacing St. Quentin and Laon; the now British advance in Flanders; these are all shocks beyond the power of official camouflage in an arrogant, obedient Press. They are the thunderbolt of reality, which has shattered the extravagant hopes of the Pan-Germans, No further pretence is possible. The proof is the wild panic on tho Berlin Stock Exchange.

The Stock Exchange is the financial barometer which invariably interprets tho war signs unerringly. It has been so in every age. As a matter of fact, in every age the commercial mind grasps the truth of victory or defeat, for the simple reason that it works nearest the truth. So long as there was hope of victory there was hope that indemnities would square the finance of the Fatherland. When that hope gives place to the certainty of disaster, the commercial mind knows that there will be vast indemnities to pay; not to receive, and understands quite well that the resources of Germany are good for many thousands of millions sterling, which will he used to pay the last farthing of indemnity for damage improperly inflicted, even if it require the occupation of Germany by foreign armies for years before justice is done. The Stock '.Exchange is the register of the commercial opinion that knows. The panic there is a, dismal proof that hope has fled from- Germany.

The Bulgarian peace move has rot relaxed the efforts of the Allies <n the least. Their offensive is proceeding with great strength and pertinacity, giving tho enemy no time to rest or recover.'' Berlin gives out that troops will bo rushed UP to stop this overwhelming tide of war. But Berlin knows that every man will be wanted to prevent Marshal Foch from driving the German armies out of France and Belgium, which is now apparently the Marshal’s grand objective. The Bulgarians are offering, so far as their Minister’s declaration can bo understood, to restore Serbia, with an outlet to the sea. and close the corridor. Now the -Bulgarian armies will either be destroyed in the battle, or they will be disarmed and disbanded. In either case Serbia and Montenegro will be restored, and it will go hard with the Austrian army of Albania (now in full retreat for Serbia), uncovered by tho defection oft destruction of the Bulgarian forces. In nil probability we shall presently hear of a huge Austrian disaster, as the direct consequence of tlk# great victory of General Oesperey over the JKiignrian armies.