TWO YEARS OF WAR

Otago Daily Times, Issue 16766, 7 August 1916, Page 6

TWO YEARS OF WAR

LORD SYDENHAM'S REVIEW. AN OPTIMISTIC FORECAST. The Times. LONDON, August 4. Lord Sydenham, in a review of two yo.as of wai, adds: The Allies face the thud year of the war with new hopes unshaken resolve, the highest morale, and untouched 100.11 ce.s. Austria, twice defeated, is faced with a despeiato military and economic position. Turkey has loht Armenia, and is faced with an Arab levolt. She is now hardly a valid ally. Bulgaria is between the upper and nether millftone if Rumania moves. In Germany feeling is deepening the people's hardship, and political rifts aie more frequent. The war tends to become a fight for existence between the dynasty and the ruling classes 011 the one side and a cruelly-deceivcd people on the other. Only victory in the field will bring a decision; but the allied armies have learnt that they aie able to beat the Germans on equal terms. The German superiority in material his been destroyed. Every month sees an increase in the Allies' equipment. More efforts and more sacrifices will be demanded. Patience and fortitude must be the national watchwords, but tho end should not be far distant. MEETINGS THROUGHOUT GREAT BRITAIN. ENTHUSIASM EVERYWHERE. Australian and N.Z. Cable Association. LONDON, August 4. London is crowded with convalescents in their hospital suits. They were driven in conveyances to the Albert Hall meeting to celebrate the second -anniversary of the war. Five thousand patients from the various hospitals attended the meeting, including hundreds of Anzacs, also 100 sailors who were wounded in the Jutland sea fight and 400 who had lost a limb. General Smith-Dorrien presided. , Three thousand patriotic meetings were held in various parts of the country, and all passed resolutions to continue the war to a victorious end, similar to those passed at the Australian and New Zealand meetings. The employees in many stores and business houses were granted an hour's leave of absence to attend services. The Primate preached at Buckingham Palace, where the King and Queen attended. Eight thousand troops attended a service at Aldershot. The Navy League " Fight for the Right" movement also organised many meetings. BRITAIN'S DETERMINATION VOICED BY THE KING. SYMPATHY WITH BELGIUM. LONDON, August 5. The King has forwarded the following message to the heads of the allied States:— " I desire, on the second anniversary of the great conflict in which my country and her gallant allies are engaged, to convey to you my steadfast resolution to prosecute the war until our united efforts have attained the objects for which we in common have taken up arms. I fee! assured that you are in accord with me in the de~ termination that the sacrifices which our valiant troops have so nobly made shall not be offered in vain, and that the liberties for which they are fighting shall be fully guaranteed and secured." ! His Majesty also sent the following message to King Albert upon the sccond anniversary of the war: —" My country took un arms to resist the violation of the independence of Belgium. I desire to assure your Majesty of my confidence that the united efforts of the Allies will liberate Belgium from the oppression of her aggressors, and restore her to the full enjoyment of national and economic independence."

GERMANY'S CRUDE BUNGLE

BRITAIN'S HONOUR AND POWER TO VINDICATE IT.

RECRUDESCENCE OF BARBARITY.

LONDON, August 5.

Lord Derby presided at the great Imperial patriotic meeting in the Queen's Hall, at which Messrs Asquith and Bonar Law were the principal speakers. Sir Douglas Haig wired: " Two years' desperate trench warfare has still further increased our comradeship with our allies and made us inflexible in the determinaHon to carry to a vic» tory a war that is not of our choosing. We iook forward with confidence to success and a triumphant pcace." Mr Asquith moved a resolution expressing inflexible determination to continue the war to a successful end. He said that never, in the Germans' tangled, bungled web oi diplomacy, had there been an error so crude, so disastrously fatal on the part of its authors, as the idea that we had lost both the sense of honour and the power to vindicate it. The enemy was everywhere on the defensive, and there were signs of a material weakening and eihaustion. The recrudescence of deliberate and calculated barbarity on the part of Germany was dictated by desperation. The latest atrocities would blacken even the besmirched an= nals of the German army. The murder of Captain Fryatt had outraged the conscience of the civilised world. We, with our allies, were considering an effective method of dealing with the authors of the outrages and the nation condoning and applauding them.— (Cheers.) The final result of victory would be a great partnership of nations, confederated in the joint pur= suit of a freer and fuller life for count> less millions. Mr Bonar Law said the enemy had lost for ever the advantages which their preparation for war gave them. The toils were closing round them. There was no good talking about the latest atrocity; they had to do somefling. A wild beast was at large, and there was only one thing' to be done, and they conld do it—shoot the beast. (Received Auc;. 6, at 5.5 p.m.) Sir r. Mackenzie and the Agents general were present at the meeting, at which Mr Massey's message was read.