THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 25,1918. THE IMPROVING MILITARY OUTLOOK.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 17429, 25 September 1918, Page 4

THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 25,1918. THE IMPROVING MILITARY OUTLOOK.

It is surely a portent of excellent omen that the change iu the complexion of the military situation on the western front, which has become rapidly more and more favourable ever since Marshal Foch's counter-stroke gave the coup do grace to Germany's great offensive, has anticipated by so short a period a correspondingly successful development in two theatres from which we have heard but little for sqine time past. Not only upon the western front is the fortune of war with the Allies. Upon the Salonika and Palestine fronts their armies are up and dcing, and under the weight of tho blows which they are dealing, the enemy is reeling backward. The later messages dealing with the operations in Palestine add materially to the lustre of General Allenby's victory. The recorded capture of 25,000 prisoners and 260 guns is but an item in the success achieved. What is of transcending importance is the utter demoralisation of the Turkish army in Palestine as an army. It is reported that the entire transport of the Turks has been captured, and that our troeps have seized the passages of the Jordan, cutting off the last avenue of escape of 40,000 Turks, who are now virtually enclosed in the net which has been spread for them. The official correspondent at Palestine Headquarters characterises General Allenby's victory as one of the complete in thn war. H© points but also that if the Turks contemplate the creation of a new army for operations in Palestine and Syria thpy must not only find the men, but must also provide themselves with the mechanism of war. It is apparent that some little time must elapse before we learn the full effects of General Allenby's success and the developments consequent upon it, but there is manifest room for sanguine expectations that Turkish ardour for the continuance of the war will not readily survive the decisive assertion of superiority which our arms have established in Palestine. For assistance Turkey has no friend to whom she can look. The Central Powers are anxiously preoccupied with the military situation on other fronts.

The Salonika army, which the enemy calculated upon driving into the sea long ago, has at last begun in earnest to do something more than justify its existence by the holding of large enemy forces immobile. The extensive offensive operations in which French and British, Serbian and Greek, and Italian troops are participating are progressing well. The Serbians are actuated by all the impetus born of the opportunity of at last strikingly vigorously for the recovery of their own territory, and an advance on their part of nearly 40 miles is officially announced. It is reported that they have cut the railway between Uskub and Salonika, which is the main avenue of supply for Austrian, German, and Bulgarian forces opposing the Anglo-French army on the Serbians' right, and that the enemy has evacuated the whole of the Doiran-Vardar line. Though it may be difficult for the layman to appreciate fully the significance of. the somewhat disjointed details furnished in the cablegrams, it is sufficiently apparent that in the very important Balkan theatre the Allies have scored a success containing promise of very useful results and possibly of developments much more significant than are yet definitely foreshadowed. It may be suggested that successes in what have been termed the "side-shows" of the war are of little consequence in comparison with the assertion of Allied superiority on the western front. The argument in this connection can easily, however, be carried too far. The Allies have large forces engaged in the remote theatres, in which the issues that are at stake are of great moment. The maintenance of their military prestige, as well as the overthrow of Germany's schemes of Eastern domination, are bound up in these subsidiary campaigns; and, as nothing succeeds like success, the effect of a convincing demonstration of their military strength upon the lesser Powers that are still giving Germany and Austria their support may be far from unimportant. The solidarity of the enemy group of belligerents has still to be tested by serious reverse and defeat; but the time of its trial is approaching. The Allies, on the other hand, gather strength as a whole from the sum total of their successes in all theatres. Looking back to what has happened this year, they have profound reascV to appreciate, in the light of the dangers that are past, the greatly improved aspect of the road they hav<yet to traverse. In the west the great German offensive has been cheeked and defeated, and the enemy, deprived of the initiative, there is no reason to doubt for good, is now waging a strictly defensive war. The Austrian offensive also fills an important place in the chronicles of enemy failure, and now Turkey and Bulgaria are feeling the weight of the Allied arm, and finding their war-prospects anything but brilliant. The general circumstances under which the Entente Powers are now fighting aro full of encouragement, and the military situation as a whole justifies a steady optimism! It will excite no surprise, therefore, if the near future provides another effort on the part of Austria—Germany remaining, as before, discreetly in. the background to secure peace.