"RABBIT" TACTICS

Otago Witness, Issue 3314, 19 September 1917, Page 23

"RABBIT" TACTICS

THE GERMANS DRIVEN UNDERGROUND. WHY BRITONS MUST ENDURE. Following is one of the most biting and at the same time most inspiring passages delivered by Mr Lloyd George in his speech at Dundee, on being presented with the freedom of the city: It is my special pride in reference to munitions that from the first I advocated a great programme of big guns and superabundant missiles for the purpose of destroying the barbed wire and the trenches of the enemy. As Minister of Munitions I had to make enormous arrangements for manufacture on a great scale. At the time it was subject to a good bit of criticism, much of it rather scornful, but I think that is past. There is no doubt that the fact that we have got such a number of big guns of the heaviest calibre and abundance of ammunition has not merely enabled us to triumph over our cruel foes, but it has also saved life. You have heard of Hill 60, 1 have no doubt. I rather think the Scottish regiments were there. In 1915, I think about the end of April or the beginning of May, we attacked that hill, and after days of the fiercest fighting we were unfortunately driven back. A few weeks ago merely as an episode in a greater battle we captured that hill in half an hour or three-quarters of an hour, and the losses were only one-fourth what it cost us to be beaten from that hill a year before. That was due to the fact that when the first attack was made we had an inadequate supply of heavy guns and ammunition, whereas when the attack was mado this year we had an overwhelming- supply of both, and that made all the difference. We have driven the great army of Germany underground. It must bo a humiliating thought for that. proud % army that it has "to dig in the ground to hide itself from an army that it despised a year or two ago. —(Cheers.) Can you imagine the Kaiser before the war, in one of his swaggering speeches, saying to this effect, say, to the Prussian Guard: "My gallant warriors—(laughter)—descendants of the men who fought under my ancestor Frederick the Great, the time lias come for you once more to face the foes of the Fatherland When that time comes I will sec to it thatdeep caverns are mado in the ground to hide you from all your enemies, and especially from that very contemptible British Army which is seeking your life. But I will do more than that. Should they by some diabolical machinery be able to destroy these shelters I will see that you have got behind other shelters to which you can run —(laughter and cheers) —and if you cannot take your guns with you —leave them behind. When an army, a_ proud army that talked for years of trampling on the nations of Europe, is driven to these tactics it is the beginning of the end.—(Cheers.) They are rabbit tactics, and it _ means_ that wo are pounding a sense of inferiority into every pore of the German military mind. That

is good for ihe war. It is even hotter for after the war.—(Cheers.) It was one of the things that was necessary. As long as the Prussian has got that idea in his mind Europe, was not a place for decent people to livo in in peace. It will be easier after this.—(Cheers.) The Prussians have many virtues, hut a sense of humility has never been among them, and now they have been taught that virtue with a fierce and relentless lash. It only requires that wo should hold fast and hold together.