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Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 170, 24 August 1914, Page 4

Reports via Amsterdam demonstrate that there lias been some fierce fight r ing between the French and German outposts in Southern Alsace. It is stated that the opposing forces were engaged unceasingly from Tuesday afternoon till oarlv on Kridav, with varying success for both sides. If, as we have been advised, as the result of a severe fight adjacent to Colinar, the Germans were forced back across the Rhine, and the French command the Rhine bridges, the Entente troops have secured a valuable strategic advantage. Not only will this advantage, if followed up, give the advance guard of the French right wing a dominant position in the S.E. corner, bin it may well be a prelude to an offensive movement northward, with a view to cutting the German lines of communication. However, what with the hotchpotch of dismembered and mutilated " facts" passed by the censor, and the highly coloured messages emanating from Paris and Brussels, it is difficult to proceed to an explanation of the position Avith any degree of confidence. But one thing can be gathered from the tangle of cablegrams, and that is, that the German left wing has failed to establish a footing on French soil after three weeks of desultory engagements. Austria, harried in the flank by the Ser vians, with the Russians crowding across the frontier, is calling up her last lines of reserves. The position with

respect to the defence in Eastern Prussia is not so defined. If, as is suggested, the exigencies of the case in the West have removed the German army corps from the Eastern frontier, then it should not be long before the Grand Duke Nicholas is knocking at the doors that bar a way across the Vistula. And one thing is certain, that, if the Vistula is forced, the German cause will be irrevocably lost. Under the circumstances, it is not likely that the German War Office would take such a risk as relying solely on the Laudwehr and Landsturm for the safeguard of the Eastern frontier.