THE COLONIST. WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1936. THE ALLIES' DETERMINATION.

Colonist, Volume LVIII, Issue 14284, 13 December 1916, Page 4

THE COLONIST. WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1936. THE ALLIES' DETERMINATION.

The reported decision of President Wilson, not to associate himself^ with any formal movement by neutral States to promote peace negotiations is a wise one. There can be no doubt that, in the words of the authoritative statement from \Vashington 3 any such movement is calculated to defeat its own ends, and to -render the United States liable to a charge of partisan interference. It has taken a good deal to convince Mr Wilson of this fact, for even after Mr Lloyd George's emphatic declaration a couple of months ago that neutral interference would not be tolerated, the Washington Government is understood to have been engaged in conversation with other neutral Governments on the subject. Mr • Sydney Brooks, the well-known j American journalist, who resides in | London and has,spent much time on the Western front, had occasion during a visit to New York recently to offer some very definite advice to Americans concerning the futility of peace overtures. "He said that the whole of the British-nation was solidly behind Mr Lloyd George in his determination Ito refuse peace overtures based on German demands. "When I left England people were still congratulating themselves on Mr Lloyd George's straight-from-the-shoulder statement,'' said Mr^Brooks. "What he said every single Englishman was thinking and feeling, and on this point there is not even a shadow of a difference between British views1 and the views of all the Allied peoples and Governments. Any outside suggestion of peace, any move toward mediation, at this juncture would simply infuriate the national opinion of all the Allies. Not because they want the -war to go on, but because it was as plain as a pikestaff that if Germany could fix up a peace under present' conditions it would be a greater victory for her than any she has won, or no\v" can ever win, on the field." Even in France, smileless, suffering France,- Mr Brooks found the national spirit implacable in. its relentlessness, amd more confident than ever of victory. There is only one mind among them: Germany must and will be crushed.. And no one who has been up and down the British front can doubt for a moment that the thing will be done;- People talk of the advance on the Somme as "the big push." In reality it is just a gentle tap to remind the Germans that we are waking up and beginning to take notice. It is nothing whatever to what is coming. But even in this preliminary . canter the British and French .forces .have captured some 120,000 square miles of territory and over 600 guns, and have put out of action at least 400,000 of the enemy. "Every one, I came across among the heads of the British Army," Mr Brooks went on to say, "spoke of it not as a possibility, or even as a probability, but as an absolute military certainty that next spring, if not be-, fore, we shall pierce, the German lines and get clean out into the open. The men who could take Fricourt, Thiepval, and Combles —infinitely stronger positions than any the Germans have yet captured^-can take anything. Meanwhile the present situation suits us exactly. We have built up in France the most complete and the smoothest-working organisation that has ever, I suppose, been known in the history of war. In two years we have utterly wiped out the lead which Germany spent foiw decades' in establishing. Our troops have the spirit and habit of victory. They go into every fight expecting to win, and conscious of that moral mastery which! in itself is three parts of'victory, In Sir Douglas Haig we have found a man who impresses both the nation and the Army as really knowing his job.. The confidence in him is a sure, reasoned, tested, and growing asset."