BEFORE VERDUN.

Taranaki Daily News, 12 April 1916, Page 2

BEFORE VERDUN.

LORD NORTHCLIFF'S ANALYSIS, ! i PICTURES TITANIC BATTLE LINE. ] ' I A graphic account of conditions under ! which the Verdun battle was fought came from the pen of Lord Northcliffe to a syndicate of American newspapers. \ The message was despatched from "before yerdun," and was in the following 1 terms:— : AVhat are the secret motives underlying the German attempt to break the 1 French line at Verdun, in which the : Crown Prince's army is incurring such appalling losses ? Is it financial in view of the coming war loan? Is it dynastic? Or is it intended to influence doubting neutrals? From evidence of German deserters it is known that the attack originally was intended to take place a .month or two hence, when the ground was dry. The premature- spring caused the Germans to accelerate their plans. There were two final delays owing to bad weather and then came the colossal onslaught on February 21. REPEAT BRITISH FAULTS. ! The Germans had made a good many of the faults that we made at Gallipoli. They announced something large was pending by closing the Swiss frontier. The French were also fully warned by their own astute intelligence department. Their aeroplanes were not idle, and if confirmation wore needed it was given by deserters, who, surmising the horrors that were to come, crept out of the trendies at night, lay down by the edge of the Mouse till the morning, and then gave themselves up, together with information that has since proved to be accurate. Tilings went wrong with the Germans in other ways. A Zeppelin that was to have blown up important railway junc tions was brought down at Revigny, and incidentally the inhabitants of what remains of that much bombarded town were avenged by the spectacle of a blazing dirigible crashing to the ground ■ and hoisting with their own petard the thirty Huns therein. FRENCH REMAIN COOL. It is not necessary to recapitulate that the gigantic eil'ort of February 21 was frustrated by the coolness and tenacity of the French soldiers and the deadly curtain of fire of their gunners. A great deal of calculated nonsense has been sent out in oilicial communiques and dilated upon by the Berlin newspaper correspondents as to the tak'"g by storm of the long dismantled fort of Douaumont. Nothing whatever has : been admitted by the Germans as to the appalling price in blood they have paid 4 since February last and are still nav- 1 ing. J 1

The jj'rench losses are and have been insignificant. I know the official figures. It Ims been verified by conversations with members of the British, French and American Red Cross Societies, who obviously are in a position to know. Tlie wounded who pass through their hands have in many cases come straight from where they have seen dead Germans as has beon described by scores of witnesses, lying as lay the Prussian guard in the first battle of Ypres. GERMAN LOSSES 100,000. More direct, though possibly less reliable evidence was secured by questioning closely a number of German prisoners. Taking into account all available indications it may be safely assumed that during the fighting of the last thirteen days the Germans have lo'st in killed, wounded and prisoners, at least 100,000 men. What, then, are the overwhelming motives that impelled the attack 011 Verdun and the chicanery of the German reports! Is it for any of the reasons I have given above, or is it the effect of economic pressure which leads to my calculation that the possible taking over of the French lines at Verdun is a means of ending the war? The German? are so wont to misread the minds of other nations that they are quite foolish to make themselves believe this or any other foolish thing. It cannot be pretended that the attack has in it any military necessity. Tt was urged forward at a time of the year when weather conditions might prove, us they have proved, a serious handicap in such matters as moving big guns and essential observations by aeroplanes.

SUFFERINGS AWFUL. The German stuff must have known that the sufferings of the wounded lying through the long nights and icy wind jn "No linn's Land" between the lines would be great. It did' not probably disturb the Crown Prince, yet it is the most gruesome fact in the history of (he war that the French, peering ! through the moonlight at what they 1 thought to the steadily crawling Ger- ' mans, found them to be wounded men 1 frozen to death. 1 In Flanders camps and in hospitals, I have conversed with at least 100 Ger- " man prisoners. Their talk is always ;o < be accepted with great reserve, but che ' prisoners in the Verdun campaign iiave 1 plainly horror and misery depicted ' upon their countenances I need no further evidence as to the tragedy through ' which they have passed. I Who are the men who are organising * the great battle for the French, side? Let me say they are young men. General Potain, one of the discoveries of the war, until lately was a colonel; he is still in the fifties. Most members of his staff are much younger, n t

XO BRITISH AID. 1 Tlie general discussed the battle as though ; he was merely an interested spectator. In appearance he resembles Lord Roberts, although he- is of larger build. At a gathering of officers someone asked if the French did not expect the British to draw off the Germans by making an attack in the west. "It is questionable'' replied one young officer, "if such an attack would not involve disproportionate losses that would weaken all of us." The same officer pointed out that although the capture of Verdun would cause great regret, owing to the historic name it bears, it would not for many reasons oe more important than pressing back the French on any other similar number of miles on the front, the fort being of little account since the introduction of the big German "hammers." He believed General Sarrail had said that the question was not onp merely of dismantling forts, but of blowing them up, as whenever the Germans capture a place where an old fort happens to be fche.v will use it as An advertiseJfieni

GERMAN SOLDIERS .POOR. Could "the neutrals see the kind of men whom the Germans do not scruple to use as soldiers, faith in Teutonic clficiency would receive a shock. Unluckily, a pigmy behind a machine-guu is the equal of a giant. ''What a pity your Highlanders cannot meet these fellows in a fair fight," said a French officer as we reviewed » gang of prisoners of war. To he mo:e than n month in personal contact with the miserable creatures who form the bulk of the German prisoners is needed to convince the observer that such specimens of humanity can really have helonged to the German army, especially to the dorps l'clite, such as the Berlin army corps.

One ill-favored youth' hailing from Charlottenburg was barely five feet four, narrow chested, peak faced. He bad the quick-wittcdness of the urban recruit, but seemed far better fitted for a stool as a railway clerk than a life in the trenches or the ideal of attack, yet he had been taken at the end of 1914 and sent to Flanders, after six weeks of training, educated in trenchmaking for another month, then left to fend for himself and comrades as a fullfledged Prussian eaglet.

WHAT IS HAPPENING. This ia what has' happened around Verdun. To the north and north-east the first and second French lines were obliterated by the intense bombardment executed with guns, of which the smallest were 106 mm., while the bulk were 210 mm. Large numbers of still heavier weapons, up to 3Sohihi., were freely usedj both in direct and in curtain fire. The weakness of the French forces holding the first arid second lines accounts for the insignificance of their losses. Ground thus having been gained by the Germans to the north the French evacuated voluntarily the marshy ground east of Verdun and the ridges in the Woevre plain." The efiect of this action was threefold. It gave the French a strong, defensive line on high ground. It prevented the formation of a dangerous salient, and apparently it induced the Germans to believe their enemy was demoralised. Verdun is not likely to be taken. Nothing justifies the belief that the apv.it or stamina of the German forces arc equal to the task of dislodging the French from the latter's present foraiiiiable positisn.