A HISTORY OF THE WAR

Taranaki Daily News, 3 April 1929, Page 6

A HISTORY OF THE WAR

A GERMAN VIEWPOINT INTOXICATION BY LOOTING. IRRESISTIBLE LURES, If the mawkish sentiment now so fashion." hie, born of the fallacy “out of siglu, out of mind,” were to secure th© prohibition of all books about war, making the small concession that half a dozen might bo preserved for the guidance of students of life and history, I should vote for the retention of “A Eatalist at War,” among these six, writes Captain B. JI. Liddell Hart in the London Daily Telegraph. This book, by th© German poet and novelist, Rudolf Binding, just published, has a threefold claim to immortality. As a picture of men at war it is one of the most vivid and realistic books yet published.

A second value of Binding’s book lies in its critical judgments on the nature of war and the course of the war. His prophetic vision is often startling, while th© dispassionate balance lie preserved in those days of passion and lies is almost miraculous. The third value of the book is the light it sheds on the history of the war. I would sacrifice a ton of self-styled histories for such a book. And so illuminating is this aspect that to it one must hero sacrifice the pleasure of bringing out its qualities as a brilliant yet profound contribution, to literature. In the early stages of the Battle of Ypres, 1914, Binding wrote:-—“The war has got stuck into a gigantic siege on both sides. The whole front is one endless fortified trench. I can see no strategy in this manner of conducting operation. Each of the countless divisions, like ours, is allotted a definite sector. It has to be held without consideration for. the character of the ground, and the inner strength of the troops, and is held to the pbint of senselessness.” ENGLAND’S SPORTSMEN. Binding ecarchingly probes various weaknesses of the great German warmachine. How different was his insight from that of the German leaders and some of our own on the value of “Kitchener’s Armies.”

“What tho English do they do well; they will make good soldiers. Ido not agree with those who ask contemptuously, where they will find theirofficers and N.C.O.’s. They will all com© — th© rowing Blues, the leading lights of the cricket and football teams. Are the Berlin police to be compared with the English police, although most of them are Prussian N.C.O.’s ? The English police know_ how to deal with masses; they handle them perfectly.” In April, 1916, he takes the realistic view that “Our conduct must depend on the consideration or decision whether we are heading for starvation or hunger. If they can starve us out any continuation of the war is criminal folly.”

And earlier still he had made the prophetic remark: “Perhaps wars may bo won, perhaps this one may, by letters from home; I would rather not use th© word ‘lost.’ ”

In June, 1916, Binding says: “What thrills the men most in an undertaking is the prospect of loot.” “A pot of English marmalade or a razor is more important to them than a British officer’s notebook.” The normal effect of this inferiority of supplies is seen growing. “We economise in material because we have to, whereas •the on J has enough and to spare.” Noi’ is it only a material inferiority. “If the German war correspondents find our troops marvellous, I don’t know whether they have any experience of the English troops.” April, 1917. “Fortunately the Americans have been selling the English ■bad shells in return for their good money.” . THE DOMINANT IMPRESSION. With confidence renewed tho Germans came to deliver their great 1918 offensive. The dominant impression is of treasure revealed behind the - English lines. “Our cars now run on the- best English rubber tires, we smoke; none but English cigarettes, and plaster our boots with lovely English boot-polish—-all unheard-of things which belong to a fairyland of long ago.” Binding meets an immaculate English brigade commander whom he calls “General Dawson, an Equerry to the King.” This is a mistake. Th© briga-dier-general referred to was F. S. Dawson, commanding the South African Brigade, in the Ninth Division, who was one of the many A.D.C.’s to the King. “The sight of all this English cloth and leather mad© me more conscious than ever of the shortcomings of my own outfit. Now wo are already in the E glish back-areas, a land flowing with milk and honey. Marvellous people .aese, who will only equip themselves with the very best that the earth produces. Our men are hardly to be distinguished from English soldiers. Everyone wear?, at least a leather jerkin, a waterproof, English boots. The horses arc feeding on masses of oats and gorgeous foodcake.” A FATAL INTOXICATION. But the sudden “exchange” had illeffects, Binding found a division, quite fresh, unaccountably halted in its advance, near Albert. “As soon as I got near the town I found curious sights. There were men driving cows —others who carried a hen under one arm ..nd a box of notepaper under th© other. Men staggering. Men who could hardly walk. They were intoxicated less with wine than with loot. An officer even stops a car when on an urgent mission, to pick up an English waterproof from th© ditch. And in their intoxication they not only lost their chance of reaching Amiens, but also ruined sources of supply invaluable to their own advance —wrecking a waterworks for the brass taps. - x

Anyone witli 'personal experience of war knows how the thought of food and of civilised.'comfort.-fills the horizon of even th©, most ,intellectual. How far was Germany’s military decline due not only to increasing hunger and “letters from home,”, but to .the conviction of the enemy’s, greater power of continuing the war that rose from breaking into the British lines? • Was the disaster of March, 1918, a stroke of fortune for us, by its revelation to the Germans of our superior economic condition? If so, what a pity w© did nqt try the solution earlier! ■ ; .