JOFFRE’S OPTIMISM,.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 144850, 30 November 1915, Page 4

JOFFRE’S OPTIMISM,.

PEACE TO-DAY A CRIME. In an interview for Collier’s, General Joffr© was asked, ’’And the question of peace?” “Ho answered with more solemnity and earnestness,” writes Mr. Owen Johnson, the interviewer. “Peace to-day would be a crime towards posterity. It would only be an armistice in which every nation would continue feverishly to prepare for war. The French nation is 100 intelligent to deceive itself or to be deceived. We are not fighting a nation with tho same ideas as our own, hut a nation drunk with tho idea of imperial domination, a nation which believes that in tho progress of tho world there is no place for little nations. The decision as to whether Europe will continue as free and individual will be made in this war alone. Either wo win the right now to continue democratic and peaceful, or we surrender Europe to the imposition of an imperial idea. You will find, wherever you go. that the French people know this. You will find them absolutely of one opinion. Thov arc pr» pared for anything, and they know what the issue is. Wo do not need to lio to'our soldiers. No matter how long thb war lasts, it will he fought out until we have conquered tho right to leave a heritage of peace to our children.” “Of course, another winter’s campaign,” the interviewer suggested, “will never he as frightful as tho last one.”

“No,” he said; “it will, he very different. We arc prepared now for many things. One thing especially we will try to avoid—tho standing in water and ice for days and weeks.” As to “the final crisis.” General Joffre said :—“Whatever happens, the French army will never crack. It did not in the* first unequal weeks; it never will. When tho day comes that the German army must retreat in the face of defeat, it is quite possible that when their theory of discipline—tho discipline of fear—is placed to that final test, tho result may ho a rout.”