The Star. WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 16, 1914. EDITORIAL NOTES

Star (Christchurch), Issue 1122, 16 December 1914, Page 4

The Star. WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 16, 1914. EDITORIAL NOTES

The whole German plan of campaign

is mysterious, and there is more than one among the military experts of Europe to say that there is no plan of campaign, and that the Germans, having failed in their first grand project to capture Paris, are hitting more ; or less blindly at any spot that seems ■ to be a vulnerable one. Their armies are now completely surrounded by the enemy, by the ocean, and by their own . frontiers. An advance anywhero into France would bo preferable to the intolerable strain of a paire defensive, jven if a poire defensive were allowed

to 'them. They must break through pomewhere or they must fall back, and perhaps therefore it is a mistake to assume some definite project to account for each move. 'Any success anywhere along the line would relieve the pro-

cess of strangulation that any army ronsfc feel in hostile territory and without tho power to advance. Such an Brmy can draw nothing niore from the exhausted country, and everything that It needs, from a howitzer gun to a bootlace, must be sent frdta home.

There need be no doubt that the Russian situation is giving far more anxiety to Berlin than the Belgian- If the

•worst should come to the worst the

forces in Belgium can always fall back upon iheir own frontier and find effective refuge and support from the great German fortresses. But there is no such possibility in the east. Either

ihe Itosaian forces that are now in German territory must be effectively beaten, or at least held, or they will advance toward Berlin. It is quite

'easy to produce a stalemate in the 1 west, but there can be no stalemate in the east. An invasion of Germany from the west would be almost, although not quite, a military impossibility. An invasion of Germany from the east is already an accomplished fact.

Although the Germans may have now no large-scale plan of campaign in Bel-

gium it is easy to see that the capture of Calais might be turned to good account in an attempted invasion of England, which would follow a successful attempt to destroy the* British fleet. There need not .be much doubt that the attempt will be made. All the signs point that way. A recent report says that the Germans are building two" Zeppelins a day, and while that is no doubt an absurd exaggeration, w© may be quite sure that they tire building as many as they can. So far the Zeppelins have done practically nothing. No one knows where they are, but they will certainly be in evidence when the German naval authorities deem that the time is ripe for a

eortie from Kiel or Wilhelmsharen. Tho

fillips will probably come forth escorted ; bv a swarm of submarines under the ■water, and of Zeppelins over the water, but inasmuch a's Zeppelins have never yet been in action since the creation of the world wa may reasonable withhold. a judgment as to their capacities.

But what they may try to do is to throw bombs on the British warships underneath while tho warships will be equally assiduous in throwing bombs from their own guns at tlie Zeppelins overhead. Now it would be a very difficult thing to Wt a warship from the height at which these airships Would have to fly to secure any reasonable amount of safety for themselves. A warship would be a very at such a distance. Moreover, it would be a moving target, and the Zeppelin herself would be moving. We may also remember that there is only one spot in the immensity of space at which a • Zeppelin would be effective, and that is the spot directly overhead of her target. At all other places she would bo as harmless as a seagull.

On the otlier hand, the warship could begin her attack on the Zeppe\in the moment she came in sight, and oould continue the attack as long as she remained in sight. The Zeppelin would also be exposed to tho attack cf aeroplanes, who would do tkdir, best to mri ner. Altogether we may suppose that life on a Zeppelin would not be ft happy one. On the other hand, if file Zeppelin were to throw over large numbers of bombs it is extremely probable that some of them would strike . and a single bomb might easily destroy » Dreadnought. It is hard to resist the conviction that a sortie of tho Gel-man Navy would be something in tho nature of a desperate and last resort. In ships alone they would havo to meet a foe of twice their own strength, perhaps three times. They would instantly • invite tho attack of a fleet of submar|ines manjr times more numerous than

their-own. Their single advantage would bo in Zeppelins, and the Zeppelins, besides being an entirely unknown quantity, would be assailed by swarms of aeroplanes as well as by a continuous rirte and artillery fire from tho warships. It would be the height of folly to predict tho lor tunes of such a fight ns this, where very much nmst dejKind upon winds and waves, but it ' would certainly toe a heroic enterprise, I and one that would seem to bo almost hopeless. Nono the less it may be tried.

Most heartily do we recommend to our readers ft brief but forceful appetd which Nurse Maude, Superintendent of the Christcluii'ch District Nursing Staff, makes bv letter on another page. Nurse Maude's request for gifts " to brighten some of the very grey lives with which sho and her band of ministering women come in contact in their work amongst the distressed and afflicted comes as a timely reminder that there is much hidden suffering in our own city. In some homes tho ■mothers and children are threatened with a dark Christmas indeed, only the nursing sisters know how dark. Most of us can do something- to lighten that gloom, and howover small the donation we ftro sure it will not be despised by Nurse Maude, who contrives to make a little go a long way in her benevolent work.