The Bay of Plenty Beacon Published Tuesdays and Fridays. FRIDAY, DEC. 29, 1944 WHAT OF 1945?

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 8, Issue 36, 29 December 1944, Page 4

The Bay of Plenty Beacon Published Tuesdays and Fridays. FRIDAY, DEC. 29, 1944 WHAT OF 1945?

THE last moments of tumultous 1944 will tick slowly by< at midnight on Sunday next. As we view the passing of this historic and eventful year we are tempted as mankind has been for untold decades in the past to speculate upon the new, and to ruminate upon the old. The happiness of the Christmas festivities is followed as a rule by the optimism which usually hails the coming of the New Year. Undoubtedly we will always be optimistic, for it is part of our inner nature to look upon the brighter side of all things wherever possible, and well for us it is so! The past year has been one of resounding victories for the Allied cause. It has been one of returning confidence, when grand scale battles of liberation have been successfully fought by the forces of Democracy. When the European mainland has been invaded, France and Belgium freed, and when two-thirds of the Italian peninsula has been wrested from the Nazi forces of oppression. Only the setback of recent weeks, when the dogged Von Rundstedt has staged the last desperate sortie from inside the German Reich, has served to remind us of the striking power of the still un-vanquished hun. The latest drive shows that he is still far from beaten, and that out of the impoverished population behind the Seigfried walls, Hitlerism has built up yet another army of far/tical young warriors willing and even eager to be sacrificed upon the grim alter of Mars, in order that the Fuehrer's doctrine of 'herrinvolk' may still be foisted upon the unsuspecting world. In the Ardennes salient Germany is employing all the secret weapons at her disposal. The time has come, when with the avenging armies now upon the borders of the Reich itself, to strike hard with every diabolical means which can be devised. We can therefore steel our hearts to the forthcoming shock of even more terrible methods of conducting war than have ever been known hitherto. Such is the position of the second world war as we face a new year; Germany which by all the rules should be ready to take the count, suddenly finding new strength, and assuming the offensive ; and Japan being remorselessly pushed back from the scenes of her treacherous conquests by the combined efforts of the Anglo-American sea, land and air forces. The must see even greater events than its .predecessor. Obviously the writing is on the wall, for Hitlv's Germany, for, in spite of the offensive in Belgium, the overwhelming might of the Allied armies in Europe must inevitably crush the resistance of the battered Reich,

now undergoing the greatest air punishment ever meted out to any nation. Von Rundstedt's latest venture will indeed do more to hasten the end, than had 4 he elected to car>7 on the war on orthodox lines and bring , about a stalemate of alternate artillery duels and ground battles. Such was the popular mode of conducting the war of 191418. The German attack has certainly ripped a large gap in the Allied front, but the counter measures of the veteran Montgomery can be calculated to be just as effective if not more so in thpir strategy and striking power. That victory will be achieved in Europe in the coming year there seems little doubt, but all observers agree that it will be a long and bitter road to Tokio, the heart of the unbeaten and arrogant Japanese empire. Here we are fighting an enemy, with which we have little in common, and whose suicidal tactics are too well known to be emphasised. Further, he has had four years flying start upon a docile Asiatic population numbering nearly 200,000,000. Preaching 'Asia for the Asiatics the Mikado can still di aw a fanatical army of no mean dimensions from such a number, and it can scarcely be hoped that Imperial Japan will be totally defeated for many years to come. Thus we face 1945 with high hopes, leavened with the sobriety of cold facts which are inescapeable to commonsense reasoning.

Men for Camp The following men from the Bay of Plenty will join the Taneatua train for camp on January 9: lane--atua: J. T. Laughton (Whakatane), C. A. Smith. Katikati: I. L. G. J. Webster. Paeroa: A. W. Houston R. H. Lynch. Rotorua: G. T. Coppard, W. D. Sanders.

December Rainfall With the weather still threatening) it is interesting to record that already December 1944 has been one of the wettest experienced in Whakatane in recent years. HOUSEWIVES! Clean and polish floors in one. operation. Use Queen Bee Wax. I/5 and 2/5.