PROGRESS OF THE WAR

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2549, 25 August 1915, Page 6

PROGRESS OF THE WAR

It will be just as well to accept the very interesting reports now in hand concerning the Dardanelles campaign in a spirit of caution, and to bear in miad that they are not official. This applies to the detailed account by a Daily Chronicle correspondent at Athens of the landing at Suvla Bay (published yesterday), to. the similar but shorter narrative of the same events supplied by an American • correspondent at Mudros and to other • unofficial messages pointing to an early collapse in the Turkish resistance. Taken at their face value these reports would mean that the whole aspect of the campaign had been transformed, but if this is tlie'position it is strange that more has not been heard about it in official dispatches. Tliat the Allies effected a surprise landing at Suvla Bay and made progress from the new landing which resulted in a considerable extension of the fighting front before they were brought to a halt was known already from tlic official reports, but practically all the other details now supplied await official confirmation. The object aimed at in the new landing is, of course, to gain an effective command of the whole breadth of the Gallipoli Peninsula, and so cut the Turkish land communications. If the correspondents mentioned are in possession of the facts this has already been accomplished.

The story, told by the Daily Chronicle correspondent is that -the Allies are astride of one • of two roads running down tho peninsula, and that their guns dominate the other road and even oommand the shore of the strait at Boghali, about three-miles north of Maidos. The American correspondent at Mudros states 'that the Turks in the southern part of the peninsula are virtually besieged, and that it is only a question of how long they_ can subsist on the supplies in their possession. This probably is an exaggeration, for the Turks are -still able to obtain a certain amount of supplies by way of the Asiatic coast and across tho 'Narrows. This route cannot, however, be regarded as a line of retreat, for the army defending the Narrows and the moral effect of an occupation and domination of the whole breadth of the peninsula further north would be great, besides which it would be a natural prelude to, an_ attack from a new point on tho positions covering tho Narrows. Whether or not the correspondents quoted have gono some way ahead of the facts it is in this direction that events are trending. It has been obvious from the first that the possibilities of the new northorn attack are limited only by tho strength available in men and artillery to drive it hoipe. - The outlook indeed may be regarded as more encouraging than it has been since tiie real strength of the Turks' position became known.

Hampered as it is by the retiring disposition of its enemies the British Navy seldom allows _ any very lengthy period to pass without giving them a convincing taste of its quality. The latest example is the Hect bombardment of a- number of ports on the Belgian coast, including Zeebruggc, which the Germans have 'been industriously developing as a submarine base. The immediate object of the bombardment seems to have been the harrying of the submarine construction yards at Zecbruggc and the destruction of a poison-gas factory and other German depots at different points along the coast, and it is evident that the work of devastation was earned out methodically and with deliberation; battle-cruisers hurling shells over a range o£ a dozen miles, and easily outranging the batteries on shore. It was all occasion on which the Germans- might have found some use for the big gun that shelled Dunkirk at long range some time, ago, but as matters stood an effective reply to tho fire of the ships was beyond them. Though the affair took on something of the aspect of a sea-parade this was a surface aspect only. The llect, in fact, attacked a stretch of coast-line that has been converted itihc; a ni's-etlcfttly coutimim fwfc. to

reckoned with. That a squadron of warships should deluge such a coastlino with shell-fire and come away unscathed implies an exorcise of wonderful skill and judgment, as well as a striking exhibition of the daring intrepidity of which the British Navy lias given so many proofs.

The sinking of the battle-cruiser Moltke in the Baltic by a British submarine must bo set down as the greatest feat of its kind ever performed. Many warships have been successfully attacked by submarines since the war began, but this is the first occasion on which a swift battle-cruiser has met such a fate. It may be taken for granted that the Moltke was screened by torpedo craft as ships of her class always are, and it is to be noted also that she was torpedoed in the Baltic and not in any of_ the passages entering the Gulf of Riga. In all likelihood she was held in reserve against the possibility of a, sortie by some of the Russian capital ships from the Gulf of Finland. In any case it may safely be assumed that the Moltke was fully on the alert, knowing that submarines were.in the vicinity, and that all possible precautions were taken to guard against attack by the under-water craft. Only a perfect combination of daring and skill could have engineered a ■ successful submarine attack in such circumstances. * # * « As regards the movement of the contending armies, more pronounced developments are reported to-day in the Eastern campaign than have been visible for some' days past. No change is reported in the Baltic Provinces, the region in which the Germans aro probably maturing their most dangerous attack, but further .south the Russian line has been materially withdrawn from the positions it occupied prior to the loss of Kovno and Novo Georgviesk. In particular the Russians have evacuated Ossowiec, the last o! their outlying fortresses in Poland, with the exception of Grodno, which lies more than twice as far away from the East Prussian frontier and a little further north. Ossowiec is only 18 miles distant from the southeastern extremity of East Prussia. The place has frequently been heavily bombarded by the Germans'- during tho last few months, but thanks in part to the fact that it is situated in the midst of a tract of marshy country, through which it is difficult to transport heavy artillery, these attacks were invariably beaten off. Its evacuation now is evidently incidental to a general retirement of the Russian line on north and south. According'to their 'own reports the Germans have profited by the Russian departure from Ossowiec - to make a rapid advance towards the Potrograd-Warsaw railway, and ire within twenty miles of it at a point south of Ossowiec. * * » * Another locality in which the Germans appear to. be making a purposeful advance is beyond Kovno. They aire across the Nicmen here, and striking east in the direction of Vilna, 50 miles away, but as yet have covered only a small part of that distance._ According to tho latest' reports in hand the Russians still hold the junction 20 miles east , of Kovno, from whicha branch linb leaves the Kovn'o-Vilna railway to run'north, into the Baltic Provinces. Broadly speaking, the position reached is that tho Russians from the Baltic Provinces to a point about 50 niiles south-west of Cffodno, a total distance of about 450 miles, are fighting in _ advance of PetrbgradWarsaw railway. Further s.ou'th their armies cover another railway which runs south, and a little east to Brest Litowsk, and continues beyond that fortress into Southern Poland.

It is suggested by one correspondent that the Germans aro about to launch another great offensive affecting nearly the whole of tho Russian front. Approximately a million men, he states, are available to act against the front in Central Poland from Ossowiec (or east of that place) to Brest Litowsk, and half a million men to strike, ohiefly from the Baltic _ Provinoes, against the Russians' right flank, and endeavour to take them in'the rear. These are the broad- features in the- enemy's preparation for what Colonel Repington : {The Times military correspondent) describes as a decisive campaign. The grounds upon which he assumes that th® phase of £hc campaign now- opening is likely' to be decisive are not stated, and are not even suggested in detail rer marks accompanying his general estimate of the position. It is, of course, true that tho Russians are holding a line south from the Baltic Provinces which is'capable of being turned and rendered untenable by a sufficiently powerful flank attack developed from the Baltic Provinces. Unless the Russians can repel the German attacks up'on yilna and the Petrograd railway to the north,,they will be compelled to make a farther general retreat. _ To this extent the position is critical, but there is'a distinction to be drawn between a further retreat and the decisive result to which Colonel Repington alludes. The Germans will gain a decisive victory in the Eastern campaign only when the Russian armies are destroyed or compelled to cease fighting, and there is no immediate prospect of anything of the kind.

Threatened as.' they are ,o'n their northern flank the Russians are certainly not in a more difficult position than they occupied prior to their evacuation of the Warsaw salient. On the contrary, their lino is now_ approximately straight, and lends itself much moro easily to a further retreat if that should bo necessary. Reaching Vilna, the Germans would be in touch with railways running south along and behind tho front on which tho Russians are fighting, but it would be ratkdr absurd .to suppose that the Russians would leave these lines'fit for service or wait to bo rolled up and destroyed by German armies advancing against their flank. A.moro obvious policy would be to continue their retreat, laying the country waste behind them, and destroying the railways, as they have done very systematically and thoroughly up to the present date. There of course, bo some limit to the application of these tactics, but there is no reason to fear that the Russians will be called upon to pursue them indefinitely, and it is equally true that there must be some limit to German exertions in the Eastern campaign.

There is no need to repeat what has been so often said about the importance and bearing of the main Western campaign and the Dardanelles campaign as factors setting a limit to tho German Eastern ofteusive, but matters have now 60 fav developed that it ia at least an open qusation whether Germany is not akyiiyc info pf

her adversaries by her present course in l Russia.. When the Vistula, line fell into German hands a point was reached at whioh Germany had the option of calling a halt in the Eastcm theatre in order to concentrate against her enemies in other uicatres. That point has long been passed, and the Austro-Gcrman armies have been thrown forward in a continual offensive which offers no visible prospect of decisive advantage, save in the wholly improbable event of a complete Russian collapse. It is already possible to say with some confidence that only % final victory over Russia would adequately reward and justify the efforts Germany has put forth and is still putting forth in the Eastern campaign, and that she is not in' the least likely to obtain it. This would imply "that Germany has been guilty of a colossal blunder in concentrating as $ho has done upon the Eastern campaign at the present stage of the war, and the hypothesis may seem too far-fetched to be accepted. But it has to be remembered that Germany opened the war with a somewhat similar blunder in directing the m,iin weight of her invasion against Paris in the hope that the French armies would be concentrated in defence of their capital _at the sacrifice of their mobility in the field. This initial blunder was realised too late to be retrieved in full, and it is distinctly possible that Germany is now making a much greater blunder in the Eastern campaign, and ono which will prove correspondingly more costly.