PROGRESS OF THE WAR

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 23, 22 October 1917, Page 4

PROGRESS OF THE WAR

A raid on England by six or sovcn Zeppelins is reported to-day. By random bomb-dropping, the airships killed and injured a considerable number of people- in residential areas, but according to a late message- retribution followed swiftly. The message quotes a French fleadquarters report as stating that four Zeppelins returning from England were brought clown or compelled to land in France, and that a fifth is believed also to have been destroyed. If these particulars are accurate, the raid is tho most disastrous, from the enemy's standpoint, in which the Zeppelins over engaged.

No infantry fighting is reported in Plunders at the moment of writing, but available messages speak of fine weather and of a heavy bombardment west of the Passchendaelc Kidge. There is an obvious suggestion that the Allies are likelv in tho very near future to resume, their interrupted attack. The ground cannot have dried to any great extent, but conditions favourable to observation and artillcy work have now reigned for several 'days, and this should mean in tho aggregate conditions very different from those which obtained on Friday week.

To-bav's news of tho Baltic campaign concentrate? attention on Moan Sound, a, short, narrow sea passage which leaves the Gulf of Riga, at its northern end. A Russian squadron, consisting, it is said, of about twenty ships, antl including probably two or three preDreaclnoughts, is bottled up in Mohn Sound, and seems to be doomed. The- Germans have won complete mastery of the Gulf of lliga; they are in possession of Oesel and Mohn Islands, across its mouth, and have landed also on "Dago Island immediately to the north. Tho position in Mohn Sound is that tho' Germane command both ends of the eight-mile passage with naval force, and also hold one coast of the sound, that of Mohn Island. This coast is six miles distant from the mainland. Sβ. far as tho imprisoned squadron is concerned, the only visible alternatives before tho Russians are to faw a battle ab hopeless odds or to destroy the ships and retire to the mainland. It is observed in one message to-day that the Russian main fleet in tho Baltic may now go to the rescue of the isolated squadron, but prospects of tho situation being retrieved in this way aro not bright. Russia has at most eight Dreadnoughts in commission in the Baltic, and Germany has at disposal nearly twenty modern battleships, apart from battlcoruisors, and a strong force of p reDreadnoughts. She has an overwhelming preponderance also in lighter vessels, notably in torpedocraft.

Russia is threatened not only with a serious naval disaster, but with developments calculated to seriously complicate her position on land. There is a great deal to support an opinion that Germany will not improve her general prospects in the war by anything she is like : ly to achieve against Russia, but it is plain that her present success, for wha-t it is worth, is likely to "be extended. She is now divided only by half-a-dozen miles of sea from a weakly defended Russian, coast at a point more than, a hundred miles north of what has hitherto been tho northern flank of bhc Russian line. If a landing is made in force the Russian front will have to Dβ extended to tho north and retired to the east, probably to the lake-line about 70 miles east of Petrograc!, which has been frequently described. The main feature of this line is a defile of thirty miles between tho coast of the Gult of Finland and the northern_ end of a lako which extends somo ninety miles to the south. Tho enemy would have to force this defile if ho extended his present land and 6ca operations into an advance on Petrograd. °** * *

The operations- in which the enemy is now point to a settled conviction on his part that tho Baltic is safely closed against the entrance of tho British Fleet. He is using a considerable part of his total naval strength in and about the Gulf of Higa, and if tho entrance to the' Baltic wero forced ho might find himself cut off from "his base. Such an attack is per"haps not absolutely outside the bounds of possibility, but unfortunately what is known of the circumstances tends to heavily _ emphasise the difficulty of forcing the passages leading into the Baltic. Denmark and Sweden hitherto have been wholly under German domination, -and 'Norway, though at ono time she showed some inclination to take an independent stand, afterwards weakened in that attitude. Sho went so far as to her territorial waters closed to belligerent submarines, but under pressure from Germany tho prohibition was withdrawn. Owing largely to the Eorvilo compliance- of Sweden and Denmark, Germany has been enabled to mine the Baltic entrances as if they were her territorial waters. This, of course, explains the confidence with which sho is pursuing her operations against Russia. ♦ * * * Asr affair is reported in the North Sea in which enemy surface ships practised tho same tactics of piracy and murder as distinguish the enemy submarines. Two hnayilyarmed raiders eluded the British patrols, and attacked a convoy between the Shetland Islands and the Norwegian coast. Two escorting destroyers put up a gallant but hopeless fight, and were sunk, with heavy loss of life. So far the enemy had broken no law of war, but, having disposed of tho warships, the raiders sank eight unarmed merchant ships belonging to the convoy. This, of course, was cofd-blood'ed piracy and murder. The ships were Norwegian, Danish, and Swedish. It is in this way that Scandinavian neutrals are rewarded for serving Germany and mining their territorial waters in her interesl.K or permitting (hem lo lie mined.