PROGRESS OF WAR

Dominion, Volume 36, Issue 17, 15 October 1942, Page 6

PROGRESS OF WAR

Replacing Defensive With Offensive VITAL SWITCH-OVER (By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright.) (Received October 14, 10 p.m.) LONDON, October 13.

“AVe hare now reached the stage where the defensive can be replaced by the offensive and tlie war can be prevented from dragging on endlessly,” said Field-Alarshal Smuts, Prime Minister of South. Africa, who has arrived in London for. consultations and discussions. “So far,” he added, “we have been able with very great difficulty to hold our own defensively against overwhelming odds. “The switchover will determine the outcome of the war, and therefore deserves most careful planning. AVe have now reached a stage in the war which calls for a careful review of the course before us. lam convinced that, with the resources we command, victory should be ours if we follow the right strategy with, the utmost energy. “This is a man-made war. The peace which follows should not prove beyond human caixicity and beyond the untapped resources of wisdom, planning, forethought and goodwill, which are still the portion of our race. I hope to have an opportunity of exchanging thoughts with Hie leaders on this most important of all problems—the winning of the peace.” . Field-Alarshal Smuts said that, like other Dominion Prime Ministers, he had had frequent pressing invitations from Air. Churchill to visit London. He did not come earlier, because of circumstances beyond his control. He was peculiarly tied down by his duties in South Africa, where the political situation was very different from the other Dominions. The position had considerably eased in South Africa. His talks with Mr. Churchill in Egypt in August had made it clear that there might be some advantage in further talks in London. NAZIS’ CHANGED WAR CONCEPT Holding Policy Defined LONDON, October 13. "Most hopes are now centred on how the United Nations lose the war, not on how Germany wins it,” says the German “Frankfurter Zeitung” in a remarkable article. "Only the destruction of the European fortress and total defeat of the Axis can change England’s situation," says the article. “A war which is not lost would, for the Axis, be a war won,, because the Axis holds the whole of Europe and its external approaches. “However, for the English, a war which is not totally won is a war lost because, apart from some points on the Mediterranean, they have nothing in their hands which would interest us or be decisive for future relations between England and Europe.”