GERMANY READY AT ALL POINTS.

Hokitika Guardian, 24 May 1917, Page 4

GERMANY READY AT ALL POINTS.

Climax of the War. (By Charles Tower, Diily Mail Correspondent iu Holland.) JRottekdasi, Feb 27 Germany is stripped for the “last round.”

Sns says so herself, aud i; sue ms rea-onable to cooclade from all reporte that when the Garmaue themselves ca ! l ibis the “ l»sfc round” they mean that they can never again make sncb an effort as they have made and are making fcr this coming spring struggle. An indecisive result ia for Germany an anemocessful result; a defeat is destruction. So Reventlow and others paint the situation this spring.

Nearly everything that she ooulu do during the winter to be ready for ‘'the last round ” has been doue, Since November 13, -from which date the Government formally took over the factories which for some weeks previously bad actually been conv r’ed into ammunition works, the Empire has been one huge arsenal; every available man has been sent to join the co’aurs, aud there is baidiy a sphere of man’s work or labour under the sun, except fighting, which is not being done to some extent by German women.

Women are riveters in the new Gorman thipe ; they are runuing radway trains, doing transport work, farming, making munitions, running half a hundred different kinds of w.jr organisations, aa well as looking after Germany's complicated system of social policy. There are parts of Germany, more particularly it would appear in the south, where you may go far afitld'without meeting any sign of a male unless it happens to he a gang of prisoners.

New positions have been poured'up to the western front through Belgium aud Luxemburg, latterly especially, it would appear, via Fumay and through Charlevilie. It is true ihaj the reports reaching Holland indicate that many of these troops are in the most literal sense cannon-fodder ; that is, they are not of a quality to carry out great storming operations ; many of them may be intended chiefly to replaoe men now on lines of comrounication, and .very many ars meant simply to “die ia a ditch,” ii need be, clutching a rifle or tending a machine gun to the last. An impression prevail*, gained here from many uncontrollable reports, that-some of these last-ditohers are being cheered up with injunctions to perform under the eyes of the AllHighest prodigies of valor in the matter of crossing river*, scattering the pig-dog English, and so forth— functions which, ih fact, they are not iot9Dderf to perform. But st.lt they are reported to be extremely weil-furnish-ed with machine guns.

SHIPS WITH LARGER GUNS. We now know, from information published by the Amsterdam Telegraaf and already sent to “ The Daily Mail ” by telegram, that at the beginning of March or thereabouts the German High Seas Fleet will at last have recovered from its disastrous drubbing at the hands of Sir John Jellicoe and Admiral Beatty last summer. Losses have been made good, damage repaired, aDd 6ome new ships, chiefly cruisers, it appears, added to the flaefc, Even the Seydhtz appears from this account to have been repaired or rebuilt, unleaß the reference in the report ia to another vessel given the same name. The Telegtaaf report states that the “ Ustfriesland class,” whioh the English text-books call the Heligoland class, is armed now with 38*centimetre guns (15in), like the Baden and Bayern, instead of the 12in guns for which they were built. But even if some details of this remarkable account may appear inaoourate, the general statement that March Ist will see the High Seas Fleet reconstituted and rather more heavily armed than before would appear to be trne enough*

All statements which have reaobed Holland may doubtless be inaccurate ia details, but their general trntb, the truth that Germany has managed during the winter to bring her preparations for the “ last round ” to the highest stage of completion, is not questionable. Neutrals assert that she has “ more men in the field than at any time during ths war ”; they believe that she has more guns, especially more machine guoa and heavy artillery, more ammunition, perhaps more ships, or at any rate not fewer, and, finally, a courage which, though it may be that of despair, is not therefore the Icbb dangerous. There remains only one respect in whioh she has been obliged to leave her preparations incomplete for want

of material—namely that of food. Since the Daily Mail has received steadily throughout the winter a stream of reports from all corners of the Empire regarding Germany’s economic condition, it may be well now at the end of winter, to summarise the facta as far as they appear to be deduoible both from the material published and the larga number of reports which for one reason or another have not been published. lam afraid there may be some illusions regarding the actual effect of Germany’s economic privations on her ability to fight “ the last round,” If so they ought to be removed at once. From all the reports received it is indicated that the civilian population is suffering in part from privations and even actual want; not everywhere, for the -south is quite evidently batter off than the nor to, and the west is in some respects less hard pressed than the past. You can still buy things in Dusseldorf which yon cannot obtain for love or money in Hamburg ; and the peasants of Franconia seem to have storeP, bidden or buried, which are not to bo found even among the/ big feudal estates oi Maoklenburg East Prussia.

ENOUGH ARMY FOOD. But even admitting that the “ useless mouths ” are barely filled with enough food or food substitutes to beep body and soul together, there is no evidence at all that Gfltminy, as a fighting force, is eerioutly handicapped for this “ last round,” Wbab has happened and what is happening is what must have been expected ; siaca there is no linger enough to fill and overfill the military stores and also to supply to the full the needs of the civilian population, the German Government deliberately insists that the latter shall take the consequences.

a Bohemian paper pointed ont some days ago that in parts of Lower Austria butter was being used at one time as axle-grease, because nothing else was available for the purpose. At another time, when petroleum ran short, butter was run down and burned for light. These are merely illustrations of the general fact that whatever might Pe the needs of the civil population they would not be allowed to handicap,the smooth running of the German military machine. If there is nothing else available, then butter must be used to enable military trains to run, even if that butter is really needed to save eome woman or child from death by tuberculosis

In all the reports furnished insistence ia laid upon the fact that there is no lack of food or of food variety at the front. “Let’s get sent to the front to get a square meal u ; “ there was any quantity of food at Vilna and Warsaw”; “at tha beginning people at home sent food to the front, now men at the front send food home ” Such ore some of the phrases in reports. It is, however, quite possible that the German military authorities may fsar that sooner or later there will even baa certain shortage at the front; it is against this that they ha 7« been providing not only by rationing the civil population but also by promptly removing from the market any kind of food on which there was a run. The’military authorities have done and are doing everything in thrir power to fores people into taking their food exclusively from the great municipal canteens, which receive, roughly speaking, what the Army does not want.