A REVIEW.

Hokitika Guardian, 7 November 1918, Page 1

A REVIEW.

OF WESTERN FRONT’ POSITION. [AUSTRALIAN it N.Z. CAULK ASSOCIATION'] LONDON, November 5. A most interesting review of the gone. ral situation is cabled by Reuter’s enreorrospondciit at British -Headquarters. He says: The series of battles that arc now raging on the West Front promise to be the most stupendous conflict’ of the whole war. It is a mistake to suppose that the. Allies have only engaged the rearguards of the enemy, as he is retreating, according. to plan. Really, the Germans are being forced to fight their hardest by the Allied attack which now is threatening to achieve the strategic collapse of the enemy. The successes already gained have actually been won against immense concentrations of enemy troops, striving most determinedly to bold their vital points.

Marshal Foch, is adhering to his plan of forcing a right-angle front. Thereby he is steadily reducing the enemy’s area of manoeuvre. Foch is squeezing him' against the Ardennes Hills from both west and south, and so is robbing him of the power of mobility in a Fashion .which likely to prove disastrous before lining. As the enemy’s strategic position becomes more hopeless so is bis strength being deeply sapped. Already the Germans’ means of exit by way of Metz is fast closing, as the result of the American approach to Stenny, which is threatening the communications between the German s noithern armies, based on Liege, and their southern armies based on Luxerriberg. These two wings will be divided by tile Ardennes heights as by a wedge, thus forcing the whole enemy lino from the. river ISambre northwards to retreat to Antwerp and Namur positions. If the enemy attempts to divert bis eastern forces to the Mouse line, these will bo increasingly congested by the British advance to the South of Valenciennes.

Sir Douglas Haig’s forces yesterday broke one of the enemy’s strongest strategic positions and are approaching important- communications whose vital point is the Mons junction. Never throughout the war have the Allied Armies proved of higher quality, for they have resisted the temptation to take things easily against- an enemy who is only too anxious to surrender territory; but they are fighting most vigorously. They Relieved in a knock-out blow. Tt is become a habit of speech to say that the enemy is still unbroken and unbeaten, but if things continue much longer at- the present rate, then we shall suddenly awake to the realisation that this statement has ceased to b« true.