A GREAT VICTORY

Levin Daily Chronicle, 17 October 1918, Page 4

A GREAT VICTORY

" You will return home before the leaves fall," said the Kaiser to his troops on the outbreak of the war. As the Auckland "Star" remarks,ileaves are falling fast in Germany now, both literally and" metaphorically, and the German armies are on their way homo, not as conquerors, bait as the conquered in the greatest series of battles in history, and as the victims of the greatest disillusionment that has ever befallen an arm}' and a people. The possibilty that the trees in Germany may not be quite bare when the beaten armies reach their own frontiers, is suggested by the continued success of. the Allied arms The capture of Cambrai has been part of a brilliant victory. The very powerful system of deep defences between Cambrai and St. Quentin has been passed, and the victorious British j armies are operating in open country well east of the fortified zone. A great breach has been made in the enemy "ij system of defence between the Sensee river and the Oise, the enemy has yielded about fifteen miles of territory in two days, and the British are before Le Cateau, famous as the scene of a critical action in the retreat of- the " Contemptibles " fw>m Mons. But Le Cateau is to-day far more important as a railway centre.' Through it pass lines feeding the enemy's front from St. Quentin to the Champagne, and our advance to it shakes a long, stretch of -his front, and greatly, increases the difficulties of the retreat of the armies in the centre. Le Cateau is clue south of Valenciennes, and its loss will mean that the use of that larger junction will be-considerably restricted. Besides advancing to Le Cateau, Sir Douglas Haig has gained ground near Lens and Douai, and the French on his right are advancing east of St. Quentin, outflanking La Fere and loosening the enemy's hold on the upper Oise Valley. The j enemy has suffered a great disaster by | this breach of his front in a vital sector, and the rapid advance beyond it, but the possibility of a far greater disaster confronts him, the separation of his northern and central armies arid the severance of the latter's principal communications.' The British victory has been a great feat of arms, and Sir Douglas Haig does well to pay a warm tribute to the men who,' after sustaining the shocks of March and April,' have stormed forward with such irre- ! sistible skill and dash.