DURATION OF THE WAR.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVII, Issue 1412, 17 June 1915, Page 4

DURATION OF THE WAR.

VIEWS OF THE WORLD’S PRESS. In our issue of Saturday last we published the views of the British Press on the duration ot the war, which were part of the opinions of the press of the world collected by an American paper. With the exception of the German papers—whose writings, it is asserted, are controlled by the military partyall lorecasts are of a highly optimistic character, and none have the slightest doubt as to the ultimate success of the allies. The comments of the Continental press are as follow : OPINION IN FRANCE. Coming to French opinion, M.

Vivianl, the Premier, writing In the Journal des Debats, says:— “France will not lay down her arms until she has regained for ever the provinces that were torn from her by force, restored to heroic Belgium her material prosperity and political independence, and broken Prussian militarism.” The Journal d’lndre-et-Loire, the oldest provincial newspaper in France, gives the opinion of the people in the neighbourhood of Tours :—“France did not want this war, and was actually forced into it, but the die is cast, and we must go on to the end. It is a question of life and death, but France will not die. The land of freedom can not die. Until the heavy clouds which darken the path of the allies towards a holy peace through liberty are rolled away, this war must continue. When that day will be is God’s secret, but all France prays that these days of wrath may be shortened.” In the French official review of the war the writer concludes : “Every further development given to the plan of campaign will result in a dimunitiou of the general value of the German armies. It will also bring nearer the moment when Germany will be at the end of her military resources and incapable of ever regaining her numerical superiority.” The Matin quotes a very remarkable utterance of Djavid Bey, the Turkish Minister for Finance, which runs: “I am of opinion that the war cannot last much longer, for the Germans will be unwilling to make a second winter campaign, I expect, therefore, a definite solution toward the end of October.” A RUSSIAN VIEW. On the Russian side the utmost confidence is displayed. The Petrograd Bitzberiya Vyedomosti says:—"Peace will be made only alter the complete and final victory over Germanism, for only in that event can enduring tranquility prevail in Europe. This result could be obtained now, but that would necessitate the sacrificing of from two to three hundred thousand lives. Rather than bring about such slaughter, the Government, fully assured of the final victory of our arms, thinks it better that the war shall be prolonged.” VAIN “HOPE” IN GERMANY. In Germany the views of the press controlled by the military party can have but little or no value. The Norddeutsche AII- - recently published an article “written to order,” in which the discussion of peace and peace terms was declared untimely, and the attitude of the Government in vetoing the publication of such an opinion in the press was upheld. The only hint in this article as to the duration of the war was given in these words: — “It was just the same in the time of Bismarck in 1870. Then, as now, there was only one object, namely, the defeat of our enemies, and the war will last, as the Imperial Chancellor told us in the 'Reichstag, until they have suffered a defeat which will insure us against further breaches of our peace, and it must give us such a peace that we can unfold our German character and strength as a free people.” This sentiment of an indefinite duration of the war is voiced in common by almost every paper in Berlin. The Editor of Kiel Meueste Nachrichten says “The war will last until the enemies of the German Empire sue for peace.”