Manawatu Herald. SATURDAY, MAY 26, 1917. THE HINDENBURG LINE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1717, 26 May 1917, Page 2

Manawatu Herald. SATURDAY, MAY 26, 1917. THE HINDENBURG LINE.

THE meaning of (lie German retreat was dismissed by Air 11. Warner Allen, British correspondent with the French armies, wilting' on Alareh 18th. Winter prevented the publie from appreciating how heavy was the blow dealt to the enemy by the British and Freneh armies on the Somme, he said, but the German High Command was well aware of the enormous wastage that that battle caused among its troops and of the extreme difficulty with which, after each French or British success, its infantry, hard pressed, rallied to the defence of (he positions in (he real'. The result of the battle of the Somme was that the enemy decided that a breach was being opened in his first line of defence, and he accordingly took the only measure that it was possible for him to take. He built a barricade behind the breach. In other words, he began last October to construct the lines, called by the French the Hindenburg lines, in order to obstruct the gap that his men could no longer hold, with the intention of rertreating to them in order to avoid the certainty of defeat. Xo besieged garrison in the history of the world has ever claimed that its position was improved by falling back from its wall to the barricade behind. Yet this is .the claim made by the Germans to-day. Their front lines were as strong as the art of fortification and two-and-a-half years’ experience could make them. The outer castle wall has obviously a great advantage over the extemporised barricade. The Hindenberg lines cannot but be inferior to fortifications that have been built by degrees to meet the practical requirements of long experience. Alorcover, geographically speaking, they are unquestionably less favoured than the positions they-arc now evacuating. So it is that last year’s blow on the Somme has forced the enemy to'evacuate not only the lines attacked at that moment, but also the positions further south, from Rove to Xoyon, where the Germans were nearest to Paris, and where the allies have never made a serious assault. The German retreat is to be regarded as the highly satisfactory result of the allies’ efforts during 191(i and as a happy omen for the success of the campaign of 1917.