Precaution Against Allies’ Offensive

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXVIV, Issue 39, 21 January 1916, Page 5

Precaution Against Allies’ Offensive

Movements of Monastir Troops

Montenegro and the Bitter End

Mesopotamian Advance Continued

BRITISH SUBMARINE ASHORE

CURRENT WAR TOPICS.

American one, may be trusted, to have great faith in the entrenchment system as a system. He regards von Mackensen’s breaking through the Russian army on the Dunajcc and the San as having been possible only in the particular circumstances. These being absent from conditions *.n the west, ho regards the German line in Flanders and France as safe.

The position in the Balkans is moving very slowly, although quite fast

enough, no doubt, for poor Montenegro. We read the announcement of • the Montenegrin Ministry with a sigh. It is that King Nicholas and his troops will fight to the bitter end. Just what that means, only the people of our unfortunate Ally will have to experience, but we know that Belgium and Serbia have gone through untold' grief and pain for the cause that they espoused so magnificently. “The Bitter End” in this case also means loss of home, cruelty and suffer-

ing, and loss ff life to thousands, and

worse than death to hundreds upon > hundreds of the womenfolk, young and old, infirm and invalid, through the length and breadth ‘of the country. Only too well have the Hunnish soldiers left tlfeir brutal marks upon fair peoples and the lands of the weakest Nations, whom in honor and by treaty they are bound to protect.

From ways that are dark and tricks that are mean and despicable to the depths of lying that appear unfathom- - able, from the disgusting,methods of the Prussian Autocrat’s miserable satellites, from murder on the High Seas, from spying and treachery and all Hun frightfulness may we be delivered. The latest instance for abhorrence of German cowardliness is the report that the . submarine commanders deny they are responsible for the sinking of the Persia! Does Germany expect any sane living man in the world to believe this for a moment? Shades of the dead American Consul at Aden! The ghosts of hundreds of innocent men and women who found a watery grave through the foul deed, which was the worst since the wholesale murder of the Lusitania’s passengers and crew, will surely rise up and mock the liars for the rest of their lives! The victims of the An<cona, the assassinated crew of the submarine El 3on the

Danish coast, the drowned nurses from the Marquette who went to their cruel death so heroically, the fearless trawlers of the North Sea, , all these, and more from their watery graves cry for vengeance, and who shall say that they will not be heard! The repudiation of the crime of the Persia will cause to rankle anew the horror of the nations, who now stand aghast at Germany.

Chartorysk, about which hard fighting has been going on for at least two months, was the scene of a very pretty Russian trick in the middle of November. Chartorysk is a town on

the River Styr, in the lower fringe of the great Pinsk /narsh region. It lies in a hollow on the left bank of the river, to the right of which there is higher ground. Somewhere about November 20 it was announced that the Germans had pushed forward across the swamps and taken the place. Twenty-four hours later the Russians were announced to have retaken it. The explanation is inter-

esting. Upon that higher ground the Russians had posted guns, trained » carefully upon the town. As soon as the Germans attacked, they withdrew, and gave the word to their gunnels, who blew up the new r occupants into minute fragments. Then they came back again.

Old “Vim o’Clock,” as the British Tommies call him, has been talking about the British army, and in a strain very different from that of the German critics who used to affect to despise it. \on Kluck ought to kno.’ about it, for he felt its stubborn resistance from Mons to the Marne and got a surprise from it that nearproved too much for him. Pnbravery and tenacity of the British \J. troops must lie admitted,” ho caul. “The old long-service men, many ol whom have served 12 years, are especially serious opponents. Nobody who knows British history can underestimate the British soldier, for he has proved his worth in all nats. Remember Waterloo. To suppose, as many do. that in the Boer war, and especially at the beginning, the British troops did not accomplish much, was very short-sighted. Ibe difliculties of colonial war are easily underestimated.” But in spite of bis appreciation, von Kluck is convinced that the Allies cannot break through the Germans lines in the west. He seems, if the report, which is an

Some months ago it was reported that a light line had been run out across the Desert of Sinai, bringing the Syrian railway, system within 60 miles of the Suez Canal. But to get within bombardment distance that line would have to be pushed at least 40 miles farther —probably 50—if the gunners wanted to be sure of doing more than frightening the natives. The guns which the enemy has found most destructive against forts and such defences are the Gorman 42 centimetre (161iu.) mortar and 381 milimetre (loin.) gun, and the Austrian 30.5 centimetre (12in.) gun. The 42 centimetre mortar can send a 20941 b. shell a distance of about eight miles. It can only bo carried on a railway track of normal gauge, and for this purpose, it is mounted on a platform which rests on two bogie trucks, each truck being carried on six wheels. The 381 millimetre gun, the “Dunkirk’ gun, winch was fired several times on Dunkirk from a distance of 24 miles, is a naval gun, the mounting of which has been designed to alhnv an elevation of over 40deg. Its projectile weighs 16751 b., its powder charge 6941 b, and the muzzle velocity is 3084 ft. pei second. This gun, which cannot fire more than about a hundred rounds ih all. had on Dunkirk a moral rather than a destructive effect. A weapon which has played a much more important part than the Dunkirk gun is the Austrian 30.5 centimetre (12in.) automobile mortar. This gun can fire at a range of six miles a projectile weighing 8801 b. According to “Engineering,” it fires with a sufficint degree of precision about ten rounds per hour.