Voilent Artillery Duels

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXVIV, Issue 44, 27 January 1916, Page 5

Voilent Artillery Duels

THE KAISER AT 57

British Labour and the War

CURRENT WAR TOPICS.

It is a fact that the idea of an offensive by the Allies on the West is always with us. No doubt thi s has arisen from the statements made from time to time by different men in authority when in their most optimistic moods. Of late, whenever the news has been meagre, “an offensive,” “drive,” “push” or other similar terms get a good run, while the slightest chance given by an exchange of artillery work or the rushing of a trench and the occupation of the crater after the enemy has left (!) —this occurred the other day in the cables—results in inward satisfaction and outward rubbing of hands and confident smiles, accompanied by the statement “Now they’ll get it!” or else “Wait till the spring!” The last is probably nearest the mark, as it is unlikely the Allies will ever attempt anything out of the way till the season is propitious. On thi s point it may be noted that when the French Minister for War was asking the Chamber for permission to call up the 1917 class of recruits—youths of 17 and 18, who, under ordinary circumstances, wbuld have been left alone for another year and ten months—he remarked that he wanted to have them ready by the spring of 1916. “Then,” he said, “in agreement with our Allies, our reinforcements, and armaments will allow. u§ to make a' decisive effort.” But what of the enemy.? For the same reason they may not intend to extend the operations to any measure except those which will just keep u s on the alert, but to-day’s cables hint at something in the nature of a birthday present for the Kaiser, and as supplementing the probability it is stated that for some time the Germans have been using their Fokker air-machines to keep at bay the inquisitive and daring Allied airmen.

The news to-day point to an additional effort on the part of the Germans, and it is not unlikely that today’s anniversary, the 57th, of their Great War Lord is the incentive to action. A nice birthday present would be the capture of many kilometres of Allied trenches in the West and a marked gain in the march on Paris, which was so suddenly and so disastrously to him suspended at the Battle of the Marne, long sad months ago, when in the flush of the war fever, the Kaiser’s best battalions set out to mangle Belgium, strangle France, invade proud Albion’s shores, and then dominate Europe—and the world! How did they succeed? The world knows only too well the terrible late of the Belgians, which has nothing to commend and only something to abhor. It is high time Germany had more than this poor reward for the terrible loss of life in the West, and the birthday may be the occasion for a move—if nothing else!

Referring to- the Kaiser, and the state of his health, an Australian writer on war matters, says:—The death of the Kaiser might make a very considerable difference to Germany and the war. One would expect it to have a generally disintegrating effect. The Kaiser is a man of character, ability, and magnetism, very far removed from the dull, self-worshipping brute of the cartoons, and under his rule many otherwise opposing forces have been bound together in the service of Prussian Germany. Even if the Groan Prince were a far stronger and moie able man than he see##, his task, if he were to succeed his father now, might

very likely be too much for him. What, for instance, would happen to 0 . the relations between Germany anil Austria-Hungary, Germany and Hungary? Can anyone imagine ■ Wilhelm the younger and lessor assuming' his father’s attitude towards poor old Francis Josef, or towards the Hungarian Premier (Count Tisza)? And what would happen within the German Empire? How would the rulers of Saxony, Bavaria, Wurternberg take the new accession Or, coming to another side of German politics, could any influence less strong than the present Kaiser’s keep the well-known opposition between the parties led by the Chancellor (Dr. von Bethmann-Holl-weg) on the one hand and Grarj> Admiral von Tirpitz on the other from blazing up into a disruptive force? Then, setting aside politics, there is to be considered the effect upon the direc.tiou and conduct of the war. There have been reports of .personal interior-

Bulgarians Defeated in Albania

erices by the present Kaiser and as to their ill-effects, but, judging by what is known of the Crown Prince so far, interference by him might be, for Germany, nothing less than calamitous. If rumor tells true, again, the Crown Prince has a strong inclination towards action, and particularly military action, but not necessarily of a wellponsidered kind. On the whole, his reign might be expected to begin with an outburst of military energy, duo partly to the deepening of national enthusiasm that the death of a widelyloved ruler would naturally cause. And if the activities generated, and the enemy’s policy generally were to lose unity of direction and tend towards the disrelated and spasmodic, that would not be a very great surprise. The will and personality of the Kaiser havo meant a great deal to the enemy s unity of will and co-ordination of effort; his death might bring his country nearer to something like the condition from which the Allies are trying to emerge. The frequent references to the freight question in Britain gives an additional interest to the announcement which appeared in the London newspapers in November stating that the Admiralty had decided to permit the private ship-building yards in Great Britain resuming the construction of mercantile steamers, says the Lyttelton Times. When war broke out rpany of the private shipbuilding yards were compelled either to dismantle vessels that were being constructed "or to cease work on them in order to take up Admiralty orders of various kinds. The need for merc-in-tile ships, however, has been growing rapidly, and the release of the private yards has been followed by an immediate activity. This demand for trading vessels has been felt all over the world. In Japan the ship-building by the end of November had orders for fifty ships aggregating 220,000 tons. At the same time .the American yards have been busy. A railway to an ice-free port, a matter of profound importance to 'Russia in her intercourse with the world, was opened the other clay from Petrograd to Ekaterina on the Arctic Ocean (says the New York Times). Three hundred miles farther north than Archangel, which is frozen during eight long months of the year, Ekaterina is blessed in its proximity to the Gulf Stream, which laves the northern shores of Norway, thence penetrating the Arctic Sen as far as the Kala Inlet, where Ekaterina stands. War traffic, of course, will be the first use to which this railroad is put. It was built under the direction of American engineers and with the aid of 10,000 men, mostly, prisoners', but 1000 oi them were American workmen who travelled to Petrograd last Jims, via San 1 rancisco, Vladivostok, and the Trans-Siber-ian railroad. Henceforth Russia will have less need of a free passage through the Dardanelles. “Germany is beaten’’ was the title of an article in a November issue of the “New York Tribune,” which naturally excited a good deal ol interest in England. From the beginning of the war the “Tribune’s” sympathy with the Allies has been naked and unashamed (writes the London correspondent of the Sydney Daily Telegraph). As befits its proud position as the leading organ of the Republican party, it is always a hold and independent vigorous critic of affairs. It does not spare what it deems to be the shortcomings and blunders anc weaknesses of the Allies. It has a fund of particularly candid severity to draw upon when it exposes or denounces what it does not like in the policy of the British Government. But all it writes in that strain is animated by the faithfulness of a friend. Briefly, the argument is that the Allies’ resources of men. munitions, and money are incomparably larger than those possessed by the enemy; that the Allies’ sea-power, mainly British, has already won a monopoly of the advantages appertaining to the freedom of the seas ; that the enemy is bleeding to death on the several battlefields, while the Allies could stand the drain on their vitality, great as it is, indefinitely; that, militarily, Germany’s one chance was to get an early decision, and it has gone; that m France and Belgium, from the sea to the mountains, Germany is hard-press-ed and barely holds her own; that the i hope of extinguishing the fires of Russian patriotism and reducing the Rus-

sian armies to impotence is now only a pretence; that the enemy’s general situation cannot lie retrieved by temporary successes iu the Balkans; that the Allies’ economic pressure upon the enemy is severely felt now and will add terror to tbo winter ; and alter all the peace-kites are flown from Berlin, none from Petrograd, Rome, Paris, or London. The “Tribune’s” article covered much of this ground. Germany, it insisted, is beaten. She cannot win. She may delay the unconcealahle end but not avoid it. She is doomed to defeat.