The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER FRIDAY, JANUARY 28, 1916. THE GERMAN MIND.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXVIV, Issue 45, 28 January 1916, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER FRIDAY, JANUARY 28, 1916. THE GERMAN MIND.

Under the heading "Imperial Psychology," a, remarkable editorial article appeared in the "New York Times" at the end of October, dealing with the Austro-German venture in the Balkans. "The German mind," says the writer, "is no more to be neglected than the German stomach. It requires to be nourished. The dramatic interest in war must be sustained. The eye of popular imagination must not be allowed to roll at will about the horizon, as it does in England. Hope must be focussed. War, as a moving picture, must preoccupy the mind outwardly, and save it from falling in upon itself. When the drama takes a wrong turn, or when it ceases altogether, another film must be snapped on in the place of the one that has turned out to be disappointing. Thus the mass imagination of Germany has been officially fixed, now upon this picture and then upon that. The first film was the capture of Paris—unfinished. The next film was the crushing of the Slav —unfinished. Another was the mastery of the sea by submarine—unfinished. The picture now running is the union of Europe and Asia through a Tureo-Gerinan corridor. The enthu-j siasm of the people for it is in proportion to their previous disappointments. It is extravagant. That is what an Imperial Department of War Psychology is for. . . If the German imagination were not preoccupied with pictures and phrases the truth might be perceived that, although Germany might lose the whole war in this Balkan adventure, she cannot win it there. In Russia she has lost momentum, and has a dangerous line to defend'. On August 2 the German armies took Mitau, 25 miles from the important Baltic port of Riga, the fall of which' then seemed foregone and imminent. It has not Fallen yet. Five weeks ago the Russian army eluded the triangular trap prepared for it at. Yilna, and fell back upon Dvinsk. That was. perhaps, to Germany the most terrible disappointment of the u . nr , S o far. Her armies proceeded then to take Dvinsk, which commands the railroads to both Riga and Petro- ; grad, and they are taking it still. That \

is on the east. On the west, what was gained by the September drive of the Anglo-French forces has net been recovered. In the control of the Baltic- Sea appears to have been lot. English submarines now occupy it and are destroying the only commerce that survived between Germany and the world—namely, that with the Scandinavian countries. Those are pictures to brood upon. The German mind must be saved from that. The Balkan campaign is a wonderful distraction, h is a high piece of strategy also. The Allies, to resist it, have to put forth an amount of energy vastly greater than the Germans put into their offensive. To transport an army around Europe by sea, land it on the Balkan Peninsula ( move it many miles through difficult territory, and by single railway lines, to meet an army that has only to cross the Danube River into Serbia —that demands more than man for man, and involves great risks on the part of the Allies. Therefore, the Germans were tactically veryshrewd to open a theatre in which their advantages were so great. But those are not the tactics of Germany that began the war. It is the .strategy of a fighter who spars for time, after having failed in three main attempts to destroy the enemy. The Allies could lose the Balkans without losing the war. This only the Imperial Government knows in Germany. Proof that it knows is that it talks obliquely of peace."