CURRENT WAR TOPICS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXX, Issue 10, 14 April 1916, Page 5

CURRENT WAR TOPICS.

There w*as a calm aighi in the Verdun region, runs the latest cable from the West. On the British line General Haig reports satisfactorily. The time cannot be long delayed now hefore the Allied offensive of which we .have heard so much will be raken. We may he sure that preparations are being pushed forward with all speed. It is some months now since the munition works in Britain came under State management, and v by this time there must be a fair supply of shells and ammunition of all kinds on hand. But an enormous surplus will be required to keep the movement sustained until victory is complete, and this is not expected to be effected in a day or two, bub, rather, will mean arduous and costly work in men and material for months on end. A letter just receive&'in'New• Zealand refers to the coming offensive as 1 'being* : a very 'real affair shortly to ; be ! 'expected/

Of late we have* 'heard little of Roumania, • whose intervention a. couple of weeks <ag» was described as imminent. ,That is not a bad sign. If Roumania has decided, and is ready to mbve, she will; naturally keep quiet until the resumption of the offensive by the Allies enables her to join with the greatest effect and with the least danger to herself. With Russia advancing along her northern frontier, and thus protecting.her flank, and the Allies «-ooperatihg by an advance from Salonika, Roumania could deal a decisive blow against Bulgaria, and with her assistance it, should be easy to sever the free communication (1 which Germany now enjoys with 'Constantinople, through. Constantinople to Asia Minor,. Palestine,, and "Mesopotamia, tljp. to February* Roumanians war amounted to £24,000,000, and since then .ajjvvar. vote, of £16,000,000 has been passed, and 45Q,000 troops have been mobilised-

Though she has been a neutral up to the present, Roumania has been busy preparing her army, and the benevolence of her neutrality as far as the Allies are concerned is a good sign. It must not be forgotten that at the outbreak of war Roumania was technically linked up with Germany as an Ally under the Triple Alliance. She wasj however, no more bound than Italy to accompany the Central Powers in a venture for conquest, and at th© Crown Council -held on August &j 1914, the treaty that linked her to Germany and Austria-Hungary was for all practical purposes denounced. The proposal that she should avail herself of her military convention with the object of taking Bessarabia from Russia was rejected. Roumania has been preparing steadily, and when she does decide to come on the scene she will be an Ally worth having. She will a well-organised army, plenty of munitions, and all her industrial activities organised to support hsr operations in the field. Perhaps in the end it will be found that Roumanians apparent hesitancy has been good—both for herself and the Allies.

General Lake's forces in Mesopotamia have still 23 miles to go before they reach Kut-el-Amara and relieve General Townshend's small force, which has been besieged there for four months, and which can scarcely hold out very much longer without relief. The Turks are sure' to dispute every mile of the way;. Umm-el-Hsin-nah, (the native name of which is Felahie) although a strong position which, resting on the Tigris to the south and impassable swamps to ,the north, could only be carried by frontal attack, is not the only, or even the greatest, obstacle separating General Lake f rom' the force he is attempting to relieve.. The Turks will make their big stand, it is believed, at Es-Sin, seven miles to the east of Kut-el-Amara, where they have strongly entrenched themselves. Still,

in the forcing of the pass between the river and the swamps the first great difficulty has been overcome, and we may hope that similar success will attend the further operations. General Lake, who superseded General Nixon as commander-in-chief of the Mesopotamian expedition in January, is now himself with the relief forcb, of which General Aylmer was in command, and which reached llmm-el-ttannah about January 20, but was unable to advance on account of the floods. But the expedition, once i+s scope was extended beyond the protection of the Persian oilfields, lias been fruitful in disappointments, and anxiety will still lie felt until General Townshend is safely relieved. The following table gives the chief events in connection with the expedition singe the landing 16 months ago : Novermber 7, 1914;—-British force' lands at the head of the Persian Gulf. -November 21.—Basra occupied. April, 1915.---General Nixon ta'kes eommand, and-occupation of Persian oilfields began. , Aprtf. 13,—Advance up, the Tigris begun.., , , ,„(. . , , • September . 29, .—Kut-el-Amara (240 miles. up .the. Tigris) occupied • 1050 prisoners taken. Turkish force in flight towards B.agdad. , . • November, 22.-Battle of Ctesiphon (300 miles up'the Tigris, 1$ miles from Bagdad). , November 25.—Arrival of huge Turkish reinforcements compels General Townshend to fall back toward Kut-el-Amara. ' ■••

.December' 3.—General Townshend reaches Kut-el-Amara, and-fs besieged there. January 7-9, 1916.—General Aylmer, advancing up the Tigris to relieve General Townshend, defeats Turks, about 50 miles' from- Kut-el-Amara. . January 10.—Sir Percy Lake to su<w ceed General Nixon in Mesopotamian command. ! . - • •• • January 21.—Aylmer at Umm-el-Hannah, about 20 miles from Kut; checked there by floods.

A careful and thorough inquiry into the story of the angels at Mons has been made in connection with the Society for Psychical Research. The result, it is announced, is the entire,discreditment of the story. It first found publicity in a parish magazine on the authority of a "Miss.M.," but when Miss M. was appealed to, she did not know who the men were who were said to have seen the vision, though the report said she knew them personally. Other versions-rincluding that of Private Cleaver, who, it is" now known, was not at Mons at all—proved, equally valueless when tested. The inquirer doubts the attribution of the stories to a source in Mr Machen's "The Bowmen " on the ground that there is hardly any resemblance between this tale and the various versions. Mr .Begbie's evidence is also discarded as quite untrustworthy from a scientific standpoint. Similarly, the story of the appearance of large bodies of cavalry escorting the British forces after Le 'Gateau is based on the evidence of men absolutely worn out with fatigue, "babbling all sorts of nonsense in sheer delirium'.'* The general conclusion of the inquirer is that the stories are founded on mere rumor, and cannot be traced to authoritative sources. A certain number of men believed themselves to have bad supernormal experiences, but'on slight grounds. No firsthand evidence was received, nor even any second-band evidence that justified belief that there had been any supernormal phenomena.