FACING THE FACTS.

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 220, 9 June 1917, Page 6

FACING THE FACTS.

COURAGEOUS SPEECH BY THE FRENCH WAR MINISTER. M. Painlevc, Minister of War, explaining in the Chamber of Deputies the necessity of calling up the 1918 Class (young men of 118 years) said: We are entering the decisive phase of the war, but decisive is not synonymous with short. For the first time the proud German army has had- to confess her western front not unshakable, but successful as may be the beginnings of the spring campaign, it would be puerile to regard the German retirement as an abandonment. The retirement is proof of the need for the German army to muster its strength for a hard battle. Germany is gathering her military and internal energies for a desperate effort By the mobilisation of all her masculine and feminine forces by the abominable violence which she has used to compel citizens of the invaded country to work for her, she has been able to send to the battlefield all her sons capable of bearing arms. In spite of the sufferings and despair of her people, Germany has succeeded in keeping her armies as numerous and as solidly equipped as ever. That is the instrument, of war over which we have to triumph, but the resources of the Allies are so immense, the heroisd of their soldiers so high, that we shall succeed no condition that wo arc under no dclustio nas to 1 the effort to be put forth and that wo meet German savagery with unshakable French energy.