The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE TUESDAY, MARCH 12, 1918. GERMAN PREDOMINATION

Taihape Daily Times, 12 March 1918, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

TUESDAY, MARCH 12, 1918. GERMAN PREDOMINATION

With which is incorporated The Tainape Post and Waimarino News).

: Germany has commenced the lons .threatened offensive on the Western >ont. Attacks were made at various important points all along the line , J 4om the North Sea .to the Vosges. "Ejin&i! 'results 'have 'been" published in ej?es y-'-'Civilised .country, : .but "not a! \4ord has yet reached Ne\V !: Zealand apout the jubilations" in -Germany, of b'ellringing and holidays to schoolchildren. The Raiser's usual speech, after the victories of his glorious troops, about what he and his gott hkve accomplished, and how they will go on from victory to victory has not reached this Dominion. There "ain't" r even a core in the Allied apple for tjie Kaiser to taste. There was no 'victory for him; his glorious troops suffered tremendously, and mourning, not; joy, pervades all Germany to-day. Im-this far-away land we shall be safe in taking to ourselves the feelings of "confidence expressed by the ex-Prem-ier of Great Britain, Asquith, and of Mr- Balfour. The former says affairs "in Russia .and the submarine frightfulness are .pretty bad, but we have no cause for apprehension.. Mr. Balfour puts down the Huns' nauseating talk about his great western offensive in which Hindenburg is going to vietoriously be in Pars before the first of April,. as contemptible bluff. German attacks in force were beaten all along the line. At some places they got a footing in the first rush, but they were finally driven out, killed dr taken prisoner, and be it noted—British casualties were very light. So ended the first act in the great, longexpected German western offensive. Of course German armies on the west will be compelled to fight, but be it also noted that they are building numerous supplementary bridges over the canals in their rear. These canals were already bridged about every mile, some places much more closely. This bridge-building does not presage German confidence in victory, but it does indicate that the Hun command is concerned for the safety of its armies, and for the getting away of its guns when the British offensive commences. We have long ago lost all faith in Germany being able to carry out a successful offensive wherever there is average Allied resistance. At Ypres, while their numbers were three to one of the British, they were denied victory, and their efforts to secure it resulted in the ground they occupied being strewn with many thousands of dead and dying. With their worn out, patched-up old soldiers and their armed schoolboys they are not going to accomplish what the very highest class German troops failed to achieve. Germany will not attack where there is resistance. The Kaiser's contemptible talk is about victory where there was nothing to fight against. When resistance makes its appearance the Kaiser and his troops become non est. His recent victories are against the traitorously sold Russians, against the isolated helpless Rumanians, against demoralised and corrupted Italians. Germany won't fight where there js resistance; they have a mortal fear of the Allies; they are seized with preomination of defeat; their courage is a shrunken

quality and it is maintained only on fronts where there is nothing to contend with. Is it not a fact that Germany has broken obligations entered into with her friends by abandoning all fronts where there was real war work'to do? Turks have been left in Mesopotamia and in Palestine, and Austria has been left to deal with a revitalised Italy. Germany's want of confidence in her own warring powers is obvious in her forcing Austrians on to the west front Germany has thereby admitted that she cannot alone defend her own frontiers against France and Belgium. Surely the mighty war lord and his gott have fallen out. With Mr. Asquith and Mr. Balfour we see no cause for apprehension, and with them we are convinced that the German western offensive is largely bluff. Then what is the .position in Russia? Berlin was alarmed and agitated a few weeks ago, when Japan notified that force would be used to stop Germany from becoming her neighbour. All the avenues of fne Hun corrupting slime were turned on to poison Russia, and even to try and frighten the Allies. They promulgated the story about Japan joining issues with them and dividing Asiatic •Russia between them. Everybody

contemptuously .grunted at the suggestion even.; -it was too silly for momentary consideration. There is still talk about Japan coming to loggerheads with Russia; that Russians will resent Japanese resistance in driving out the would-be enslaver of mankind. Will any sane person believe that Japan has mobilised her army and navy; has mobilised all her industries, gone to the full extreme of instituting war provisioning without first having come to terms with the dominant Russia as she sees it for concerted and cooperative action in Siberia? Is there any man amongst the Allies, or in Germany even, so imbecile as to think that Japan's plans for intervention in Russia were not complete, and were not co-ordinated to Russian needs and desires before any preliminary step was taken to mobilise industries? The thought is too foolish. Japan has gone to the extreme in her preparations, which is supreme signification that all her. plans are complete, that not a single step is to be made in the dark..,, Before. Japan mobilised her. industries fj?r conducting a war on.the largest possible scale her. coucse-was cT§Sr. sb far, as Russia; and th-e^Allies are concerned, and nobodyv.knows that better than Germany,, and in Berlin there is alarrnt agitation. Germany knows that Japan has an old score to wipe off; and Russia knows it, but Russia also knows that Japan ihas made some;form of treaty with •her, .and that Japan does not- scrap pieces of paper of. that■ = kind. The rapidly growing dominant force fn Russia has called upon the Allies to help them against enslavement by Germany. Russia knew quite well that such help could only come from the eastward; from Japanese armies in which there might be a sprinkling of the other Allies, and from Japanese munition factories. Japan has done what Britain failed to do; had Britain mobilised all her industries from the beginning there would now have been no war. Japan has commenced upon a great war and everything has been done before hostilities commence to ensure quick and certain victory .