AIRMEN SAVE THE FRONT.

Taihape Daily Times, 13 August 1918, Page 3

AIRMEN SAVE THE FRONT.

An interesting sidelight on one of the critical moments of the German offensive is supplied in an article written for the Field by Mr John L. Balderston. It states that General Petain was informed on Macrh 22 that the Germans had temporarily broken the B'ritish line, and for the moment had the road clear to Paris. The French resfives had had no time to get up far enough to bar the way. There was ii-it I'ven ttfi: s-t-.'lgLi-ng blind.d lino of h'tii'-nrriit <\ !-«p«-r<ite camo followers, who held the last of the roads from Ypres to the Channel ports in. 1914. Yet again Germany was foiled upon the very razor edge of her proposed accomplishment. Now it was General Petain who had conceived and ordered the instiantanleous formation of that endless chain of motor transport between Verdun and Bar-le-Duc, which saved the fortress at the crisis of its fate in 1916. It was Petain, again, o n the night of March 22, 1918, who as suddenly conceived and ordered a simultaneous attack of every aeroplane from the whole front upon the German concentrations at Ham. German troops had crossed the Somme that night it might have meant irreparable disaster. Deluged with bombs and bullets from the sky/they were thrown into confusion and delayed. They did not get across till next morning. By that time the British were reorganised, and the French were waiting for them at Noyon. The German plans were foiled.