Enemy is Beaten.

Taihape Daily Times, 20 September 1918, Page 3

Enemy is Beaten.

A LONG WAT TO GO, WE MUST PENETRATE GERMANY SAYS GENERAL PAU. General Pan, chief of the French Mission, now in Australia, is one of the most distinguished men of the French army, and his views on the prospects of the Allies winning the war arc of particular interest and value. On arrival in Sydney he was, of course, interviewed hy Press repreand the inevitable question was asked: "When arc we going to win the war?”

The General expressively shrugged his shoulders, smiled and replied: "I have not counted how many people have put that question to me, but there must have been several thousand. I myself consider that the enemy is beaten: but he does not deem it so himself yet. I believe that his military chiefs have commenced to have that opinion. They are beginning to see their danger; but they have no intention of saying so to their people because the German military chiefs still hope by their well-known proceedings of dissolution and by their methods of endeavouring to promote division amongst the Allies to secure that dissolution and division. That is what they count upon to secure them victory. As regards their own nation, they continue their old system of lying towards their own people, but when the facts at last become too strong to be overcome by words, all that edifice of false confidence among the German people will crumble away But, in order to make the German people realise that, they must feel the war in themselves and in their own country, and we must go there and make them feel it.”

"Do you think we shall get there soon?”

The General shook his head vigorously, and gesticulated energetically with his war-shorn right arm. “Non! non!” he exclaimed. “There is still a long and difficult way to go before wo penetrate in their territory.” “Can they hold on the Hindcnburg line?”

“I think,” replied the General, “there will be, as there always has been a lull in the operations at present being carried, out. But I don’t think they will be able to hold there for long.” The general was informed that the morning cables showed that the enemy had been ordered to stand at all costs. “It is evident,” said General Pau, “that they will endeavour to hold on at all costs.' What makes it certain that they will hold on with obstinacy is the fact that they realise their political existence and their economic situation are at stake. But gradually in proportion as the struggle advances their forces will diminish and the Allied forces should'- steadily increase, not only from a material but also from a moral point of view. There is a steady increase, which must tell, going on in our strength As to the ultimate issue of the struggle, I have no doubt victory is certain and sure. This opinion has been my opinion since the beginning of the war. My conviction as to the ultimate result lias never changed; never wavered.” FRANCE’S GREAT SACRIFICE

Speaking at a reception accorded by t’no French community of Sydney, General Pau worked his hearers up to a high pitch of enthusiasm. After having paid a. tribute to Britain’s “contemptible little army,” which, though small was not contemptible and had grown into the great and victorious army of to-day, General Pau referred to the groat sacrifices France had made. Of the total population, he siad, 15 or 16 per cent had been mobilised and of the manhood of the country 35 or 36 per cent had been mobilised —a higher percentage than that of any other Power engaged in the war.

The General also spoke of the devastation wrongful by the Huns in Northern France, and declared that the enemy would have to restore to both nation and the individual everything of which he had robbed them. No punishment, he added amidst applause, would bo complete until the enemy as defeated on German soil. The nation that made this war would have to taste its horrors but the Allies would not bo guilty of the Huns brutalities—they could not be even if they wished to be.

General Pan concluded with a tribute to the people of his country, especially the poorer clases of society, who had never shaken in their confidence of ultimate victory, and the womenfolk, who had stood steadfast and firm throughout. Other nations had been . accustomed 'to look upon French women as frivolous ,ana Careless, but that idea had now been swept away for ever because of the fact that it was the splendid spirit of the women of France which had sustained the whole nation.