The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 25, 1918 THE CRUSADERS IN PALESTINE.

Taihape Daily Times, 25 September 1918, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 25, 1918 THE CRUSADERS IN PALESTINE.

("With which is Incorporated The .Tai* hape Post and Walcmmo News).

General 'Allenby’s victory in Palestine is certainly one of the chief phenomena of the whole war; with one great swoop he has rid the country of its Turkish oppressors and has thrown open the doors to their widest extent for the Jewish people, scattered over the world, to return once more to their own after many centuries of exile. In looking at the map it is realised that British forces have, during the last few days, been fighting over territory and places the names of which are familiarised to many in biblical history, Nablous is very nearly the site of Shechem and is at the foot of Mount Gerizlm; Samaria is a little further north, while to the eastward Es-Salt is Ramoth Gilead, and a few mflfes northward is Damieh, at the fooftof Mount Gilead, where the Turks gave considerable trouble. It is this chain of mountains from the Dead Sea,\ stretching far to the north which include Mount Hermon and the De)bahons. Therefore, our soldiers have their most .desperate work along where that old historic Jordan wends its sinuous way. In fact, the hilly country extends, in this la-., cality, nearly to the sea and is intersected hy streams, ravines and fivers/ One mentioned in yesterday’s cables, the Wadi Palaik, branches out in sev- f eral directions with their confluenceon the Plains of Sharon from whence* it runs a fairly large waterway to theMediterranean. Mention is made of the nature of the country in which the Palestine Turkish Army has been given its coup de grace to indicate that all the natural advantages of defence were available to the Turks,' and to show that the British victory was not helped by want of topographical natural fortresses of which the enemy had full possession. Allenhy’s victory becomes all the more surprising. hut it seems likely, from the names of places mentioned, that 1 his cavalry did their most deadly work by a rapid scouring of the Plains of Sharon, probably, after having a way cleared hy Bfitish warships lying off, i

" ' I in the Mediterranean. The capture of a complete army with all its transport, cannons and all other guns, , railways and rolling stock, all engineering machinery and tools, in fact everything that goes to make a mod- i ern army is a truly marvellous exploit. At latest reports cavalry were still - intensely engrossed with the rounding up of prisoners and the complete encirclement of the balance of the enemy, that they had not time to count their gains. So far twentyfive thousand prisoners are reported and there are a further forty thousand that are so surrounded that it is believed they have no chance of escape. General Liman von Sanders, the German Commander-in-Chief, had a very narrow escape from capture; he deserted his armies the evening before the site of his headquarters at , Nazareth was captured by British cavalry. The effects of this great crushing victory will be very farreaching; first, it will destroy what- j ever prestige Liman von Sanders had amongst the Turks, rendering his work dangerously ineffective and his - position less secure amongst the 1 Turkish people. The Turks have a i 1 most impressive demonstration that * there no more immunity from dis- ( aster and capture from fighting under 1 a German super-man than there is from 1 the guidance of a Turkish general. £ The victory cannot be confined to its A present limits; no time will be lost in f sweeping up and consolidating in readiness for a sweep onward. It is T an exceedingly difficult country for an p army to travel rapidly over owing to c abundance of hill cover for an enemy, g but our armies are now north of Naz- f areth, facing towards Mount Hermon, t and Damascus on the eastern side oT t the mountains, and Tyre, Beirut and g Tripoli on the western side. Our v Arab allies have rendered great ser- h vice in cutting the railway, making re- t treat next to impossible of success via e the main line running inland, north to f Damascus and Baalbek It will also n

render the despatch of reinforcements or rather a new army, from Aleppo, quite impracticable; it will lower the morale of .the Turkish armies facing General Marshall in Mesopotamia, who is pushing along the valley of the Euphrates with a functioning of his troops with those of General 'Allenby at Aleppo as his objective. The army that was shielding the rear of the Turks in Mesopotamia has been destroyed, and it must be replaced at some point by reinforcements from Armenia- or Constantinople or a general fall back towards Aleppo seems the only other alternative. • The Palestine victory will weaken the whole enemy situation in the Caspian and Black Sea localities, for it it a military essential that a line should be established for the defence of Aleppo, for once through the mountain doorway at Adana, Constantinople would be threatened by the Allies. Troops and all mechanism of-war must be sent from some other scene of action and it will probably soon be made apparent that von Sanders is exceedingly busy in this connection, that is if the Kaiser does not class him with the failures and retire him. Allenby’s victory will force upon the notice of the Military High Command that the longer they fight the more their dreams of Eastern possessions are proving untrue. The Mesopotamian British success rendered the BerlinBagdad scheme a chimera; then Germany turned to Russia, hoping to secure a back-door entry, but there her efforts are futile, and ground, and prestige ,are daly slipping away from them, the Allies are marching, almost uniterruptedly, on the heart of Russia, re-organising the Russian people as they go and instilling into them new hopes of a glorious national life, freed from every vestige of German domination. Germany will, by Allenby’s victory, be helped to a sane realisation of the complete defeat of all the aims for which the world was plunged into this hideous war. They are now aware that the Prussian dream of world dominion is merely the most horrible of nightmares; they are being hopelessly defeated on every front whereever they or their allies are fighting, arid are being’ disastrously routed. In France; in Serbia: in Palestine; in Russia; nowhere can they make a stand against the irresistible armies of the Allies". Germany, Austria,. Bulgaria and Turkey are all defeated beyond recovery, no military authority now doubts that, the fact is too obvious, and sooner or later the Prussian Swankers .wall admit that the only peace terms are unconditional surrender; the bloodiest, most hideous of glPwars will he over and Germany for ever be notorious for scientific barbarisms that were hitherto inconceivable. Allenby’s victory has brought the end very much nearer.