The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 2, 1918. THE END VERY NEAR.

Taihape Daily Times, 2 October 1918, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 2, 1918. THE END VERY NEAR.

(With which is Incorporated The Tai* hape Post and Walm-ariao News).,

Bulgaria is definitely defeated, has surrendered unconditionally to the Allies in preference to continuing the war of her annihilation. One of the four nations in the group seeking world dominion has militarily collapsed and its Prime Minister has stated that Bulgaria henceforth will be on the side of the Allies. Unconditional surrender means that the Bulgarian forces will be disarmed, that they will immediately evacuate all Allied territory; that all railways in Bulgaria will be at the service of Allied armies and that the Allies will have freedom to pass over Bulgarian territory to attack Turkey or any other enemy. Fighting with Bulgaria ceased at noon on Monday, and with the laying down of Bulgarian arms there passed from the realm of possibility Germany’s dream of an eastern empire as well as of all her schemes for a Mittel Buropa; it has rendered the breakdown of Turkey certain and her immediate unconditional surrender sure; it will free Rumania to again take up arms, and, realising this, the Germans in Rumanian are hastening to get away while there is yet a railway available for them to travel by. In fact, this great Balkan victory will give Austria-Hungary a line to defend commencing at the Black Sea, reaching to Switzerland, somewhere in the neighbourhood of a thousand miles. With Servia in Allied possession Austria cannot remain long in Albania, Bosnia or Herzegovina, more especially as the peoples of those countries are in revolt. It is doubtful whether Austrian troops will be able to withdraw from those territories before disaster overtakes them, for it will be understood that the Allied Balkan army is now entirely free to travel north and west without opposition, in fact, with Bulgarian assistance, to cut off the Austrians that are endeavouring to eyacuate Albania, The 1 despised, inactive Salonikan Army has [ waited for its opportunity and it has i at last struck the blow that will bring i complete final victory, an unconditlon|al surrender of all the Germanic | Powers, and that lasting peace for : which the Allies went to war, all with- | in the next few months, probably by | next Christmas. The present indicat- ■ ed situation, is that Turkey is likely to tender complete surrender within a i week; it is impossible for Austria to j man the new line of battle and she | must also ask for acceptance of un- ■ conditional surrender or submit" to devastation of her country by the war being carried across it. Possibly, Germany and Austria will throw iu the sponge together; that is problematical however, as there is some doubt about the quality of Prussian courage; if it is at all preponderant with boastfulness it may die hard, hut evidences all

tend to- indicate that it will not fight with its back to the wall. The probability is that the greatest military machine the world has known will hand over its artillery, arms, ammunition, warships and tender its complete submission to the Allied generals at an early date, before any considerable invasion of German territory takes place. The evidence supporting such an eventuality is all on one side; Germany will no longer be able to secure food through the Balkans from the east, consequently the spectre of starvation will . soon be stalking throughout the land; oil supplies will be stopped, as the Rumanian and Turkish wells will be closed to her. By Turkish surrender very nearly all. the huge, gallant, Allied forces in Mesopotamia and Palestine will be set free to travel rapidly over Turkish railways to the Black Sea, to the Crimea and the Ukraine; the Dardanelles will be thrown open to Allied ships, setting free all the stored wheat and oil in South Russia. Seeing the power of Germany gone the Poles and other small Slav peoples will at' once cast off the yoke and gird up to rid ■ themselves of German presence, while Bohemia and other States of which the Austrian conglomeration of peoples is composed, will assert their independence of the Magyars and Prussianism. There is now no room for doubting that Prussian militarism has been fought almost to a standstill, and its trouncing win be complete beyonQ question or cavil. That the hour of peace for the world is on the point of being rung out is plainly evidenced by the unchecked freedom with which German newspapers comment upon the situation. The Cologne Gazette apologetically and pessimistically states, “With enviable secrecy the Allies have secured numerical superiority of ‘ man-ipower, gug-nower, and tank-power which Germany cannot hope to stand against.” Overwhelming fear grips German generals;’ their morale has sunk low. The “iLokal Anzeiger” says fhat communication with Constantinople must be maintained ai •

all costs, but we know that such communication is no longer practicable. “ Vorwaerts," after referring to probable German collapse in France and Belgium, urges its Government to endeavour to secure a peace that will not entail unbearable burdens; they must seek the conference-table at the earliest moment. It is too late; the conference-table is no longer there; only one condition now remains, and that is unconditional surrneder. In Austria consternation is supreme; alarmed at the complete defeat ot Bulgaria, the Premier and political leaders are summoning the Reichsrath; the Premier has been ordered to form a Coalition Ministry. The State is about to bo invaded by an invincible enemy and the peace potion of unconditional surrender, distasteful though it be, is the only antidote for national safety and continuity, and even that is not a specific in either the Austrian or German case. There is intense emotion in Germany; neither they nor we dwell upon the evidences of complete collapse of German militarism; they are too obvious to them and to us. It is not unthinkable that peace may from now on be declared any day. Germany knows that her peace tactics have entirely destroyed the last leg of any conference table, and she is fully conscious that all that now remains between invasion of her country and peace is unconditional surrender. Invasion, devastation and starvation, with concomitant loss of German life, is all that faces the German future every day the war continues. Neither military caste nor kings of industry, commerce, and finance will deceive themselves for a moment about the extreme truth of the German situation. They have realised the entire overthrow and defeat of their war aims, and that only the alternatives of annihilation and unconditional surrender are left for them to choose from. There is no doubt about what the choice will be, and we may all reasonably hope that the last 'shot in this greatest of all world war orgies will have been fired long enough before Christmas to enable many of the worn out soldiers on both sides to spend the first Christmas at 1101116 with their wives, parents, or friends, since war began.