The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE FRIDAY, OCTOBER 4, 1918. FINAL RETREAT COMMENCED.

Taihape Daily Times, 4 October 1918, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 4, 1918. FINAL RETREAT COMMENCED.

(With which is incorporated The Taihape Post and WaJnmrl-ao News).

It is somewhat difficult to get a full realisation of the true situation of the war on the west front at this moment. Great battles have followed one upon the other with such rapid succession that count of their real significance is overlooked or not understood. Victory after victory, great military successes, crowd upon our notice with such persistent frequency as to cause indifference about their true import and magnitude and we become unconscious of the great changes that are taking place in the war situation from day to day. Were we to say that German armies in prance have been irretrievably conquered on the west front we should be regarded as optimists of an ■>' extreme character, not because what we said was contrary to fact, but because our critics have not made themselves aware of w T hat each battle ami each capture has contributed to final and absolute defeat of the German armies. One of the most pessimistic of American correspondent in France has said that Germany is defeated in France and must immediately quit the invaded country. A statement of that kind is not an opinion it is a frank laying bare of fact What we are to disregard is the nearness of the enemy to the mountains that constitute the frontier between France and Germany, and the consequent nature of the German system of defence. Modern weapons of warfare have changed old methods of defence; provision has to bo made for an outlet for defeated armies when it is found that the last line of defence cannot be maintained, and such is the scheme that German military scientists and strategists have adopted right throughout this war, and there has been repeated occasions when we have admired the cleverness of a Successful retreat from what looked like sure disaster. Escapes of the kind have, however, been merely local affairs, all of which had their value and importance in the huge enveloping, comprehensive strategic scheme that Foch will not bo tempted to depart from. The American correspondent who, yesterday, said Germans must quit France immediately, sees that there is only the last road of escape left; that Foch has smashed through the highest, strongest most elaborate natural and artificial fortifications an army could put its trust in; that there is not room for any other such line of fortification that would permit of | adequate avenues of escape In case of I disaster, and he secs that the only J way to avoid capture or destruction is j to promptly get out, and he naturally assumes that the Germans will quit as rapidly as they can, commensurate with saving and taking with them all they need. B’efore the Germans made their thrust for the Channel ports and Paris, commencing last March, the Allies were at w r hat may be termed the foothills of Germany’s last line of defence. When this or that line of defence, named after Hun heathen gods, has been broken through our armies have only penetrated and passed particular obstructions in the one great defensive structure. Since Foch launched his offensive, in July, the Allies have returned to the foothills of

German boasted invulnerability; they have passed through. Seigfried, Wotan and other theatrically named lines of obstruction on the road to the summit} Yesterday cables informed us that Foch’s men had reached the sUmmit and had smashed through miles of inconceivable conglomerations of everything that would be likely to stand against modern military assault; that the two most important centres of distribution of commissarist, guns, equipment and munitions were already in Allied possession, and that German legions thereabout were in the air with no other stronghold to fall back upon; nothing but the avenues of escape left when destruction and defeat came. They have commenced to traverse those avenues, knowing full well that Foch would very soon have them between his guns and the mountains in their rear when only the alternatives of annihilation and surrender would be left to them. The crowning bastions of German defence in France have been smashed and Foch is preparing for the open country fighting and pursuit of the enemy’s soon to be fleeing legions. The blow has been struck that virtually determines the war by Foch; it has been gloriously siiccessful; victory in the' highest degree rests with the Allies and German militarism is as surely defeated to-day as it ever will be, and Mr Simmonds tells the world that the German armies will be quitting France at once. Tlf? centre of boasted invulnerability has been destroyed there only remains the bastions at Laon and in the south and Lille in the north to bring down, both of which can no longer be successfully defended for more than a week or two

During the last few days the war situation' in Belgium has undergone dramatic transformation; Foch has sent the Belgians forwmrd to iaccomplish in two or three days mare than British armies could do in five or six months earlier in the war, and they have more than succeeded. Under the personal command of their King, the B'elgians have delivered an irresistable notice to the -Kaiser tO' remove his objectionable minions from Brussclls, and the German officers are busy packing up their loot. Seven hundred railway cars are in readiness to receive the booty that the German people will have to foot the bill for; German soldiers are freely saying they are to be out of Belgium in six weeks. The important centres of Rollers and Courtrai arc once more Belgian, and when Thorout, which the Belgians are threatening, falls into Belgian hands the Germans on the- coast 'in the Ostend sector will be between the fire of the Belgian army on land and British naval guns on the sea; all territory between Thorout and Ostcnd will be untenable and the now familiar scuttle and run will soon make the w-hole of the remainder of Belgium untenable as a scene for Hun brigand,age and robbery. The .crowming feature of tho last two day’s fighting is the smashing of Germany’s last defensive hope in France, making the German stay in France increasingly more fraught with disaster. Mr Simmonds has said that they must go at once.