SIR JOHN FRENCH.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 145, 13 November 1914, Page 3

SIR JOHN FRENCH.

AMERICAN* PRAISE. DESCRIBED AS MOST XOTABLE FIGURE IN WAR. "Sir John French, Field Marshal of the Army of Great Britain, has added lustre to his name-," said a United States army officer in Washington early in October.

"As the sunny fields and swelling hills of France have constituted the western theatre of war, the broadcast press has been inclined to ascribe the recent success of the allied arms entirely to France, The columns of the daily papers have been filled with the doings of the really great General u oifre and the inspired enthusiasm of the Frenchmen who are bent upon avenging the disaster of 1870.

"The legions of the Lord have been cheeked in their victorious advance; the great strategic pivoting movement upon Strassburg, wherein the Kaiser has swung his forces with hammerlikc blows upon the Allied left, has failed, checked through tile defenet offered by builet and shrapnel, and the Germans are in retreat.

"It is not my desire to detract from the glory of Joffre, for his was the plan which lured the advancing hosts to their humiliation; nor to deny one jot or tittle of glory to the Frenchmen who have waited over two decades for 'the day.' But it is my earnest desire to give due credit for sustaining the most crucial point of the line of tattle in the ■hour of need, and the credit, in my opinion, goes to Sir John French. "Had the Allied left failed before the German assault, two army corps holding off five, the story would have been diirerent, for the Allied line would have crumpled before the blow, and the defending armies would have been forced into each other, their line of communications severed and their defeat assured; but General Frencli saved tlie day. "Strategists agree, that the most difficult movement to Execute on the field of battle is that in which a lesser force •successfully withdraws before the battering of a stronger one, without becoming so seriously involved as to almost ensure defeat. This Sir John French did, back to the line of the Marne. The strategy of General Joffre is to be recognised in directing that the Allied line retired with but faint resistance until the ] tatt!/-gi'ou#'l of its own choosing was reached, but the execution of the difficult manoeuvre, by the left flank, was entrusted to the British forces, under its commander, and to him the consummation of the victory must be awarded. A general officer of mediocrity would never have accomplished it. "For an army the size of that which Germany launched the advance of seven miles a day, unopposed in time of peace, is a fair rate. The French and British forces about equalled' the numbers of the Germans, and it is evident that a much greater opposition could have lieen offered if deemed desirable. Yet the attacking force was permitted to advance at the average rate of aliout six miles a day.

"Why? Did you ever soe a wrestling master get an opponent oIT his balance before throwing him. The French induced the Germans to swing off their balance by hasty advances and the attenuation of their line of communication. Then they struck, and struck hard. French did the striking. "Time and agaip, as letters from the front show, the British 'Tommies,' occupying magnificent local defensive positions, checked the assault, yet were immediately afterward directed to withdraw to positions further to the rear, which they unquestioninglv, yet wonderingly, did. The strategic answer is obvious,"