SUEZ CANAL.

Taranaki Daily News, 7 January 1916, Page 8

SUEZ CANAL.

GERMAN ATTACK LIKELY. London newspapers have lately been very attentive to rumors coiwerniug the pending Turkish attack on the Suez Canal. Here is one story from a Swiss correspondent, who gathers his information from "private sources." The message is prefaced with the remark that the Germans are alarmed about the general position and are contemplating a coup do main. "The coup do main must ho countered before it is made, or it may he dangerous," he writes. "Of the various coups de main which are possible the one which is most specially the concern of England is an attack upon Egypt. That, according to reports received in Switzerland from Germany by a specially well-informed resident in this country, is the object on which at the present moment the German high command are concentrating most of their energy. They intend, by mean? of a light railway across the desert, to make a dash on the Suez Canal. They are counting on our traditional English slowness to move. They know that if the canal was properly protected by modern trenches it would be impossible for them to bring off their coup de main. No light railway could carry the huge supplies of men, guns, munitions, water and provisions which in that case would be necessary for a successful attack on the canal. But they believe that we have not yet made these entrenchments, and they calculate on our not making use of them in time. In that case they consider that their rush tactics could and will be successfully carried out with a comparatively small body of troops, which would not tax too severely the capacities of the desert railway. Assuming that the canal is not already properly fortified, my informant is of the opinion that we have time to make it impregnable and so make the coup de main a disastrous failure, if—but only if—we began at once. But he only gives us a month before the German attempt will be made."