WAR NOTES.

Taranaki Daily News, 19 January 1916, Page 6

WAR NOTES.

THE RIDDLE OF THE BALKANS. London, November 8. The situation in the Balkans continues to monopolise public interest here. Everyone recognises that the whole position in south-eastern Europe is in a state of flux. Nor is it likely to change until Lord Kitchener bas had time to review the whole situation. When last heard of this week. K. of K. bad arrived on the Gallipoli Peninsula, and it is a pretty open secret both in regard to tile Dardanelles and the Balkans the Secretary of State for War has been armed with something. like plenipotentiary powers by the French and British Governments. In the Balkans our diplomacy has not been as successful as might have been hoped. The Italians were the first to elucidate the truth about Germany's relation with the Balkan States. But Italy had the advantage both of a more intimate acquaintance with the Balkans and a closer knowledge of Germany. Months ago the Allied Governments wore warned that Bulgaria was preparing to throw her sword into the scales of fate with the Central Empires. This proved to be only too true. There is reason to fear that the later warnings recently received about the true attitude of Greece and possibly of Roumania are equally well founded. It might have been different t if the Allies had been the first to deliver the military goods. But the Germans were the first in the field with their legions and their heavy batteries, and they have been able to supporttbeir dynastic alliances by moral suasion of the only sort that is likely to be very convincing in this troubled region.

GERMAN AIMS. The Germans have already accomplished the main object of their Balkan excursions. Perfectly reliable accounts have now been received in London of what is going on behind the advancing German lines. Huge convoys with munitions are moving down to Turkey and huge convoys with corn are moving up to Germany. Thus the German advance in the Balkans has already to some extent relieved the military starvation of Turkey and the economic starvation of Germany, and to that extent the enemy is finding a loophole of escape from the strangle-bold of tile Allied fleets. It does not follow that the adventure may not yet be fatal to the enemy. The Balkan operations mean that the compact 'position of the Central Empires, with their great advantage of interior lines artft no flanks, is so far modified that a long arm has foeen thrust out towards Constantinople. If the Allies' are able to concentrate adequate forces in the Balkans they may even yet succeed not only in overawing those Balkan States whose attitude is uncertain, but also in crushing the enemy's outstretched arm with disastrous results to the Central EmpiresN But this is a highly speculative surmise. The Question is whether Germany intends to press forward in the Balkans, with the object of forcing in Greece and Boumania, or whether she will be content with the economic relief secured in -the form of food supplied from Turkey, and will now attempt to resume an active offensive either in the West or in the East. It is no use crying over spilt milk, and utterly futile to start controversies about past irrevocable mistakes. But there is certainly much to be said for the energetic sagacity of Mr. Churchill's views that, instead of accumulating huge reserve forces in France, we should have done better to strike with all our available forces at Constantinople. Nobody believes that Gallipoli could have been rushed if the big "push" had not gone awry, thougft ft is only fair to point out that in the more restricted areas of the Gallipoli Peninsula there are not tlie same facilities for artillery preparation for infanty attack that there are on the Western front.

GOOD OMENS. Good progress is being made by the Allies, however, in the direction of ensuring a more efficient conduct of the war. In spite of the muddle about the recruiting question we are getting the men we want. If ever it comes to a choice between out-and-out conscription and an inconclusive peace this country will not hesitate for an instant. We are, as Mr. Churchill said, the reserves of the Allies, and whilst those reserves are only just beginning to make their influence felt the enemy's reserves of man power are showing unmistakable signs of exhaustion. Of this there is no possible doubt whatever. It is established by reliable figures carefully scrutinised and analyse by the military staffs of the Allies, and it is borne out by private letters from the front that both in morale and in numbers the German army on the western front shows undoubted signs of weakening. Even the enemy's offensives in the Champagne sector and on the Loo's front were, adopted, not with any definite military' objective, but solely with tfie objeet of restoring the waning confidence of the German soldiery. Against our infantry attacks the enemy's rank and file offer nothing like the resistance displayed in the early days of the campaign. The only question i 3 whether the strain on our finances will enable us to hold out long enough to bring about the collapse of the enemy ( under the strain on his military reserves. These must already be approaching absolute exhaustion. We have seen that Germany has had to abandon almost vital enterprises against Russia, including even von Hindonburg"s advance on Riga, merely in order to detach a relatively small number of troopa for tbe Balkans. When the time comes that Germany has put all her available men in the field, and can no longer make good to any extent her appalling casualties, the end of the war will be in sight. It is a moderate computation that Germany needs a hundred thousand men a week. Once that hundred thousand is no longer forthcoming from the reserves, -and represents a steady reduction in her fighting line, Germany will soon reach the end of the rope- i •".. . ~