The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 11, 1917. GETTING TO GRIPS.

Taranaki Daily News, 11 April 1917, Page 4

The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 11, 1917. GETTING TO GRIPS.

The cables show that tlie Allies' offensive, on the Western front has commenced in earnest. The recent intense aerial activity foreshadowed ;i general move on the part of the British. The attack, according to Mr. Philip Gibbs, is being made on a twelve-mile front. Already the immediate main points have been won, the British attacking in a heavy rainstorm, the enemy, fighting desperately, retreating to a strong rearguard line. The capture of the Vimy ridge is important, for it dominates the plain of Douai and the German positions around Arras. This win the scene, Mr. Philip Gibbs tells us, oi. some of the fiercest Frr r co-German battles, and the fact that it fell to the Canadians, after a heroic fight, is of more than usual iuterest, for the Canadians have some old scores to pay oil' against the Huns. Mr. Gibbs says the offensive aims at wrecking the northern end of Hindenburg's line. Sir Douglas H.ig has been tjo quick for the Teuton, whose plans for the retrea* have been frustrated. If we pierce the line completely —we are already through four systems of trenches—the aspect of the situation J or the whole Western front, will immediately be changed, for to protect himself Hindenburg must go back. No doubt he has similar fortified lines behind, and the advance of the British will therefore be no cakewalk. Ho has been driven from his positions on the Sonune-Ancre front, probably the strongest lines he held on tke French side of the Rhine, and it is safe to assume he will fare no'better in respect to his other lines. It all depends upon the conditions of the ground and weather. If they are suitable for tlie movement of troops and guns, the British will not be stayed for long. They have the guns, they have the munitions, and the men with the will to conquer. We were told by Sir Wifsiam Robertson the other day that Germany is numerically stronger to-day than ever before.

The Chiof-of-,Staff •speaks with an authority that is unchallengeable. Germany undoubtedly will make her supreme effort this year. By forced recruiting in Poland, Belgium and elsewhere, and by the enforcement of compulsory civilian service in Germany to relieve men to fill the. gaps, she has added a million to her righting forcc«. But the quality of the German treoir, is not what it was, una the repeated retreats and defeats will not add to their morale. It is a rather remarkable fact that in the attacks ou the Sommc aiul Ancre the Allies have captured or killed most of the defenders of the sectors attacked. Colonel Repington, commenting on this, said the othel day: "The German wails of anguish from the Somme make it probable that the German commanders in 'the West have told Ilindonburg that there are limits to human endurance, and that the stonewalling actics of 191G cannot safely be prolonged. In this case the Marshal may be compelled to adopt heroic measures, to mass bis troops for one more great effort, to hold the rest of his Wi'sLcrn front defensively with a thin lino of the worst elements of hi? new levies, and, if all fails, to go buck to the Mouse or some other river line where the defensive can be conducted with greater ease than ■ -„hc front now held. This is a course ...r which we must constantly be /n the watch, especially during the next four months, if our offensive does not precede one by the enemy, and we must extend our surveillance to the Belgian front as much as to any other." Mr. Simms, the American war correspondent, cables that the present battle is greater in intensity than even the Somme operations, which were 1 so disastrous to the enemy, who is gftting a taste of the. medicine he himself forced upon an unsuspecting and peaceful world not three years ago. In vulgar parlance, he is "getting it in the neck," and very little sympathy will be felt for him. The worst part of it is that we have to sacrifice so many of our own fine men in the process, but there is no other way of re-establishing ternational law and bringing about an enduring .peace. It must be a truly awful spectacle all the same, this clash of the might of the British Empire with that of the haughty Germans, who by this time have probably revised their ideas about the "contemptible British army." They are not only fighting a British army. They are fighting tht British Empire, which will "never sheath the sword until the rights of the smaller nationalities of Europe are placed upon an unassailable foundation, and until the military domination of Prussia is wholly and finally destroyed," to quote Mr. Asquith's memorable words.