RUSSIA.

Taranaki Daily News, 24 September 1917, Page 5

RUSSIA.

GENERAL ALEXIEFF. RESIGNS HIS POST. Received September 22, 5.5 p.m. Reuter Service. London, Sept. 21. General Alexieff lias resigned the post of chief of staff under M. Kerensky. TROUBLE OVER KORNILOFF'S OFFICERS. Received Sept. 22, 5.5 p.m. PetrogTad, Sept. 21. Cieneral Alexieff is resigning owing to a dispute with M. Kerensky.. Alexieff considers it essential to continue to employ many of the officers implicated in the Korniloff revolt. A ROYALIST REVOLUTION. KORNILOFF IMPLICATED. NUMEROUS ARRESTS. Received Sept. 23, 5.5 p.m. Stockholm, Sept. 22. A big counter revolutionary movement lias been discovered at Tobolsk, where the Czar is interned. The officers of the whole Tobolsk garrison were fn the confidence of the revolutionary leaders, who planned to first release the Czar. Already a hundred arrests have been made, including officers of high rank. It is alleged that General Korniloff was co-operating with the plotters. RUSSIANS FORCED BACK. ENEMY ATTACKS AT RIGA FAIL. Received Sept. 23, 11.50 n.m. London, Sept. 23. A wireless Russian official message States: The enemy pierced our lines and captured parts of positions south-west of the Admini region at Jacobstadt, also •positions two miles from the LYina. We retired to the right bank of the Dvina. Enemy attacks in the region of Riga, northward of Munchelu and northward pf Groseßelle broke down. REPORTED CAPTURE OF JACOBSTADT. Received Sept. 23, 11.10 p.m. New York, Sept. 23. It is reported that the Germans have captured Jacobstadt. SWEEPING CHANGE IN ARMY COMMAND. Petrograd, Sept. 21. CoL Verchousky (War Minister) announces that he is replacing the whole of the supreme command of the army, GATE OF PETROGRAD. KRONSTADT THE IMPREGNABLE. In the following article in the Daily Express Mr. Max iPemberton describes the famous fortress, of. which possession has been taken by the extreme Socialists of Russia. The fortress figures in Mr. Pemberton's popular novel, "Tho Impregnable City." Of Kronstadt—perhaps the first of all the naval fortresses—a young Russian soldier once said to me, "There is not in all the world another citadel such as this; there is not one stamped out of the earth so clearly a work of God unmistakable for tie defence of the Empire." Truly the soldier spoke well. If you take a map of the Gulf of Finland you will see at the head of it the V-shaped bay, into which the mouths of the Neva open, and beyond them a little way the city of Petrograd itself, rising above the marshes. A casual glance at the lie of the city would seem to say that an enemy ship might steam right up to it, there being only a puny island across the mouth of the bay, and that running narrowly from north-west to south-east. It is that island which has been Petrograd's salvation during the war. Approach it and you will see the domes and spires of si considerable city, hear the roar of a great arsenal, observe all the activities of a splendid military harbor, and many witnesses to commercial vitality. But you will also see, if there be any authority with, an "Open Sesame," the forts and bastions of one of the mightiest strongholds in the world. For half a century or more Russia has worked to make that low, rakish island impreg- ; nable. To the north, where the sea appears , wide and the fairway good, she has built , a monstrous dyke of granite, which ah the navies in the world could not pass while the guns of Kronstadt are manned i To the south, by which waterway you pass, there ie a spit of sand running out from Oranienbaum to the fort of Ktot--stadt and leaving a channel for ships but three hundred yards wide. HIDDEN FORTS. On this channel the fire of mighty guns can be converged from practically every point of the compass. North and south and east and west are the hidden forts, sometimes but black shapes , hardly rising above the surface of the ; sea—elsewhere, bastions of colossal strength looking down proudly upon the still waters. The town itself is a seetKing hive of industry—the great arsenal of Russia, her door to the Baltic, the rampart of Peter's city. The German flee't, might have blown Petrograd to the skies long ago but for Kronstadt. But the Dardanelles have proved the impotence of ships when opposed by. land forts whose gunners know their business. Quoting my young Russian friend again, I do not wonder that in asking me to observe the nature of the place enthusiasm should have moved him to heroics. ' "You will see," said he, "how the • island filling into the neck of the gulf : becomes a vast and natural wedge which ; enemy ships may never pass. If they come by the north side there is the great boom which a hundred navies could not destroy. If they attack us by the ■ south channel there are guns of all the t forts, a tremendous armament which ) would crumble cities to the dust. No r my friend, you may search all seas ami ? you will never find another citadel like l this. She is impregnable—the terrible gate of my country,"