WAR NOTES.

Taranaki Daily News, 14 November 1917, Page 7

WAR NOTES.

GERMANY BEATEN ON THE WEST. The collapse of the German army on the western front was in sight to-day (said Mr. T. M. Wilford at Christchurch last week). The German army was not to-day worrying about whether it could hold specific positions, but whether it could withdraw without annihilation from the positions it was now holding. The lecturer then drew a map of the Western front, and showed that Germany now held as a main line of defence only a ten-milo triangular strip of Belgium. The Allied strategy, he said, was quite simple and quite clear. The four towns to keep in mind were Lille, Cambrai, St. Quentin and Laon, which, connecting up with Metz and Saarbrucken, constituted the Ilindenburg line. Laon and Verdun were the hinges of the door. The object of the Allies was to work up northwards to Roulers to clear the sea coast of the submarine menace, and to break the Hindenburg line, with the object of capturing the great strategic railway lines concerned. The line had already been rolled back to the Passcliendaele Ridge, and every other ridge of major importance relied upon by Germany had been captured. The lecturer proceeded to describe in detail the Allied advance on the Western front, and asserted that all the military evidence available went to show that in Germany's campaign on the Western front she had been beaten at) almost every important strategic point. The outcome was certain and inevitable. (Utter rout might fall on Germany any day. But whether the rout came soon or late, the Allies were advancing, slowly but surely. The fall of Laon would .mean the turning of the German line, and the cutting of their line at Lille, at Cambrai, or St. Quentin would upset the provisions of the German army.