The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 1918. BREAKING THE ENEMY.

Taranaki Daily News, 17 April 1918, Page 4

The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 1918. BREAKING THE ENEMY.

How necessary it is for the Allies to achieve a decisive victory if the world is to be saved from Prussian militarism is shown by recent cables regarding the fate of the richest of the Russian provinces. Courland, Lithuania, Esthonia and Livonia were, under the terms of the Brest Litovsk treaty, given autonomy and "self-determination." As everyone acquainted with the hypocrisy and "slimness" of the Germans knew, "self-deter-mination" was but another name for conquest. Now that Germany has met with a measure of success in her onslaughts in the West, she throws off the mask, and gives it out that these provinces have "jointly passed a resolution that they desire to become a part of the German Empire under the common constitution." This simply means that these states are to be Germanised, and their resources exploited, and in future will be brought into a political and economic dependence upon Germany. We are told that the booty represents 780,000 square kilotnei - of territory, fifty-six million inhabitants (or 32 per cent, of Russia's total population), one-third of the total Russian railways, 73 per cent, of the total production of iron, 89 per cent, of the total production of coal, besides hundreds flf factories, savings banks, etc. Germany's aim—but a subsidiary one, it is true—was to weaken, disorganise, and, if possible, break up Russia. In this she has succeeded beyond her most sanguine expectations. She has not only broken up Russia, but secured the ports, its amplest food stores, its wealthiest ironflelds, and barred the way for the rest of Russia from the Black Sea, the Mediterranean, and the ice-free waters of the world. Germany has her hands on the throat of Russia, and liberally helped herself to what was valuable and suited her needs. There is only one way of loosening her grip, and that is by a decisive victory in the West. As Hilaire Belloc says: "The task is to defeat the German armies; to undo them. Wherever they are defeated, whether upon the line they now hold or upon other lines, their defeat and our victory will leave us with complete power. If that task is beyond our strength, then, civilisation has suffered defeat, and there is the end of it. If by some negotiation (involving, of cqurse, the evacuation of the occupied districts in the West) the enemy remains undefeated, civilised Europe has losti the war and Prussia has won it." The defeat of Germany is well within the power of the Allies. A single decisive defeat on the West front will bring the German house totttring down. The Allies are stronger than the Central Powers in men and resources. Though Germany has her hands over the mineral fields of Russia, Roumania and Asia Minor, it lias to be remembered that they cannot provide all the raw materials which are essential to German industries. Of these the Allied Powers have a virtual monopoly, and without them Germany cannot demobilise her forces. While we retain mastery of the sea, which the enemy dare not even challenge, we can "hamstring" Germany economically. Germany has beaten the Allies in the preliminary bouts, but only at an immense sacrifice of life! Where the issues are so great, the loss of a few miles of country is not what tells; it is the last million men, and the Allies will have at their disposal millions of men when Germany will have been bled white. The present crisis * unquestionahJy a grave one, for Germany is evidently determined to force a decision at all costs, but no more crave than in and ia^ovem-

ber, 1!) 14, and February, ■ 1 England, it is well to remember, lias seen darker days, and emerged triumphantly. I'or three long, hard years she resisted, almost single-handed, the power of Napoleon, when' he was master of Europe, and the Kaiser is. by no means yet the master of Europe, To-day we have allies as strong as ourselves. Against such a combination no power that the Kaiser can exert will ever prevail.