GERMAN ARMY.

Taranaki Daily News, 22 March 1919, Page 5

GERMAN ARMY.

HOW IT COLLAPSED. UNDERESTIMATE OF BRITISH L42TD FORCES. INTERESTING DISCLOSURES. Received March 21,11.20 p.m. Paris, March 15. A German officer, writing to a prisoner of V«r in Germany, throws light upon the collapse of the German Army He •tates that the collapse was not due to *be revolution. Discipline had considerably deteriorated during the last year of tb* war, especially among troops on the ••stent front. These went unwillingly to the Western front. Headquarters no loogtr had influence at the War Office, so Lu&adorff, after much disputing, took matters into his own hands from the top to' the bottom. There was also a la* of freak battalion leaders, and war weariness wa» constantly met with. The first great mistake Germany made wto» Mtdermtrnf the Englishmen as land Mtttta, «nd the second the underrating of Anrtrtea's- capacity to build ships and .raise an army. The writer says: "We got false information from our navy, which was thoroughly spoilt by the great fuss made over it from the Kaiser downwards, and by the injudicious distribution of distinctions made to submarine eonißsadtn, who reported larger sinkings than was the case. Thus the army »nd staff.worked on a wrong basis. Our Navy was unable to disturb the 'American transports, and when this truth was realised we had to take the offensive earlier than we planned and before the Army was sufficiently trained. As a result we lost 180,000 in the first offensive, and Germany had scattered her troops in every theatre of the war, instead of havmg, every man at the decfirre point. Our offensives at Soissons, Kemmel and' Rheims were miserable attempt*. After the failure at Rheims Ludendorff lost his serve, and risked all upon a throw. Then followed the fight «f despair. The moment to try for peace had now slipped by. The German's letter concludes by stating that th» Entente never lost their stubbormsss. The revolution was not the cause but the result of defeat. When the American leaflets undermined our confidence the use of tanks completely broke it down. Order is entirely lacking in German ftfutnws, est there is no money to spare for efficient preparation of the world war 4tgtAhßtion began a year prior to November last, with the help of Russian Bolshevik capital, but when the Kiel mutiny occurred a large portion of the troops at the front and at home was already infected.