Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 62, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 March 1918 — WAR SUMMARY [ARTICLE]

WAR SUMMARY

Hindenburg’s western drive is in full swing.. His volcano so steel and flesh is being hurled against the Brittish on a fifty-mile front, from the Scarpe, long since better known as “the river of blood,” down to Vendeui, below St. Quentin. This front early seemed penetrated is at least four sectors. The Germans are driving forward in the direction of Arras, Bapaume, Epehy, Ham and Chauy. All are ruined landmarks of Hindenburg’s famous “strategic retreat.” The Somme battlefield looms as the scene of the supreme clash between Teuton and Briton. The battle is spreading northworld as far as the coast.. Severest fighting also has broken out in several vital sectors of the French front. Verdun, Rheims and the Campagne are the storm centers. The main immediate objectives, as apparent from the German procedure, were: 1. To drive a wedge between the British and French armies at or near their junction point, somewhere to the west of La Fere. 2. To extend the drive northward from Messines to the coast, 'with Dunkirk and Calais as objectives. 3. Battering and attacking the French in eyery important segment of the front, with the twofold

aim: (a) Of preventing reinforcement* being sent to the British. (b) Of “feeling” for the weak spot for a break through to Pari*. So gigantic is this supreme effort —the last card, upon which Hindenburg ha* staked the fate of the empire—and so tremendous are the possibilities involved, both in it* failure and success, that names, distances and number, captives, and booty, dwindled into insignificance from the moment it was seen that this is THE effort. “WHI they break through?” is the only question. Austrian gun* are aiding the German artillery. Berlin laid stress on this fact in it* official bulletin. There ha* been bitter opposition in Austria-Hungary to this drive. The people of the dual monarchy thus are slyly impressed with the fact that they too have something at stake. Revolt in Austria at this critical hour would—but why speculate? The facts of the present happenings are bigger; for once the allied world agrees with something the Kaiser has said: “The decisive moment of the war has come.”