Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 233, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 October 1918 — ACT THREE OF MIGHTY DRAMA [ARTICLE]

ACT THREE OF MIGHTY DRAMA

FOCH WILL ATTEMPT TO DESTROY HUN ARMY AS • -IT RETREATS. A correspondent of an easterft metrqpoltan paper, who has written interestingly about the war, has the following to say about the present Situation:

The most interesting circumstance in the battle of France is the advance of the Belgians and the Second British army. It is interesting both in its present importance and the light it casts on the strategy of four years ago. Plumer and King Arthur are now doing what French And Foch strove to do in 1914. Four years ago Kluck made, good his ground at the Aisne and the front had been stabalized from Oise to the Swiss frontier. French moved his army up to a front from St. Omer to Bethume and began a turning movement around Lilld and attempted to drive the. Germans from this great city. In the course of this operation, Sir Douglas Haig reached Ypres and there joined Sir Henry Rawlinson’s 7th corps. At the close of the third week in October French attempted to push east from Ypres down to the Menin road and seize the crossing of the Lys. Here he encountered the first wave of Germans who had captured Antwerp. This was the begining of the first battle of Ypres. The allied offensive was turned into ah almost despairing defensive, while the British army stood and died holding the road to Calais, and the Belgans and French to the westward held the Eser canal line. After a month of desperate fighting the struggle was narrowly won by the allies. Again the tide has turned the British and French are doing What French attempted ‘to do in 1914 and Haig in 1917. A wedge is being driven behind the German positions o nthe Belgian coast and the allied movement is causing the Germans to evacuate Lille on the south and Ostend on the coast. Ypres has become a quiet sector and the Germans are on their way back to the Scheldt. And what is happening in Belgium is also happening in France. The German line which, with minor modification has endured for four years, is becoming a thing of the past, Cam>rai and St. Quentin have fallen; Lille will promptly be evacuated; Rheims, like Ypres and Verdun, will before many days be fhr behind the line. We may see a long struggle from one trench system to another, a reproduction on an enormous scale of the first battle of the Somme. But the Germans must retire between the Meuse and the Oise and particularly about Laon and in the St. Gobain region must retire with little delay and over a considerable distance. Foch’s stupendous three-act drama began July 18 when' he broke the German -offensive and seized the initiative. August 8 he began the drive that threw the Germans back to the Hindenburg line. The last act, which has been very successful, was to drive the Germans from the Hindenburg line. We are to see the pursuit of the Teutons retiring from the Hindenburg positions. On the character of theGerman retirement depends thf ultimate' outcome of the campaign of 1918. If the Germans retreat as they did from the Marne in July, and from the old Somme front in August, the campaign will end by the time they reach the next defense system behind the Scheldt and the Meuse, and the liberation of most of Belgium will have to be postponed until next

year. , C2' , But if the German morale breaks down, if there is a crumbling-of the resistance at any vital sector, then we may see a supreme disaster, the rout of the German army and a military decision this year. Of this last event there seems to me only the remotest chance. It is certain that the Germans must go to the frontier, but it is probable that they will be able to rally there, and-bad weather will interrupt operations for the year. Even if the liberation of northern France-be themaxmum profit of this campaign, it will endure as one of the most wonderful in human history. The German offensive has been broken, Germany’s conquered provinces and cities are slipping rapidly from her grasp. Allied troops in Belgium, in French Flanders, in Artois, in Champagne and in Lorraine are advancing in country which has been German for forty-seven long months. And all chance of a German return to the offensive is gone. ~ The march to Berlin has begun. St. Quentin, Cambrai and Lille the only the starting places, but after four years no one can fail to see that the grand march has started. If the road is long, the rate of our advance is increasing. One of the darkest nights in all human history is coming to a close. Victory is no longer even a matter of debate. From the North sea to the banks of the Moselle the final advance is going forward.