Evening star., 1915-03-07
BOTH SIDES CLAIM
VICTORIES IN WEST
French Declare They Have
Made Gains in Champagne
and Argonne.
BERLIN INSISTS GERMAN
COUNTER ATTACK WON
Paris Claims Kaiser's Losses in Five
Months Total 5000, ,0Oo-Teutons
Use Liquid Fire.

LONDON, March 6.-Along the west
ern front the French continue their
attacks against the Germans, and. ac-
cording to Paris. the French have
made progress in the Champagne and
the Argonne regions. The Germans,
however, have delivered some sharp
counter attacks which, the Berlin re-
port says, have been successful.
On the whole, these tactics seeming
ly have not succeeded in materially
changing the position of the two
armies.
If the French have made the progress
in the Champagne region with which
they credit themselves. military OBJ
servers believe it will doubtless bring
about a big battle, such as similar
advance did at scissors, or readjust-
ment of the German front in this re-
gion. -...-
Puts German Loss at 8, 100000
The French war office gave out a
note today placing the German losses
at 100000. 1t says:
analysis of the German losses dur
ing five months, in ten regiments taken
from army corps on both the eastern
and western German fronts, shows a
total of 36,2s1 officers and soldiers
that is. an average per regiment of 725
monthly" says the note.
Applying this percentage OF losses to
the entire German army, including the
landwehr, landsturm. new formations
that the total German losses during
the seven months of the war must ex-
coed 100000.
The note continues:
ments suffered less than those men
toned above. all the regiments have
been violently engaged repeatedly on
one or the other of the two fronts,
to arrive at smaller figure for the
total German losses, including the sick,
than 100000"
Germans Using Liquid Fire.
PARIS, March 6, p.m-At the war
Office today there was issued state
ment describing in somewhat greater
detail the use by the Germans of a
burning liquid against French trenches
in the woods of Malincourt. which was
referred to in a previous official COM
munication. Today's statement fol-
lows:
February 70. toward noon, the men
who occupied one of the trenches thus
captured, near path in the center of
some woods. saw thick and voluminous
smoke rising against the paraDet of
their field work. This column of
smoke. of blackish color. rose to a
height of forty meters. Those who
were farthest from the interior of the
woods perceived 1t and thought that
our men had just set off a mine
THE defenders of the trench felt a
hot wind blow upon them, and few
instants later they were burned with
flaming liquid which they believed
to be from tar. The jets of liquid
spurted upon them through the smoke
a dozen meters of breastworks and wire
In front of the trench, but. concealed
by the cloud of smoke, the Germans,
many of whom carried huge scissors
hanging on their necks, were able to
open passage.
French Regain Losses.
They succeeded thus in penetrating
to the trench. and profiting by the ef-
fects of the surprise produced at
tempted to enhance their success in
gaining some of the ground in the
woods. But we succeeded in establish
ing to the rear a solid barrier, and the
next day vigorous counter attack re-
| turned to us. almost entirely the
ground lost on the 26th.
There is, then. only to keep in mind
from this incident that the utilizatio
Of this procedure renews some methods
of warfare which it was supposed were
abolished. The German army, already
provided with regular fncendtary ma
terial. has completed Its set of imple-
ments.