Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1917-10-18
PRUSSIAN ROUT
In SIGHT in WEST
War in Flanders Enters
New and Probably Final
Phase
OPEN-CoUNTRY BATTLES

LONDON, oct. IS.
Although Field Marshal Haig today re-
ports only heavy German artillery fire
south Of the Ypres-Comines Canal and near
1onnebeke. with a successful British raid
near Gorele. on the Arras front, the con-
viction is growing here that the war on
the western front has entered a new phase
and probably it's last The fighting there
is as different now from what 1t was in
1914 and 1915 as 1t could possibly be-
First, there was open warfare-when
the Germans swept over Belgium and
France Second, there came trench fight
Ing. which slowly developed until the taxi
ing Of a single trench was an operation
as big as Waterloo Now one sees vir-
tually open country battles, with the enemy
engaging in sort Of rear-guard action,
which when fully expanded will mean a
Prussian rout
CURTAIN ON KAISERS DRAMA
Only the sudden collapse Of hostilites
can prevent this curtain on the Kaiser's
three-act drama.
Not since the Crown Prince broke his
eaglet feathers against Verdun more than
R year ago have the German armies dared
real offensive on the western front Since
the Somme, Hindenbure mas been openly on
the defensive, and the present methods Of
hehtihb are lHe ulTeCt outcome of that
erals gropIngs to find a means to hold out
The Somme battles were series of
Htorming operations--the taking of trench
systems that stretched for miles i'm yeritable
mazes OF supporting cuts and channels So
long as Hindenburg believed he might still
break through the Allies line he continued
this trench warfare. He kept his front iin.,
full of men. Tens of thousands of his
troops were killed before he awoke to r,
aizaton that he was losing his punch
Hindenburg dug the trenches and dugouts
oeeper-ofter thirty even fifty feet be-
low ground. But his men still died like
rats IN traps when British Tommies threw
bombs down the dugout openings or rolled
charges of high explosives down the almost
perpendicular stairs.
In the fire trenches. where HindenburR
Kept troops standing shoulder to shoulder
TO repel attacks Allied shells tore whole
companies to shreds. While the great Ger
man tactician bundered on British and
French guns Numbered and the superb Ger
man labyrinth Of trenches became an ap-
palling shambles
AH1NDENBURG SEES LIGHT
At last Hindenburg saw a light The Of
fensive was no longer his. He must fight
henceforth defensive war. The famous
retreat on the Somme last winter was sten
number one. He abandoned his once precious
trenches. now become hell hole Uttered
with the purifying corpses of German
youths.
Hindenburg's next step was observed dur
Ing the battle of Arras i'm April His
trenches were stll there but now thinIv
manned. The bulk of troops was kept In
support trenches hundreds OF yards be-
hind.
But his plan was stll faulty. and later
at Messines in June. German troops were
more widely scattered. NJ lchine guns were
no longer fired from trenches but from
special Isolated posts. Also trench mortars
And specially trained counter-atta cxing
troops were in readiness to charge the tired
British as soon as objectives had been won.
But the British got on just the same,
and Hindenburg began to lose faith in
trenches * July 81, beginning the b title of
Flanders, found the Germans still differ
emily disposed
They were occupying not trenches so
much as concrete shell-holes. two or three
linked together with short tunnels. 'Pill
boxes steel and concrete turrets, whose
Undiscovered tops were just above the
ground-made their debut and from their
narrow slits machine-guns spat death over
the Flemish quagmres These shell-hoe
positions and pill boxes" with scraps of
trenches few yards long, plus patches
OF barbed-wire entanglements here and
there, covered an area mile or so in depth.
and such thing as fire trench had ceased
to exist.
The idea, of course, as British officers
explained it, was TO make il necessary for
u tHe brltlsn 10 Hre at lnNlSlble targets. The
pillbox tops were well-nigh invisible from
= the air and only direct hit suhiced to put
them entirely out of commission. Then
when Tommies advanced they would come
across an unsuspected bit of barbed wire
enfiladed by machne-gun fire. Finally.
hfter crossing such zone as this they
would meet fresh troops in terrible coun-
ter-attack.
The plan worked only in part. Then
came the battle Of Menin road when the
unheard-of creeping barrage used by the
British took the fight out of even the pill
boxes. The rain of shells iattened every
thing. Likewise, the same terrible curtain
OF hre often wiped out German counter-at-
tacking troops before they got started.
Such is the fighting today 1t is now
Hindenburg's move.