East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current, 1918-03-25
How Bluff Won for the Canadians
By Major HUGH w. NIVEN, of the PrincessPats"

minute you give the British 'Tomfny" OF
1.-THE Canadian 'srommy'' or the French
Tommy" anything impossible to do he
does it. ~
We were told to advance twelve hun
ldred yards across this ground in n certain
lgiven time. to capture SO many ''pill-
boxes" consolidate the forward position
land let the people behind know when IL
was done, and am proud to say that to
1.-THE minute that programme was carried
lout.,
The morale of the German army dur
ling the last three years, my own observas
ltions show, has gone down Tremendously.
land the morale of the allied troops has
Igope up steadily. Three years ago had
the pleasure of being in three or four
hand to hand encounters, or being near
when they were going on, and we had
some pretty stiff hand to hand fighting.
During the last year in the three i'm.
portant positions that have been taken
by the Canadian soldiers, Vimy, at Mes
sines Ridge and at Paeschendaele, have
not seen a single German officer or sol.
der when one of our men got within fit-
teen yards of him, who did not throw up
his hands.
But one of the most wonderful parts
of the campaign going on in France and
Flanders is the health of the troops AL
though our army numbers something like
four millions in the field, do not believe
there are Afty cases Of typhoid in the
whole of that army. Every detail re.
garding sanitation is most caretnIT
watched. Every man Is made to look
after himself and his part Of any building
or camp he Is in. There is no way be
can get out of the responsibility, Rnd
every one sees that he has that responsS
bility. 1t is marvellous to go over these
and inspect camp in the mud. When
left the mud was over the tops of our
boots. If you go into camp where the
men have been living probably for week
with no chance to dry themselves, no
sheets or anything, defy you to find
single scrap of paper in that whole camp
The Way to Win the War.
do not think am giving away any
military secret-the only way to win this
war, in my estimation, is by killing Ger
mans. During 1917 the Allies took some
thing more than 100000 prisoners. They
killed 100000 or 100000 and wounded
probably 10000 to 100000. There Is
only one way to kill Germans now and
that is to go after them. We went after
them on the Somme, and We killed, took
prisoners and wounded great many.
The same happened at Vimy Ridge-we
took another 5000 to 10000; at Mes
sines we took 10000 or 10000 and
killed 10000 or more; at Paeschendaele
we took great many prisoners and killed
a great mony. and so on. At Cambrai
we did the same thing-we took 1000
prisoners and we killed 10000 or 1900.
And from that story, being in the war,
yo1 are able to calculate about how many
you viii wound. The object of the Cam
hrai drive. no matter how far we went
'r where we went or how far we came
back, | believe was achieved when we
took those 1000 prisoners, when We
killed those 10000 % 10000 Germans
and wounded another 10000.
II the United States sends over n vast
number of ueroplanes. that will have n
tendency to shorten the war. Whenever
Tol can stop an aeroplane from coming
'ver the British lines you put out the
Germans eyes. The only wny he can find
nut what we are doing behind our lines
via nny certainty. with any speed, is by
leroplane observation. When we can
en- him from coming behind our lines
md seeing where we are mnssing troops,
'eeing where we are massing guns, why,
We can bring off n surprise and do a
'rent deal of damage. In two or three
# the fights we have been in lately our
Iir supremacy has allowed us a great
many PRIVILEGES we did not have in 1915.