The Mena weekly star., 1918-10-31
AMERICANS HAVE
 HARDEST TASK
Germans Are Fighting Harder Than In Weeks and Are Losing Many Prisoners-New Drive Start
 ed Against the Turks.

London, Oct. 26.-The German, apparently are fighting harder thar at any time for several weeks. Their resistance is more stubborn along tho whole west front.
 Large hauis of prisoners have been made in the last few days and ses- eral villages have been captured. but at no point have the Germans given ground voluntarily, the Allies having to fight, and fight hard, for every yard gained.
 Americans Have Hardest Task.
 The most bitter struggle is going on north of Verdun, where the Amer jeans and Germans are swaying back and forth over a most difficult ter rain, in a desperate battle for a com manding series of ridges on both sides of the Mouse.
 The enemy realizes this is the most vital point in this line, a veritable Achilles heel, and is measuring the importance of this ground in the ex- penditure of a staggering toll in fnanpower Once the Stenay Gap is reached the German retreat across the Mouse and through Luxenburg Is cut off The Americans have only ten miles to go.
 In addition to repulsing num- Der of counter attacks on both sides of the Mouse today Americans push ed forward north of Grand Pre- and Bantheville.
 French Make Big Gains.
 The fighting in the region east of Vouzieres, where the French were en- deavoring to turn the northern ex- tension of the Argonne Massif, in or der to permit general American ad- vance east of that forest, evidently has become temporarily stabilized. No reports of that operation have been received for two days.
 The French, in hard fighting, have pushed forward on nearly the entire 50-mile front from the Disc Canal Boutheastward to the Aise, east of Rethel Several additional villages have been occupied. The British drive toward Maubeuge and Mons is meeting with determined opposition. The Germans are expected to defend Normal Forest as long as possible and may force Field Marshal Haig to carry out an eneircling movement to the northward so as to squeeze the enemy out of the forest rather than attempt to take it by storm or fil- tering in process.
 The French and British have begun n new drive west of Courtrais, direc- ted at Audenarde. They are attack ing along the whole line between the Lys and the Scheldt.
 New Drive in Turkey.
 General Marshall's drive toward Mosul, in Mesopotamia, is being watched with interest. He is about one hundred miles south of that im- portant city which is only 110 miles southeast of Nisibin, the eastern ter minus of the Berlin-to- -Bagdad Rail- way The British now hold the ter minus of the portion of the line ex- tending northward from Bagdad. The rails have never been laid from Mis- ibin southeastward to Shoreimieh.
 Nisibin is 250 miles east of Alep- DO, where Marshall and General AL ienby may form junction The lat ter has less than one hundred miles to go before reaching Aleppo
 East of the Tigris the British are reported within a few miles of Ku- kuh, which is connected with Mosul by an excellent highway
 At Austria's Back Door.
 In the Balkans the Serbs are now within seventy miles of Belgrade, having occupied Kralievo. They are driving the Austro-G Germans north ward on a wide front between that town and Parachin, astride the great Moravia River. The French are in- proving their positions along the Danube.
 The sudden activity on tine Italian,