Evening star., 1944-11-11
5 Forces Today
Are Beyond Positions
OF Yanks in 1918
By the Associated Prexs.

BY the Associated Press.
PARIS, Nov. Lit. Gen. George
S. PattOn's tank-riding infantry
swept on today toward Metz, already
well beyond the line where Gen.
John j. Pershing's doughboys were
poised for similar attack on the
fortress city when armistice' came in
1918.
For the new American forces this
was the first Armistice day on the
western front, but the rising power
of Gen. Pattons assault gave prom
ise that before another rolls around
they will have left the battlefields of
Europe.
In their muddy trenches before
Metz, the doughboys of the last war
were preparing on November IL,
1918, for just such an offensive as
Gen. Patton has uncorked. Then 1t.
Gen. r. l.. Billiards. American I'd
Army was scheduled to push of
just three days later-on Novem-
ber IA.
Positions Compared.
The old I'd was lined up along the
right flank of the 1st Army on much
the same front as the one Gen. Pat
tons Sd Army has now broken
across. Reduction of the old st.
Mihiel salient had put Gen. Bull
lard's army in position some Is miles
southwest of Metz and along line
which crossed the Moselle River
near Pont-a- -Mousson and extended
northeast of Nancy. Today they are
about 8 miles south of Metz.
Down the road to Metz on this
day a generation ago marched the
l37th Infantry Regiment under or
ders to assault the fortress city.
which never had been taken by
direct attack
Suddenly the word swept down
the line, man to man, at first in
an unbelieving undertone, and then
when somebody said it was off,
cial-the undertone developed into
a yell;
"Armistice! Armistice!"
I'VE just stopped marching then
and there" recalled Staff Sergt.
Paul N. Hill, Horton, Kans, back
now where 26 years ago he was
l9-year-old mortarman.
History Repeats.
Now mess sergeant of Company
E, same regiment, same division,
he stood at almost the same spot
as in 19l8-and he is just one of
the many for whom history is re-
peating itself.
Elsewhere all similarity to the
positions then and now ceases.
Then the Americans total front
amounted to 83 miles. Today the
Sd Army alone is on the offensive
along a front nearly that long.
There Is an American Army in
the south and another in the north.
This time the Allies have already
given the Wehrmacht a worse beat
ing than it took in the World War.
Germany has fewer troops engaged
in and backing the line in the west
than in its hour of collapse in No.
vember, 1918. But this time the
Germans are fighting grimly on to
the death.
No Crackup Evident.
A home. front crackup like 1875
has not yet appeared in the Reich
of 1914.
All the way from just north of
Nancy to middle Holland the 1914,
Allied onslaught has folded the
Germans back beyond their 1918
surrender line. which cut through
Southwestern Belgium.
The Allies today have what they
didn't have in the last war-a fight
ing foothold inside Germany in the
penetration beyond Aachen on the
route to Cologne where the Sd Army
Of the World War stood its post
armistice watch on the Rhine.
In Paris. American Army and
Navy detachments will participate
today in a parade of French and
Allied troops.
ROME. Nov. II (P.-American
British and French troops were re-
viewed in the Piazza Venezia in
front of Mussolinis former head
quarters today in observance of the
26th anniversary of the World War
Armistice.