Winning Allies still gaining ground

Defence at breaking point

Heavy rain has had an important effect on the operations proceeding.

Thanks to French official reports we are able to gauge approximately the present position of affairs.

At no time it appears has the outlook been brighter.

The suggestion that there has been a recrudescence of activity on the part of the Germans has its foundations in a continuance do those spasmodic but desperate efforts on the part of the harassed enemy to show that his claws have not all yet been cut.

It is quite clear that the attacks are less formidable than formerly and the comparative ease with which they are countered give the onlooker from far all the confidence he needs.

The fighting has been of a sanguinary character and we cannot escape the conclusion that the allies have suffered heavily but the German losses must have been appalling.

The latest French message states that the fighting is becoming less violent and we make make two assumptions.

The first is that one of the opposing sides has reached its limit of endurance and the second is that – that side is not ours.

The German defence is at breaking point and whatever the object of the present resistance has been, an attempt to regain the full offensive, a covering movement, we may be sure that a retreat will soon be in progress.

The point to which again attention is drawn is the extreme left where it is evident that there has been a considerable advance.

Although Von Kluck has created a fortress line which is as good as anything which he is likely to find shelter in on this side of the Rhine , there is evidence of a bending and a giving, which can mean only one thing.

Bending may not be breaking but malleable has its limits and the snap will soon come.

Von Kluck is evidently the German General with the brains but he cannot achieve impossibilities and there is more than one problem facing in and his staff generally What of the 600,000 soldiers in the vicinity of Brussels? They are probably still there whatever may be aid to the contrary.

Thrown into the line of battle, their value just now could hardly be over estimated, but their withdrawing would mean not only the freeing of the humiliated capital, but it would leave at the rear of the Germans, a resolute and embittered Belgian army capable of not only cutting the enemy’s communications but heading off his retreat.

There is more evidence that the Germans fear a wide turning movement in the west.

Surveying the situation as dispassionately as possible and beating down nought to mere wish, there is everything to encourage and nothing to cause fear or doubt.