SIR JOHN FRENCH'S OPTIMISM.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XL, Issue 12541, 12 May 1915, Page 1

SIR JOHN FRENCH'S OPTIMISM.

I DO NOT BELIEVE IN A LONG

WAR."

MUNITIONS WANTED

Paris,.March. 22.

A cbrrespcmd.ent' of the Havas iVgencr who has been making a tour of the-Bri-tish front gives the following'account of an. interview he has had with FieldMarshal Sir John French. Sir ; John said': — ' . "Yon have risited our soldiers in the trenches and 'you have thus been able to see. that the-da-nip. foggy winter basin no way damped their good humor and cbeer'iness. It k a rough war -this, but the problem it sets is a eompai'atively simple one—munitions, _ : nior'e< munitions, '.always more munitions. That ,iis the essential question, the governing condition of all progress, of every leap forward. "Everybody needs plenty of- munitions, but the Germans (and here the field-marshal's eyes sparkled) need tliciu even more than we. I 'have the feeling that for some time now they have been becoming more snaring of their shells. There is no longer the squandering there was at the beginning.

NO LIGHTNING VICTORY. "They arc economising. They arcfeeling'the lack o: ■ tlie nitrates required for the manufacture of explosives. Nor is the morale of their troops any longer what it was. One can divine their weariness and lassitude. "Tliov made all their calculations for ■a lightning victory. The plan collapsed, and the state of mind of their troops' is suffering accordingly. "Moreover, their economic difficulties at home are becoming every day more serious. Doubtless the Germans arestill a- long way from famine, but they are hampered/ That is a good deal, and 1 do not believe in a protracted war.

"Spring has come in well for the Allies. The French army, in whese praiss tbera ;is nothing morn to be s-iid, is in excellent- form and very well provided with the means of action. It is showing it' daily. The Russians, have, jns.t occupied -Meuiel and have again entered -foist Prussia, which imperial proclamations have seemed to depict as definitely free front ail danger of invasion, lii the Dardanelles several forts .have been reduced. "In such, difficult enterprises losses are. inevitable, and we must net he surprised at them. The essential thing is final success-, whether'we are considering the' straits, the Francd-Belgian front, or the Russian front, and I myself and all those here are convincedthat at the end of these hard months of war definite victojy awaits ns." ; — Renter Special.