5 OCTOBER 1918, Page 2

The Western Front is now aflame from the sea to

Verdun. This week has seen the hardest fighting of the war. Marshal Foch has launched not one offensive but a whole series, in one sector after another, BO that now the battle is joined along a front of over two hundred miles. Everywhere the enemy, conscious that the decisive moment has come, is offering a desperate resistance. The first of these new blows were struck on Thursday week by the French to the west and by the Americans to the east of the Argonne. On Friday week Sir Douglas Haig, with American support, launched a tremendous attack on the Cambrai-St. Quentin line. Last Saturday the Belgian Army and our own Second Army, under King Albert,

• opened an offensive in Flanders with great success. Last Sunday the French attacked from St. Quentin to La Fere. On Monday the French and Italians began a vigorous advance between the Aisne and Vesle, west of Reims. The enemy is thus hotly engaged at almost every point, and can no longer weaken one part of his line • to strengthen at:other, since a breach at any place would be disastrous.