General Smuts has been released from his East African command
in order that be may represent the Union of South Africa at the coming Imperial War Conference. General Botha is unable to leave South Africa, partly because the Parliamentary Session opens in mid-February, and partly, we regret to learn, because his wife is seriously ilL It was hoped that General Smuts would be able to finish off the East African campaign, which he began so brilliantly last spring, and which he described very deafly in a long despatch published on Thursday. The War Office, however, announces that the command can safely be entrusted to other hands, and that in any case General Smuts would soon have been enabled to return home. Colonel von Lettow-Vorbeek, the German com- mander, does not control a railway, a town, or a port ; his forces are much reduced, and his supplies are dwindling and cannot be replaced. General Smuts has, in effect, done tho work required of him, and he will be invaluable to the Empire as a member of the War Conference.
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