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Show mmm nusT SEE IN TURKEY General Maurice Foresees a Slight Retirement in the Cambrai Salient. LONDON, Deo. 3. British tros. act-ins act-ins in . on.y.jnction with an efficient force o;" Russians, have can led oat a successful success-ful operation in Mesopotamia. Major General Gen-eral y. P. Maurice, chief director of military mili-tary operations at tie war office, announced an-nounced IOC General Maurice said that, fwlng to tne Gor-uan gains on the flunk at Camhrai. it might "ho i!t.vsai-y for the British n retire shghtlv Pom the area north of the client. "There is little doubt," continued Genera! Gen-era! Maunee. "that the latent German attacks at-tacks in the Cambrai sector have been pi. '.nned and superln trndended by Crcneial von l.vabmdorff hmiself. Von Luden-(loi Luden-(loi ffs pla n was a thoroughly good one. as imv;t uf the German plans are. It was an ctuivk on both flanks of our salient, followed by an attack in force ou the center. "His attacks on our north and renter failed completely, but on his left the enemy succeeded jn break ing through a part of our front. Ho attacked not only u.ir new front, but ou a part of the hue as it existed before to the south. He succecd'-il in . f fee ting a mirprtse and broke through to a depth of nearly finno yards e tea r I ii rough our gun positions. Bui we had ample reserves available and promptly drove him back two-thirds of the distance covered. "One cannot say the Germans have not made substantial gains on this' effort. When you are in a narrow salient even a small inroad on one's flanks increases greatly the difficulty of holding the salient and supplying the men in it. Tie supply to the men on certain portions of our front has now become a matter of considerable con-siderable difficulty," After alluding to the readjustment of the line that might he necessary to &omc extent In this area. General Maurice continued con-tinued : "For the first time in many a day tho enemy captured some British guns. The last British gnus he captured were four from a territorial battery behind the French lines in the but tie of Ypres in PU5, .during the first gaa attack. Sinci then we had not lost a single gun on the western front and have captured Got) of the enemy's, of which C 10 were captured cap-tured in P)17. "The number of gunR we captured at Cambrai is 13$. The Germans claim 100 of ours, and I am not yet aide to tell exactly ex-actly how far this claim is true, as complete com-plete returns from the batteries are not yet In, but the promptitude of the announcement an-nouncement and the round number used leads to suspicions. X believe the Germans have included in the count; numbers of trench mortars, etc., and that therefore this number will be subject to a la rge d i sco u n t on i n v es t i gat io n. The sa m e probably is ltrue of the G000 prisoners which is claimed. "In Mesopotamia we are continuing the policy of striking wherever the enemy gives us opportunity. We have just carried car-ried out this policy in an operation of our right with the full co-operation of Russian forces. The success of the Russian. Rus-sian. arms here shows that some portions of the Russian army are still willing and ready to fight." General Maurice said that, while there had been much talk in tiie press of the danger from further German attacks in Italy, he considered the enemy's advance into Italy had been definitely checked. This the first report of fighting by Russians since negotiations for an armistice between Germany and Russia were begun. The Russian troops on the northern front have been inactive for w eeks. but t he army on the Caucasus front has been carrying forward the campaign cam-paign against the Turks. The Russian forces, hi Persia, near the Mesopotamia!! border, have done little since the Russian revolution, however, and the lessening of their effort seriously interfered with the Russo-Brit ish plan of campaign after the capture of Bagdad, when a junction of these forces almost had' been effected. |