Peiping, Oct. 16.
A general Chinese withdrawal to south of the Yellow River, abandontg Hopei, Shansi, northern Shantung und the greater part of Suiyuan to the Japanese, is now regarded as almost inevitable in consequence of the continued advance of the Japanese.
The Japanese drive in the Tientsin-Pukow Railway zone is now claimed to have reached as far as Cheng-chuang, in Shantung, 25 miles north of the Yellow River.
The situation in North Shansi is obscure.
Despite Chinese claims of a victory in the Yuanping area, a Japanese scout plane reports that Hsinhsien, 25 miles south of Yuanping, has been captured by a Japanese unit, which thus threatens Taiyuanfu, the Shansi capital, from the north.
"he defeats suffered by the Chinese in North China were attributed by the Japanese military spokesman to-day to lack of effective leadership und central control. Divisions fought and retreated, he said, independent of any general plan, often abandoning tenable and carefully prepared defences with scarcely a struggle.
The spokesman's view is endorsed ey mally foreign observers, although others believe that the Chinese are allowing a prearranged plan to withdraw to the Yellow River after making the Japanese pay as dearly as possible for their gains. In any se, both schools agree that after the withdrawal, the Chinese com. mand will have a better chance of ce-ordinating its forces.—Reuter.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.