Word: tain
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...rains fell all along the French front, the forces of le Maréchal Pétain took up impregnable positions fanning out toward the Mediterranean from Kifane to a distance of some 20 miles. At the extreme northeast tip of the fan, French troops were reported to be in contact near Syan with a Spanish force (see SPAIN) which had advanced thither from Ajdir...
...rumored that Maréchal Pétain, copying the strategy employed by Foch in his final drive against the Germans in 1918, had been concentrating his forces first at one point and then at another, and was now about to consolidate the points of vantage in a final drive upon the heights of Bribane, which would sweep on until Abd-el-Krim surrendered...
...events transpired it became evident that Maréchal Pétain did indeed mean business by his drive upon Bribane. Tanks advanced, smashing through frail adobe huts like mastodons treading upon eggshells. French 75's spotted the heights, and sent fragments of the rocky butte, deadly as shrapnel, splintering among the Moorish tribesmen. The whole mountain, which is topped by the stronghold village of Bribane, was enveloped by the smoke of burning crops and villages and the fumes of exploding shells. Armored cars and cavalry advanced up the easier slopes, while battalion after battalion of infantry stormed the steep western salient...
Results were two: 1) From El Brisbane, Maréchal Pétain commands stragetically a large territory, but any great advance, in view of the desperate resistance of the Riffians, will be extremely difficult, because the rainy season will very shortly open and transform the salient into a quagmire over which French war paraphernalia cannot be dragged; 2) politically the victory is of some importance because it has led to the surrender of the Beni Urriaguet tribe, whose territory the French now dominate...
...regarded as certain that Maréchal Pétain will strengthen his present formidable line into, an impregnable winter position rather than attempt to gain an immediate victory. In Paris talk of Foch and 1918 has subsided...