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MEETING THE SUBMARINE
PROBLEM
By E D W A R D LYELL FOX
T H E submarine is Germany's
last powerful play. There
are—were rather, before Germans
openly began ruthless
submarine warfare in February
of this year—12,000,000 tons of shipping
in the world which the Allies could
use to bring food, raw material, and the
finished products of war to their ports.
The German Admiralty's plan was
to sink this shipping at the rate of
1,000,000 tons a month. We know that
after their February campaign, the Germans
announced a toll of half a million
tons of ships. We know that several
weeks after that announcement, there
came a second bulletin from the Imperial
Admiralty which said that the
actual amount of shippin
sunk in February was
nearly a million tons.
This new estimate was
based upon reports
from submarines,
which, the Germans
said, had not returned
to port by the time the
first statement was
issued; therefore,
they explained,
what
these submar
i n e s had
sunk had not
been known
at the time of
the 5 00,000
ton announcement.
Our naval
officers do not
take the submarinemenace
lightly.
696
Their plan is to build a Yankee merchant
fleet of three thousand ships. One
thousand of these merchant ships of small
tonnage can be built in half a year. The
yards have been selected already. The
vessels are being built in sections and
assembled just as that little automobile,
a household word in America, is built
and assembled.
The plan is to bridge the Atlantic with
wood or steel steamers, each one bringing
supplies to the Allies, without which
supplies Germany would triumph. The
Atlantic will be bridged; for were this
line of communication to British and
French ports to be cut, it would be like
cutting the aorta of the Allied cause.
How many submarines
has Germany? I
do not profess
to know. lean,
though, give
the estimates
of men who are
in a position to
know. Last
October, I was
told that Germany
could
turn out six
COPYRIGHT tNTERWAT. FILH GERVICf
"Schrecklichkeit!"
In our estimation, this camera
portrait of a German
undersea sailor personifies
exactly the spirit of piratical
ruthlessness that has
driven the United States
into the war on the side of
England.
submarines a
week. We are
told that they
are losing
more submarines
than