WIRELESS IN WAR

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 2256, 16 September 1914, Page 7

WIRELESS IN WAR

INFLUENCE ON MILITARY STRATEGY A NEW FORCE (BTATIONS OF THE GR£AT POWERS. Wireless telegraph l is the new force in modern warfare which has changed all tho old problems of communication. Formerly the aim was to capture and destroy the enemy's telegraph lines or submarine cables. Nowadays the'matter is not so simple,' for tho wireless zones cover- Europe, and ships at sea -may bo in touch with,tho war offices in their capitals. Professor Frank Waldo, writing in the Boston "Transcript,"' gives an interesting description .of war time uses of the wireless. "The usefulness of wireless in war time," says Professor Waldo, "has just been proved in the recall of certain ships after they had left port, war having been declared in tho meantime. One ship was recalled to Now York after proceeding over 500 miles on her way across the Atlantic; and tho wireless has-been active in reaching ships from tho European stations -either for purposes of • recall or notification that the war is on. "The stopping of all telegraphic and telephonic communication between tho belligerents at the first breathingG of war, and tho partial stopping, by control and censorship of such communications from nations at war to non-bellig-erents, has rendered invaluable messages by wireless across and around tho regions controlled by -the belligerents and especially at sea' and across ' the seas.. But the bottling up of any place so that it cannot hold communication with the outside is a thing of the past. The fact that a wireless apparatus cannot be easily hidden prevents the surreptitious use which might be: made of it hi regions under control of the. belligerents'; although for' short-distance communication,-such as along.frontiers or between close-lying countries as in western Europe, 9 small wireless receiving apparatus might be secretively used, especially-if it were temporarily strung under cover of the darkness, and taken", down before daylight. In such work there will bo a new field for signal-corps' works and scoutings. ' Gig Government Stations. "As regards the more powerful land stations, those which will keep up communication 500 miles and upwards, these can be easily kept under Govern-, ment supervision; but the use of wireless on ships for "sending messages up to from 250 to 500 miles, and receiving them at still .gerater, distances from powerful laud stations, will be subject only to such artificial interference as may be put in operation by the belligerents. There 'can be no doubt that the experience in the present war will result in-tho closer Governmental control of private and amateur wireless installation. '. . " " "Austro-Hungary has four important Government wireless stations; Castelnuovo, Pola, and Sebhiico, with a normal range of 250 mdes by day and 500 by night, and Triest, with a day range of 150 miles and a night range of 300. "Germany has seventeen wireless stations, of which eight are lightships with small range of from 20 to 60 miles. .The remaining stations are at Barkurn, range 100 miles; Bremerhafen, range 200 miles; Bulk'.(Kiel Bay), range.llo miles; Cuxhaven, day range-' 110 miles,' aiight-'rahge" 170 'mile's; Danzig, daj\range 330 miMt, night'range 600.miles; Heligoland, range 110 miles.; >. r orddeich f day .range 420. miles, ; night lange'B3o miles'; Sassrutz (Rugen),'range 110 miles; Swinciminde, • day range 330 miles, night range 660. \ ' "France has eighteen stations: Bou-logne-sur-Mcr, range 100 miles; Bouscat, Tahge 1(50 miles; Brest, range 350 wiles; Cherbourg, range 350 miles; Dieppe, range 55 miles; Dunkerque, range 350 miles;-Eiffel Tower, large range; Ouessant, range 380 miles; Port Veudres, —; Rochefort, range 350 miles ;;S. Maries de-la-er, range 380 miles; Toulon, —; several other stations are on tho African coast. "Russia has twenty-eight stations, of which the following - are on or near the Baltic Sea; Helsingfors, range—; Kronstadt, range —; Libau, range — (170 miles); Presto, range —; Reval, range 170 miles; Riga, range ,160 miles; Rouno, range 70 miles; Wiborg, range "Great Britain has sixty-eight land stations. Literally thousands of ships are provided with wireless outfits, and those.on board men-of-war usually have a range of 300 miles or more, and are ,thus equal to a good land station. Servia has no land stations." Nations Kept in Touch, A wireless expert, writing in tho London "Chronicle," also gives in an illuminating way the realisation of what the now telegraphy means and how it.is made use of in war. Ho 6ays: "Through'-the medium of the Eiffel Tower regular communication should be maintained 'with the wireless telegraph _ station at Moscow and Petrograd, and France and Russia should therefore he able to keep.in continuous communication, despite any interruption of the ordinary telegraph The danger of. interference with the wireless service by stations of the opposing nations is practically non-existent. To commence witli, each station would be too busily engaged in dealing with its own correspondence to attempt to prevent another station from working, arid at best they could hope to overhear communications. "In wireless telegraphy,' tho adjustment of one circuit to another in such a way that the 'time-periods' aro the same throughout the system, so that electro-magnetic waves possessing a different time-period will produce kittle or no effect on the system, considerably reduces the danger of tapping messages, while the provision of secret codes and cyphers would make such fragments of messages as are overheard unintelligible to an outside party. "Eiffel Tower station possesses the further advantage that interference is practically impossible, owing to tho peculiar sound of the signal emitted. In Germany the principal station is at Norddeich, which has a" rango of about 800 miles by night and 400 by day. The Nauen station, near Berlin, might also !to of considerable service. Success in Balkan War. ' "Ah incident during tho recent Balkan War illustrates the remarkable re-liability-of wireless telegraphy. During the" siege of AdriaWple, all communication between the city and Constantinople was stopped. But shut up in the beleaguered city with the imprisoned garrison was a li-k.w. Marcom wireless telegraph station of the portablo type, and this fortunate circumstance alone enabled her to keep in touch with Constantinople, whore is installed another Marconi station. "At no time did the station fall, and during the time that the city was invested over 450,000 words were transmitted to "headquarters without a hitch. This, too, in spite of the difficulties the Allies attempted to create by placing one of their stations to the westward of Adrianople and another to tho castward, so that they might conic as'nearly as possible in a direct line between the Adrianople and Constantinople statiofis. As soon as the latter commenced calling up Adrianople, or vice versa, the Allies hammered away at their two stations in a vigorous but vain attempt to "jam" the Turkish signals. Tho efforts of-"the Turks were entirely successful, and the calls were transmitted

and received without tlio slightest inconvenience. I portable Wireless in the Field. "Thanks to Mr. Marconi's genius, and largely to his company's enterprise, portable wireless telegraphy is available for field use. It is moro than likely that the use of this apparatus will help to curtail that particularly troublesome form of warfare—guerilla fighting. An array divided by its onemy, as would bo the case in tho present war, would bo able to keep in touch with all its units, and reconnoitring and flanking movements could bo carried out with greater safety than hitherto possible. ".Portable military stations arc designed to bo carried in carts, automobiles, on pack-saddles, and by hand, and they are adapted for use on aeroplanes and airships, the range of communication being between 12 and 350 miles or more, according to tho type employed. Tho Marconi stations are ingeniously designed to ensure absolute secrecy, the method being to change tho wave-length of the transmitter at frequent intervals from one fixed wavelength, to another in a fraction of a second. "The operator can therefore change his wave-length or "tune" after every three or four words to any of tho waves to which his switch has been adjusted by sending a code letter indicating to which "tuno" lie was about to change, 'the operator at the station with which lie is communicating, and whose receiver is similarly fitted, would bo able to follow him without- difficulty. The wireless service of an army, properly organised v with such stations as those, makes it impossible for any station notinformed to read messages transmitted.