A NATIONAL ASSET
WELSH COAL AND THE WAR-. , In speaking of the relative strength of England and Germany on the seas one seafarer who has ploughed the ocean for many years sounded a note yesterday, the echo of which will undoubtedly play a part in the future naval policy of England. For years past—how many years he said he would not care to say—Germany has been storing up vast quantities of Welsh coal at all her naval and commercial ports, and were it not for the possession of this score it was extremely doubtful if Germany would be at war to-day, for she is fighting England to a great extent witii the almost indispensable aid of an English product. Our informant, who states that England will be wise if she keeps an eye on the destination of her coal, states that he has never been to Hamburg without noticing between 200 and 300 colliers discharging Welsh coal. It i 3 the only coal which the warships can do their guaranteed speed on, and had the Germans been forced into using their own Westphalian coal, it ivould have knocked half a dozen knots per hour off every one cf their boats. All the German warships used Welsh coal and it was Welsh coal which fed the furnaces at Krupp's great works at Essen. As a matter of fact he believed that England would with little difficulty always hold the balance of naval power without any overwhelming superiority in the number of ships, if she. declined to supply foreign Governments with Welsh coal. Everywhere one went on the Continent, at Havre, Toulon, Marseilles, Genoa, Trieste, etc.— great quantities of Welsh coal were discharged every week, which meant that there was no decent substitute for it, except in the case of oil-burning vessels. Tho Westphalian coal was muck compared with either the Welsh or Newcastle product, though the latter was objected to for naval purposes ori account of the volume of smoke it raised. It would probably curtail the industry commercially to cut off supplies to foreign Governments,, but it would pay in tho long run.
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Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2339, 22 December 1914, Page 7
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353A NATIONAL ASSET Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2339, 22 December 1914, Page 7
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