A WAR OF GEAR AND INVENTION

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2487, 14 June 1915, Page 6

A WAR OF GEAR AND INVENTION

MR. H. G. WELLS DISCUSSES OUR SHORTCOMINGS. London, June 11. Sir. H. G. Wells, the novelist, in a letter to the newspapers, says; "Modem war is essentially a struggle of gear and invention; we must be perpetually outwitting our opponent. Britishers have shown great individual courago, but that is insufficient. Our aviators are in inadequate supply. Seaplanes should be produced and an aeroplano capablo of overtaking a Zeppelin. There should be some counter-stroke against the submarine and Germany's improved torpedoes. "Our troops still want armoured protection during advances against ma-chine-guns. Our exploits in the Dardanelles throughout have not been far-see-ing or inventive. We have been recruiting millions of infantry, while the Germans have realised that for defensive purposes one well-protected, skilled machine gunner is superior to a row of riflemen. Wc want not politicians, but self-government, and scientific, teclmi-callv-compctcnt men to wage war." A STRIKINC METAPHOR. GERMANY A HUGE CENTRIFUGAL MACHINE. London, June 11. A neutral sums up his impressions in the following striking metaphor: —Germany is a huge centrifugal machine discharging its energies at the periphery. The machine will givo out when, the central store of energy has been;;exhausted, but every effort is being-made to conserve and increase the store. V In this respect the German is providing an instructive contrast to Times" and Sydney "Sun" Services.-i 1 / SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE TO HELP I FRANCE. PART OF THE WAR MACHINE. (Rec. Juno 13, 4 p.m.) \ Paris, June 12.' The Government has made a committee of the Academy of Sciences an essential part of its great military machine. Two points are being discussed—the possibility of a cloud of asphyxiating gaseß to counteract the enemy's, instead of the use of respirators, and some substitute for high explosive shells in the destruction of barbed-wire entanglements. 1 AN AUSTRIAN WAR MORTAR. (Rec. June 13, 4.15 p.m.) London, June 12. A message from Vienna dated June 12 states that recent Austrian successes are largely attributed to the fifteencentimetre mortar, which throws a projectile charged with ekrasit, which explodes in the ground, scattering huge quantities of earth and killing all near the spot. No field earthworks are able to withstand it. HINT TO LANCASHIRE COTTON MILLS. MUST BE NO STOPPAGE.' London, June 11. Trade Union officials who have returned to Manchester from London report that the Government in very plain terms intimated that there must not bo a stoppage in tho Lancashire cotton trade.