MR CHURCHILL AND HIS CRITICS

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2489, 16 June 1915, Page 8

MR CHURCHILL AND HIS CRITICS

; A SEVERE DENUNCIATION 1 MORNING POST ON DARDAN- ' ELLES BOMBARDMENT i The storm at tho Admiralty which led > ultimately t o tho retirement of both Jlr. : ? T r u \ the First Lord - an <i i Admnal Lord lusher, tha Ifirst. i Alhittrv d th ° -°Tf iO l - of a Coalition I Jlmiitp, nas just breaking when yesi tcrday s Eiighsn mail left Loudon. Tho , Morning Post," in a series 0 f leadin® articles, was making an unsparing eit tc sm of ilr. Churchill's administration. in an article on April 27 our j contemporary wrote as follows:— I Ljl , commou 1 jyifh several other newspapers \\<j published yesterday an ar- , t-icle from a Special Correspondent, who , is recognised by the British Govern- • ment, and whose dispatch was passed , by the censor. The dispatch amount . ed to the severest condemnation of the i that lias yet been published. I ior it, described tho passage of the Dardanelles by a Fleet unassisted by aa Army as a flat impossibility. The Fleet cannot even destroy the forts effectively. and cannot reach the mobile and clttsivo batteries which are hidden l amou E the folds of tho hills. Hore- > neavy ships dare not enter the . otraits because of the mines which aro I "Oatcd down the current and the con- . cealed torpedo tubes which lie along the shores. It is impossible for light craft | like destroyers and trawlers to clear away theso obstacles because of the j aforesaid masked batteries. 'Therel ™ le > says this semi-ofiicial correspond- . ent, the only way the Straits can bo [ oucned is from the land side. To ac- ; complish this a very largo Expcdition- . ary i'orcc is required, and also a very ; larue number of field howitzers, with ; which to deal with the concealed bat- ■ tones. The guns of the battleships can , eovor a landing, and their fire will be , able to assist an advance inland up to , a certain point, but once the army is [ on shore it must do the real work of ; takm« the enemy's positions in rovSrso [ by its own unaided efforts. ... A great . army is required to ensure success. 1 In . other words the previous attempt to burst through the Straits with ships un- [ supported by land forces was an at- ■ tvr S n fche IB !Possible. It cost the I Allies three major ships and a great . number of lives, and it was foredoomed Ito failure. Not only so, but it fore- ) a rned the enemy that the Dardanelles . was to be the object of attack. "We . understand that when tho naval attack , was opened over two months ago there I H er V?,? ,e ,- fi S e6U thousand lurks in , the Gallipoli Peninsula; there are now said to be one hundred and fifty thousand Turks there. At the beginning of the operation thirty thousand men might nave taken tho Peninsula: it now requires a "great army," to bo reckoned in hundreds of thousands. We hear that the landing has been made at various joints on the Gallipoli Peninsula 'in spite of serious opposi--1 tion from the enemy in strong entrench- ' s ' I)r °t ec ted by barbed wire." ; 1 hat means hrtivy fighting and costly • attaaks o n prepared positions—attacks which will cost men and entail a coui stant stream of reinforcements. Our ; dread is lest the operations in the Gal- ; Imoh Peninsula should become a "major f expedition as costly as, and less.effec- . tive than, the fighting in Flanders, f of this would have been saved if i tho Army and Navy had operated simul- , taneously from the start. [ ''Who is responsible for this costly i blunder—costly whether the present ' operation succeeds or fails? We assert that the lirst Lord of the Admiralty acted against the opinion of his experts. ; We assert, further, that he led the > Cabinet to believe that he had behind ' t tho opinion of Lord Fislier, whereas : Lord Fisher's opinion was that tho operations, to havo a chance of success must be conducted jointly by Army an<s Navy. These aro serious charges. Thar© is no question of Cabinet responsibility i because tho Cabinet did not know the r truth. But in any event theso times i are much too serious for Ministers to - found themselves upon. Constitutional > conventions. Tho truth is that Mr. ; W inston Churchill is a danger to . this ) country. He forced the Government - into the Anwerp Expedition, which he i managed personally, and which ended i disastrously for Antwerp, which was bombarded; for the Naval Division, which tried to relieve Antwerp; and for tho Seventh Division, which tried to s relievo the Naval Division. We have 3 stated —and it has never been denied— that tho HogUiS, the Cressy, and tho Aboukir were under the direct control of the Admiralty, and not of Admiral Jellicoe, when they were sunk. The Admiralty dispositions which led to tho loss of Craddock's squadron were shockingly incompetent. All through these events w© see the mark of the amateur over-riding the expert. -Both the Antwerp Expedition and this Dardanelles 3 blunder are the capital offences. When } tho Antwerp fiasco occurred we warned the Government that by allowing Mr. Churchill to interfere with the conduct ' of naval and military operations they 1 were endangering the country. Their 1 mistaken loyalty to their colleague » prompted them to overlook the ofteuce. 1 It hae now been repeated with greater • loss as a- result.' Aro we to wait for a ' third disaster even more costly than these other two? Lord Fisher is not re--1 sponsible and Lord Kitchener is not reJ sponsible. They are both much injured ; men; but we warn them that they too. " unless they make a timely protest, and come out strongly on the side of'expert control of naval and military opera- ' tions, will be held to share in the rtis- ; credit and the responsibility. The time j is for them to speak out now and have J done with this appalling danger of ama- | teur interference with the man at the ; wheel. The Constitution has no place ' for such a phenomenon. It is exactly . as if one of the board of directors of a great steamship company, who fancied himself as an amateur yachtsman, should , get upon the bridge in a region of ice- ' bergs and take the wheel out of the 1 hands of the navigating officer. Mr. j Churchill has done this several times, . and every time it has cost the nation J heavily. We warn Lord Fisher, Lord : Kitchener, and the Cabinet that by their acquiescence in this abuse they J are failing in their duty and endanl gering the country. As for Mr. Chur- , chill, ho should have the gTace to see s that his position has now become imI posible and givo place to a professional , sailor."