PROGRESS OF THE WAR

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2496, 24 June 1915, Page 4

PROGRESS OF THE WAR

Bio developments are astir in both the main theatres of wir, but no I very new feature is disclosed to-dav. The fate of Lcinberg, at time of writing, is not yet determined, and the mere fact that the Russian army should hold out so long under the handicap imposed by the enemy's crushing superiority in artillery is a splendid testimony to its indomitable valour. On the opposite front the French are continuing their smashing assault norlh of Arras and have made further headway in |,„v. mine and ori fhe approach to Colmar. ft is manifest that the Western it. Wsinjj dtveinpKti a;nl MrclM y;ilA\ unbtoken success.,

Accounts of recent fighting at the Dardanelles relate to the southern front, where British and French troops are extended in line across the Gallipoli Peninsula. On the left of the line the French three days ago succeeded by a gallant assault in capturing the enemy trenches opposite their front. This apparently brings the attackers to the brink of the ravine which has been mentioned in official dispatches as a serious obstacle to progress. Further west, towards the Gulf of Saros, the Turks attacked and for a time- entered the Allied line, but hero also the fighting culminated in their defeat and heavy loss. The right of the Allied line, however, has apparently not lately been advanced. Vivid descriptions arc furnished, notably by Jlr. Ashmead Bartlett, of the great battle in which the Australians and New Zcalanders so signally defeated the Turks a .little over a month ago. The battle was reported at the time in official dispatches, but these later messages contain a wealth of interesting detail, and throw light upon the nature of tho position: held by the colonial troops and the splendid fashion in which they are rising to the demands of war. A rumoured possibility that Sweden may declare war on Russia commands attention only because it is said to have provoked expressions of uneasiness in some Petrograd newspapers. Even so, it is unlikely that the rumour .has any substantial foundation. Sweden, in many respects a model democracy, has cherished little .friendship for Russia in the past, and the treatment of Finland has given her positive cause for dissatisfaction _ with that country. But Russia is now a leading member of an Alliance which stands above all things for the rights of little nations, and the fact is bound to colour her whole future policy. It would be an act of such inconceivable madness on the part of a country like Sweden to link her fate with that of Ge. many and Austria— the destroyers of little nations—that the idea of her doing so need not be entertained until some more positive evidence than an unsupported rumour is submitted. Up to the present indications have been that (Sweden, like her Scandinavian neighbours, is chiefly anxious to preserve a safe neutrality. Like other neutial nations, she has suffered to some extent under the inflictions of German piracy and violations of international law, and in the unlikely event of a departure from neutrality she would better serve her interests by fighting against Germany than as her ally. Sweden, however, in spite of her martial traditions, is now essentially a peaceful country. _ In addition tj a small fleet she has an army of only about 100,000 men at immediate call, with ultimate resources amounting to about half a million men. * * * * The neutral observer, who has keen quoted several times in the cablegrams of late in regard to conditions and the state of public feeling in Germany, furnishes some observations to-day which indicate that the German nation is still strangely blind to the dominating facts of the war. Unmindful of its commerce swept from the seas and its battlefleet rusting in harbour, the German public, according to this observer, is comforting itself with mind-pic-tures of the British Fleet hiding in error "behind the west coast of Ireland," and looking to a day when German battleships, submarines, and airships will sally forth to destroy tho hated and trembling.enemy. It is a picture which gives strong support to a theory recently advanced that the Germans arc a race of lunatics. Unfortunately for the British Fleet, which has waited so long and eagerly for its enemy, the excursion thus gaily predicted is not likely to be made. The submarine capable of accompanying and manoeuvring with a battle-fleet has yet to be constructed. It_ has been demonstrated that submarines are able to render useful service in covering the. retreat of a beaten fleet into its own home waters, but this is not quite what the German optimists are looking for. _ If tho German fleet nuts to sea it must be content with the screening of surface craft or sacrifice one of its best assets—speed. As to airships, they have had numberless opportunities of proving their qualities in attack since the war began, and as far as is known have failed to account for a single warship gi;eat or small. For them the projected combined excursion would Ik a desperately risky affair.

A "German naval officer," who has written to New York outlining his country's recent naval construction, scems_ to have set down whatever came into his mind as his pen travelled over the paper. Germany, he says, has completed and commissioned a battleship and a battlecruiser of the Derfflinger class, both carrying 15-inch guns, two fast cruisers, and four Dreadnoughts, and "a number" of battle-cruisers are to be completed at the end of the year, armed with even heavier than 15-inch guns. Twenty-four 1200-ton submarines havo been constructed since the beginning of tho war, and twelve 800-ton submarines and an equal number of small submarines have been completed. It is thus alleged that Germany will have added at least eight or nine capital ships to her navy by the end of tho year, apart from the Derfflinger (one of tie new battle-cruisers battered in the battle of the Dogger Bank), most of them of a boldly experimental type. Germany is known to have had nine capital ships on tho stocks when the war began. Four Dreadnoughts, each armed with ten 12-inch guns, were due to he completed by July this year. The battleship a'nd the bat-tle-cruiser of the Derfflinger class, both carrying 15-inch guns, are almost certainly mythical. At all events, the Dcrfflingers main armament consists of eight 12-inch guns. Two battle-cruisers in tho Derfflinger class were due to be completed, one this year and one next year. In addition, Germany has three powerful warships under construction, whiyh are to be armed, like the- Q.uee'n Elizabeth, with eight 15-inch guns. Two are due to be completed early next year, and one in 1917. Making every allowance for hastened construction, it is like- I ly that the "naval officer" has about doubled the strength in capital ships added, or to be added, to the German navy this year. That Germany has been able to extemporise ships armed with l.i-ineh guns during a year of war is rather a tall stor.v. Apart from the practical difficulties involved, she eannol aflord to make coolly and rNky experiments at the present ttag" of her naval fortunes. The t-upcr-brc'idnoiights due to be t!«wti|e<«i-| Mr:.-!. f*4r «MrJ (.fee I i after wiii >w d.o\#t

man ships to carry 15-inch guns. Two of them may conceivably be completed this year. The story about guns "even heavier than 15inch" may safely be ee.t aside. * * * * More interest attaches to what the German naval officer has to say about submarines. He claims that 48 of these craft in all have been added to the German llotiilas. The number is hardly in excess of the estimate arrived at by some British experts, who assume that a submarine can be built in about nine months. It is known also that at the outbreak of war Germany took over a number of submarine engines originally destined for craft which were being built under contract for foreign countries. It is quite possible that Germany may have added thirty or forty submarines to her flotillas since the war began, and with her losses, numbering about twenty, this would mean that her flotillas may now total about fifty. Very little attention need be paid to stories about super-submarines— of which craft the German officer asserts that 24 have been built. Commenting not long ago upon the impression that Uo6 (one of the German submarines completed since the war began), and others of her class, were remarkably large mysterious craft, Mr. i'\ T. Jane stated that U36 had been photographed by the captain of one of her victims, and the definite ovidoncc thus obtained showed her (unless false numbers were employed) to be an exact sister to U25 and later boats. These craft are of about 800 tons displacement, and their surface and submerged speed is 18 knots and 10 knots respectively. Mr. Jane argues with some force that Germany would certainly not embark in time of war upon the construction of craft in any way experimental. The risk of. failure is obviously too great to be undertaken. It may be added that there is no visible reason why any such risk should be faced. In time to come the submarine may develop into a submersible battleship, depending upon its strength as much as upon the protection afforded by submersion. But this development is certainly not imminent. At present the submarine depends not on strength, but on the ability to make a concealed approach, coupled with considerable cruising range. While die broad features of weakness and necessity for c-oncealment remain— and they are not likely to depart with this war—the conception of the supev-submcrsible is .meaningless. Contemporary submarines can voyage to great distances from their base, keep the sea in all weathers and under favourable circumstances can sink the most powerful battleship afloat. * * * *

Being in a position to multiply craft of this character, Germany is not likely to embark upon experiments in submarine .construction. Without giving any hoed to tales of mysterious supcr-submersibles, it has to be recognised that the submarine is a living menace. The danger of submarine attack is perhaps the only serious danger to which the British Fleet is exposed. Germany has undoubtedly very greatly increased her resources for such an attack _so far as the building of submarines is concerned, and the danger, as experience has shown, is none the less real because the new German submersibles are almost certainly of normal type—decidedly inferior to the best and latest boats in the British and French flotillas. As has,been pointed out previously, there are compensating factors which diminish the submarine menace. Germany is certainly able to produce strong flotillas, but will find it very difficult, perhaps impossible, to provide tho highly skilled officers who alone can command and use them with effect. Another and even more important factor is that during the months of war Britain and her Allies havo had time, at some cost, to bring their system of anti-sub-marine _ ta-ctics to the highest possible efficiency. As bearing upon the question of super-submersiblcs, it is interesting that the "German naval officer," almost certainly an inspired reporter, states that it was one of the new stiper-submersibes that made the trip to the Dardanelles., A German communique published yesterday stated that it was U2l that had made this trip, and U2l is a boat of 800 tons or less, built more than two years ago, and possessing no remarkable features.

A number of recent messages have spoken of naval and other guns of large calibre which the Germans are said to be on their Western battle-line, but little has been heard so far of da-mag j done by this heavy artillery. It is reported to-day that Dunkirk has been again bombarded at long range, but- no other result is mentioned than the killing of a few civilians. In a similar bombardment some weeks ago Dunkirk was shelled by a gun or guns mounted in Flanders, close upon 24 miles away. A certain amount of havoc was wrought, but no important military advantage was gained. Experts at the time expressed the opinion that tbo bombardment probatly involved a greater outlay by the German's than the cost of the damage done. Accounts varied as to the actual weapon employed, but it was most likely a 15-inch naval gun. A French communique quoted the story of a German deserter that engineers had been occupicd for two months in erecting a gun of this type near Dixmude. The most powerful Krupp 15-inch gun weighs 93 tons and is 63 feet long. Its mountings weigh about 50 tons. The gun being fired at its maximum range of 29 miles, the height of the trajectory is 6 2-3 miles—at the highest point of its passage the shell is at that height above the level from which it is fired.

Except in tho bombardment of fortifications, such guns are not likely to be of any great service to the army using them, ancl even in attacking forts heavy howitzers are probably more useful. One theory is that the Germans first installed a big gun or two near the Belgian coast in fear of a naval attack, and that their use in bombarding Dunkirk was an after-thought. At all events, these ponderous weapons are so difficult to transport that they would inevitably be lost in any save the most leisurely retreat. They arc costly to construct, load, and maintain, and their effective use is only possible in any ease where aeroplanes are free to fly over the target and direct their fire. From all accounts this is a state of affairs that does not often obtain on the Westem front. An enemy aeroplane which observed and directed the bombardment of Dunkirk about seven weeks ago was fjuickly chased away by Allied aircraft. and from the fart that only fourteen shells were fired in the latest bombardment. it may be inferred that somethinK Mmilav happens ob t-his oc. , cation.