The Dominion. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1917. BRITAIN'S SEA PROBLEM
Britain to-day is in fchb 'proud position of having established perhaps tho most complete command of the sea ever gained in naval war. Sinco tho war began tho fighting ships of tho enemy, other than submarines, have emerged from their ports only in furtive raids or to suffer defeats in which they escaped annihilation only by seeking safety in flight. Yet it must be recognised that much tho most serious problem by which Britain is at present faced concerns tho use of tho highways of the sea—it is that of providing and keeping in existence an adequate merchant fleet. The problem has been aggravated and accentuated by tho raiding of the enemy submarines, but the submarine campaign is only one of the causes, and up to tho present not by any means the most important, from which it takes its rise. Much more important causes of the shipping famine which oxists to-day than the destruction effected by the submarines are the transfer of ships to - war service and the interruption of construction in British and foreign shipyards. It must be remembered; also, that the outbreak of war, which created an enormously increased demand for shipping, had tho effect of shutting up in port nearly two thousand enemy and other vessels with a gross tonnage approaching 7,000,000 tons. The biggest factor of all is the transfer of more than half tho available British tonnage to war service. As to now construction, tho reduction in tho British output alone means that tho mercantile marine is smaller by several million tons than it would have been had not its needs been, of necessity, subordinated for a time to those of tho Navy. Taking these factors in their aggregate volume the amount of destruction effected by tho enemy submarines—about three million tons of shipping of all nations were destroyed in nearly two years of war—appears comparatively small. Some idea of the dearth of tonnage- which Britain is now called upon to relieve is to be gained from a Board of Trade return giving particulars of tho tonnage of ships entering and clearing British ports with mercantile cargoes in 1913 and in succeeding years to 1916. Year by year the tonnago figures show an increasing decline. In tho oleven months to November, 1913, the tonnage of British and foreign ships entering British ports with cargoes was 44,845,105. For the eloven months ending November, 1916, tho corresponding total was 27,845,617. The tonnage total _ of ships clearing British ports with cargoes was 62,229,729, for the eleven months ending in November, 1913, and 33,080,787 for tho corresponding period of 1916. The trend here disclosed is, of courso, ycry largely accounted for by the diversion and locking up, as distinct from the loss, of shipß. But when all allowances are made theso figures drive home the fact, already emphasised in tho visible dearth pf tonnage and tho fancy prices at which ships have recently changed hands, that the construction of merchant shipping and all other measures which will tend to minimise the ill effects of the shortage of tonnage, make at tho present time a most imperativo demand upon British energies. It is obvious that if the amount of home and foreign tonnago available to Britain for mercantile purposes continued to fall away as it did during tho first two years of war, tho question of oversea trado and supplies would he ono giving occasion for grave concern. Fortunately, even with the enemy submarines ongaged, in a maximum effort, and ac " complishing for the moment an unprecedented amount of destruction, there is no reason to fear any such continued decline. The period in which mercantile construction was almost wholly subordinated to naval construction in the British shipyards has ended. liW months past priority has been yielded to mercantile construction. Not only aro increasing resources being applied 10 the construction of merchant ships, but improved methods have ' been adopted—notably tho system of stun- j dardisation —which make for a maxt-1 mum output from the shipyards. A I. tho same time, measures are initrain | to stimulate the production of homo- j grown food and other commodities, and seaport organisation is being improved in order that ships may bo "turned round" rapidly. A number of theso measures woro inaugurated before tho Asquitii Government left office. For instance, Mil. lUinoiman secured the return from tho Army to the shipyards and the. engine shops of several thousand skilled men. At nis instanco,-steel for merchant shipbuilding waß placed at tho hoad of tho priority list of. metals, and in various ways, while ho was at the head of tho Board of Trade, tho Stato stimulated and encouraged the progress of shipbuilding. As a result Mr. Runcijian anticipated that about half a million tons of new shipping would bo turned out of tho British shipyards in the last six , months o£ 1916. The actual figures
arc- not yet available-, but flic output is said to bo greater than w;is at first anticipated. A great deal of course remains to bo douc, and tho re is ample scopc_ for the comprehensive attack which tho Lloyd George Government is now making on tho shipping problem. Now rrv'ound was broken in tho appointment of an expert (Sir. Joseph Maclay) as Shipping Controller; and in a speech which be made tho other day Mr. Lloyd George dcr clarod his belief that with tho nation organised it could be demonstrated to the enemy that his piracy and murders on the high seas -aro futile. The most heartening feature of the war situation at tho moment is the confidence expressed in naval and official circles in England that Germany's subinarino campaign can be checkmated, and that it is doomed to fail. Once Germany is convinced of the failure of her great submarine effort in its avowed object of starving Britain into submission to a. German-made peace, tho end will not be far off. •
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Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3002, 13 February 1917, Page 4
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990The Dominion. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1917. BRITAIN'S SEA PROBLEM Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3002, 13 February 1917, Page 4
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