SECRET OF THE SEA WAR.

Hokitika Guardian, 28 May 1920, Page 4

SECRET OF THE SEA WAR.

(J3y H. W. Wilson, Author of “lroiclads in Action.”) The first instalment of the official naval history of the war, by Sir Mihail Corbett, is issued to-day (“Naval Operations,” Vol. 1., with -cast of maps, Longmans, 17s 6d net). It comes down to the Battle of Falklands, and h is 442 pages of closely printed text, with a good indax. The main interest of the public’ will necessarily be in tlifc disclosures which it makes. The early pages are a record of intense activity on the part of our Fleet, with many signs of indifferen. staff ' work on the part of the Admiralty. Thus the failure of the British force in the Mediterranean to bring the Goeben and Breslau to action and destroy them was due in some, degree to bad luck, but also in some degree to the failure to inform the British admirals in the Mediterranean of the exact situation in Turkey. Ihe Germans knew their own minds and acted ve y boldly; the British did not with the exception of the little cruiser Gloucester. Sir Julian wraps his verdict up thus ■ The sudden pressure on an embryonic staff organisation was more than it could, bear, but the fact remains that the intelligence essential for forming a correct appreciation of the shifting situation either did not reach him, or reached him (Admiral Milne) too late, and what was more embarrassing, l.is original instructions as to his “primary” object were not cancelled when they were rendered obsolete.

'The tragic story of the loss of the three Cressvs (sunk by a, submarine on the 22nd. (September 1914,) becomes even more tragic now the fact is revealed that on September 18th., four days earlier, Mr Churchill had declared that they ought not to continue on this beat. The risk to such ships is not justified by any services they can render. J’he narrow seas should be kept by a number of good modern ships. But the cumbrous routine of the office prevented prompt action from being taken and as the result 1,400 lives were sacri. heed. Again, the sacrifice was greatly increased by the failure of the Staff to direct ships as to their tactics when a vessel in their company was submarinedd •

In the case of Admiral Cradock, wl o perished so heroically at Coronel (’November Ist, 1914), Mr Churchill issued instructions which might have averted disaster had they only been followed. The difficulty of communicating with Crado -k was great owing to “atmospherics” affecting wireless signals in the Southern Atlantic and many messages miscarried. Pie went to his doom like another Grenville. With the advent of Lord Fisher to the Admiralty the situation changed rv if by magic. The staff work improve! and one of the greatest strokes of genius in the war—the dispatch of two battle cruisers to destroy von Spec—• ended in the completest naval success of the whole struggle.