CAN ENGLAND BE INVADED?

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 191, 14 July 1916, Page 2 (Supplement)

CAN ENGLAND BE INVADED?

Ii is certain that the Germans have their plans worked out for an invasion of England. It is more liktly than not that tiny will attempt the "gambler's throw'.' when their General Staff has convinced itself that defeat is inevitable unless the success of some desperate venture can knock the keystone out of our Alliance. We may hold our own opinion as to the possibility of their achieving their end; but we must always remember that the deciding factor is not what we know, but what they beiieve. They are a nation of soldiers, possessing very littlo of the "sea-sense'' which Britons have inherited. An enterprise which seems to us merely hare-brained may present to them every prospect of success. We may, at any rate, attempt to envisage the problem which the Germans have to soive, and to enumerate the conditions which have to be fulfilled in order to undertake such an attack. 1 do not recall in all history a single instance of an over-sea invasion being successfully undertaken in face of a superior hostile fleet. The nearest approach to such an exploit which 1 can thmk of is Napoleon's landing in Egypt in 1798. Of course, recent events have entirely exploded the idea popularly, but erroneously, attributed to Mahan, that an army cannot >/e landed while there is an enemy fleet "in being," | If the Germans entertain any hope of success, it must he based on the peculiar circumstances which keep the Grand Elect in the extreme north of the North Sea, at a greater distance from the spot which they would probably select for a landing than are their own ports in the "wet triangle." They possioiy hope that, by the lavish use of mines on the course which Admiral Jellicoo would be compelled to follow on a hasty return south, they might so weaken his fleet tliat their own, fighting a delaying action, might, even if beaten and destroyed, gain sufficient time to put the expeditionary , force ashore; that German picked troops would quickly brush aside the | half-trained levies we could place in the field against them, and that a rapid march on London, accompanied by the i laying in ashes of our towns by Zep- ; pelins. would so shake our nerve, of , which they have no high opinion, as to induce us' to "cave in." The expedi- ! tion wou'd be convoyed by the older j battleships of the German Navy and by > a strong force of light cruisers, tor- \ pedo-boats, and auxiliaries to protect it j against submarines. Such a plan pre- j supposes perfect conditions of weather ' and long, clear nights. To attempt . the nassage in fog would be imposvolc. j Now, let us ask ourselves what fctce j would be the least winch could be em- j ployed with hope of success, if it got ashore, and what its composition would ! be. The old rule-of-thumb adopted by i the Defence Committee as the basis of ! our defensive arrangements was that we should be prepared to meet a raid ; by 70,01)0 men, that being the largest ■ force which, it was calculated, could avoid tile vigilance of our Navy. The I number was subsequently raised to : 100.000, on account of the increased j carrying capacity of certain Germ in j ships. But it must be remembered I that what W!)S contemplated was a sit- J prise raid, undertaken before the Navy | or the Army could be fully mobilised. | We have now the Navy on a war-fi.ot- j ing, and many hundreds of thousands \ of men ashore, in various stages cf training. Certain othei measures have also been taken which are calculated , to enhance the difficulty of that rapid , march on which the hope of success must depend. In the first place, therefore, the number of 70,000, or even 100.000, is much too small to give any hope of success, while, on the other hand, the chance of getting even the lesser of these two numbers over I y surprise is very greatlj diminished. Let us say, for the sake of argument, that the German General Staff deter- ' mines to emp'.oy six aimy corps, or 240.000 men. ' They must send '"he whole force at once and must arrange for the quickest possible disembarkation and the greatest possible mobility once it is ashore. Tins implies two thines —(1) that it must be content with a very limited supply of heavy guns, and (2) that a largo force of cavalry must be included, or, in the alternative, a great fleet of armoured cars and other automobiles. A great number of horses reguires a great additional amount of tonnage. Automobiles require appliances in the nature of derricks and lighters for getting them ashore on an open coast. Ecu- a journey like that across the North Sea it might be possible to allot no more than a ton of shipping per man, and a ton and a half per horse. Our usual formula for short passages is a ton and a half per man and two tons per horse. "Tonnage," in this sense, is a measurement of cubic capacity and not of weight. The net tonnage, properly called "freight tonnage," available' for transport purposes is 40 per cent, of the gross tonnage of a vessel. That suffices to carry not only the men and horses, but also regimental transport and ammunition and two days' rations for the men.

It also provides for the conveyance of field hospital, with the ammunition carried in their limbers and the battery ammunition waggons. It would also, no doubt, include the field hospilai normally attached to the units < mployed. An expeditionary force of this size would, on the ordinary computation, comprise about 180.000 sabres and bayonets, and would require about 101)0 gun-. With gun-teams, cavalry mounts, and transport animals, it is impossible to allot, less than :>>),'■)( p liorsea to an expedition of this size. So we have to provide net tonnage at the rate of one ton per man for 240.000 men, and one and a half ton per I orso for 00,000 horses. That is, altogeth-r, Ml"), 000 tons net for the expedition, beside; what is required for such .tores as must be carried.

PROBLEMS THE GERMANS MUST CONSIDER.

Jiy GERARD FIENXKS, in the "Graphic.''

Bui 315,000 tons net, or "freight" I tonnage, is gross. If we add the absolutely necessary reserve stores, the automobiles required for the airservice, and so on, a million tons gross docs not seem an excessive estimate, and previous experience bears out this opinion. In the Balmacedist revolution in Chile in 1891 the Congrcssionalisfa (who were commanded by a German) used 25,000 tons gross to .novo just under 10.000 men a short distance to Quintero Bay, and this is considered to have been an insufficient quantity, nor did it allow anything for stores, other than those the regiments carried with them. On the same basis, an expedition of 240.000 men would '.e. qiiire 600,000 tons gross. I ;.m not sure of the tonnage used by the Japanese when they landed the Second Army, under General Oku, near I"■ i>owo in 1901, but they employed over eighty ships' for about 70.000 men, wih 1 only first-lino stores. If we allow ;n average of 3000 tons gross per vessel, this gives 210,000 gross tonnage, and, on this scale, an army of 240,000 vi.ukl require about 700,000 tons gross, without reckoning store ships. There were few, if any. cavalry in the first iaeding. and the Japanese would take Ufs accommodation per man than the Germans', so that my estimate of me Million tons gross for the voyage to England is shown to be fairly accural. Taking an average of 5000 tons gus per iship. which is rather high, tiie number of vessels required would be i'oo. But to these must be added the ipec.al boats or barges and the steam trawlers and tugs requisite to effect a landing. The picket-boats of the convoying fleet would, no doubt, supply a certain proportion of the latter. I cannot ctiimate the number of auxiliary cal; of tiiis kind that would be required, but let us see what area of i-ea would be covered by thus veritable armada. We will suppose it assembled in the flight of Heligo'and and prepared to steam westwards. Merchant ships of eery variety of speed and handiness and every degree of skill in their skippers and crews cannot steam in tiu close formations which squadrons of w-> -ships can adopt. We must allow four cabhs (nearly half a mile) between snips, s.i d riot less than ten cables (2000 yards) between columns. Suppose the armada to proceed in four columns of fifty ships each. There would be something likt twenty-five miles between the head and tail of each column, and vo tl is must be added the distance of the .advanced guard of cruisers and destrivers, say another five mi'es. From wing to wing, allowing for the auxiliaries and the convoying squadrons of l>atileships, there would not be less than 12,000 yards, or. roughly, seven .m'es, so that the whole fleet would over nr area of 210 square miles of sea, not mi easy object for our patrols to oiiss. Next, we must discuss speed and the time which would be taken in making Ihe passage, with reference to the length of daylight at various times of year. As regards speed, it is almost an axiom of amphibious war that the speed of a convoy must be about two knots below the speed of the slowest ship, in order to give lame ducks which may get out of station time to get up. This might mean a speed of ten knots. But as allowance has to be made for the steam barges or trawlers with heavy tows of lighters required for landing, it will be safe to reduce the possible speed as low as eight. The distance to be covered may be put, at the lowest, at three hundred miles, so that the time required from weighing to easting anchor off the English coast, even if the passage were uninterrupted, would be thirty-eight hours. i'hit would mean, according to the season, a minimum of from ten to twenty hours' daylight passage. Whatever course was kept, the expedition could not possibly hop? to escape observation and effect a surprise. A\'e come next to the question of disembarkation, and here the Germans would be likelv to meet with the greatest of their difficulties. I assirne that it wou'd be attempted on the open coast, and at several points within supporting distance of one ■■mother. The enemy might seize some equipped port, but it, would be a slow business to brine his transports one after the .itlict for 'discharge alongside the wharves. Our own experience in South Af-'ea, and during the present war shows that, in a friendly country and with all the resources of a great port available, it is good work to land a division a duy, complete with guns and first-line Ct'airport and stores. Taking a landing en the open coast, however, the following are some of the preceding instances : The Cnngressionalists in Chili (1891) took thirteen hours to land 9500 men.

The Japanese, in 1894, took five dnys to land 32,000 men at Wei-hai-wei. The Japanese took eight days to land 70,000 men at Pitsewo hi 1904. All these landings were carried out with the command of the sea absolutely assured. If the Germans try, it will be in the teeth of a superior fleet, which ti:ey can defeat only by a miracle, and, if they should succeed >n doing so, there stands the French fleet behind it. There does not seem any reasonable chance that the enemy could succeed. Even if, by some accident, or hv some devilish device not at present disclosed, the Grand Meet should be reduced to impotence, there are still the flotil'as of destrovers and submarines to be reckoned with. The Germans might, of course, try a raid with considerably smaller effectives. They nHuiit thing it worth while to put 20,000 men ashore, and, in that case, 1 have no doubt that they have enough fast transports materially to rcduc ■ the time required for passage or land'-na. But the force would not be bis: onoucli to effect anything decisive. Tf the Germans wish to invade, they have to overcome the British Navy, and we shall be only too happy to see them make the attempt.