ON THE SEA.

Taihape Daily Times, 10 August 1918, Page 5

ON THE SEA.

* THE SUBMARINE MENACE. HUNTERS BEING HUNTED. BUILDING EQUALS SINKINGS. LONDON, July 30. In the House of Commons to-day. Sir Erie Geddes, First Lord of the Admiralty, stated that the British, allied and neutral shipping completed in the half-year ending Juno 30, balanced the shipping losses of all kinds in the same period. Enemy submarines now found it too dangerous to work inshore, and were again going far out. The number of ships damaged, as well as the sinkings, was declining. In a speech at Kcw to-day, Mr. Massey, Prime Minister of New Zealand, said that the German idea that the submarines were going to win the war had been dispelled by steps taken to deal with submarines. The submarine peril had not yet passed, but it was being dealt with with much more success than a year ago. The navy was now able to sink submarines, more rapidly than they could be replaced, and the sinkings by torpedoes could not now affect the final result of the war. The hunter was becoming the hunted, and the hunting would continue until not a submarine was left.

The Hague correspondent of the Times states that an interviewer of the Kolnischo Zeitung asked Admiral von Holtzendorff. the German Admiralty Chief, why so many Americans had reached Franjcc free from submarine action. He reminded Holtzendorff of the numerous predictions of wholesale destruction. Holtzendortf admitted that now there was little prospect of success as the transports were strongly convoyed. They arrived irregularly and secretly at numerous ports between the North of Scotland, and the Mediterranean. It was impossible ta keep submarines at ports awaiting a chance shot. On the other hand he claimed that the submarining of merchantmen was succeeding.