SUBMARINES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 234, 11 February 1911, Page 9

SUBMARINES.

BRITISH AND GERMAN RIVALRY. According to the Dilke return, the British navy now possesses 63 submarines, mid is building 11. Germany has eight, and how many she is building is not known. France has 08, and is building 23. The United States has 18 and is building 10. Russia possesses 30, and three are building. Italy is at a standstill with seven submarines, while Japan also is weak in this type of ship, having only nine, with three building. The champion of the submarine in England is Admiral Lord Fisker, whose advice the Admiralty has followed for several years, despite the protests of the mob of critics of the British construction policy, who are never silent, and are ever prating about the superior sagacity, foresight, and energy of the German naval authorities.

These critics also were pointing out that Germanv devoted a good deal of attention to destroyers, but spent little money on submarines, from which they argued that, as th» Germans always knew what they were about. England must be wrong to put so many submarines into the water. These critics have lately been confounded by the feverish activity of Germany in construing submarines, although the work is done under cover, and it now appears that the Germans are imitating the British policy of making the submarine an important unit of attack and defence, just as they acknowledged the Dreadnought type _ of battleship as indispensable by designing and building them as rapidly as appropriations would permit. It is claimed for Great Britain that she easily leads the world in submarine*, although in ships owned and building France has a slight numerical advantage. The explanation is that Britain possesses very few submarines that can be put in the obsolete class, whereas France lias a good many of them. Moreover, it is said that in the British service a vast deal of experience has been gained in the employment of these craft, and there is no navy in the world and men skilled m the niceties of submarine navigation. In a late number of Blackwood's Magazine, Colonel a'Court Repington, a naval expert, who pins his faith to the submarine, and sees in it a very effective instrument of attack, declares that neither Dreadnoughts, pre-Dreadnoughte, nor su-per-Dreadnoughts will a few years hence have any place in a naval war waged in such narrow waters as those of the North Sea. A super-Dreadnought, he contends, can be sunk by a torpedo fired from an invisible submarine, costing about £«),000or £BO,OOO, at 7000 yards ran«e. The Admiralty does not agree with him about the effect of a torpedo striking the hull of one of these big vessels at such a distance, but at best it is a matter of opinion, since no superjjroacinought has ever gone through such an ordeal. "Periscope," another authority, makes this comment in tie Naval and Military Record upon Colonel Repington's general view of the uses of the submarines:

"No one can doubt that the writer kas reached a correct conclusion regarding the submarine as an important offensive weapon which is'likely to have a dramatic influence upon naval policy on tke North Sea. This is apparently the reason which has led the Admiralty during the past few years to devote so larg« a proportion of the sum available for naval construction to the building of these craft."

Given a body of water of comparatively limited area, the submarines, according to Colonel Repington, can close it to a line of battle.

"Swarms of destroyers and .submarines and even- vear more of the latter, will infest the sea, and the existence of every great ship venturing into the area eontrolled by these pests, which are almost unassailable by naval means, will he most precarious. Our great and costly battleships and cruisers must be stowed awav safely in some distant, safe and secluded anchorage—Scapa Flow- and Portsmouth to-day, Berchavcn and Lough Swilly, perhaps, to-morrow. The North Sea in time of war will be a desert of waters, insecure on both sides, open to neither, commanded by none." As a means of preparing the way for a descent of transports loaded with soldiers upon the coast of Great Britain this specialist believes that flotillas of submarines might be successful. But so,long as Great Britain maintains a long lead in having so many of these hornet ships available, the answer is that the Admiralty has nothing to fear from the buildin* activity of Germany. Two submarines should certainly be able to deal with one of the enemy,'and a fleet of transports could not move toward the English coast without the unnerving dread of attack from swarms of British submarine. Moreover, Great Britain has a superiority in other types of torpedo craft that Germany cannot possibly overcome.