TERROR OF U-BOATS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 November 1939, Page 7

TERROR OF U-BOATS

BRITAIN USING SECRET WEAPON MAJOR WORRY FOR GERMAN COMMAND. ENEMY'S ILLEGAL USE OF MINES. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY. November 11. Naval circles here point out that the failure of German U-boats against British merchant shipping—not one British merchantman has been lost this month —and their reluctance to deliver a direct attack in face of British anti-submarine measures, the most successful of which is the Navy’s secret weapon, which seeks out and destroys unseen submarines and which has become the terror of U-boats and one of the major worries of the German High Command, has led to the adoption by, Germany of a new form of warfare against merchant shipping. This has taken the form of the sowing of mines in defiance of the rules of warfare, which state that the position of any mined area on the high seas must be announced. These mines have already claimed neutral victims. "There is. in fact, ample evidence that Germany is failing to observe tne rights of neutral shipping. In the first two months of the war 30 neutral ships were lost through German action, and. while British anti-submarine measures have made a great decrease in British losses —99.7 per cent of British convoyed ships arrived at port safely—neutral losses appear to be on the increase. In view of Field-Marshal Goering’s reported statement that in this war ships are more important objectives than enemy territory, the lull in German activity against British merchant shipping is considered significant in London. The present German objective appears to be to damage neutral maritime trade just as much as British. In fact, while Germany has not claimed any British merchant ships during the last 10 days, Germany fired on and seized the Finnish ship Soumen Poika and also seized the Finnish steanjer Otava. It is reported that Germany yesterday seized two Norwegian steamers.