156 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 
turies has been “‘Feinde rings herum” (enemies around 
about) called into place all available resources, and since 
that time has been very largely dependent upon self-help. 
Girt about with a proverbial wall of steel, and unable to 
secure raw materials from overseas, or even from ad- 
joining parts of Europe, a nation of seventy million souls, 
living within an area about five-sixths as large as Texas, 
has given a wonderful exhibition of the way in which science 
and technology can be forced to do superhuman things 
when superhuman demands are made. 
First and foremost came a demand for explosives, and 
that meant nitrogen in various forms of combination. With 
ordinary sources of nitrates shut off, it was necessary to 
convert inert nitrogen of the atmosphere into compounds 
rich in energy, and it was done. With cotton excluded 
from imports, substitutes had to be found; wood pulp had 
to be used—and it was done successfully. Ammonia had 
to be produced from atmospheric nitrogen, and the cyanamid 
process solved the difficulty. Copper and zinc became 
scarcer and scarcer, therefore other alloys and even paper 
were substituted for them. Petroleum having been ex- 
cluded from imports was replaced, in part at least, by sub- 
stances obtained from the distillation of coal—a distillation 
carried out, not with the ordinary beehive oven but with 
byproduct ovens and others of improved constructions. It 
is claimed that some coals have been subjected to treatments 
whereby hydrocarbons become the principal products. 
“Petrol” is as important to the modern army as food or am- 
munition. 
As the result of a carefully thought-out plan the first 
blows struck by Germany were directed at the portion of 
France and Belgium able to supply coal, iron and other raw 
materials not found extensively in Germany, and a second 
great offensive was directed at Mesopotomia in order to 
open up a district from which foodstuffs might be obtained. 
In England naval efficiency was found adequate to meet 
the emergency as soon as it arose. The work of construct- 
ing armies for oversea campaigns was no greater than that 
required to produce supplies for both army and navy. In 
