LAND AND WATER 
NovcmLer 14, 1914 
In the second place, in order to make the demonstration 
the Gennans had to negotiate a mine field of ours. This they 
did without the least difficulty, conclusive proofs that they knew 
the exact road through the mine field, knowledge which could 
only have been arrived at surreptitiously. Forewarned is 
forearmed ! In demonstrating to us that they do know, they 
have struck themselves a far heavier blow than the loss of the 
Yorck. 
Thirdly, there are certain important psychological features 
cf the raid which are of the utmost moral importance. The two 
per cent, of hits against the Halcyon was extremely bad 
gunnery as compared with all the German gunnery, good, bad, 
or indifferent, which we have so far experienced. Now, 
erceptionally bad gunnery in war time invariably spells one thing — 
the " rattles." The gunners in the great raid destined to put 
terror into the heart of England, were obviously in a good deal 
of terror them.selves. 
We must be careful how we take it as a view of the morale 
of the German Navy as a whole. But we can take it that the 
difference between the enemy we met at Heligoland and the men 
who " raided " our East Coast is so great that something has 
probably happened in the interim. 
Probabl}' it means that the effect of enforced inaction is 
making itself felt just as it made itself felt on the enemy confined 
to harbour in the days of the Great War a hundred odd years ago. 
We know enough of German gunnery and German averages to be 
quite certain that a mere two per cent, of hits against a stationary 
target must have a meaning. 
There is, of course, the possibility that the bad shooting was 
deliberately planned, but I cannot imagine this likely. The 
sinking of any British warship whatever, right off the English 
coast, would have been an asset of high moral value to Gennany. 
Nor can one conceive of any expected advantage from such 
pretended bad shooting. 
I may seem to have written a great deal about an incident 
which has generally been passed over as trivial ; but when the war 
is finished, and the books are opened, I am strongly of opinion 
that this seemingly farcical German raid on the East Coast will 
turn out to have been of considerable value to us. 
I understand from correspondence received that I have 
achieved a certain amount of unpopularity because I suggested 
that the Heligoland affair instead of being — as popularly 
claimed — a " Great British victory " was reaDy a moral victory 
for Germany. That view I still hold. Along precisely the same 
lines I think that the German East Coast Raid is a " British 
victory " of the utmost importance — something beside which 
Admiral Cradock's defeat off the Coast of Chile sinks into 
complete insignificance. We cannot (if we want to know where 
we really are) consider the new naval warfare along the lines of 
the old. Everything is altered. 
For the public to attune itself to the new conditions is 
naturally bound to take time. For a thousand years we have 
been trained to think in terms of losses — of ships sunk and men 
destroyed. The new warfare, however, is something utterly 
different. 
Of course, if the German High Sea Fleet did come out and 
give battle to our Dreadnoughts — victory would be victory. 
But even so, there would not necessarily be a moral Trafalgar on 
cither side. The whole matter is too complex to be put into 
ordinary words. Only in the crudest possible way can I attempt 
to explain the (to most readers) abnormal view I take of things. 
So far as I can do so — it is something like this. 
In the old days you killed the enemy or else he killed you. 
Who killed best was the victor. But under the new conditions 
which have arisen some new condition has been brought into 
being. The thing done in one place may directly cause a strong 
reaction elsewhere. For example, Spec's defeat of Cradock may 
put a terrible stiffening into a British crew faced with odds in some 
quite other part of the world. In the old days events in one 
quarter remained unknown in another — now nous avons change 
tout cela. Every combatant in the naval field knows almost at 
once everything that happens elsewhere and takes it according to 
his calibre. 
• I have, I fear, inadequately expressed my meaning and 
failed to explain logically my theory that victory may really 
be defeat, and defeat victory in modem conditions. Words fail. 
But for myself I am absolutely convinced that, despite all this 
jubilation in Berlin, the two worst disasters sustained by Germany 
are the famous raid against our East Coast and the defeat of 
Admiral Cradock off the coast of Chile. 
To assert a thing of this sort is giving hostages to fortune 
■with a vengeance. However, I do assert it. 
THE MEDITERRANEAN. 
Accounts from here are at present too chaotic to count for 
much. It is apparently established that the German-led Turks 
have sunk the Prut, a Russian mine-layer of 5,000 tons odd. 
They have also probably sunk one Russian destroyer (the Turkish 
Btory runs to four), and since November 3rd one of the Dardanelles 
forts has been persistently bombarded with the usual result — i.e., 
the absolute usclessness of fixed defences under modern conditions. 
For the rest, Turkey's action appears to have relieved the 
pressure on Cattaro, but only to a temporary degree. It will 
not save Cattaro. 
The temporary result is that the Austrians were enabled to 
reoccupy Lissa and rc-erect the wireless there. This has now been 
destroyed once more by the Allies. 
Meanwhile, the British cruiser Minerva has made her 
presence felt at Akaba on the Syrian Coast. On the importance 
of Akaba I need not dilate ; Mr. Belloc explained it amply in his 
last week's notes. Therefrom the assumption is permissible that 
Sea Power has already negatived the expected Turkish advance 
on Eigypt by the only reasonably feasible route. 
It may safely be prophecied that Constantinople will be in 
the hands of the Allies long before any Turkish soldier reaches 
the Suez Canal and takes on the problem of crossing it in face of 
a hostile fleet. 
Mr. Belloc has indicated the land difficulties which face a 
Turkish invasion. But these difficulties are as notliing compared 
to the naval obstacle.' The Turks have not a dog's chance of 
crossing the Suez Canal. Half a dozen British ships of no actual 
fighting value whatever are ample to make it absolutely 
impossible, unless the Germans manage to scuttle something at 
a lock or the equivalent thereof. Even so, however, crossing an 
army in the face of Sea Power seems an impossible proposition. 
Think it out as one will, it is not possible to envisage Turkish 
troops passing the Suez Canal. 
THE FAR EAST. 
The somewhat unexpectedly early capture of Kiao-Chau 
has an importance altogether outside and beyond the intrinsic 
value of this ex-German outpost. 
In the first place it releases a number of ships, both Japanese 
and British for the extremely difficult task of finding and destroy- 
ing the enemy's supply ships and colliers. This — as I have 
explained in previous articles — is a task of infinitely greater 
magnitude than the general public has any conception of. But 
it is the only way. 
Actual search for the corsairs themselves is blind man's 
bluff in a twenty acre field : the correct reply (which we are 
making) is " stopping earths." For this neither speed not power 
matter much — the great thing is numbers ; and an efficient 
consular service, which unfortunately wo do not possess. In 
this direction, at least, we are paying heavily for our past peace 
economies, an alien custodian of our interests — no matter how 
honest — cannot be expected to worrj- himself unduly as to 
information about hostile movements. 
However, this is the soit of difficulty which can be overcome 
by numbers, hence the importance of the fall of Kiao-Chau. 
The second asset is merely moral and psychological, and 
due mostly, if not entuely, to one of those incoiisidered telegrams 
which so appeal to the Kaiser. A moment or so of consideration 
would have convinced him that Kiao-Chau was bound to be 
captured. Yet he had the folly to make it known broadcast 
that the loss of Kiao-Chau would be considered as worse than the 
fall of Berlin. The German Press Censors did, for as long as 
possible, suppress the news ; but it was bound to leak out, and 
its moral effect will be all the heavier accordingly. The 
exaggerated and melodramatic value placed on Kiao-Chau will 
utterly negative the enormous psychological result which might 
otherwise have been produced by the German naval victory off 
the coast of Chile. In the ordinary way the two things might 
have balanced. As things are, the Kaiser by that particular 
Kiao-Chau telegram, has made our loss intangible, and his own 
very tangible indeed ! 
Details are a steady bombardment and ultimate bayonet 
charges ; but things of this sort do not matter. What does 
matter is that the Kaiser was foolish enough to send a certain 
telegram to the Kiao-Chau Commander. 
Earl Roberts lias advised ns of the result of his appeal for gl.isses 
for non-commissioned officers in the field. Up to the present ho has 
received over 14,000 pairs of field an.d stalking glasses. Field-Marslial 
Sir John French slates that the latter, as weU as field glasses, aro 
found to be most useful. Many people who had none forwarded 
cheques, which were utilised for tho purchase oi suitable glasses. A 
large number of these very useful additions to equipment are still 
wanted, and sliould be forwarded to the National Sorvice League, 72, 
Victoria-street, London, S.W. In tho absence of glasses, cheques 
would be much appreciated. 
Mr. T. Fisher Unwin has just published From the Trenches — 
LoMvain to the Aisne, the first account of an eye v.'itness of the first 
phases of the great war in the western area. Tho work is vivid and 
realistic ; it docs not pretend to stratogio value or historical detail. The 
author, Mr. Geoffrey Young, relates the things ho saw and the impres- 
sions he gathered out of the days that immediately followed the out- 
break of hostilities, and his story is a very dramatic and interesting 
one. 
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