LAND AND .WATER. 
March 27, 1915. 
Rumili to ConatanMuople is, rouglily, only about fifteen miles; 
but compared to tlie Bosphorus, the Dardanelles are as a 
broad highway to a country lane. In addition, the whole 
passage is tortuous and surrounded by hills from which a 
plunging fire can be delivered. 
The forts are probably even more third-class than those 
of the Dardanelles; but the position is such that a single six- 
inch shore gun is probably equivalent to the entire broadside 
of a battleship in destructive capacity. Furthermore, there 
are few opportunities for outranging on account of the many 
twist? and turns, and over the greater part of the course 
attacking warships would have to come singly and in the 
terribly disadvantageous end-on position. The deadliness of 
that position (the ideal one of a past generation) is not so 
much that only a portion of the guns can be utilised, as that 
the chances of being hit are multiplied several fold. Hitting 
with modern gunnery is purely a matter of elevation — misses 
in the matter of direction are so rare as to be almost negligible. 
Owing to the use of heavily armoured bulkheads, being 
" raked " has no longer the terrors of the old days, but 
modern gunnery and long modern ranges have introduced a 
new danger. The appended diagram indicates how a com- 
paratively slight error in elevation (that is to say, in comput- 
ing range) may leave a ship broadside on unscathed, while 
seriously damaging the end-on ship. 
Of course, there is an apparent off-set to this. That is to 
say, an efficiently garrisoned fort normally knows all the 
ranges from constant practice, and (in theory) is, therefore, 
unlikely to make errors in elevation. In practice, however, 
when under fire, errors are far easier. In fact, a ship attack- 
venient and more or less dangerous so far as hypothetical 
damage is concerned, but an assurance against fatal results. 
Ihe really important part of the business is the actual 
bombardment and its results. Of this, only the general out- 
lines have yet reached us. But we have been told enough to 
know that the forts have given a better account of themselves 
than the British public expected. 
It is to the last degree improbable that either our 
Admiralty or the French Admiralty were under any 
delusions. In the early days of the war, when the Germans 
smashed Liege v/ithout difficulty, it was at once assumed on 
all sides that the days of forts were numbered. It seemed 
clear that the heavy gun was omnijiotent. 
Along that assumption Cattaro, the Austrian station 
in the Adriatic, was bombarded, and all of us took as a fore- 
gone conclusion that the lesson of Liege would be repeated, 
and all the Austrian naval stations fall into the hands of th« 
Allies. 
Cattaro forts received a great many shells and a great 
deal of apparent damage was done. But, after a while the 
attack was relinquished, and has never been resumed. lb 
was — as I mentioned at the time — somewhat of the nature 
of an experimental bombardment. As I also mentioned, 
there was every reason to believe that the experiment would 
be successful. 
Apparently, however, it all only went to prove that whafc 
Nelson and others of his era thought of forts against ships is 
just as true now as then; just as true as when, in 1882, after 
the British Fleet had pounded the Alexandria forts into ruins 
the American officers who witnessed it laid down the maxim 
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.---'■-:":'. si ^~^^_j/ J 
Ti}rt "Broadside on. "End on. 
DI-iGCAU TO ILLUSTKATE HOW A SHIP EKD ON 13 A BIGQEB TARGET THAN A SHIP BROADSIDE ON. 
Ing a fort relies mainly on obscuring the fort's vision with 
dust and tile shattering of nerves by big shell expbsions, which, 
as like as not, do no other harm. That is why the fort 
retaliates by placing its position finders well away from the 
fort. This ensures range-finding being fairly free from the 
dust problem, but it does not protect the sight-setter from 
nerve-.strain. Consequently the net result is that the end- 
on ship remains at a serious disadvantage whenever the range 
is more than point blank. Consequently, also, a Russian 
attempt to force tbo Bosphorus would be a needless risk of 
warshifys. 
We may now revert to the Dardanelles operations them- 
selves. That two British ships, Irresistible and Ocean, and 
one French ship, the Boiivef, were sunk by floating mines is 
not a matter of any great military significance. The fighting 
value of all thr3e, so far as modern naval warfare is concerned, 
was very slight— in a line of modern Dreadnoughts any of 
them would have been a drawback rather than a help on 
account of their relatively slow speed and comparatively short- 
range guns. Nor does the fact that damage was d'one by 
floating mines amount to much; such mines were expected, 
and their effects, of course, well understood. The disquieting 
feature here is that inadequate provision appears to have 
been made to meet this form of attack. I say " appears," 
because some time ago there were apparently well authenti- 
cated rumours of a German submarine having been smuggled 
into Constantinople in sections, and a German submarine 
may, perhaps, have done what Turkish mines are a3sum.ed to 
have done. Incidentally, the Germans attribute the 
'damage to "torpedoes." And here, en passant, it may be 
observed that had several submarines been available for tlie 
defence, the Allied Fleet would probably have been rendered 
impotent. 
As for the actual floating m.ines, these arc easily to be 
provided against by precisely the same means as those 
employed fifty years ago against " torpedoes "—as mines were 
then called— by Admiral Farragut in the American Civil 
iWar. A boom defence in the bow is ample to render floating 
ir.ines innocuous, and all that they can really accomplish is 
ta compel attacking ships to adopt the end-on position— incon- 
that " save in exceptional circumstances ships are no good 
against forts." 
At Alexandria there were very exceptional circumstances 
— a fleet out of all proportion to the mediocre defence and all 
the forts " low site " ones. In the Dardanelles these circum- 
stances are partially reproduced to some considerable extent — 
that is to say, an overwhehning naval force is employed, and 
the forts are of a third-rate nature. 
Yet even so, considerable damage has been done. The 
Inflexible has sustained a heavy casualty list. The losses of 
the French Fleet which engaged the forts at close range have 
not yet been published, but v/e know that the ships were 
frequently hit. 
The Turks (or their German advi.=^ers) appear to have 
been past masters at feigning disablement, or in bringing up 
heavy howitzers to replace lost guns during the intervals when 
bad weather caused a lull in the operations — a condition 
v/hich has obtained throughout the attack. 
The price of victory is going to be heavy — as like as nofe 
the losses of the Allies have only just commenced. But the 
reward of victory — corn ships from Russia, munitions of war 
to Rus.sia in return — is so great that heavy sacHfices will be 
well justified. Once the Narrows are passed the worst should 
be over — once the Sea of Marmora is reached, success is 
assured. But the way is long and difficult, and there has 
never been any occasion in the v/ar in which it is so absolutely 
necessary that the genera! public shall tru.st the British Navy. 
It is idle to deny that on the face of it the destruction of 
three battleships in one day by alleged floating mines seems 
suggestive of carelessness cr stupidity, or what not. But it 
is necessary to remember that (apart from the possibility that 
it was a submarine which did the dam.age) the brief official 
statement gives no inkling whatever as to the dispositions of 
the ships or the conditions under which they were compelled 
to act. Criticism of the Navy in such circumstances is not 
folly; it is criminal lunacy! 
THE SUBM.A.RINE "BLOCKADE" 
This particular German "revue," like "Charley's 
Aunt," is still running; but its failure may now be taken as 
assured. To say that the Germans have lost a submarine for 
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