July 31, 1915. 
LAND AND ,W A T E K , 
THE WAR BY WATER. 
By A. H. POLLEN 
In accordance «ith the requirements ot the Press Bureau, which does not object to the publication as censored, and talies no 
responsibility for the correctness of the statements. 
(HE Austriaiis have apparently resumed 
their destroyer expeditions against the 
Italian coast. It is a tempting form of 
enterprise, because the railway south- 
wards from Kavenna all the way to the River 
Fortorie, and from Trinitiipoli all the way to Brin- 
disi, can be brought under fire. It is not sur- 
prising to hear that the Italians have seized the 
Island of Pelagosa, a half-Avay house, and useful 
to raiders for keeping in touch with home. Pela- 
gosa is about five-and-thirty miles north of the 
Gargano Promontory and about forty-five miles 
south of the Island of Lissa. We shall j^rob- 
ably later hear of other islands having been 
seized in the Dalmatian Archipelago. For 
the Italians are not likely to limit themselves to 
the destruction of lighthouses and telegraph 
stations. If the cross-ravaging of the Austnans 
is to be stopped, advanced bases on islands that 
give better anchorage than Pelagosa will be 
highly desirable. 
Telegrams from Athens and Mitylene and 
from the Black Sea show that the war on Turkish 
communications, both by British submarines and 
by the Russian Fleet, continues with unabated 
activity. It is stated that these are having a de- 
pressing effect upon the Turks. It is certainly 
startling to hear of submarines bombarding rail- 
way depots. 
A correspondent writes to ask why the 
Turkish positions in Achi Baba cannot be taken 
in reverse by high explosive shell attacks from 
battleships in the Gulf of Xeros. It is to be re- 
membered that such bombardments were ex- 
tensively used in the first weeks after the land- 
ing of the British forces, but they do not appear 
to have proved very effective. The explanation 
probably is that all the points that can be reached 
by ships' guns have been carefully avoided by the 
Turks, and that the batteries are concealed in the 
innumerable folds of those tangled hills. He asks 
me if submarines prevent such an employment of 
battleships, but I am unable to answer his question. 
iWe have had no news any German submarine acti- 
vities either in the Dardanelles or in the ^gean for 
some time, and it is extremely probable that by 
now means have been found to defend such ships 
as can usefully be employed. 
I find that it is somewhat generally assumed 
that battleships and merchantmen are each 
and all defenceless against the submarine. This 
heresy arises from the fact that in time of peace 
we devoted much more time to developing sub- 
marines than to finding means to counteract their 
pestilent capacity. Their awful powers have been 
the subject of much exciting talk : their limita- 
tions are little understood. I am entirely ignorant 
of the detailed measures which have now been 
adopted by the Fleet, either at home and abroad, to 
deal with the problem. But the tale of loss, both of 
warships and of merchantmen, is so ludicrously 
small compared with the nature and extent of the 
menace that only one conclusion is possible. Now 
that the Navy has had to face the problem it is in 
a fair way to solve it. The principles that 
govern the question have always been well under- 
stood by the few, and are now being applied by 
the many. Before this war is over there will be 
a strong" case for the nations giving up the sub- 
marine altogether. That it can be murderously, 
misused against non-combatants is ground enough 
for its abolition by force. That it will prove to 
be an utterly inefficient engine of war may make 
force unnecessary and permit of its abolition by 
consent. Meantime, the most striking manifesta- 
tion of its activities seems within measurable dis- 
tance of achieving what all the world thought im- 
possible. It really looks as if America would be 
compelled to fight. 
THE AMERICAN NOTE. 
The third Note which the United States have 
addressed to Germany on the Lvsitania affair 
seems to be intended to be final on the main issues, 
but it requires very careful reading if its meaning 
is to be understood. And however careful the 
reading, there seems to be some passages which 
almost defy interpretation. Let us, however, first 
deal with what is unmistakable. 
It is nothing less than an ultimatum in two 
respects. The statement of the doctrine on which 
America intends to insist is as explicit as it can 
be, and the warning that to persist in violating 
this doctrine will be regarded as deliberately un- 
friendly goes to the limit of the diplomatic 
voca.bulary. But when we pass from these two 
points to the admission that modern instruments 
have produc-ed conditions not contemplated in the 
existing code and that allowance must be made 
for them, the statement that in the last two months 
it has been shown that submarines can be used 
in manner substantially consonant with the ac- 
knowledged principles of regulated warfare, to 
the American advocacy in common with Germany 
of the freedom of the seas, and the pious hope 
that this freedom should be advanced, now and 
even between the combatants, and finally, to the 
readiness of the United States to act as a go- 
between in a bargain to secure this end — we leave 
the region of plain sailing and enter an area in 
which the President's meaning is not defined and 
is difficult to grasp. 
AMERICAN DOCTRINE OF 
SEA LAW. 
Mr. Lansing lays down the following 
principles as those that must govern the conduct 
of belligerents towards neutrals : 
1. The high seas are free (to neutral ships). 
2. This freedom can only lawfully be interfered with 
after the character and cargo of the merchantmen 
have been ascertained. 
3. The lives of non-combatants may not be put in 
jeopardy in any case (i.e., no trading ship, 
whether neutral or belonging to a belligerent, and 
lawfully entitled to carry neutral passengers, may 
be sunk on sight), 
unless the vessel 
(a) Resists capture, 
(b) Seeks to escape after it has been Eum- 
moned to submit— note this— to examina- 
tion (not to extermination). 
U 
