February- 15, 1917 
LAiND & WATER 
The German Failure 
By Arthur Pollen 
"^ "ir y HEN those pages come into the reader's hands 
% ^L I the new ruthless, devastating submarine cam- 
^^^U paign — Germany's determined and, by all 
T T accoimts, her final effort to defeat the most 
formidable as well as the most treacherous of her enemies 
— will have been in progress for exactly a fortnight. At 
the time of writing, twelve days of this dreadful period 
have passed. British ships from the hrst of February, 
wherever found, have been exposed to instant and secret 
attack. Until to-day, to neutrals there has been ex- 
tended — at any rate so a German pronouncement tells 
us — the more merciful dispenj^ation of our enemy's 
previous method. This same period has seen the diplo- 
matic breach between Germany and America, the threat 
of war and, as the natural consequence, the not very 
edifying picture of Berlin preparing to face a new belli- 
gerent. These preparations, as perhaps might have been 
expected, have included the brigand manceuvre of holding 
captives to ransom— with no doubt the usual brigand's 
alternative of torture -if the ransom is not paid. For a 
time, even the sacred person of President Wilson's' 
Ambassador was included amongst the hostages. But 
on second thoughts, the \\'ar Lord has let his unwilling 
guest depart, together with a small number of those who 
wished to accompany him. One does not know what the 
fate of those still retained in the enemy's capital may be. 
Amongst those who have got away is the able and level- 
headed correspondent of the American Associated Press, 
and, from Copenhagen, he has despatched a singularly 
interesting messagc^.to his principals. Its interest lies 
in this. He tells us precisely what the Germans expected 
from their submarine campaign and, as we ha\"e had 
tweh'e days' experience of it, we can now compare the 
German hopes with Cierman achievement. 
Threat and Achievement 
Let us first see precisely what the German achievement 
is. The figures have been printed daily — and quoted in 
the House of Lords. The purely British loss is 
slightly more than double the Neutral loss. If we 
compare it with the average of the campaign during 
the previous five or six months, we see that there 
is an increase of about 50 per cent, in the loss of 
ships and between 25 and 30 per cent, in tonnage. 
The increase in the purely Britisli loss is higher. It is 
roughly doubled, and there is a corresponding fall hi the 
neutral loss. The Germans deny that an}' neutrals have 
yet been sunk at sight, and the submarine commanders 
may so far have been So instructed. But the evidence 
seems to be conclusive that the statement is untrue. 
On the other hand, it is undoubtedly true — the news from 
New York, no less than from Holland and Scandinavian 
countries is conclusive on this point — that many neutral 
ships ha\-e been kept in harbour either at home or abroad, 
in consequence of the German Note. If, then, neutral 
shipping resumes its normal activities and the attack on 
it is made reckless, an increase of the sinking of non-belli- 
gerent tonnage may be expected. But against British 
shipping the Germans have now done their worst. How 
does this compare with their expectations ? The 
American correspondent to whom I have referred, writes : 
In German naval circles the belief is expressed that, if 
the submarine campaign succeeds in raising the monthly 
total of tonnage sunk to one million, in addition to the 
• deterring effect on the 3,000,000 tons of neutral shipping 
- plying to Britisli ports, the campaign will force England 
to consider peace proposals. This achievement would 
have to be effected by not more than two-thirds of the 
available submarines, because submarines must spend at 
least one-third of their time in port refitting or en route 
\ to or from their cruising grounds. 
It seems clear from the foregoing that Germany has 
risked war with all the States of North and South America 
and, possibly, with Spain, because she thought that she 
could sink a million tons of British shipping a month, 
deter the neutrals from trading with our ports, and so 
bring us to that chastened frame of mind, so much to be 
desired, in which our consent to a German peace may be 
won. And, no doubt, // a million tons of shipping could 
be destroyed per month ; // this rate of destruction could 
be kept up ; if we failed in our attack on submarines and 
our capacity to protect our merchant ships from them 
did not improve ; ij neither we nor our Allies, actual 
or prospective, nor the neutrals —supposing, of course, 
that in a month's time there are any neutrals left ! — 
could build no merchant ships at all ; and if, finally, 
it turned out that there were no stocks of food in this 
country worth speaking of, then no doubt the German 
plot to bring us, if not to our knees, at least to reason 
would have this amount of sense behind it that it would 
be possible to name a date after which our capacity to 
feed the people and carry on our military operations over 
sea would become altogether too burdensome. The 
German plan, then, was a perfectly sound one— if only it 
could be carried out. Fortunately, wt at present possess 
a measure of Germany's ability to carry it out. The plan 
was to destroy a million tons a month' — say, 33,000 tons 
a day. The enemy is hardly carrying a quarter of his 
programme into effect. It is certainly not worth the 
risk of war with the United States. > 
Now this is interesting because there has apparentl}' 
been no reservation in his instructions to the U-boat 
commanders. Every kind of ship has been sunk at sight 
■ — liners and passenger ships, no less than colliers and 
even trawlers. That is the first point. The next is that 
it is highly improbable that Germany has kept a single 
boat in reserve that could be put into the theatre of war. 
\\'hate\'er else German methods may lack, they never 
lack in thoroughness. When the War Lord says he will 
do a thing, every atom of power at his disposal is used 
to get the thing done. It was so in the first rush into 
France, in the great invasion of Russia, in the attacks on 
Verdun, the Trentino and Roumania. It is a method 
that is specially important where the effect you are 
driving at is a purely moral effect. The object here is 
not literally the star\'ing of England, but such a threat 
of starvation as \\ ill bring us to our senses. It is a blow 
aimed far more at the man in the street than at the army 
or the navy or the Government. Its effect is to be 
measured entirely by the public opinion that it creates. 
Allthis(iermany knows and naturally must have planned 
to make the opening stages of the campaign as destructive 
and therefore as terrifying as possible. And destruction 
at the most of a million tons a month would have gone 
a long way towards getting the effect desired. 
Is this the Worst? 
The weakness of frightfulness as a method is that it is 
either completely eftective or much worse than ineffective. 
If an enem}- could really threaten us with famine and do 
it by means in themselves cru^l, horrifying and m.urderous, 
the result might not only be effective, but instantaneous 
and overwhelming. But the practice of frightfulness in 
small doses produces exactly the contrary of the 
effect desired. So far from impairing national courage 
or weakening popular resolution, it simply enhances both. 
To be frightful and to fail, then, ensures not only the non- 
achievement of the object in view ; it strengthens the 
thing you aim to undermine. This being so, it is quite 
important the public should realise the exact dimensions 
of the (ierman stroke, treating it now not as a threat of 
what may happen, but as a thing that has been tried to 
the utmost for a limited period, and as showing results 
that in all probability cannot be very greatly enhanced. 
And in examining its value, at this point, let us go a step 
further and assume that we can neither improve our attack 
on submarines, better our means of defending our ships, 
nor yet replace our losses. Taking everj'thing at its worst, 
how do things stand ? 
On the eve of this campaign the Liverpool Daily Post 
