Land & Water 
March 7, 19 18 
sliij , iiig was " incre.ising rapidJy " — with the later official 
.1 lii'iMji-cmcnt that, whereas over 130,000 and 150,000 tons 
' 1 ' been completed in November and December, only 
-^...no tons had been so completed in January, and that the 
n^ure for Fcl)ruarv would be no better. The rate of con- 
struction for a third of a year then promises hardly more 
than a million tons for the twelvemonth, which is about 
what we did in 1917. Mr. Honar Law, admitted labour 
troubles were largely re.sponsible for this. 
The situation is more unpleasant from the fact that nobody 
reallv seems to know what the situation is. Sir Eric Geddes, 
it is dear, did not on February 2nd know of the collapse of 
shipbuilding in the previous month. Lloyd's List, neces- 
sarilv the best-informed journal of shipbuilding, in trying to 
strike a balance between losses by enemy action and new 
'-onstrUction in 1917. confesses that it is reduced to pure 
euess-work, and finds Sir Leo Monev's statement that our 
net lo-is in 1917 was 598 ships of over i,6co tons, and that 
British tonnage available was now 20 per cent, less than it 
»'a>. quite unintelligible. .. 
There are, then, two salient features of the situation. 
First, that those who .should know most of the subject — the 
First Lord of the Admiralty and the premier shipping journal 
- '-annot make head or tail of it : next, that those who 
handle labour — that is, their own leaders and the employers — 
'.annot succeed in getting continuous and energetic work. 
\\> venture to think that the first of these phenomena 
e.\ plains the second, 
• • * 
There can be little doubt now that the Government has 
made a grave mistake in trying to disguise, minimise, or 
conceal our loss of ships by submarines and mines. In the 
early part of 1915 wc were told the names and tonnage of 
each ship lost and the approximate locality of every sinking. 
When this information was set out graphically in these pages 
—that is, by chart and diagram — to enforce our naval con- 
Tributor's argument that the historic defences of convoy and" 
patrol should be adopted, the localities of the sinkings' were 
at once suppressed, and further argument along this line was 
stopped by the censorship. When the more vigorous sub- 
marine campaign reopened in August, 1916, we were for- 
bidden even to tabulate the monthly results in diagram form. 
When the ruthless campaign began thirteen months ago, all 
infonnation, except the bare number of British ships sunk 
was suppressed. 
There may be two reasons for secrecy. The first is to 
prevent the enemy getting information that will help him to 
smk more ships : the second is to suppress alarm that would 
be discouraging to ourselves or to our Allies— and, inci- 
dentally, any criticism that exposes responsibility for the 
events which cause the alarm. The first is a legitimate 
reas<jn for absolute secrecy for a certain period, but a month 
after the event, the name, tonnage, and locality of the sinking 
would tell the enemy nothing useful. The mere suppression 
or disguismg of bad news for fear of its effect is a thoroughly 
baa reason for secrecy, for it gives the country and our 
Allies a totally false sense of security, while leaving the 
enemv free to get the full propaganda value of any wildly 
e-vaegTU".! statements he chooses to circulate 
.Mr. Barnes made a remarkable statement in the House of 
Commons last week upon the present state of shipbuilding 
The speech included certain preliminary statements by this 
Minister upon the 12 J per cent, bonus, of which we have 
^ V. f i"""*"' '*^ ^^^^^ "P°" '=^^0"''' and the discussions 
which had risen upon it in the workshops. Important as this 
policy has proved, and grave as are the problems raised by 
what has followed upon it, it is one exceedingly difficult for 
the general public to deal with justly 
We do not know, because we are not told, exactly what 
part of the new policy was due to the initiative of the Ministry 
of .Munitions or how much to the initiative of the Ministry 
01 Labour. And no one can possibly tell, e.xcept those 
immersed in the immensely complicated details of labour 
and munition administration at this moment, what the full 
*?TL «^ ^'^" "■■ ^"■'^ '"'•^'y *° '^«- Wliat is important is 
that Mr. Barnes ascribed a recent unsatisfactory decline in 
the rate of shipbuilding to the labour ferment, and traced 
this ferment, in part at least, to the policy of the bonus 
The words he used were significant and grave. He told 
... that during January less than half of the estimated 
tonnage had been actually turned out. and that February 
would show the same bad record. He added the remarkable 
(and. m dealing with foreign affairs, unusual) phrase 
America ha.s failed us so far as shipbuilding is concerned '= 
Mr. Barnes is a Minister of the War Cabinet, and it is the 
first time during the course of this struggle that such words 
have been used with regard to an Ally by any responsible 
member of any administration in any of the Allied countries. 
The phrase is, of course, rhetorical and exaggerated ; but it 
is none the less to be regretted. Its object was undoubtedly 
excellent, since it was designed to make the public under- 
stand the gravity of the situation ; but it was very unfor- 
tunately put. 
* * . * 
The Man-Power Bill was considered by the miners at their 
adjourned conference last week. A resolution from Lan- 
cashire recommending immediate measures to supply the 
recruits from the mines was rejected. On the other hand, a 
resolution from Northumberland recommending the Govern- 
ment to open negotiations with the Central Powers was also 
rejected, and the conference decided to refer the question 
to a ballot. 
In the case of the engineers, the result of the recent ballot, 
though the majority was large, is inconclusive for the neces- 
sary proportion of members did not vote. The situation has 
been made much more difficult by the methods of the Govern- 
ment, for obviously it was most" important that the national 
need should be made clear, whereas the authorities seemed 
to think it was better tactics to try to set one union against 
another. The industrial world is full of suspicion, but there 
is no weakening of the main purpose, and the workmen are 
quite ready for sacrifices when the necessity is put plainly 
before them. 
* . * * 
An important agreement has been come to between the 
Japanese and the other Allies. It is to the effect that the 
Japanese are to have a free hand to protect the large accumu- 
lation of stores in the East of Siberia, and particularly 
at Vladivostock, which had been provided by the Allies 
for the defence of Russia while that nation still existed. 
The Japanese Government, which in this matter has 
been specially approached by the French, will have full support 
of the Allies in occupying and policing the districts threatened 
by the present anarchy in Eastern Siberia, and will be able, 
it is hoped, to salve no small part of the material now im- 
perilled. It is rumoured that a very large number of German 
and Austrian prisoners in Siberia have been given arms 
by the Revolutionaries, and that this renders the action »f 
Japan. the more necessary. 
The incident is a curious commentary upon that state of 
mind which confidently prophesies the future in international 
affairs. It is not 20 years since what was then the Russian 
Empire was regarded as the necessary heir to European 
influence in the far North-East, and when its power there 
was regarded as specially menacing to the- interests of this 
country. It is not 15 years since this so-called "inevitable 
process " was checked by the Japanese declaring war. In all 
the possible endings to that rivalry which the wisest observer 
could imagine, such an ending as the present was not and 
could not have been conceived. 
A change of considerable importance has long been effected 
m the Austro-Hungarian service. A complete study of it 
has recently appeared on the Continent, and its effects will 
be interesting to note in the fighting of this year. Even 
allowing for the large number of Slav prisoners which that 
service has lost, the majority of its recruitment is still neither 
German nor Magyar in race, but Slav, with a certain small 
proportion of Rumanian (about 7 per cent, of the whole). 
In the first part of the war, when recruitment was local 
and fairiy homogeneous, these subject and discontented 
elements all mustered together in the same unity, gave 
active opportunities for revolt and organised disaffection, as 
aJso for general surrenders— especially to the Russians. In 
the latter part of the war nearly every non-German or Magyar 
iHiit has been thoroughly leavened 'with German or Magyar 
elements, while Slavs have been dispersed into many units 
of non-Slav origin. This policy has been piu-sued even in 
the case of the officers. The result is that actively organised 
opposition or mutiny is more difficult to produce and has 
almost disappeared. Moreover, the defeat of Russia has 
helped the process. 
On the other hand, the best units have lost their old quality 
under this policy, and there is a sort of dilution affecting the 
whole army, and lessening its vigour and driving power 
Some special corps— for instance, the Mountaineers from the 
lyrol, have remained untouched. But these are excep- 
tions^ The mass of the forces have suffered the pro- 
cess described. It has given political, though very short- 
lived, advantages, at the expense of purely military 
considerations. 
