TIRPITZ TALKS.

Auckland Star, Volume L, Issue 222, 18 September 1919, Page 5

TIRPITZ TALKS.

GOTT STRAFE ENGLAND,

SOLLWEG'S FOOLISH MERCY. LONDON, September 2. "Yon Tirpitz, in the extracts from "The Memoirs of yon Tirpitz," published in the "Sunday Times," declares that he alone in Germany realised Britain's desire to crush Germany, and but for the interference of the German politicians would have concentrated all Germany's energies against Britain. He maintains that unrestricted submarine warfare should have been prosecuted ruthlessly to the end, as it was the _nly weapon which could have saved Germany from defeat. He declares that the prestige of the British Navy robbed Germany's leaders of their courage at the beginning of the war, when the German navy had a prospect of victory.

Discussing the blunders of German diplomacy, Tirpitz declares that the dispatch -oi the Panther to Agadir, for ■which Kiderlen-Waechter was chiefly responsible, was a grave blunder, which inflicted a severe blow on German prestige. To counteract this Tirpitz insisted on the introduction of the Naval Supplementary Bill, the announcement of which in the K.aiser's speech of February 7, 1912, led to Lord Haldane's visit to Berlin.

Tirpitz expatiates on Haldane's cleverness as a negotiator, and tells how he dazzled the I_aiser with the prospect of a great African empire, while ''merely claimincr the Cane to Cairo railway as England's share. That meant Africa for England."

Tirpitz reproaches the German Stall with having ur.dfr-estimated the British army even as late as autiunn, 1914. He says that he was constantly thwarted in his design of concentrating his energies on the cuttinjr of British communications by risking the High Sea Fleet in battle in order to seize the Channel ports.

Tirpitz declares that Bethmann-Holl-s-eg failed to realise that England, having entered the war, was deliberately jent on winning it. He says that leading rireles in Germany were quite ignorant of the meaning of sea-power, and the oitter fate threatening Germany if she was driven off the seas. Tirpitz laments the lost opportunity not merely of holding up the traffic of the Channel with artillery posted on Cape Gris-Nez, but of subjecting London to a concentrated bombardment from Gris-Nez, which would have been far more effective than , the bombardment of Paris in 191 S.