EMBARGO ON WOOL

New Zealand Herald, Volume LII, Issue 15849, 20 February 1915, Page 6

EMBARGO ON WOOL

There is abundant evidence that the feeding and clothing of the new armies which will take the field in the spring will test the resources of all the belligerents. Under the first head we have the commandeering of all grain by the German Government, the frantic German efforts to bribe or bluster Britain into relaxing her grip on the North Sea, and the reservation of New Zealand and Australian meat supplies for Imperial uses. Under the other head we have tho known exhaustion of German wool supplies and the prohibition of the export of Australian wool to America. No army can fight long unless it be well fed and clothed, and it is probable Germany finds it as difficult to supply her new armies with uniforms as to assure them food for the months of hard campaigning that lie ahead. Early in October an embargo was placed by the Imperial

authorities on the export of wool to neutral countries; by this time the German mills are probably feeling acutely a lack of supplies. In Verviers, Antwerp, Rheims, and Roubaix, wool has been seized by the invaders as a rich prize. Agents of the German Government have scoured Spain for wool. Holland, Sweden, and Norway have forbidden the export of the raw material and of yarns, but the United States, in pursuance of her resolution to keep out of the fight and turn the misfortune of Europe to her own advantage, has supplied as much wool as Germany could smuggle past the British naval guard. Of

; this there is ample evidence. Perj mission to ship Merino wool from ! Australia was granted early in j January, but a few days later Brii tain found it necessary to warn the ; American authorities that if mer- , chants persisted in exporting wool i and woollen products to Britain's ; enemies the modifications of the emi bargo would be withdrawn. Ger- ; man soldiers have hitherto been clothed very largely in cloths made i from Merino and fine crossbreds. ; Shortly after the war commenced [.America, for the first time in her ! history, was exporting more wool | than she imported. A large number iof Germans and their descendants | are engaged in the American textile j industry, and their efforts to aid I Germany, together with the purely : commercial policy of other Ameri-

can interests, made it necessary that supplies of British wool to America should be cut off. Under the circumstances the fairly stringent embargo now imposed becomes merely an act of self-preservation. To supply Germany with wool through America would on the part of British subjects be treason, on the part of British states culpable folly. It is easy for American mills to protect themselves by giving satisfactory guarantees that imported wools will not be manufactured and exported for Austro-Ger-man use; the fact that there are I difficulties in the way of this reasonI a^e solution is conclusive evidence I that British precautions are posi- ' tively necessary.