FOOD FOR BIG GUNS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LII, Issue 15900, 24 April 1915, Page 4 (Supplement)

FOOD FOR BIG GUNS.

HEAVY ARTILLERY. THE SUPPLY OF SHELLS. Tros chief factor in deciding this war "ill be the superiority on one sido or the other of heavy artillery, writes Mr. Hilaire F.elloc '.n the Daily Sketch. The war has reached a phase in which that point is quite clear, and it is a point which should bo familiar henceforward to the public opinion of all the allies; for i lie provision of ammunition and of pieces in sufficient rapidity will vary largely depend i;,ion that opinion. There are three things that give one party superiority in its heavy artillery over another. . The handling of the pieces; The number of the pieces (including tho power o! relining worn riflings and replacing lost pieces) ; and Third, the supply of ammunition. Tho handling of guns is a nutter of talent aud natural temperament as much as any other art, and the allies in the nest arc now clearly proved the superiors of the enemy in that art.

The refitting of gun» and the production of new guns would be an equally essential consideration were there not this curious relationship between guns and Ammunition nowadays; that you can produce a gun more easily and more quickly than you can produce the ammunition it will need in a few weeks. It is therefore the third poiut which is really the crux. If wo have, not sufficient ammunition for the job all our superiority is handicapped, and much of it is thrown away.

What is the cause of this demand for ammunition, which is the ono great call of the army at this moment It is the nature of the modern weapon, and of the fighting that has developed from it. I am not speaking of the quick-firing field gun, but of the heavy gun which has in this new trench fighting everywhere become tho decisive weapon.

, T«oA<ffl at Flu. It is the heavy gun which renders a trench untenable. Men read the other day in the papers of a successful advance made by the French near Perthes, in Champagne. Do they know what that particular movement of Jess than a day and a-half cost in ammunition for the heavy pieces? It cost 80,000 rounds: and it was this tornado of five, that made the brilliant local success possible. I saw but two weeks ago a vast shed in the north where every man and machine was turning out such shell, and yet the contract then was for but 3000-"

It is so in every part of the line. Upon the crushing effect of unlimited heavy gunfire the cowing of the opposed lines will depend; upon its uninterrupted activity will the maintenance of our superiority depend: upon a special concentration of such fire without stint and without thought for reserves will tho final effort depend when the time comes. And for all this rapid, increased, continued production of munitions is the absolute prime necessity. The one thing quite clear to every man now risking his life at th/ front,and equally clear to anv man who is privileged to visit from time to time the zone of the »rmy and the belt over which our fate is even now being decided, is that, leaving all recrimination and dispute for the future, the one thing necessary at the moment is the accumulation of food for the big guns. A hitch or a slack would be as fatally foolish as a hitch or a slack in the working of the pumps at sea upon a vessel not far from port, yet depending upon the energy of the pumps to rea«h port at all.