GERMAN NAVAL RAID.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16214, 27 April 1916, Page 6

GERMAN NAVAL RAID.

♦ The fact that a German squadron has been able to throw shells into Lowestoft and return to the German coast will occasion no surprise in view of earlier raids of this description. The possibilities of such raids are well understood. On the' one hand there is the chance of accomplishing the random murder of some British civilians, as in the bombardment of Scarborough and .West Hartlepool in December, 1914. On the other hand there is the risk of the German raiders meeting a faster and more powerful British squadron, as happened off the Dogger Bank in January, 1915. In the case of the Loweßtoft raid luck favoured neither side decisively. The enemy encountered a British naval force which was apparently able to protect the town and the lives of civilians without being strong enough to overwhelm the German ships, which thus escaped before a stronger British squadron was able to intercept them. The two most interesting features of the raid are the success of the British naval defence and the use of German warships for offensive action for the first time since Admiral Beatty sank the Blucher and seriously damaged two other German battle-cruisers. It was then anticipated that the Germans would attempt no further raids until the damaged cruisers had been repaired. Ample time has elapsed for this to have been done, and further raids are among naval possibilities of the next few months. To an enemy which possesses 24 Dreadnoughts against Britain's 48-assuming' all the battleships and battle-cruisers authorised by the two nations when the war began to have been completed—a general fleet action is not an attractive prospect. Raids of the kind to which we have become accustomed are an alternative form of offence, which, if risky, is not so surely foredoomed. There is a possibility of sinking a British scout, or bombarding a town, and the presence of a German squadron in the North Sea may gratify public feeling in Germany, and impress uninformed neutral opinion. Above all the Germans probably hope to disorganise British naval dispositions and cause powerful warships to be sent where they may become a target for submarines. Such a hope is certain to meet with disappointment now, at, it did earlier in the war.