The New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. FRIDAY, MAY 19, 1916. BESIEGED GERMANY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16233, 19 May 1916, Page 4

The New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. FRIDAY, MAY 19, 1916. BESIEGED GERMANY.

Whu,e the anxiety of the Kaiser and of an appreciable section of his subjects for peace may well be construed as - an indication of failing military strength and consequent inability to withstand the impending aggressive operations of the Great Alliance, it must not be forgotten that, apart from the threatened onslaught of her enemies, Germany is being steadily weakened by the blockade which the Allies have imposed on her. For nearly two years she has been cut off from ordinary communication with the outside world. Her manufacturing industries have been paralysed and her foreign trade is at a standstill. Her mercantile marine is useless. Her population is placed on short rations of food. Her financial position is desperate. Like a city be- ; sieged she is slowly approaching a stage when she may be forced to submit to whatever terms her besiegers may impose. The nature of this Allied blockade is two-fold. On land it consists of battle-fronts which extend for some 2000 miles; on sea it consists of a complete blockade of the outer coastlines of Germany and her allies. It has become increasingly evident during the last few months that the most strenuous efforts of the Germans to break the land blockade are futile, while in regard to the sea blockade their passive attitude points definitely to their inability to accomplish anything which might relieve the situation. The besiegers of Germany may not be able to reduce her to submission by mere methods of deprivation, it must be recognised that it is possible for them to combine methods of deprivation and of aggression, on land and sea, which may materially hasten the time of her capitulation. The immense preponderance of force possessed by the Great Alliance on land obviously permits the leaders of its armies to assume aggressive operations against the German battle-fronts at any time they may choose. The combined navies of the Great Alliance cannot force the German Navy to issue from : its ports and give battle, but it is! possible for them to carry the blockade so close to the German coast as to affect the military situation materially. A well-known French naval expert, Rear-Admiral Degouey, has expressed the opinion; that it is quite possible for the Allied fleets to capture certain islands in close proximity to Schleswig, whence aviators might attack the Kiel Canal and render it temporarily if not permanently useless. He enumerates the naval forces of the

Allies "arid compares them with the naval forces of the Germans, arid the inference to be drawn from his remarks is that with so great a preponderance of force the Allied navymay well undertake something more than a passive blockade of the German coast. Locked up in the port of Wilhelmshaven, in the Kiel Canal and the mouth of the Elbe are between forty and fifty capital ships, carrying some 400 guns of large calibre; with them in due proportion are cruisers, destroyers, submarines and torpedo-boats. Blockading this navy are 90 capital ships of Britain, 18 capital ships of France, with cruisers, destroyers and submarines. In the Baltic the Russian capital ships number 12, carrying some 112 heavy guns. Russia's Baltic squadrons of destroyers and submarines are of themselves about equal in strength to the destroyer and submarine squadrons of Germany. . It will, therefore, be seen that the theory of the French RearAdmiral, whose opinion on naval matters is regarded in France in the same light as Admiral Mahan's was regarded in America and Britain, appears to warrant close inspection. Were the Kiel Canal blocked and rendered useless, the German Fleet would be debarred from passing from its North Sea ports into the Baltic, and vice versa; that part of the German Fleet which might be in the Baltic would be quickly driven into port. If the German Fleet were thus excluded from the Baltic, an extraordinary situation would be created in regard to the possibilities of conducting a descent upon the coasts of Pomerania and Prussia. With the German Fleet inoperative in the Baltic and that sea dominated by the fleets of Russia and her allies, it might be possible for Russia to land within striking distance of Berlin a sufficient force to paralyse German military operations in other quarters. Indeed, such a movement, effected at a time when a general offensive was being carried out by the armies of the Great Alliance on all the battlefronts, might prove to be the decisive stroke of the war. Little attention has been paid to the various ways by which Germany might be attacked because the Allies have hitherto stood upon the defensive excepting for the earlier raids made by the Russians in the east. As the tide turns and Germany has to defend herself it will be possible to carry out plans which if attempted at present would be foredoomed to failure.