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Show A PERIL TO ITSELF, Two British submarines have been run ashore on the coast of Holland within the last three weeks and the crews have been interned. A few days ago an American submarine was wrecked and many of the crew killed or injured by a mysterious explosion. Some months ago it was intimated that German crews were refusing to take their undersea boats into British waters because so many German submarines had been destroyed with all on board. The submarine's failure in the present pres-ent war is due to the fact that it is almost as muh of a peril to itself as to its foes. Mysterious dangers lurk in the nooks and corners of the submarines. subma-rines. When everything seems to be going aright an explosion sends the submarine to an everlasting grave at the bottom of tho sea. Or the submersible submer-sible suddenly pokes its nose into a steel net or runs against some unexpected unex-pected obstruction or plays some grotesque gro-tesque and unexplainable antic, and without rhyme, or reason, so to speak, dives to death. No wonder the crews of submarines are becoming insubordinate. The risk is much greater than anyone imagined at the outbreak of the war. It would not. be surprising to learn that many more British submarines than the thirteen thir-teen officially listed have been destroyed de-stroyed since August 4, 1914, and that the crews interned iu Holland deliberately delib-erately ran their boats ashore to get awav'from the death that forever lies in ambush for the submarine. The submarine is still far from a perfect war machine. No doubt it can be made measurelessly more reliable than it is, .but the recent war probably . will have passed into history before the necessary , improvements are effected. |