Salt Lake Tribune | 1918-02-14 | Page 4 | Ships Sunk in 1917 Exceeds Production

SHIPS SB I1 1817 EXCEEDSPRODUGTIQ Submarines Destroy Three Times Output of U. S. and Great Britain.- WASHINGTON, Feb. 13 Ship tonnage sunk by submarines in 1S17 was nearly three times as great as the total of production pro-duction in the United States and Great Britain during that year. This was disclosed today by the announcement an-nouncement of Andrew Eonar Law, chancellor chan-cellor of the exchequer, in the British house of commons that Great Britain produced only 1.16S.4T4 tons of shipping last year. The output in the United States was 001,233 tons, making a total combined tonnage of 2.054. 673, while sinkings sink-ings by submarines last year generally are reckoned at 6.0U0.H0O tons. While complete figures on, construction in Japan. Italy France and other nations In l?17 are not yet available, ofiicials here do not believe their aggregate equaled the total of the. United States. If that is the case, submarine sinkings more than doubled all new tonnage produced. pro-duced. Both American and British officials expect ex-pect a very different srory in lUS, however. how-ever. The United States and Great Britain Brit-ain are speeding tip their shipping programmes pro-grammes and naval officials in both countries coun-tries have confidently predicted that the j submarine will be curbed this summer. Secretary Daniels believes that effectual results will be obtained In the early summer. sum-mer. Admiral Sir John R. Jellieoe. former for-mer chief of the British naval staff, re-cently re-cently predicted that by August it could be said that the "submarine menace is killed. However, he predicted dark months before that time. The output of ship tonnage in the United States jn 191S has been variously esti ma ted at from 2.5"'i).'"i00 tons to 4, nOO, '':0 tons, with shipping board officials offi-cials confident that at leat 3.S0i.f" tons will be completed. No estimate of Great Britain's output has been received, hut rhai country is expected to materially Increase In-crease its i? 17 figures. Japan's operations just now are hampered ham-pered by lark of ste"l, but this handicap is expected soon to be overcome and that couV.try also is expf'ted to increase its output this year. Other countries are building few ships.