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Show f SUPREMACY OF i GREAT BRITAIN t i I Balfour Reviews the Naval Triumphs of the Ships Un- j der His Command. London, Aug. 3, 10:15 p. m. The first Jord of the admiralty, A. J. Balfour, Bal-four, has, has issued a statement for publication, in the course of which he says: "The second anniversary of the British Brit-ish declaration of war provides a fitting fit-ting opportunity for a brief survey ot the naval situation. The consequences, consequen-ces, material and moral, of the Jutland battle cannot be easily. overlooked; an allied diplomatist assured me that he considered it the turning point of tie war. "The tide, which had long ceased to help our enemies, began from that moment mo-ment to flow strongly in our favor. 'This much at least is true, that every week which has passed since the German Ger-man fleet was driven damaged into Iport has seen new successes for the allies in one part or another of the field of operations. It would be an error, er-ror, however, to suppose that the naval -victory changed the situation; what it : did was to confirm it. "Before the Jutland battle, as after, the German fleet was imprisoned. The battle was an attempt to break the :bars and burst the confining gates. It :failed, and with its failure the high seas fleet sank again into impotence. il Vaunts British Blockade. "The Germans claim Jutland as a victory, but in essence they admit the J contrary, since the obect of a naval ;j 'battle is to obtain command of the ,seas, and it is certain that Germany Ihas not obtained that command, whilst Great Britain has not lost it. Tests of this assertion are easy to apply. Has i the grip of the British blockade re-i re-i Jaxed since May 31? Has it not, on f the contrary tightened? j "The Germans themselves will ad mit the increasing diffciulty of importing im-porting materials and foodstuffs and ! of exporting their manufactures; : hence the violence of their invectives against Great Britain." Mr. Balfour argues that if they ; had felt themselves on the war to t" maritime equality, the Germans would not have so loudly advertised the j Deutschland incident, the whole inter-J inter-J est of which, in German eyes, was to prove their ability to elude the barrier bar-rier raised by the British fleet between '! them and the outed world. As further proof of the "impotence" of the Ger. i man fleet, Mr. Balfour pdints to the !. ever-increasing flow of men and mu-: mu-: nltions from England, pouring across the channel to France. Vast Munitions Transport. "It' had reached colossal proportions," propor-tions," he adds, "Its effect on the war A r- i ii .i in i i i i may well be decisive. Yet never has It been more secure from attack by I enemy battleships or cruisers than It has been since the German 'victory" of Jutland." The first lord refers to German exhortations ex-hortations to look at the map and see the extent of German successes, and adds: "That depends on -what maps you take. Even the map of Europe shows an ever-shrinking battle line. But look at the map of the world. All of Germany's colonies are gone, except .2ast Africa, which, even as I write, seems slipping from her grasp. Has the "battle of Jutland opened up the smallest prospect of Germany's regaining re-gaining these colonies or giving a moment's mo-ment's respite to the hard-pressed colonists in German East Africa?" Mr. Balfour advises those requiring further proofs of the value the Germans Ger-mans attach to their "victorious fleet" to study the German policy of submarine sub-marine warfare, and says: "The advantage of submarine attacks at-tacks on commerce Is that they cannot can-not bo controlled by superior fleet power in the same way as attacks by cruisers; a disadvantage is that they cannot be carried out on a large scale consistently with the laws of war or the requirements of humanity. They make, therefore, a double appeal to German militarism, an appeal to its prudence and appeal to its brutality. brutal-ity. "The Germans know that their 'victorious 'vic-torious fleet' was useless. It could be kept safe in harbor while the submarine subma-rine warfare went on merrily outside. out-side. They knew that submarines cannot be brought into action by battleships bat-tleships or battle cruisers. ' They thought, therefore, that to these new commerce destroyers our merchant ships must fall an easy prey, unprotected unpro-tected by our ships of war and unable to protect themselves. "They were wrong in both respects and doubtless it is their wrath at the skill and energy with which British merchant captains and British crews have defended the lives and property under their charge that has driven the German admiralty into their latest and most supid act of calculated ferocity fer-ocity the judicial murder of Captain Fryatt." The first lord contends that the case is not worth arguing, that it is useless use-less to do the German military authorities au-thorities the injustice of supposing they were animated by solicitude for the principles of international law, and accidentallv blundered. "The illegality of their folly," he continues, "was of a different kind. It flowed from a different source. They knew that Captain Fryatt was doing his duty and they l'esolved at all costs to dlscourge imitation. "What blunderers they are! They know how to manipulate machines, but of managing men they know less than nothing. They are always wrong, because they always suppose that if they behave like brutes they can cow their enemies into behaving" like cowards. cow-ards. Small is their knowledge of our merchant seamen. I doubt whether wheth-er one can be found who has not resolved re-solved to defend himself to the last against piratical attack. But if there is such a one, depend upon it, ho will be cured by the last exhibition of 'German civilization.' And, what must! neutrals think of all this? "The freedom of the sea means to! Germany that the German navy is to behave at sea as the German army behaves be-haves on land. It means that neither enemy civilians nor neutrals may possess right6 against militant Germany; Ger-many; that those who do not resist will be drowned and those who do will be shot. "Already 244 neutral merchantmen have been sunk. Mankind, with the experience of two years of war behind it, has made up its mind about 'Ger- man kultur.' It is not, I think, with- out material for forming judgment about German freedom." |