We have positive knowledge of the destruction of more than one-half of
these submarines, and we also know that it is practically impossible for
Germany to keep in operation more than 10 per cent of those remaining.
It is therefore reduced to a negligible quantity so far as its ultimate
effect upon the result of the war is concerned.
1 saw a reliable statement in France to the effect that there is one
ship of some character leaving the eastern shores of America for the war
zone every six minutes, and it is only a few vessels which are ever
torpedoed, estimated at about one per cent. This is less than the loss
by storm and accident in the earlier days of transportation and is not
much greater than such loss now. We must bear in mind that we read only
of the ships which have been torpedoed and see but little account of the
hundreds of ships which pass over the ocean safely and undisturbed.
Three hundred thousand soldiers are conveyed across the Atlantic every
thirty days, and an average of about 500,000 tons of freight carried to
the French coast. There are warehouses in only one of the many ports of
France with a capacity of over 2,000,000 tons.
It is to the navy that the credit for the destruction of this outlaw
seagoing craft is due. The navy is and has been the backbone of this
war, the same as it has been of almost every great war in history.
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