CHAPTER XIII

TRANSPORTING TWO MILLION AMERICAN SOLDIERS TO FRANCE

In March, 1918, it became apparent that the German submarine campaign had failed. The prospect that confronted the Allied forces at that time, when compared with the conditions which had faced them in April, 1917, forms one of the most impressive contrasts in history. In the first part of the earlier year the cause of the Allied Powers, and consequently the cause of liberty throughout the world, had reached the point almost of desperation. On both land and sea the Germans seemed to hold the future in their hands. In Europe the armies of the Central Powers were everywhere in the ascendant. The French and British were holding their own in France, and in the Somme campaign they had apparently inflicted great damage upon the German forces, yet the disintegration of the Russian army, the unmistakable signs of which had already appeared, was bringing nearer the day when they would have to meet the undivided strength of their enemy. At the time in question, Rumania, Serbia, and Montenegro were conquered countries, and Italy seemed unable to make any progress against the Austrians. Bulgaria and Turkey had become practically German provinces, and the dream of a great Germanic eastern empire was rapidly approaching realization. So strong was Germany in a military sense, so little did she apprehend that the United States could ever assemble her resources and her men in time to make them a decisive element in the struggle, that the German war lords, in their effort to bring the European conflict to a quick conclusion, did not hesitate to take the step which was destined to make our country their enemy. Probably no nation ever adopted a war measure with more confidence in its success. The results which the German submarines could accomplish seemed at that time to be simply a matter of mathematical calculation. The Germans estimated that they could sink at least 1,000,000 tons a month, completely cut off Great Britain's supplies of food and war materials, and thus end the war by October or November of 1917. Even though the United States should declare war, what could an unprepared nation like our own accomplish in such a brief period? Millions of troops we might indeed raise, but we could not train them in three or four months, and, even though we could perform such a miracle, it was ridiculous to suppose that we could transport them to Europe through the submarine danger zone. I have already shown that the Germans were not alone in thus predicting the course of events. In the month of April, 1917, I had found the Allied officials just about as distressed as the Germans were jubilant. Already the latter, in sinking merchant ships, had had successes which almost equalled their own predictions; no adequate means of defence against the submarine had been devised; and the chiefs of the British navy made no attempts to disguise their apprehension for the future.

Such was the atmosphere of gloom which prevailed in Allied councils in April, 1917; yet one year later the naval situation had completely changed. The reasons for that change have been set forth in the preceding pages. In that brief twelve months the relative position of the submarine had undergone a marked transformation. Instead of being usually the pursuer it was now often the pursued. Instead of sailing jauntily upon the high seas, sinking helpless merchantmen almost at will, it was half-heartedly lying in wait along the coasts, seeking its victims in the vessels of dispersed convoys. If it attempted to push out to sea, and attack a convoy, escorting destroyers were likely to deliver one of their dangerous attacks; if it sought the shallower coastal waters, a fleet of yachts, sloops, and subchasers was constantly ready to assail it with dozens of depth charges. An attempt to pass through the Straits of Dover meant almost inevitable destruction by mines; an attempt to escape into the ocean by the northern passage involved the momentary dread of a similar end or the hazard of navigating the difficult Pentland Firth. In most of the narrow passages Allied submarines lay constantly in wait with their torpedoes; a great fleet of airplanes and dirigibles was always circling above ready to rain a shower of bombs upon the under-water foe. Already the ocean floor about the British Isles held not far from 200 sunken submarines, with most of their crews, amounting to at least 4,000 men, whose deaths involved perhaps the most hideous tragedies of the war. Bad as was this situation, it was nothing compared with what it would become a few months or a year later. American and British shipyards were turning out anti-submarine craft with great rapidity; the industries of America, with their enormous output of steel, had been enlisted in the anti-submarine campaign. The American and British shipbuilding facilities were neutralizing the German campaign in two ways: they were not only constructing war vessels on a scale which would soon drive all the German submarines from the sea, but they were building merchant tonnage so rapidly that, in March, 1918, more new tonnage was launched than was being destroyed. Thus by this time the Teutonic hopes of ending the war by the submarine had utterly collapsed; if the Germans were to win the war at all, or even to obtain a peace which would not be disastrous, some other programme must be adopted and adopted quickly.

Disheartened by their failure at sea, the enemy therefore turned their eyes once more toward the land. The destruction of Russian military power had given the German armies a great numerical superiority over those of the Allies. There seemed little likelihood that the French or the British, after three years of frightfully gruelling war, could add materially to their forces. Thus, with the grouping of the Powers, such as existed in 1917, the Germans had a tremendous advantage on their side, for Russia, which German statesmen for fifty years had feared as a source of inexhaustible man-supply to her enemies, had disappeared as a military power. But a new element in the situation now counterbalanced this temporary gain; that was the daily increasing importance of the United States in the war. The Germans, who in 1917 had despised us as an enemy, immediate or prospective, now despised us no longer. The army which they declared could never be raised and trained was actually being raised and trained by the millions. The nation which their publicists had denounced as lacking cohesion and public spirit had adopted conscription simultaneously with their declaration of war, and the people whom the Germans had affected to regard as devoted only to the pursuit of gain and pleasure had manifested a unity of purpose which they had never before displayed, and had offered their lives, their labours, and their wealth without limit to the cause of the Allies. Up to March, 1918, only a comparatively small part of this American army had reached Europe, but the Germans had already tested its fighting quality and had learned to respect it. Yet all these manifestations would not have disturbed the Germanic calculations except for one depressing fact. Even a nation of 100,000,000 brave and energetic people, fully trained and equipped for war, is not a formidable foe so long as an impassable watery gulf of three thousand miles separates them from the field of battle.

For the greater part of 1917 the German people believed that their submarines could bar the progress of the American armies. By March, 1918, they had awakened from this delusion. Not only was an American army millions strong in process of formation, but the alarming truth now dawned upon the Germans that it could be transported to Europe. The great industries of America could provide munitions and food to supply any number of soldiers indefinitely, and these, too, could be brought to the Western Front. Outwardly, the German chiefs might still affect to despise this new foe, but in their hearts they knew that it spelt their doom. They were not now dealing with a corrupt Czardom and hordes of ignorant and passionless Slavs, who could be eliminated by propaganda and sedition; they were dealing with millions of intelligent and energetic freemen, all animated by a mighty and almost religious purpose. Yet the situation, desperate as it seemed, held forth one more hope. If the German armies, which still greatly outnumbered the French and British, could strike and win a decisive victory before the Americans could arrive, then they might still force a satisfactory peace. "It is a race between Ludendorff and Wilson" is the terse and accurate way in which Lloyd George summed up the situation. The great blow fell on March 21, 1918; the British and the French met it with heroism, but it was quite evident that they were fighting against terrible odds. At this time the American army in France numbered about 300,000 men; it now became the business of the American navy, assisted by the British, to transport the American troops who could increase these forces sufficiently to turn the balance in the Allies' favour.

The supreme hour, to which all the anti-submarine labours of the preceding year were merely preliminary, had now arrived. Since the close of the war there has been much discussion of the part which the American navy played in bringing it to a successful end. Even during the war there was some criticism on this point. There were two more or less definite opinions in the public mind upon this question. One was that the main business of our war vessels was to convoy the American soldiers to France; the other emphasized the anti-submarine warfare as its most important duty. Anyone would suppose, from the detached way in which these two subjects have been discussed, that the anti-submarine warfare and the successful transportation of troops were separate matters. An impression apparently prevails that, at the beginning of the war, the American navy could have quietly decided whether it would devote its energies to making warfare on the submarine or to convoying American armies; yet the absurdity of such a conception must be apparent to anyone who has read the foregoing pages. The several operations in which the Allied navies engaged were all part of a comprehensive programme; they were all interdependent. According to my idea, the business of the American navy was to join its forces whole-heartedly with those of the Allies in the effort to win the war. Anything which helped to accomplish this great purpose became automatically our duty. Germany was basing her chances of success upon the submarine; our business was therefore to assist in defeating the submarine. The cause of the Allies was our cause; our cause was the cause of the Allies; anything which benefited the Allies benefited the United States; and anything which benefited the United States benefited the Allies. Neither we nor France nor England were conducting a separate campaign; we were separate units of an harmonious whole. At the beginning the one pressing duty was to put an end to the sinking of merchantmen, not because these merchantmen were for the larger part British, but because the failure to do so would have meant the elimination of Great Britain from the war, with results which would have meant defeat for the other Allies. Let us imagine, for a moment, what the sequence of events would have been had the submarine campaign against merchant shipping succeeded; in that case Britain and France would have been compelled to surrender unconditionally and the United States would therefore have been forced to fight the Central Empires alone. Germany's terms of peace would have included the surrender of all the Allied fleets; this would eventually have left the United States navy to fight the German navy reinforced by the ships of Great Britain, Austria, France, and Italy. In such a contest we should have been outnumbered about three or four to one. I have such confidence in the power and purpose of America as to believe that, even in a single-handed conflict with Germany, we should have won in the end; but it is evident that the problem would have been quite a different one from that of fighting in co-operation with the Allies against the Germanic foe.

Simply as a matter of self-interest and strategy it was certainly wisdom to throw the last ounce of our strength into the scale of the Allied navies; and it was therefore inevitable that we should first of all use our anti-submarine craft to protect all shipping sailing to Europe and to clear the sea of submarines. In doing this we were protecting the food supply not only of Great Britain, but of France and our other Allies, for most of the materials which we sent to our European friends were transported first to England and thence were shipped across the Channel. Moreover, our twelve months' campaign against the submarine was an invaluable preliminary to transporting the troops. Does any sane person believe that we could have put two million Americans into France had the German submarines maintained until the spring and summer of 1918 the striking power which had been theirs in the spring of 1917? Merely to state the question is to answer it. In that same twelve months we had gained much experience which was exceedingly valuable when we began transporting troops in great numbers. The most efficacious protection to merchant shipping, the convoy, was similarly the greatest safeguard to our military transports. Those methods which had been so successfully used in shipping food, munitions, and materials were now used in shipping soldiers. The section of the great headquarters which we had developed in London for routing convoys was used for routing transports, and the American naval officer, Captain Byron A. Long, who had demonstrated such great ability in this respect, was likewise the master mind in directing the course of the American soldiers to France.

In other ways we had laid the foundations for this, the greatest troop movement in history. In the preceding twelve months we had increased the oil tankage at Brest more than fourfold, sent over repair ships, and augmented its repair facilities. This port and all of our naval activities in France were under the command first of Rear-Admiral Wm. B. Fletcher, and later Rear-Admiral Henry B. Wilson. It was a matter of regret that we could not earlier have made Brest the main naval base for the American naval forces in France, for it was in some respects strategically better located for that purpose than was any other port in Europe. Even for escorting certain merchant convoys into the Channel Brest would have provided a better base than either Plymouth or Queenstown. A glance at the map explains why. To send destroyers from Queenstown to pick up convoys and escort them into the Channel or to French ports and thence return to their base involved a long triangular trip; to send such destroyers from Brest to escort these involved a smaller amount of steaming and a direct east and west voyage. Similarly, Queenstown was a much better location for destroyers sent to meet convoys bound for ports in the Irish Sea over the northern "trunk line." But unfortunately it was utterly impossible to use the great natural advantages of Brest in the early days of war; the mere fact that this French harbour possessed most inadequate tankage facilities put it out of the question, and it was also very deficient in docks, repair facilities, and other indispensable features of a naval base. At this time Brest was hardly more than able to provide for the requirements of the French, and it would have embarrassed our French allies greatly had we attempted to establish a large American force there, before we had supplied the essential oil fuel and repair facilities. The ships which we did send in the first part of the war were mostly yachts, of the "dollar-a-year" variety, which their owners had generously given to the national service; their crews were largely of that type of young business man and college undergraduate to whose skill and devotion I have already paid tribute. This little flotilla acquitted itself splendidly up and down the coast of France. Meanwhile, we were constructing fuel-oil tanks; and as soon as these were ready and repair ships were available, we began building up a large force at Brest—a force which was ultimately larger than the one we maintained at Queenstown; at the height of the troop movements it comprised about 36 destroyers, 12 yachts, 3 tenders, and several mine-sweepers and tugs. The fine work which this detachment accomplished in escorting troop and supply convoys is sufficient evidence of the skill acquired by the destroyers and other vessels in carrying out their duties in this peculiar warfare.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, a great organization had been created under the able direction of Rear-Admiral Albert Gleaves for maintaining and administering the fleet of transports and their ocean escorts. Also, as soon as war was declared the work was begun of converting into transports those German merchant ships which had been interned in American ports. The successful completion of this work was, in itself, a great triumph for the American navy. Of the vessels which the Germans had left in our hands, seventeen at New York, Boston, Norfolk, and Philadelphia, seemed to be adapted for transport purposes, but the Germans had not intended that we should make any such use of them. The condition of these ships, after their German custodians had left, was something indescribable; they reflected great discredit upon German seamanship, for it would have been impossible for any people which really loved ships to permit them to deteriorate as had these vessels and to become such cesspools of filth. For three years the Germans had evidently made no attempt to clean them; the sanitary conditions were so bad that our workmen could not sleep on board, but had to have sleeping quarters near the docks; they spent weeks scrubbing, scraping, and disinfecting, in a finally successful effort to make the ships suitable habitations for human beings. Not only had the Germans permitted such liners as the Vaterland and the Kronprinzessin Cecilie to go neglected, but, on their departure, they had attempted to injure them in all conceivable ways. The cylinders had been broken, engines had been smashed, vital parts of the machinery had been removed and thrown into the sea, ground glass had been placed in the oil cups, gunpowder had been placed in the coal—evidently in the hope of causing explosions when the vessels were at sea—and other damage of a more subtle nature had been done, it evidently being the expectation that the ships would break down when on the ocean and beyond the possibility of repair. Although our navy yards had no copies of the plans of these vessels or their machinery—the Germans having destroyed them all—and although the missing parts were of peculiarly German design, they succeeded, in an incredibly short time, in making them even better and speedier vessels than they had ever been before.

The national sense of humour did not fail the transport service when it came to rechristening these ships; the Princess Irene became the Pocahontas, the Rhein the Susquehanna; and there was also an ironic justice in the fact that the Vaterland, which had been built by the Germans partly for the purpose of transporting troops in war, actually fulfilled this mission, though not quite in the way which the Germans had anticipated. Meanwhile, both the American and the British mercantile marines were supplementing this German tonnage. The first troops which we sent to France, in June, 1917, were transported in ships of the United Fruit Company; and when the German blow was struck, in March, 1918, both the United States and Great Britain began collecting from all parts of the world vessels which could be used as troop transports. We called in all available vessels from the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and the Great Lakes; England stripped her trade routes to South America, Australia, and the East, and France and Italy also made their contributions. Of all the American troops sent to France from the beginning of the war, the United States provided transports for 46·25 per cent., Great Britain for 51·25, the remainder being provided by France and Italy. Of those sent between March, 1918, and the armistice, American vessels carried 42·15 per cent., British 55·40 per cent.[8]

Yet there was one element in the safe transportation of troops which was even more fundamental than those which I have named. The basis of all our naval operations was the dreadnoughts and the battle-cruisers of the Grand Fleet. It was this aggregation, as I have already indicated, which made possible the operation of all the surface ships that destroyed the effectiveness of the submarines. Had the Grand Fleet suddenly disappeared beneath the waves, all these offensive craft would have been driven from the seas, the Allies' sea lines of communication would have been cut, and the war would have ended in Germany's favour. From the time the transportation of troops began the United States had a squadron of five dreadnought battleships constantly with the Grand Fleet. The following vessels performed this important duty: the New York, Captain C. F. Hughes, afterward Captain E. L. Beach; the Wyoming, Captain H. A. Wiley, afterward Captain H. H. Christy; the Florida, Captain Thomas Washington, afterward Captain M. M. Taylor; the Delaware, Captain A. H. Scales; the Arkansas, Captain W. H. G. Bullard, afterward Captain L. R. de Steiguer; and the Texas, Captain Victor Blue. These vessels gave this great force an unquestioned preponderance, and made it practically certain that Germany would not attempt another general sea battle. Under Rear-Admiral Hugh Rodman, the American squadron performed excellent service and made the most favourable impression upon the chiefs of the Allied navies. Under the general policy of co-operation established throughout our European naval forces these vessels were quickly made a part of the Grand Fleet in so far as concerned their military operations. This was, of course, wholly essential to efficiency—a point the layman does not always understand—so essential, in fact, that it may be said that, if the Grand Fleet had gone into battle the day after our vessels joined, the latter might have decreased rather than increased the fighting efficiency of the whole; for, though our people and the British spoke the same language, the languages of the ships, that is, their methods of communication by signals, were wholly different. It was therefore our duty to stow our signal flags and books down below, and learn the British signal language. This they did so well that four days after their arrival they went out and manœuvred successfully with the Grand Fleet. In the same way they adopted the British systems of tactics and fire control, and in every other way conformed to the established practices of the British. Too great praise cannot be given the officers and men of our squadron, not only for their efficiency and the cordiality of their co-operation, but for the patience with which they bore the almost continuous restriction to their ships, and the long vigil without the opportunity of a contact with the enemy forces. Just how well our ships succeeded in this essential co-operation was expressed by Admiral Sir David Beatty in the farewell speech which he made to them upon the day of their departure for home. He said in part:

"I want, first of all, to thank you, Admiral Rodman, the captains, officers, and ships' companies of the magnificent squadron, for the wonderful co-operation and the loyalty you have given to me and to my admirals; and the assistance that you have given us in every duty you had to undertake. The support which you have shown is that of true comradeship; and in time of stress, that is worth a very great deal.

"You will return to your own shores; and I hope in the sunshine, which Admiral Rodman tells me always shines there, you won't forget your 'comrades of the mist' and your pleasant associations of the North Sea....

"I thank you again and again for the great part the Sixth Battle Squadron played in bringing about the greatest naval victory in history. I hope you will give this message to your comrades: 'Come back soon. Good-bye and good luck!'"

But these were not the only large battleships which the United States had sent to European waters. Despite all the precautions which I have described, there was still one danger which constantly confronted American troop transports. By June and July, 1918, our troops were crossing the Atlantic in enormous numbers, about 300,000 a month, and were accomplishing most decisive results upon the battlefield. A successful attack upon a convoy, involving the sinking of one or more transports, would have had no important effect upon the war, but it would probably have improved German moral and possibly have injured that of the Americans. There was practically only one way in which such an attack could be made; one or more German battle-cruisers might slip out to sea and assail one of our troop convoys. In order to prepare for such a possibility, the Department sent three of our most powerful dreadnoughts to Berehaven, Ireland—the Nevada, Captain A. T. Long, afterward Captain W. C. Cole; the Oklahoma, Captain M. L. Bristol, afterward Captain C. B. McVay; and the Utah, Captain F. B. Bassett, the whole division under the command of Rear-Admiral Thomas S. Rodgers. This port is located in Bantry Bay, on the extreme southwestern coast. For several months our dreadnoughts lay here, momentarily awaiting the news that a German raider had escaped, ready to start to sea and give battle. But the expected did not happen. The fact that this powerful squadron was ready for the emergency is perhaps the reason why the Germans never attempted the adventure.

A reference to the map which accompanies this chapter will help the reader to understand why our transports were able to carry American troops to France so successfully that not a single ingoing ship was ever struck by a torpedo. This diagram makes it evident that there were two areas of the Atlantic through which American shipping could reach its European destination. The line of division was about the forty-ninth parallel of latitude, the French city of Brest representing its most familiar landmark. From this point extending southward, as far as the forty-fifth parallel, which corresponds to the location of the city of Bordeaux, is a great stretch of ocean, about 200 miles wide. It includes the larger part of the Bay of Biscay, which forms that huge indentation with which our school geographies have made us Americans so familiar, and which has always enjoyed a particular fame for its storms, the dangers of its coast, and the sturdy and independent character of the people on its shores. The other distinct area to which the map calls attention extends northerly from the forty-ninth parallel to the fifty-second; it comprises the English Channel, and includes both the French channel ports, the British ports, the southern coast of Ireland, and the entrance to the Irish Sea. The width of this second section is very nearly the same as that of the one to the south, or about 200 miles.

Emery Walper Ltd. sc.

THE OPTION OFFERED TO THE GERMAN SUBMARINES

This diagram explains why the American navy succeeded in transporting more than 2,000,000 American soldiers to France without loss because of submarines. The Atlantic was divided into two broad areas—shown by the shaded parts of the diagram. Through the northern area were sent practically all the merchant ships with supplies of food and materials for Europe. The southern area, extending roughly from the forty-fifth to the forty-ninth parallel, was used almost exclusively for troopships. The Germans could keep only eight or ten U-boats at the same time in the eastern Atlantic; they thus were forced to choose whether they should devote these boats to attacking mercantile or troop convoys. The text explains why, under these circumstances, they were compelled to use nearly all their forces against merchant ships and leave troop transports practically alone.

Up to the present moment this narrative has been concerned chiefly with the northernmost of these two great sea pathways. Through this one to the north passed practically all the merchant shipping which was destined for the Allies. Consequently, as I have described, it was the great hunting ground of the German submarines. I have thus far had little to say of the Bay of Biscay section because, until 1918, there was comparatively little activity in that part of the ocean. For every ship which sailed through this bay I suppose that there were at least 100 which came through the Irish Sea and the English Channel. In my first report to the Department I described the principal scene of submarine activity as the area of the Atlantic reaching from the French island of Ushant—which lies just westward of Brest—to the tip of Scotland, and that remained the chief scene of hostilities to the end. Along much of the coastline south of Brest the waters were so shallow that the submarines could operate only with difficulty; it was a long distance from the German bases; the shipping consisted largely of coastal convoys; much of this was the coal trade from England; it is therefore not surprising that the Germans contented themselves with now and then planting mines off the most important harbours. Since our enemy was able to maintain only eight or ten U-boats in the Atlantic at one time it would have been sheer waste of energy to have stationed them off the western coast of France. They would have put in their time to little purpose, and meanwhile the ships and cargoes which they were above all ambitious to destroy would have been safely finding their way into British ports.

The fact that we had these two separate areas and that these areas were so different in character was what made it possible to send our 2,000,000 soldiers to France without losing a single man. From March, 1918, to the conclusion of the war, the American and British navies were engaged in two distinct transportation operations. The shipment of food and munitions continued in 1918 as in 1917, and on an even larger scale. With the passing of time the mechanism of these mercantile convoys increased in efficiency, and by March, 1918, the management of this great transportation system had become almost automatic. Shipping from America came into British ports, it will be remembered, in two great "trunk lines," one of which ran through the English Channel and the other up the Irish Sea. But when the time came to bring over the American troops, we naturally selected the area to the south, both because it was necessary to send the troops to France and because we had here a great expanse of ocean which was relatively free of submarines. Our earliest troop shipments disembarked at St. Nazaire; later, when the great trans-Atlantic liners, both German and British, were pressed into service, we landed many tens of thousands at Brest; and all the largest French ports from Brest to Bordeaux took a share. A smaller number we sent to England, from which country they were transported across the Channel into France; when the demands became pressing, indeed, hardly a ship of any kind was sent to Europe without its quota of American soldiers; but, on the whole, the business of transportation in 1918 followed simple and well-defined lines. We sent mercantile convoys in what I may call the northern "lane" and troop convoys in the southern "lane." We kept both lines of traffic for the most part distinct; and this simple procedure offered to our German enemies a pretty problem.

For, I must repeat, the German navy could maintain in the open Atlantic an average of only about eight or ten of her efficient U-boats at one time. The German Admiralty thus had to answer this difficult question: Shall we use these submarines to attack mercantile convoys or to attack troop convoys? The submarine flotilla which was actively engaged was so small that it was absurd to think of sending half into each lane; the Germans must send most of their submarines against cargo ships or most of them against troopships. Which should it be? If it were decided to concentrate on mercantile vessels then the American armies, which the German chiefs had declared to their people could never get to the Western Front, would reach France and furnish General Foch the reserves with which he might crush the German armies before winter. If, on the other hand, the Germans should decide to concentrate on troopships, then the food and supplies which were essential to the Allied cause would flow at an even greater rate into Great Britain and thence to the European nations. Whether it were more important, in a military sense, to cut the Allies' commercial lines of communication or to sink troop transports is an interesting question. It is almost impossible for the Anglo-Saxon mind to consider this as a purely military matter, apart from the human factors involved. The sinking of a great transport, with 4,000 or 5,000 American boys on board, would have been a dreadful calamity and would have struck horror to the American people; it was something which the Navy was determined to prevent, and which we did prevent. Considered as a strictly military question, however—and that was the only consideration which influenced the Germans—it is hard to see how the loss of one transport, or even the loss of several, would have materially affected the course of the war. In judging the purely military results of such a tragedy, we must remember that the Allied armies were losing from 3,000 to 5,000 men a day; thus the sinking of an American transport once a week would not have particularly affected the course of the war. The destruction of merchant shipping in large quantities, however, represented the one way in which the Germans could win. There were at least a hundred merchant ships to every one of our troopships; if a considerable number of the former could be sunk, Germany would have scored a decisive advantage. From the declaration of submarine warfare, the objective of the German Admiralty had been for "tonnage"; by March, 1918, as already said, the chances of destroying sufficient tonnage to win had become extremely slight; yet it still represented the one logical mission of the submarine.

The two alternatives, however, that of attacking mercantile convoys or troop convoys, hardly existed in fact. Let us suppose for a moment that the Germans had changed their programme, had taken their group of operating submarines from the northern trade routes, and had stationed them to the south, in the track of the troop transports. What would the results have been? "Lane," though a convenient word for descriptive purposes, is hardly an accurate one; for this ocean passage-way was really about 200 miles wide. Imagine eight or ten submarines, stretched across that expanse and hunting for troopships. At this rate the Germans would have had about one submarine for every twenty miles. Instead of finding themselves sailing amid a swarm of surface ships, as they were when they were stationed in the busy trade routes of the Irish Sea or the English Channel, the submarines would have found themselves drifting on a great waste of waters. Our troop convoys averaged not more than three a week even in the busiest period; in all probability the submarines would therefore have hung around for a month without catching a glimpse of one. Even if by some chance the patient vigil should finally have been rewarded, it is extremely unlikely that the submarine would ever have found a favourable opportunity to attack. We must keep in mind that the convoy room at the Admiralty knew, within certain limits, the location of submarines from day to day; any time one was located in the track of a troop convoy, therefore, a wireless to the convoy would have conveyed this information and directed it to reach the coast of France by another route.

At the beginning the speediest vessels only were used for transporting troops. Ships which made less than twelve knots an hour were not deemed safe for such precious cargoes; when the need for troops became more and more pressing and when our transport service had demonstrated great skill in the work, a few slower vessels were used; but the great majority of our troop transports were those which made twelve knots or more. Now one of the greatest protections which a ship possesses against submarine attack is unquestionably high speed. A submarine makes only eight knots when submerged—and it must submerge immediately if its attack is to be successful. It must be within at least a mile of its quarry when it discharges its torpedo; and most successful attacks were made within three hundred yards. Now take a pencil and a piece of paper and figure out what must be the location of a submarine, having a speed of eight knots, when it sights a convoy, which makes twelve knots and more, if it hopes to approach near enough to launch a torpedo. A little diagramming will prove that the U-boat must be almost directly in line of its hoped-for victim if it is to score a hit. But even though the god of Chance should favour the enemy in this way, the likelihood of sinking its prey would still be very remote. Like all convoys, the troopships began zigzagging as soon as they entered the danger zone; and this in itself made it almost impossible for a submarine to get its bearings and take good aim. I believe that these circumstances in themselves—the comparative scarcity of troop transports, the width of the "lane" in which they travelled, the high speed which they maintained, and their constant zigzagging, would have defeated most of the attempts which the Germans could have made to torpedo them. Though I think that most of them would have reached their destinations unharmed without any other protection, still this risk, small as it was, could not be taken; and we therefore gave them one other protection greater than any of those which I have yet mentioned—the destroyer escort. A convoy of four or five large troopships would be surrounded by as many as ten or a dozen destroyers. Very properly, since they were carrying human cargoes, we gave them an escort at least three times as large per vessel as that given to large mercantile convoys of twenty or more vessels; and this fact made them very uninviting baits for the most venturesome U-boat commanders.

When the engineers build a Brooklyn bridge they introduce an element which they call the factor of safety. It is their usual procedure to estimate the greatest weight which their structure may be called upon to bear under any conceivable circumstances and then they make it strong enough to stand a number of times that weight. This additional strength is the "factor of safety"; it is never called into use, of course, but the consciousness that it exists gives the public a sense of security which it could obtain in no other way. We adopted a similar policy in transporting these millions of American boys to Europe. We also had a large margin of safety. We did not depend upon one precaution to assure the lives of our soldiers; we heaped one precautionary measure on another. From the embarking of the troops at New York or at Hampton Roads to the disembarkation at Brest, St. Nazaire, La Pallice, Bordeaux, or at one of their other destinations, not the minutest safeguard was omitted. We necessarily thus somewhat diminished the protection of some of the mercantile convoys—and properly so. This was done whenever the arrival of a troop convoy conflicted with the arrival of a merchant convoy. Also, until they reached the submarine zone, they were attended by a cruiser or a battleship whose business it was to protect them against a German raider which might possibly have made its escape into the ocean; the work performed by these ocean escorts, practically all of which were American, was for the most part unobtrusive and unspectacular, but it constitutes a particularly fine example of efficiency and seamanlike devotion. At Berehaven, Ireland, as described above, we had stationed three powerful American dreadnoughts, momentarily prepared to rush to the scene in case one of the great German battle-cruisers succeeded in breaking into the open sea. Even the most minute precautions were taken by the transports.

The soldiers and crews were not permitted to throw anything overboard which might betray the course of a convoy; the cook's refuse was dropped at a particular time and in a way that would furnish no clue to a lurking submarine; even a tin can, if thrown into the sea, was first pierced with holes to make sure that it would sink. Anyone who struck a match at night in the danger zone committed a punishable offence. It is thus apparent why the Germans never "landed" a single one of our transports. The records show only three or four cases in which even attempts were made to do this; and those few efforts were feeble and ineffectual. Of course, the boys all had exciting experiences with phantom submarines; indeed I don't suppose that there is a single one of our more than 2,000,000 troops who has not entertained his friends and relatives with accounts of torpedo streaks and schools of U-boats.

But the Germans made no concerted campaign against our transports; fundamental conditions, already described, rendered such an offensive hopeless; and the skill with which our transport service was organized and conducted likewise dissuaded them. I have always believed that the German Admiralty ordered their U-boat captains to let the American transports alone; or at least not to attack except under very favourable circumstances, and this belief is rather confirmed by a passage in General Ludendorff's memoirs. "From our previous experience of the submarine war," General Ludendorff writes, "I expected strong forces of Americans to come, but the rapidity with which they actually did arrive proved surprising. General von Cramon, the German military representative at the Austro-Hungarian Headquarters, often called me up and asked me to insist on the sinking of American troopships; public opinion in Austria-Hungary demanded it. Admiral von Holtzendorff could only reply that everything was being done to reduce enemy tonnage and to sink troopships. It was not possible to direct the submarines against troopships exclusively. They could approach the coasts of Europe anywhere between the north of England and Gibraltar, a front of some fourteen hundred nautical miles. It was impossible effectively to close this area by means of submarines. One could have concentrated them only on certain routes; but whether the troopships would choose the same routes at the same time was the question. As soon as the enemy heard of submarines anywhere he could always send the ships new orders by wireless and unload at another port. It was, therefore, not certain that by this method we should meet with a sufficient number of troopships. The destruction of the enemy's freight tonnage would then have been undertaken only spasmodically, and would have been set back in an undesirable manner; and in that way the submarine war would have become diverted from its original object. The submarine war against commerce was therefore continued with all the vigour possible."

Apparently it became the policy of the German Admiralty, as I have said, to concentrate their U-boats on merchant shipping and leave the American troopships practically alone—at least those bound to Europe. Unfortunately, however, at no time did we have enough destroyers to provide escorts for all of these transports as fast as they were unloaded and ready to return to America, but as time in the "turn around" was the all-important consideration in getting the troops over, the transports were sent back through the submarine zone under the escort of armed yachts, and occasionally not escorted at all. Under these conditions the transports could be attacked with much less risk, as was shown by the fact that five were torpedoed, though of these happily only three were sunk.

III

The position of the German naval chiefs, as is shown by the quotation from General Ludendorff's book, was an extremely unhappy one. They had blatantly promised the German people that their submarines would prevent the transportation of American troops to Europe. At first they had ridiculed the idea that undisciplined, unmilitary America could ever organize an army; after we adopted conscription and began to train our young men by the millions, they just as vehemently proclaimed that this army could never be landed in Europe. In this opinion the German military chieftains were not alone. No such army movement had ever before been attempted. The discouraging forecast made by a brilliant British naval authority in July, 1917, reflected the ideas of too many military people on both sides of the ocean. "I am distressed," he said, "at the fact that it appears to me to be impossible to provide enough shipping to bring the American army over in hundreds of thousands to France, and, after they are brought over, to supply the enormous amount of shipping which will be required to keep them full up with munitions, food, and equipment."

It is thus not surprising that the German people accepted as gospel the promises of their Admiralty; therefore their anger was unbounded when American troops began to arrive. The German newspapers began to ask the most embarrassing questions. What had become of their submarines? Had the German people not been promised that their U-boats would sink any American troopships that attempted to cross the ocean? As the shipments increased, and as the effect of these vigorous fresh young troops began to be manifest upon the Western Front, the outcries in Germany waxed even more fierce and abusive. Von Capelle and other German naval chiefs made rambling speeches in the Reichstag, once more promising their people that the submarines would certainly win the war—speeches that were followed by ever-increasing arrivals of American soldiers in France. The success of our transports led directly to the fall of Von Capelle as Minister of Marine; his successor, Admiral von Mann, who was evidently driven to desperation by the popular outburst, decided to make one frantic attempt to attack our men. The new minister, of course, knew that he could accomplish no definite results; but the sinking of even one transport with several thousand troops on board would have had a tremendous effect upon German moral. When the great British liner Justicia was torpedoed, the German Admiralty officially announced that it was the Leviathan, filled with American soldiers; and the jubilation which followed in the German press, and the subsequent dejection when it was learned that this was a practically empty transport, sailing westward, showed that an actual achievement of this kind would have raised their drooping spirits. Admiral von Mann, therefore, took several submarines away from the trade routes and sent them into the transport zone. But they did not succeed even in attacking a single east-bound troopship. The only result accomplished was the one which, from what I have already said, would have been expected; the removal of the submarines from the commercial lane caused a great fall in the sinking of merchant ships. In August, 1918, these sinkings amounted to 280,000 tons; in September and October, when this futile drive was made at American transports, the sinkings fell to 190,000 and 110,000 tons.

Too much praise cannot be given to the commanders of our troop convoys and the commanding officers of the troop transports, as well as the commanders of the cruisers and battleships that escorted them from America to the western edge of the submarine zone. The success of their valuable services is evidence of a high degree not only of nautical skill, judgment, and experience, but of the admirable seamanship displayed under the very unusual conditions of steaming without lights while continuously manœuvring in close formation. Moreover, their cordial co-operation with the escorts sent to meet them was everything that could be desired. In this invaluable service these commanding officers had the loyal and enthusiastic support of the admirable petty officers and men whose initiative, energy, and devotion throughout the war enabled us to accomplish results which were not only beyond our expectations but which demonstrated that they are second to none in the world in the qualities which make for success in war on the sea.

On the whole, the safeguarding of American soldiers on the ocean was an achievement of the American navy. Great Britain provided a slightly larger amount of tonnage for this purpose than the United States; but about 82 per cent. of the escorting was done by our own forces. The cruiser escorts across the ocean to France were almost entirely American; and the destroyer escorts through the danger zone were likewise nearly all our own work. And in performing this great feat the American navy fulfilled its ultimate duty in the war. The transportation of these American troops brought the great struggle to an end. On the battlefield they acquitted themselves in a way that aroused the admiration of their brothers in the naval service. When we were reading, day by day, the story of their achievements, when we saw the German battle lines draw nearer and nearer to the Rhine, and, finally, when the German Government raised its hands in abject surrender, the eighteen months' warfare against the German submarines, in which the American navy had been privileged to play its part, appeared in its true light—as one of the greatest victories against the organized forces of evil in all history.

FOOTNOTE:

[8] These figures are taken from the Annual Report of the Secretary of the Navy for 1919, page 207.

THE END