“Malbrook s’en va-t’en guerre!”
The Baltic Project was scoffed at, though it had the impregnable sanction of Frederick the Great, and the project was turned down in November, 1914; and now the Germans, because of their possession of the Baltic as a German lake, are going to annex all the Islands they want that command Russia and Sweden, and the Russian Fleet, with its splendid “Dreadnoughts” and Destroyers disappear and eight British Submarines have been sunk. Ichabod!
Yours truly,
Fisher.
The German Submarine Menace. Lord Fisher to a Friend.
March 2nd, 1918.
My Dear “Mr. Faithful,”
You write anxious to have some connected statement in regard to the whole history of the German Submarine Menace.
Now, the first observation thereon is the oft-repeated indisputable statement that no private person whatever can hope to fight successfully any Public Department. So even if you had the most conclusive evidence of effete apathy such as at first characterised the dealing with this German Submarine Menace, yet you would to the World at large be completely refuted by a rejoinder in Parliament of departmental facts. Nevertheless here is a bit of Naval History.
In December, 1915, the Prime Minister (Mr. Asquith) unexpectedly came up to me in the Lobby of the House of Commons, and said he was anxious to consult me about Naval affairs, and he would take an early opportunity of seeing me! However, he must have been put off this for I never saw him. A month afterwards I pressed him in writing to see Sir John Jellicoe in regard to the paucity both of suitable apparatus and of suitable measures to cope with the German Submarine Menace; after much opposition the Prime Minister himself sent for Sir John Jellicoe and he appeared before the War Council. This is my Memorandum at that time, dated February 7th, 1916: