Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1918-08-09
The Huns SharbeSt Weab0n.

The submarine situation tersely summed up
the other day by Sir Eric Geddes, First Lord of the
Admiralty when he told the House of Commons
that just year ago the net loss of Allied shipping
through U-boat ravages amounted to five hundred
and fifty thousand tons month whereas there is
net gain of one hundred thousand tons
month. Thus within a year Prussanism at sea
has been thwarted and so circumscribed that
it is virtually defeated and done for If the U-boat
campaign had continued sinking five hundred and
fifty thousand mere tons of shipping a month than
the Allies constructing the Kaiser's boastful
threat of starving England and barring Americas
war path the Atlantic would have stood
chance, indeed very good chance, of fulfllment.
But now that we are turning forth every thirty
days one hundred Thousand more tons of shipping
than the Uboats, together with all other hostile de-
vices and maritime accidents, destroy, his words
pass idle wind.
The story of this conquest when fully written
will make one of the peculiarly stirring chapters of
the The vim of patriotism with which Ameri-
can labor and British labor have barred their giant
for the building of ships is of itself magnih-
cent Never have men felled and hauled and forged
and hammered and rveted and triumphed in their
toll with results gloriously far-reaching; and
never has the genius of organization and produc-
tive skill been turned to finer effect On July the
Fourth American yards launched approximately a
hundred Ships and on Labor Day they will launch
upwards of a hundred Every four-and-
twenty hours the production of one or more
vessels from American pants-cargo carriers,
transports, and all the various types essential to
complete merchant marine. Moreover, the speed of
production continually increases. If we are now
beating the U-boats at the rate Of one hundred
thousand tons a month, we shall be making
it two hundred thousand a month, and so on until
the pirates even if they afoat in considerable
numbers, will be overwhelmed by the mass of the
Allied merchant feet.
we have not been content, however with mere
" building ships faster than the enemy could de-
stroy them We have gone aggressively forth
against the Kaisers wolves. The destroyer, the
depth bomb and other anti-submarne weapons are
employed so effectively that the U-boats more
hunted than hunting, and are destroyed faster than
they can be replaced. True, they continue to sink
hospital ships in their skulIing, brutal character
istically German fashion; and occasionally they
pounce upon a schooner or a fishing smack off our
coasts They continue, moreover, to take appre
cable toll of transatlantic tonnage. They have
not yet been put out of the But they certain
ly have been put out as possibly decisive factor
in the war. A year ago Germany had submarine
hopes Today she realizes, if she has insight into
the situation, that her ambitious sea warfare is
failure a complete failure, in far as its impor-
tant detectives concerned 1t has tailed TO cut
off the Allies from abundant imports of food and
other necessaries 1t has failed to prevent the safe
passage of a million three hundred thousand Amer
lean troops to crush German chances on the West
front
The defeat of the submarine within twelve
month is a shining augury for the Allied cause
The same energy and resourcefulness, the same
power and resoluteness that wrested from the Hun
his sharpest and most dangerous weapon will
eventually fetter all his strokes and drag him to
unconditional surrender.