The Madison daily leader. [volume] (Madison, S.D.) 1890-current, 1918-10-04

Zeebrugge raid gives Tor the nrSt
time some idea of the tremendous, in
tricate schemes that must be devised
for modern naval operations, such as
bottIing up the Zeebrugge submarine
base.
While the name of the officer who
gave the interview may not be used,
for obvious reasons, the study was
arranged with the permission of the
first sea lord, Sir Rosslyn Wemyss,
and through the courtesy of Sir Doug
las Brownrigg, chief naval censor
The spectacular story of the raid the
almost superhuman work done In the
face of a whirlwind of fire, and the
heroic attack of the storming party
scrambling over the Mole were all
placed by the British officer as mere
incidentals in the tremendous assault
that was determined upon.
"The problem that lay before u.s."
he said, twas far bigger and greater
than the landing on the Mole, or any
mere spectacular features. 1t was
vastly different from merely sending
n or more ships into a harbor pro-
tected by shore batteries, because the
channel to be blocked was narrow,
and a ship or ships must be placed
carefully to make the effort success
full. Moreover, the waters through
which the vessels must dash were UNI
der the protection Of heavy guns
which commanded the sea practically
for Is miles out from the coast.
Dash Under Cover.
"This meant that the vessels, with
the block ships, must arrange their
dash under cover for 10 miles. And
then, having run the coast batteries,
they must run close to a heavy bat
terry on the Mole, located practically a
mile out In the harbor, and which
could fire practically point blank at
the vessels. And then, Of course, also
under cover of the near shore bat
teries Of the Mole and the heavier
coast batteries, making another u
Of Is miles. The German mine fields
also had to be encountered.
"various elements had to be taken
into consideration. Naturally the
cash must be made at high tide.
There was only one way In which we
could hope to protect the vessels IL
the raid were made by daylight, and
that was a smoke screen. But air
Flames, scouting above. would lay a
lleet open to observation and to prac-
tically the same attack by indirect fire
as on land. So the dash had to be
made at night, and on such a night
as the tide would be high at about
midnight, for the ships must go In,
do their destruction. and then come
out again before the shore batteries
would have the daylight to help them.
'There were something like 100
guns on the shore commanding the 10
mile radius. II these discovered the
vessels none of the ships could have
lived through the falling shells. AS
the batteries all had the use OF
searchlights and star shells 1t became
necessary to take measures to pre-
vent the ships being seen by any
method of illumination until the last
moment. That ~necessitated the use
of smoke screens. A smoke screen Is
very little use unless 1t approaches
with you; thus you must always have
the wind blowing I'm your direction OF
advance. In our case II was from the
north. The use of any craft to make
smoke would not be Of much avail
lnless they could approach the coast
making smoke to the last minute.
This necessitated light draft vessels,
and they in turn required calm
weather.
Details to BE Worked Out.
$50 the conditions necessary de-
manded high water occurring at a
particular period of the night. wind
blowing directly into the harbor, calm
weather and, of course, no fog, for
the latter would prevent the blocking
ships from finding the coast.
Having attained these, there still
were other matters to be worked out.
For the blocking ships TO find their
destination 1t was quite obvious that
they must be able to see for a certain
distance, say for a mile or two at
least. And this means that the mo-
ment the entrance to the canal was
In the same area Of clear atmosphere
with the blocking ships, namely, dur.
ing the final run in, the shore bat
teries on the coast line also would be
IN the clear weather and able to con-
centrate on the blocking ships, much
to their detriment.
"This applied both to Z~eebrugge
and Ostend, where the German bat
teries are on the actual coast line.
But at Zeebrugge there was the ad'
ditional obstruction which IL absent
at Ostend-the Mole.
'The Mole at Z~eebrugge extends
rather more than three-Quarters OF
mile from the entrance Of the canal
and the outer end of the Mole had
been turned into a veritable fortress
The position Of the navigable channe
leading to the canal entrance was sucf
that the ships were forced to pass close
to the batteries on the Mole, and 1t wa