Chapter XX: The Sham Blockade (1)

SECRET SERVICE PROTEST AGAINST THE OPEN DOOR TO GERMANY--ACTIVITY
OF OUR NAVAL ARM NULLIFIED--LORD NORTHCLIFFE'S PATRIOTISM--BLOCKADE
BUNKUM--POSITION OF DENMARK--HUGE CONSIGNMENTS FOR GERMANY--THE
DECLARATION FIASCO--BRITISH MINISTERS' GULLIBILITY IN
COPENHAGEN--GERMAN BANK GUARANTEEING THE BRITISH AGAINST GOODS
GOING TO GERMANY--BRITISH NAVY PARALYSED BY DIPLOMATIC AND
POLITICAL FOLLY--STATISTICS EXTRAORDINARY--FLOUTING THE DECLARATION
OF LONDON--SIR EDWARD GREY'S DILATORINESS AND PUERILE
APOLOGIA--LORD HALDANE PUSHED OUT--LORD FISHER'S EFFICIENCY
UNRECOGNISED--LORD DEVONPORT'S AMAZING FIGURES ON GERMAN
IMPORTS--FURTHER STARTLING STATISTICS--BRITISH THE GREATEST
MUDDLERS ON EARTH--NOBLE SERVICE BY AUSTRALIAN PREMIER, W. H.
HUGHES--HOLLOW SHAM OF THE DANISH AGREEMENT AND THE NETHERLANDS
OVERSEAS TRUST--BLOCKADE MINISTER, LORD ROBERT CECIL, AND HIS
FEEBLE FUTILE EFFORTS--MORE STATISTICS--THE TRIUMVIRATE--ASQUITH
THE UNREADY, SIR EDWARD GREY THE IRRESOLUTE, AND LORD HALDANE THE
FRIEND OF THE KAISER--DAVID LLOYD GEORGE, THE SAVIOUR OF THE
SITUATION--HOW HE PROVED HIMSELF A MAN--A NEGLECTED OPPORTUNITY.

During the first year of the war Secret Service agents busied themselves much concerning the vast stream of goods, necessities and munitions in the raw state which poured into Germany direct and through neutral countries like the waters of a rising flood over weirs on the Thames. Night and day these ever-restless beings flitted as shadows along the secretly or openly favoured trade routes. Persistently and energetically they followed up clues and signs of the trails of enemy traders, from ports of entry to original sources. Week by week, almost day by day, they flashed home news of then present and future consignments of such importance and value to the enemy that he paid exorbitant prices and ridiculous commissions to help rush them over his frontiers. Seemingly all was in vain. These efforts were but wasted. The work was apparently unappreciated and unresponsively received. England, to all intents and purposes, was slumbering too soundly to be awakened. Meanwhile, during every hour of the twenty-four, unending processions of trade ships of every shape, make and rig sneaked along the coasts of neutral waters, as near to land as safety permitted, on their way to the receiving ports of Germany.

Observers, stationed in lighthouses or on promontories, who watched this abnormal freighting activity, could not but help noticing that, whenever smoke showed itself upon the horizon seawards, consternation at once became manifest on the decks of these cargo carriers. They would squeeze dangerously inshore, lay to, or drop anchors, bank up their fires and damp down every curl of smoke which it was possible to suppress; in short, they adopted every conceivable ruse to conceal their presence and identity.

If this trade was honest and legitimate, why should these tactics be followed, and these precautions taken? _Res ipsa loquitur._

As the year 1915 progressed and the inertia of the British Government became more and more realised abroad, the captains of freighters grew bolder and bolder, and the confidence of the thousands upon thousands of get-rich-quick-anyhow dealers ashore increased and multiplied accordingly. No one, except the Germans themselves, knew or could get to know the actual extent of this enormous volume of their import trade. The chattels came from so many different countries and were consigned through so many channels that accurate records were rendered impossible; whilst the greater part was shipped in direct.

The English Press, which had been so self-denying and loyal to the Government in spite of the shameful manner in which it had been gagged and bound down, until the Censor's blue-pencilling amounted almost to an entire suppression of news, began to grumble and to hint very broadly that the bombastic utterances of our Ministers regarding the effectiveness of our blockade and the starvation of the Central Powers were exaggerations and not facts. Men who had always put their country before any other consideration began to proclaim that the so-called blockade was a delusion; whilst they quoted figures of imports to neutral countries which were embarrassing to the Government. Something therefore had to be done. The notorious Danish Agreement[19] was accordingly framed in secret (in secret only from the British public), and a very highly-coloured and altogether misleading interpretation of its limitations and effectiveness was hinted at in Parliament. In spite of terrific pressure upon Ministers by members of both Houses, not a clause of this extraordinary document was permitted to be published, although its context was freely circulated or commented upon in the Press of neutral countries and the whole Agreement was printed _in extenso_ on December 12th, 1915, in the _Borsen_, at Copenhagen. What a sham and a farce this whole arrangement turned out to be will be seen later.

It has ever been the proud boast of Englishmen that Britannia rules the waves. Until this war the British Navy had been supreme mistress of the seas, and no loyal person within the Empire whereon the sun never sets has grudged a penny of the very heavy taxation which has been necessary to keep up the efficiency of our Fleet. From the commencement of the war, however, our Fleet was tied up body and soul, shackled in the intricacies of red tape entanglements woven round its keels, guns, and propellers by lawyer politicians who never could leave the management of naval affairs to the Navy, any more than they could leave the management of military affairs to the Army. In theory these pedantic illusionists may be superb, whilst some of them even stated (1915-16) that if they were removed from office during the continuance of the war it would be a calamity. But in practice the British public has seen proved too vividly--and at what a cost!--only an incessant stream of terrible disasters and mishaps; "milestones" in their policy of makeshift, dawdle and defeat.

The first chapter in this book shows that our party system Government was probably directly responsible for the war itself, or at least for our being precipitated unprepared into it. Without a shadow of a doubt it is solely accountable for the wild and riotously extravagant waste, for our colossal supererogation, and for our excessive losses.

What would have happened to the Mother Country and to her extensive Colonial Possessions had not Lord Northcliffe, through the powerful newspapers he controls, stepped in from time to time and torn off the scales which had been plastered and bandaged upon the eyes of an all-too-confiding British public, and just in the nick of time to save disaster upon disaster too awful to contemplate?

It is not necessary to enumerate the many and vital matters which Lord Northcliffe helped an indignant and a deluded public to consider and discuss, whereby the Government was roused from its torpor and pushed into reluctant activity, but the greatest of all canards which it had attempted to foist upon Europe does very much concern the subject-matter of this volume, hence it must be separately dealt with. It is this so-called blockade, which amongst Teuton traders in Northern neutral countries was looked upon as the best of all "war jokes"!

It seems to be universally believed that had the British Fleet been given a free hand and its direction left to the discretion of a good, business-like, fighting Sea Lord, the war would have been over within eighteen months from the first declaration. As it has happened, the freedom of action of our Fleet has been so hampered that our enemies have actually been permitted to draw certain food supplies not only from our own Colonies, but from the United Kingdom itself. How can it be argued that this suicidal policy has not helped to drag out the war and add to its terrible and unnecessary wastage of life and wealth, with the aftermath of woe and misery consequent thereon?

For our Ministers to affirm that Germany has been starved by our blockade is as untrue as it is ridiculous. The bunkum which has filled the thousands upon thousands of Press columns in different countries on this subject has been mere chimerical effort, in great part subsidised from indirect pro-German sources of more or less remote origin in accordance with the value of the publication used.

Now for a dissection of the facts concerning the main subject.

Passing over innumerable paragraphs in the Press which hinted at much more than they disclosed, attention should be given to an article which appeared in the January (1916) number of the _National Review_ (pp. 771-780), in which a naval correspondent gives record of a startling amount of supplies of cotton, copper, oils, foodstuffs and other commodities that were permitted to pass into Germany by permission of our benevolent Government.

The _Edinburgh Review_ of the same month also contains an article worthy of perusal upon the same subject. Many other periodicals directly and indirectly touched upon it, but for proof positive and authentic evidence the reader is referred to the files of the _Daily Mail_. That paper, in its persistent and praiseworthy patriotism, by pushing forward everything it honestly believed to be for the Empire's good, or which it hoped might help shorten the war, determined to get to the bottom of the matter. In order to ascertain how far this alleged supplying of Germany was permitted it arranged for one of its Special Commissioners to visit Scandinavia for the express purpose of collecting evidence on the spot and for publication in its columns. The author has taken the liberty of extracting freely therefrom. On January 12th, 1916, the special series of articles commenced as follows:

"In setting out the facts I will try hard to keep from my
presentation of them any distortion due to the disgust and burning
anger that they evoked in me, as they must do in every patriot of
this Empire.

"Lest even for a moment a wrong and cruel suspicion rest upon
little Denmark--namely, that she is unfriendly towards the Allies
and has been 'two-faced' in the many tokens of friendliness and
respect she has shown us, I say with conviction that there is not a
truer or deeper love for England and the English than exists
to-day in Denmark. These Danes, forefathers of so many of our race,
warm still to Britain and the British. Their hearts glow to our
successes, yearn to our reverses. Deep down they are for us through
and through. The best Danes revolt at the work Denmark is now
forced to do. A big and greedy German fist hangs over
her--threatening, bullying, driving. 'So far as in you lies,' says
the bully behind that fist, 'you must be useful to us--as useful at
least as you are to our enemy'--(aside, 'even more useful if we can
make you so')--'and should you fail by one iota to yield us such
surplus food commodities as you produce and such food commodities
as you can get'--(aside, 'by hook or by crook')--'from abroad, then
the consequences for you will be serious. We shall seize Denmark.'"

Here follow several columns of statistics relating to the importation of foodstuffs to Denmark, showing increases in some instances of upwards of 1,000 per cent. upon her normal supplies.

Denmark's total population is under 3,000,000, and to argue that she would, or even could, use these commodities herself is mere foolishness. Extracting further:

"The vast bulk of Denmark's pork goes to Germany--either directly,
by train or ship, or _via_ Sweden, where obliging workmen,
dignified _pro tem_. with the title 'merchant consignee' (but whose
whole stock-in-trade consists perhaps of a hammer, some nails and a
batch of labels), change the labels on the goods and perhaps turn
upside down the marked ends of the packing-cases, and then
re-consign the goods to Germany.

"And they may even leave Sweden in the very railway trucks and
cases in which they have arrived and travel to Germany back through
Denmark in sealed trucks over which the Danish Customs have no
control. Or there may be no need to trouble to send them to Sweden.
They may leave Copenhagen docks direct for Lübeck, Warnemunde,
Stettin, or Hamburg, in direct steamers, of which some 500 sailed
during the year. Or they may go by train. Huge trains leave every
day. The trains and ferries and boats connecting Denmark and
Germany are so full that there is competition for room. How often
may one see the Danish shippers, in advertising their sailings for
German ports, add the significant words, 'Cargo space already full'
days before the actual date of sailing!

"Now more Swedish traffic than ever crosses the water from Malmö or
Helsingborg and makes its way to Germany across Denmark by rail. I
have stood about the railways at many points in the two countries
and watched truck after truck go by--all to cross the German
frontier below Kolding, in Jutland. The great wagons were closed
and a little seal gleamed red on their black doors. I have stood,
too, on the quays at these ports and watched the dock cranes
lifting and lowering sack after sack, box after box, and barrel
after barrel, from the quays to German-bound steamers, to German
words of command, and on the main or mizzen-mast of the steamer
would be as often as not the gloomy little German flag, black and
white and red, still blacker and gloomier with the smoke drifting
from the funnel before it.

"On the quays at Copenhagen I watched the steamers _Hugo Stinnes_,
of Hamburg, _Esberg_, _Snare_, _Haeland_, _Hever_, and others, of
Sweden, loading wine from Spain and Portugal; oil, lard, coffee and
petroleum from America; meat from Denmark, and many other goods,
_all for German ports_. I travelled to Malmö, in Sweden, with a
cargo of oils and fats and iron and boxes with no marks on them,
and at Malmö saw these things put ready on the quay to await the
next German steamer. At the same port I saw pork in boxes,
meatstuffs in boxes and barrels labelled 'Armour and Co.,' oils and
fats bearing the names Swift or Morris or Harrison or Salzberger,
and some of them adding the information that the contents were
'guaranteed to contain 30 per cent. of pure neat's-foot oil'; also
petroleum of 'Best Standard White' and other brands; pork 'fat
backs,' and many other things besides, _all labelled 'Lübeck'_ and
going into lighters for transport thither. Fussing tugs, with a
litter of 400-ton lighters behind, may be seen travelling these
waters all hours of the day bound for Germany, and no one can say
what mysterious cargoes slip from country to country at night. The
glut of traffic at these link-points is tremendous. _At some ports
there is such a glut of stuff that Danish traders complain that
they cannot get their own Danish produce over to Germany 'because
of the amount of foreign stuff' there is to be ferried over._ A
pretty position, indeed!

"And it is we in Great Britain who are allowing all this 'foreign
stuff' to reach these countries. It is British licences and permits
and recommendations which make possible this pouring of the world's
goods into Germany. Little wonder the Danish merchants and other
onlookers less friendly to us look with wonder upon us. 'My word,
but you are truly a Christian people,' they say. 'You love your
enemies all right--well enough to feed them. And if you, England,
will allow the stuff over, it is not for us, little Denmark, to
stand in Germany's way.'

"But how is all this possible, you may ask, this feeding of Germany
through neutral Scandinavian countries? Are there not strict
undertakings and promises and guarantees given to England against
these goods, supplied from outside, ever reaching our enemy,
Germany?

"Our Navy does its part. Ships are hauled into ---- and searched.
Guarantees are exacted and forthcoming. And the whole performance,
admirably and bravely done, is so much waste of effort. _For the
guarantees are not worth the ink they are written with_; they are
not worth a single tinker's expletive. To show this will be a
little intricate, perhaps, but it is worth trouble to follow.

"Goods leave Great Britain and America, Spain and other countries
for Danish ports. The shipper, now wary of the British Fleet, which
has done wonderful police duty on the high seas, generally exacts a
declaration that the goods are not for export to an enemy country.
The declaration is signed right willingly, for the consignor can
quite easily believe, or pretend to believe, that his goods are
merely for Denmark. A British warship overhauls the boat, and
perhaps takes her into ---- (a certain British port) for
examination.

"The declaration with each consignment is in order. But, not
satisfied (the Navy all through have been suspicious, and rightly),
the officer communicates with London. 'The s.s. _so-and-so_ has big
consignments of foodstuffs for Copenhagen under the names
So-and-So. Can we release them?' London communicates with our
Legation at Copenhagen, in whose hands they are in this matter.
'Can we let through consignments to So-and-So in your capital?' And
our Copenhagen Legation replies with a list of the Danish people
whose consignments must be let through and a list of those (if any)
whose goods must be stopped or forwarded only on declaration that
the goods must not leave Copenhagen Harbour or Copenhagen City. It
all looks admirable--most businesslike; quite systematic and
thorough. _It is so much nonsense. For in point of fact the ideas
of our Legation at Copenhagen on the good faith of some Danish
traders and the bad faith of others are childish beyond words.
Their rulings are the laughing-stock of Denmark._ And the joke
would be all the more appreciable were it not that there is so much
anger caused by the arbitrariness of the Legation's trade rulings
and the baiting of some honest men, while less honest go free and
trade with impunity. Struck by the frequency with which one or two
names appeared in the Copenhagen importers' lists, I made some
calculations, then some personal inquiries. I found that 'X' alone
had imported during the year 4,000,000 lbs. pork, 3,000,000 lbs.
lard, 2,500,000 lbs. oleo, 1,000,000 lbs. other pork and meat. 'Y,'
another man, imported in September, October and November alone,
1,045,000 lbs. of cocoa. Neither of these men was engaged in these
trades before the war. They were men of quite humble business
attainments. _Yet both enjoyed the full confidence of our trusting
British Legation at Copenhagen_, who would have taken solemn
affidavits, no doubt, that neither of these men traded with
Germany. I would have done the same myself. But these men traded
with others who did trade with Germany, either directly or through
third and fourth and maybe fifth parties.

"What is the result? You have in Copenhagen that amazing modern war
phenomenon the trader of the _n_th degree. Plain Trader imports his
goods and basks and grows fat under the ægis of the British
Legation in Copenhagen. Trader 2 buys from Plain Trader under a
'guarantee' not to sell to Germany, and if he does not dare to
break that guarantee himself he sells to Trader 3 or Trader 4 or
Trader 5, one of whom will undoubtedly do it. And the less money
that Trader 5 has the better, because then, even if he is caught,
which is not likely, for nobody worries, no one can squeeze him for
the amount of the guarantee because he has not got it.

"The result is that every Tom, Dick and Harry of Copenhagen is a
trader--from the _bona fide_ merchant downwards. Your hotel porter
may be trading with a Hungarian for flour or rice or fat; the
"Boots" can get you a ton or two of meal. Imagine the amazement of
the Danish housewife when her maid came in one day and, with hands
clasped in enthusiasm, said, 'Oh, madam, I've got three wagon-loads
of marmalade to sell'! And that happened in Copenhagen not long
ago.

"The newspapers are daily blackened with great display
advertisements offering goods for sale. I have before me as I write
a whole sheaf of such advertisements, offering anything, from
American lard to potash and oil and cocoa and coffee. And not one
of these advertisements has a name or an address to it; nothing but
a telephone number. One or two of these I tracked down, only to
find as vendors simple, kindly souls, such as old shopwomen,
caretakers, porters, shop-girls, and the rest waiting for an offer
for their goods. _Per contra_, as the book-keepers say, there are
advertisements from those wanting goods, and these are often more
outspoken.

"Some of these nameless advertisements treat of great quantities.
'Ten thousand kilos fat, with permit to export; 20,000 kilos salted
half-pigs; 50,000 kilos salt meat'; and much more says one
advertisement alone. And the good soul answering to your inquiry
may prove a simple little typewriting girl--one of Copenhagen's new
traders to the _n_th degree.

"The machinery that has been established by Great Britain in
Denmark for preventing imported foodstuffs from reaching our enemy
might be very admirable--if only it worked.

"There has been little or no enforcement of the trading laws
imposed upon Danish traders by Great Britain. We have supplied them
with goods and have allowed them to help themselves to goods from
all the ends of the earth upon set conditions--namely, that those
goods should not go to Germany, our enemy. They go to Germany,
nevertheless, and _they go because we have no one in Denmark who
sees to it that they shall not go_. Great Britain, in short, lacks
a watchful policeman in Denmark. Great Britain also lacks a live
sergeant at home to see to it that her Denmark policeman does not
sleep on his beat. _The British Foreign Office_ is the sergeant I
mean; _the British Legation at Copenhagen_, or its commercial
department, is the policeman. _Theirs is the duty. And both have
failed us._

"Take the written declarations made by traders that goods supplied
to them by or through us shall not go to Germany. Without control
and enforcement they are perfectly useless. I myself found traders
who told me point-blank that they would consider such agreements as
this not morally binding upon them. 'Your Navy seizes our ships,'
said one, 'and your Foreign Office releases them only on condition
that the goods they contain shall be subject to your own
conditions. I sign those conditions, but they are exacted from me
by force, and I don't consider them as worth a snap of the fingers.
If you put a pistol to my head and said, "Sign that cheque," I'd
sign it, but I'd telephone to the bank the minute you'd gone and
stop payment. And I'll do the same thing with your British import
agreements.' These agreements are perhaps 'backed' by a money
penalty. The banks undertake this guarantee part of the business.
For a modest 3 per cent. or so they will put up your money
guarantee against your goods ever reaching Germany and contravening
the agreement clause. And when the goods go on to Sweden the
Swedish banks relieve the Danish banks of their obligations. And
when the goods go on from Sweden to Germany, who relieves the
Swedish banks? I have it on the word of a man I believe to be
thoroughly honest and well informed that the North German Bank of
Hamburg alone has taken over from Swedish banks of late in one
transaction as much as £78,000 worth of guarantees--that the goods
will not reach Germany! _Was ever there such a comedy? A German
bank guaranteeing that much-needed goods will not reach Germany!_

"The Germans are not 'let down' by their diplomacy in Copenhagen. A
constant weight is poised carefully and with a silken brutality
over little Denmark's head and von Ranzau smiles and assures
Denmark he is really preserving her from his powerful master. And
he gets his way, of course. The little matter of a permit for
export? Well, perhaps it can be managed for you, Baron--_especially
as the British watchman is asleep just now_!

"So the great game goes on. If Denmark has goods that cannot obtain
a permit for direct export to Germany they can go _via_ Sweden.
_Vice versa_, if Sweden has goods about which our active British
Legation there is too curious, send them to Denmark and re-export
them. That is simple. And I have seen for myself at Denmark's port
of Copenhagen Swedish goods (casks of American oil) which had been
refused permits for shipment direct from Sweden to Germany, being
loaded into the steamer _Heinrich Hugo Stinnes_, of Hamburg, for
shipment to Hamburg. Also, on the quay at Malmö (Sweden) I have
seen goods for which Denmark had refused a direct export permit
being loaded into nameless lighters for shipment to German Lübeck.

"Thus agreements, promises, guarantees, and prohibitions--_the
whole commercial code that Great Britain has devised for regulating
imports into Denmark and for checking their re-export to Germany_
(and, incidentally, for displaying to us at home) _are so much
meaningless pantomime_. They have become so simply because the
honester traders of Denmark, and the dishonest parasites of all
nations who work under them and through them, have found that there
is no supervision, no punishment, no judge to answer. _Our
watchmen, both in London and in Copenhagen, have slept._"

On January 13th, 1916, Lord Sydenham in the House of Lords raised the question of "Feeding the Germans," and in his speech stated that in cocoa alone our exports for August-July, 1913-14, were 6,138 tons as against 32,083 tons for 1914-15. For the sixteen months preceding the war our exports were 8,883 tons, as against 33,357 tons during the first sixteen months of the war.

Lord Lansdowne, following, admitted that "_there was an enormous balance unaccounted for which it was reasonable to suppose found its way to enemy countries_."

The following are the exports of cocoa to the countries named in the years 1913, 1914, and up to December 30th, 1915:

COCOA EXPORTS

In lbs. to 1913. 1914. 1915.
(to Dec. 30.)
Holland 2,205,282 12,203,463 9,298,805
Denmark 50,782 1,853,948 10,615,873
Scandinavia 343,573 3,079,904 14,606,309

A leading article in the _Daily Mail_ of January 14th, 1916, stated:

"The strength of the greatest Navy in the world is being paralysed
by administrative feebleness and diplomatic weakness. Had our sea
power been used, as the sailors would have used it, from the
opening of the war, it is possible that Germany would before now
have collapsed. The mightiest weapon in our arsenal has been
blunted because our politicians imagined they could wage what
Napoleon called 'rosewater war,' and were more eager to please
everybody than to hurt the enemy, and because our diplomatists are
remiss.

"On December 29th the _Neue Freie Presse_,[20] a leading Austrian
newspaper, published for the benefit of the people of Vienna an
advertisement offering provisions from Holland. A list of the
articles which could be supplied at moderate prices followed. It
included cocoa, chocolate, potatoes, flour, sausages, sides of
bacon, butter, coffee, tea, sardines, oranges, lemons and figs.

"_And yet Mr. Runciman tells us that the Germans are on the verge
of starvation!_

"The cure for this state of affairs is to infuse greater energy and
insight into our diplomacy and to free the Navy from its paper
fetters. Much of the mischief is due to the want of capable
advisers at the British Legations in the neutral capitals and of
energy and vigilance on the part of the Foreign Office at home. The
Germans have been quick to realise the importance of stationing
active agents at the vital posts.

"_The present system of setting diplomatists who have lived all
their life in a world of formality to deal with the sharpest
business men in Europe in a matter where huge profits are at stake
is an immense blunder which may have the most serious
consequences._

"Our very gentleness with Denmark is being quoted in that country
to prove that we are not likely to win the war. This is undoubted
and dangerous fact."

On January 14th, 1916, the Special Commissioner in a further article, headed, "The Sham Blockade: British tyres on German Cars," explained in detail the tricks used by unscrupulous foreigners and others to acquire stocks of rubber motor-tyres for German use. He complained, with reason, that the broken promises, broken guarantees, and reckless manner in which permits to trade were granted seemed to be almost entirely the fault of the British Foreign Office representatives at the British Legation. He concludes with the following paragraph:

"Is this soft-heartedness towards commercial shortcomings and
laxity characteristic of our British control in Copenhagen? On the
evidence that I have I honestly believe it to be so. But is this
attitude solely the individual attitude of Britain's
representatives in Copenhagen or is it merely a reflex of the
Foreign Office attitude at home?

"I think the true answer is that the Copenhagen Legation attitude
is a reflex of our Foreign Office attitude. But _if London is mild,
Copenhagen is puny_; if London is a lamb, Copenhagen is a sucking
dove."

On January 13th, 1916, the following paragraph appeared in the _Globe_:

"We cannot disregard the startling and amazing figures collected in
Denmark by the Special Commissioner sent out by the _Daily Mail_.

"Of course, all these commodities are consigned to Danish
purchasers, under guarantees that they are not intended for the
enemy. What purposes these guarantees serve except to hold harmless
the vessels in which the articles are conveyed we are at a loss to
understand.

"No sane person will believe that the Danish people have suddenly
developed such a passion for pork that they must increase their
consumption by 1,300 per cent., or that every man, woman and child
in Denmark requires the daily bath in cocoa with which the 23,000
tons they now import would appear to be intended to provide them.
_The only possible inference from these figures is that we are
being deluded, and are feeding Germany_ in our own despite."

The _Pall Mall Gazette_ of January 18th, 1916, said:

"Revelations like these can only be described as heart-breaking to
the men and women who have given their sons and brothers and
husbands to the end that Germany may be brought to her knees. Now
they find that some malign spell has paralysed the Navy's arm so
that, instead of Germany's foreign supplies being cut off, they are
in some vital respects more abundant than ever."

The _Quarterly Review_, January, 1916, contains a powerful article on "The Danish Agreement." It suggests how _some blight has been at work in our Foreign Office for years steadily undermining our mastery of the sea_. One paragraph bears particularly on the present point:

"No informed man doubts that the winter of 1916-17 must weaken to a
marked degree, through lack of food, Germany's armed resistance,
always assuming that she is not supplied through neutral countries.
The existence of England depends on her victory over Germany. Her
victory over Germany depends on the cutting off of neutral
supplies. Therefore the existence of England depends on the cutting
off of neutral supplies. But _when_, in August, 1914, _the Cabinet
and, above all, the Foreign Office, were confronted by this great
possibility of stratagem every psychological force was set in
motion against its adoption_."

A telegram from Washington, U.S.A., on January 17th, 1916, to the _Morning Post_, set out the exports permitted to be poured into neutral countries in spite of all the efforts and protests of our Navy by our all-too-benevolent Foreign Office, and in face of Mr. Asquith's pledges to the House of Commons in March and in November, 1915, when he emphasised to loud cheering that _he would stick at nothing to prevent commodities of any kind reaching or leaving Germany. That there was no form of economic pressure to which he did not consider we were entitled to win the war_.

EXPORTS TO NEUTRAL COUNTRIES

1913. 1915.
To Bushels. Bushels.

WHEAT Holland, Norway,
Sweden, Denmark 19,000,000 50,000,000
MAIZE Denmark 4,750,000 10,950,000
Holland 6,900,000 11,600,000
Other neutrals 2,100,000 6,400,000
---------- ----------
13,750,000 28,950,000
========== ==========

Barrels. Barrels.
WHEAT Holland 708,000 1,500,000
FLOUR Other neutrals 709,000 3,800,000
1,417,000 5,100,000

lbs. lbs.
BACON Holland 3,900,000 9,000,000
Other neutrals 27,000,000 82,500,000
---------- ----------
30,900,000 91,500,000
========== ==========
1914 1915
BOOTS Neutrals 462,000 pairs 4,800,000 pairs
COTTON Neutrals 53,000 bales 1,100,000 bales

MOTOR-}
CARS &} Neutrals £260,000 £4,000,000
PARTS }

The New York _Journal of Commerce_, quoting statistics of the U.S.A. export trade for the first ten months of 1915 under a headline, "Increase to Neutral Europe Equals German Loss," shows that "whilst shipments to Germany fell away £31,400,000 for the period named, the gain to the neutral nations on the north of Germany was £32,000,000."

What could give more confirmatory proof?

On January 24th, 1916, the _Morning Post_ received a further cablegram from Washington, U.S.A., containing the elucidating facts that in the ten months from January 1st to October 31st, 1913, Germany imported from the U.S.A. 9,898,289 lbs. of cotton-seed oil, the Netherlands 31,867,327 lbs., and Norway 6,174,033 lbs.

In the corresponding ten months of 1915 the figures were: Germany, nil; the Netherlands, 93,153,175 lbs.; and Norway 24,110,269 lbs.

Other statistics follow, such as cotton-seed, meal and cake, etc., proving beyond all shadow of doubt that neutral countries were importing far more goods and foodstuffs, etc, than their usual average imports plus the total previous imports of Germany in addition.

A careful analysis of the leading American exports showed, almost without an exception, the striking fact that the prices of peace exports were very much lower in 1915 than in 1913; whilst the prices of war exports all showed large and heavy advances.

Deducing from these figures, leader-writers came to the obvious conclusion that _Germany was enjoying unrestricted imports for which Great Britain directly or indirectly paid_.

Returns from other parts of the world merely corroborated, adding proof upon proof. By way of example the Brazilian official trade returns during the first nine months of 1913, compared with 1915, show the following exports to the countries named:

1913. 1915.
£ £
Sweden 389,475 2,844,787
Norway 63,562 594,900
Denmark 105,637 715,387

In addition to the export figures given and those quoted from the U.S.A. should be added the enormous quantities of corn, etc, re-exported from Liverpool and other British ports under special license issued by our Government.

It is therefore reasonably arguable that _our Government has used our Fleet to convoy our Merchantmen in freighting foodstuffs, at our expense, to feed the Germans_. By this incomprehensible tolerance home prices of food in the United Kingdom were directly raised to a high figure and neutral countries were directly helped to pile up fortunes by _bleeding and pinching our own peoples in order to feed their enemies_.

On January 21st, 1916, in the House of Commons Major Rowland Hunt asked the Foreign Secretary "whether the Foreign Office had been aware of the state of things demonstrated by the American trade statistics and if so could he say how much longer our Navy was to be crippled by the Foreign Office, the war prolonged, and many more thousands of our men sacrificed?"

Sir E. Grey: "I understand that the subject is to be discussed next week. I must, however, say that the statements in the question are grossly unfair and entirely misrepresent the facts of the case. I reserve any further statement I have to make until next week."

From December 16th to 30th, 1915, just on 25,000 tons of iron ore were openly _consigned to Germany_ through Rotterdam and Holland; as to which see further on.

Here is a sample report of the sales one day at Esbjerg (Denmark) cattle market, December, 1915:

"Cattle sold to-day numbered 1,450 head, of which Street, of Hamburg, bought 141; Dar Neilsen, of Kiel, 330; Franck of Berlin, 440; an Austrian buyer, 327."

This leaves 212 for Danish buyers. No wonder best beef was then half a crown a pound in Denmark!

Incidentally great quantities of the fodder with which these cattle for Germany are fed come from British ports and possessions.

Our Government was fully, persistently, and impressively advised by the Secret Service agents of this continual and enormous export of cattle and beef direct to Germany in January and February, 1915. Yet it apparently did not lift a finger to attempt to stop or divert it throughout the year following, or at any time.

Sweden, which normally imports 734,720 lbs. of meat in November and exports 2,961,280 lbs., imported during November, 1915, 8,016,960 lbs.

Holland, which usually imports in November 1,843,520 lbs. of meat and exports 11,874,240 lbs., imported in November, 1915, no less than 17,973,760 lbs.

In the light of these figures it seems idle to say that our blockade was tightened or in any degree effectual.

In the House of Commons on January 19th, 1916, Mr. Booth put the following question to Lord Robert Cecil in reference to these exports.

Mr. Booth: "Is the noble Lord aware that the Germans in New York toasted the health of the Foreign Office at Christmas time?"

No answer was returned.

On January 26th, 1916, Sir Edward Grey delivered his promised reply in the House of Commons. It was brilliant oratory, but it was not argument. It was a defence of the Navy, which needed no defence. It was a masterpiece of forensic jurisprudence, but it revealed between the chinks of polished sentences and high-sounding declamation, in startling nakedness, the weaknesses, the unwarrantable hesitating caution, or the downright cowardice of the Cabinet. With such grace and skill did the speaker unfold his case that a reader, unaware of the facts concealed behind it, would believe the policy and actions of the Government had been hitherto faultless, flawless, and blameless. Reading it at a later date brought to my mind the story of a poacher's wife, who with tears of grateful joy streaming down her countenance, thanked a learned junior counsel for his able and successful defence of her husband, who had been charged with stealing a certain shot-gun.

"My good woman," replied her modest advocate, "it was only a mistake. The judge truly said that your good husband left the Court without a stain upon his character. It was only _alleged_ that he stole the gun."

"Alleged be bothered," said the woman; "why, we've got the gun at home now!"

If this speech of Sir Edward Grey, as a speech, had a fault at all, it was that the defence he made was too good to ring true. At the time of its utterance it appeared to appease the House. No one wished to hamper the Government, which, like the energetic but painfully inefficient pianist at a certain Western mining camp, was protected by proclamation: "Please don't shoot. He's doing his best." But outside the House the underlying effect of the speech upon thinking people was very different. It created satisfaction in Germany and amongst neutral Governments. It caused great jubilation amongst the vast army of mushroom traders and adventurers abroad who were piling up fortunes by illicit trading. But it left Englishmen and our true sympathisers in this tragic war irritable, indignant, and unsatisfied; smouldering in their just wrath at the confessed weak-kneed policy of politicians, who, however good their intentions, proved that they had not yet grasped the difference between a quarrel at law and a quarrel at war.

It left the nation disappointed. The people felt we had been fooling with the war too long; that the time had arrived for some strong and decisive action. That politics and patronage should be shelved and the Navy given a free hand. It remembered how the Government had hesitated, procrastinated, and vacillated in this so-called blockade, as in other matters. It remembered that Parliament had refused to pass a code of international rules called the Declaration of London because that code, made largely to please Germany, weakened the hands of the Navy. It remembered that _the Government had gone behind the back of Parliament and illegally put that very code into operation after war began_. It had not forgotten that this proved such a scandalous weakening of our right and our strength that soon after the Coalition Government came into being that code was said to have been scrapped. Even as to this doubts arose for long afterwards.[21]

It had not forgotten the seventeen long months of public pressure and the trouble there had been to force cotton as contraband; nor the seventeen months of "wait and see" before the Navy was permitted to examine mails and extract (_inter alia_) parcels of rubber. It had not forgotten Sir Edward Grey's declaration that "he had no intention of making cotton contraband"; nor Lord Haldane's contention that "it was useless stopping the import of cotton to Germany, because if we did Germany could find a substitute for it."

The nation had been deceived and lulled to sleep before by soft words and gentle assurances. It had been told, "we decline to be bound by judicial niceties." It had been promised "to prevent commodities of any kind from entering or leaving the enemy's country"; "to stick at nothing." It remembered with some misgiving how these promises had been kept.[22]

What, it reasoned, were the disappointments of a few Dutch and Scandinavian adventurers from making fortunes out of a war which to ourselves was a tragedy? The country had unbounded confidence in the Navy. It had not unbounded confidence in either the Government or the Foreign Office. It hungered with an overwhelming desire to know why the Navy should not be given a free and unhampered hand.

The speaker skilfully evaded too much information on that point, and the nation was compelled to nurse its resentment.

At the outset of his speech, Sir Edward Grey attempted to deal with the mass of statistics and evidence of direct importation of goods into Germany accumulated by the Press. He selected wheat and flour only, whilst he casually referred to a list of figures issued by the Press Bureau from the War Trade Department of the Government the day before the debate, which members in the House rightly complained had not been supplied to themselves. This list was stated to have been compiled officially in this country from true copies of the ships' manifests, and it alleged the figures given by the Danish _Borsen_ were in many cases wrong and unduly inflated. For instance, the increase in rice imports should have been only 480 per cent. as against 580 per cent.; lard, 275 per cent. instead of 375 per cent.; pork only 1,216 per cent. instead of 1,300 per cent.; and so on. Now everyone knows that statistics are not infallible and a generous allowance should always be made by a careful calculator. But when all circumstances are taken into consideration it can safely be concluded that the majority of the increases alleged by the various Press writers, as having percolated into Germany, were, if anything, under rather than over the mark.

As to the reliability of the _Borsen_, it is edited by a Government statistician, and considered by Danish traders as official.

So far as Norway is concerned, H.B.M. Minister at Christiania had difficulty in obtaining official statistics regarding imports and exports after the Casement affair remained unanswered; certain it is that Government assistance was denied to various Consuls acting under him; whilst I, when in that country, was informed (by British authorities) I must not collect these figures, although to me and others working with me they were comparatively easy of access.

So far as Foreign Office knowledge is concerned, it is hardly a credit to the ability or even sanity of the British Legations in Scandinavia if they have denied knowledge of these colossal imports of goods into Germany, which were known to almost every inhabitant of seaport towns. If they deliberately shut their eyes to the evidence all around them, they presumably obeyed orders. One could then only wonder as to the reason for such suicidal policy.

As before mentioned, at the commencement of his speech Sir Edward Grey laid stress upon the fact that part of the stated increased import, namely, 2,000,000 barrels of flour were allowed to be exported to Belgium; whilst a little later in his speech he admitted that "She [Germany] had requisitioned the food supplies of the civil population of Poland and Belgium." Almost immediately afterwards Lord Robert Cecil strove hard to back up the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, but he could not give the House any positive assurance that the Belgian Relief distribution was absolutely independent of German control. The disposition of this is therefore obvious.

Sir Edward Grey attempted to whittle down the U.S.A. exports of wheat by stating that nearly half went to Spain, Portugal, Greece, and Malta; but he did not refer to the corn, etc., exported to Northern neutrals from Liverpool and other British ports, nor did he make any allowances for the stream of mysterious ships sailing round far northern seas (many of them choosing the passage north of Iceland), which sighted land on the north-western coast of Norway and carried their course inside neutral waters into the Baltic; which heavily-laden cargo-boats I and others in the Secret Service had watched and reported week by week and month by month with heart-rending persistency. The majority of these ships probably sailed direct to German ports, and no records of their cargoes were likely to be made, or returned from any country concerning them. Nor did Sir Edward Grey make reference to the grain ships, which although nominally bound for Scandinavian ports, were intercepted by their owners' or consignees' agents in the Baltic, for the purpose of varying orders for their ultimate port of destination; nor to the ships which were held up in the Baltic by German war vessels and taken to German ports under circumstances calling for grave investigation. Nor did he attempt to answer the general American statistics showing that the gain in imports to northern neutral countries exceeded the German loss.

About the middle of his speech Sir Edward Grey said: "If a vessel was held up by the Fleet with suspected cargo on board, the matter was referred to the contraband committee, who decided what _part_ of the cargo should go to the Prize Court."

Surely any other nation in the world at war would have arranged from the outset that the capture of a vessel _with contraband_ on board _en route for the enemy_, would have meant _confiscation_ of the ship and her cargo. Our exceptional and extraordinary leniency was hardly commented upon; it was certainly not satisfactorily explained.

Continuing to quote from the speech: _He would_ say to neutrals that we could not give up the right to interfere with enemy trade and must maintain and press that point. _He would_ ask those countries in considering our rights to apply the principles which were applied by the American Government in the war between the North and South as affected by modern conditions. _If they agreed_ to it, then let them with their Chambers of Commerce and other bodies make it easier for us to distinguish between goods intended for the enemy and goods intended for themselves. _If those_ neutral countries said that we were not entitled to prevent trading through, neutral countries with the enemy, _then he_ (Sir E. Grey) _must say_ to the neutral countries who took that line that it was a departure from neutrality. (Cheers.) But he did not think they would take that line.

What naturally strikes the reader on perusal is this: why not the words, "I had said" and "I have asked" instead of "he would say" and "he would ask" which Sir Edward Grey used in his speech? Why wait eighteen months to arrive at such a decision? Why were not these words used as soon as war was declared? Flagrant breaches arose, as Sir Edward Grey should or must have known, and continued to increase in magnitude from the autumn of 1914. Why he waited until the then date, and why he had not acted before, was not explained. In the next few grandiloquent sentences he admitted the justification and the necessity; whilst the House cheered the words, forgetting past neglected deeds.

Next he admitted that "Germany had, in effect, treated food, when she found it, as absolute contraband since the first outbreak of war."

This admission gave one much to ponder over.

On the point of a stricter blockade Sir Edward Grey suggested that "if a rigorous blockade had been established the whole world would have been against us."

Such a contingency, put into legal parlance, is too ridiculously remote for further consideration. Why did he not explain why our Fleet was not allowed to limit particular imports to neutral countries to certain fixed totals per month, or per annum? It is unthinkable to suppose that any country would seriously threaten war in face of former well-known precedent and because such limits were imposed by a blockading Fleet. More particularly so if any such affected country happened to have been one of the parties to the Treaty of the Hague, which affirmed the integrity of poor innocent, unoffending Belgium; the country which, without justification or excuse, was violated, and ravished, outraged by the barbarian Hun invaders, and which so many other countries watched aghast without attempting to help England to protect or to avenge.

Admittedly it would have been easy for us to close the Baltic and the Mediterranean. Why did we not do so? We could then have regulated to each country not at war its full and fair average annual complement of necessities plus an extra and a generous margin for contingencies. The Government of each recipient country would have seen to it that its own respective countrymen reaped full benefits; leaks to the Central Powers would have automatically stopped.

What countries would such a course of action have forced into war against us?

Possibly Sweden, doubtfully Holland, remotely Denmark.

America had boasted she was "too proud to fight." She might have favoured us with a "note," but her love of trade would have been an absolute bar to the possibility of any cessation of supplies and munitions.

No other country would have demurred except Greece, and the vacillating tactics of the Greeks were but the harvest which could have been expected from the seed of "wait-and-see" diplomatic sowing. This is clearly shown by the utterances of King Tino, who said: "I fear the Germans. I do not fear the English." The Greeks have similarly expressed themselves. "We know the Germans would rob, murder, and outrage our land and our people without any hesitation. The English are quite incapable of anything of that kind."

It had been proved that Consulates in Greece had been nests of espionage and arsenals of munitions, and the Islands bases for submarine murderers; and yet their King actually sent us a protest against our movement at Salonika to assist the persecuted Serbians whom he and his country had pledged themselves to uphold and protect; a solemn treaty they had long ago undertaken, but so conveniently forgotten and lamely excused themselves out of as soon as called upon to carry it into active force.

As a general answer to the direct charges of the Press that the Foreign Office had not kept faith with the nation in doing all that could be done to make an effective blockade, as an explanation to sweep on one side the overwhelming mass of evidence relating to the extraordinary number of German agents and dealers who swarmed throughout Scandinavia and Holland, their amazing advertisements, their suddenly accumulated wealth, the balance sheets showing large profits of neutral companies dealing in Germany's requirements, the alleged wholesale dealers of imported goods so suddenly sprung up from the ranks of hotel porters, clerks, typists, adventurers, caretakers, and even charwomen and servant-girls, our own inflated home prices of necessities and commodities--Sir Edward Grey's answer to all this was: The Government had lately sent Lord Faringdon to examine the position in Holland and Scandinavia and he reported that on the whole things were very satisfactory and that all was being done that could be done to prevent the enemy obtaining supplies.

Well might the fat stomachs of the "Goulashes"[23] extend and shake in merriment when they read these comfortable words!

Sir Edward Grey concluded his speech with this stirring peroration: The whole of our resources were engaged in this war, and our maximum effort was at the disposal of our Allies in carrying on this conflict. With them we should see it through to the end and we should slacken no effort in the common cause. We should exert all our efforts to put the maximum possible pressure upon the enemy, and part of that pressure must be doing the most we could to prevent supplies going to or from the enemy, _using the Navy to its full power_ ... and in common with our Allies sparing nothing, whether it were military, naval, or financial effort, which this country could afford, to see the thing through with them to the end.

In the loud cheering with which the House of Commons received the speech no thought was given to the famous words of Napoleon: "Put no faith in talk which is not borne out by action"; whilst future events went to show that Napoleon truly forecasted England's present-day weakness when he wrote: "Feebleness in its Government is the most frightful calamity that can befall a nation."

Contrast Sir Edward Grey's eloquent words and diplomatic evasiveness upon the treatment of neutrals with the plain, outspoken, thoroughly English opinion of Lord Fisher, who is credited with having said:

"There are no such things as neutral powers. Powers are either with us or against us. If they are friendly they will put up with some inconvenience; if they are unfriendly they will squeal. Let them squeal."