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Russia, Italy, Roumania, Japan, the United States and Greece, besides several smaller nations.

It is now a war for freedom. We wish to see all nations free to live and develop safe from the iron hand of German militarism. There can be no peace with Germany without victory, because without this, Germany will still be in the hands of the ambitious Kaiser and his war lords. The world has learned that these men can not be trusted. We could soon have peace if the German people would remove the Kaiser and his military aristocrats and let their people rule the empire. We have nothing but admiration for the sturdy, industrious citizens of Germany.

CHAPTER XV

SUBMARINE WARFARE

One of the new engines of death which has come largely into use in this war and which at last brought us into conflict with Germany, is the submarine. The Germans call it the "Unter See" or U-boat. It was invented in the United States, but Germany and other nations have developed it until it is a powerful weapon in sea warfare.

The submarine is made of a thin shell of steel about half an inch thick so as not to be heavy. Thus it is easily sunk by a small gun shell. The U-boat is propelled on the surface of the water by gasoline power, but when submerged it must move by electricity. The U-boat can remain under water for several days if it is motionless, but if it uses up its electric power to move about it must come to the surface in about six hours to recharge its batteries. This is the time when our motor boats and destroyers can get in their work.

When the U-boat is just under the water it can see all about it on the surface for several miles by means of a periscope, which is a seeing tube extending from the boat above the water. The periscope is fitted with mirrors and lenses which enables the man under water to see any approaching ship. When the image of its victim crosses a certain hair line seen in the periscope, it is time for the gunner in the submarine to fire his torpedo.

The modern automobile torpedo is a cigar-shaped

object 22 feet long and 21 inches in diameter and THE weighs nearly a ton. When shot from the TORPEDO U-boat it steers itself and plows unseen through the water at a speed of forty miles an hour. It will travel six miles before it is spent. The torpedo has three parts; the warhead, or front section, contains three or four hundred pounds of explosives. The central chamber, or air flask, contains compressed air to run the tiny turbine engine. Lastly, the tail end of the torpedo has a wonderful engine that turns the propeller blades. It develops 160 horsepower and starts the torpedo at the rate of nearly a mile a minute, but it gradually loses speed.

It requires almost a thousand pieces of steel, brass and bronze to make the delicate automatic mechanism of the torpedo. A long time is required to make one, and each torpedo costs about $6,000. Therefore the U-boats save them for sure shots. It is fired from a tube about twenty feet long, well greased inside so the weapon will slip out easily. It is sent forth, or fired, by compressed air. Immediately upon striking the water the torpedo comes to life. Its turbine engine and propellers start driving it at a swift pace straight towards the target. After dealing its blow the missile disappears in its own ruin. In case it misses the target the motor power gradually runs down and the torpedo becomes a dangerous floating mine. The Germans are now said to use a smoking device which will enable them to locate their expensive weapon by its own smoke in case it is a miss. In this way they can recover it and use it again.

The course of the torpedo is plainly visible because of the white streak of air bubbles caused by the air exhaust of the torpedo engine. Many ships are now

being sunk by gunfire from the submarines without even the cost of a torpedo.

A SHIP'S

The best known device to protect a ship from a torpedo is the torpedo net. This chain net is slung about the ship at a sufficient distance to prevent the shock of the explosion from injuring the hull. The net is supposed to explode the torpedo. Then net-cutters were attached to the warheads of the torpedoes, which cut a hole large enough for the torpedo to pass through unexploded. As the net offers a great hindrance to a ship while in motion, it is used only when the fleet is at rest. The fleet is best protected when in a harbor guarded by a mine field at the harbor's entrance, and by heavy chain netting to prevent the passage of torpedoes and submarines. Every day new devices are found to make the submarine more destructive and hundreds of men are working on means of defense and destruction against it.

When a battleship fleet takes to the open sea it is protected in two ways: First, it has a screen of destroyer ships steaming in a wedge-shaped formation in front and others in a line on either side of the battleship column. It is the duty of this screen to meet the attack of the enemy and to sink or drive off his flotillas before they get within firing range of the main fleet. In the second place, each battleship has a torpedo defense battery of rapid-fire 5-inch and 6inch guns which can pour a perfect stream of high explosive shells at any torpedo boat or submarine that breaks through the destroyer screen.

However, the best defense of a ship in battle is its high speed and its power to turn quickly, whereby it can avoid torpedoes or ram the submarines.

CHAPTER XVI

THE UNITED STATES ENTERS THE WAR

In order to understand the quarrel between Germany and the United States which has brought us to armed conflict we must go back to the beginning of the World War. We remember that in a few months after the Germans started hostilities, England's mammoth war fleet drove German commerce from the sea and bottled up the Kaiser's warships in the Kiel Canal. There they have remained to this day except for short raids into the North Sea. England's plan was to starve Germany out as the only way to conquer her, for she saw that the Central Powers could hardly be overcome on the land. By this blockade England cut off neutral ships from reaching the Central Powers, except those of Sweden, which might cross the Baltic.

Germany defied the world to starve her. The German government took control of all food supplies in the Empire, calculated just how much was necessary for each person, and by doling them out sparingly to the people by means of food cards she has kept them from starvation. She tried to limit rich and poor alike to just enough to keep them going. For example, butter once a week, an egg once a month, and meat only occasionally obtained through the dealers. These conditions brought great hardship to many people. They suffered most from lack of fats.

Now, there is an understanding among all nations

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