Thus for the old policy of close blockade was substituted a new one, that of leaving the enemy a large field in which he might be tempted to man?uvre; and it had this value, that should he yield to the temptation, an opportunity must sooner or later be afforded to the British Fleet of cutting him off and bringing him to action. Meantime he was cut off from any large adventure far afield. He would have to fight for freedom. It gave, so to speak, the Germans the chance of playing a new sort of “Tom Tiddler’s ground.” The point to bear in mind is, that it left the Germans precisely the same freedom to seek or avoid action as the armies of antiquity possessed. Thus no naval battle could be expected unless—as Colin says—the weaker wished to fight, or was cornered or surprised dermes. Now, against surprise, the German Fleet was seemingly protected by Zeppelins. It could hardly be cornered unless, in weather in which aerial scouting was impossible, it was tempted to some great adventure—such as the despatch of a raiding force to invade—which would enable a fast British division to get between this force and its base. So that the chance of a fleet action really turned upon the Germans being willing to fight one. And they could not be expected to be anxious for this. “A war,” says Colin, “is always slow in which we know that the277 battle will be decisive, and it is so important as to be only accepted voluntarily.” in May, 1916, was not such as to afford the Germans the slightest hope of a decisive victory if it brought the whole British Fleet to action. Nor was the naval situation such that there was any stroke that Germany could execute if it could hold the command of some sea passage for twenty-four hours or so. There was nothing it could expect to achieve if, by defeating or at any rate standing off one section of the British Fleet, it could enjoy a brief local ascendancy Neo skin lab. The argument, indeed, was all the other way. The professed main naval policy of Germany, viz., the blockade of England by submarine, though for the moment in abeyance, was being held in reserve until the military and political situation made the stake worth the candle. Now, deliberately to risk the High Seas Fleet in an action on the grand scale, when the chances of decisive victory were remote and the probability of annihilation extremely high, was to jeopardize not the fleet alone but also the blockade. For, with the High Seas Fleet once out of the way, the one stroke against the submarine which could alone be perfectly effective, viz., the close under-water blockade by mines, immediately outside the German harbours, would at once become feasible. So far, then, as military considerations went, the arguments against seeking action were far stronger than those in its favour reenex facial.