The
threat had no effect in the way of _Schrecklichkeit_, but rather it
steeled us to a future which began to appear inevitable. And deep under
the surface affairs began to move in the Navy Department.
No doubt, too, the conviction began to grow upon the government that the
policy of dealing fairly by Germany was not appreciated, and that when
the exigencies of the war situation seemed to require it, our ships
would be sent to the bottom as cheerfully as those of other neutrals
such as Holland, Norway, and Sweden, as well as other countries who
unfortunately were not in the position to guard their neutrality with
some show of dignity that we were in.
Subsequent events proved how true this feeling was. For not six months
later the German policy of sea aggression had brought us to the point
where it was not possible for us to remain out of the conflict against
the pirate nation. It was in the following April that we went to war,
and our first act was to send forth a destroyer flotilla to engage the
U-boat in its hunting-ground, Among that flotilla, as said, were many of
the craft which had rescued survivors of the Nantucket affair. They were
ready and their officers were ready, nay, eager. They swept across a
stormy Atlantic like unleashed hounds, and when the British commander
received them at Queenstown, and asked the American commanders when they
would be ready to take their places with the British destroyers, the
answer came quickly:
"We are ready now.
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