A Dangerous Highway The instructions issued to British warships in
the Mediter- ranean by the Admiralty on Tuesday are significant. " If any British merchant ship is attacked by a submarine without warning, his Majesty's ships are authorised to counter-attack the submarine." What is in question, it is to be noted, is not attack from the air (in spite of the recent attempt on the ` British Corporal ' by aeroplanes admitted by the local insurgent authorities at Palma to be insurgent machines) but by submarines, and the warning follows immediately on news of the attack on a Spanish ship by a submarine bearing the insurgent colours near the Dardanelles on Sunday. General Franco possesses few submarines and it would be surprising to find one of the few operating 1,500 miles from its base in an area where no hostile warships could be looked for. Passage through the Mediterranean is becoming a dangerous business. On Thursday of last week a Danish ship was bombed and sunk by an unknown aeroplane south of Barcelona. On Friday a French ship was attacked by an unknown submarine off the African coast near Bizerta. On Saturday a tanker bearing the Panama colours was shelled and set on fire off Cape Bon in Tunisia. General Franco is evidently bent on preventing petrol from reaching the Government forces by sea, and it is by no means certain that his admirers outside Spain are refraining from lending him illicit assistance. The British warning is studiously vague in its terms ; it is addressed primarily to the commanders of British warships only, but is clearly meant to reach all whom it may concern. Valencia openly accuses Italy.
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