Panama Canal Useless In 15 Years.

New York Times 100 years ago today, May 4, 1913:
Bunau-Varilla in New Book Urges a Quick Change from the Lock System.
SCOFFS AT COLOMBIA'S CASE
He Declares Her Claim to Title in Panama Territory Is Like Shylock's Pound of Flesh.
By Marconi Transatlantic Wireless Telegraph to The New York Times.
    PARIS, May 3.— Philippe Bunau-Varilla has just published an interesting book of great bulk entitled "Panama: Its Creation, Destruction, and Resurrection." This deals with the whole history of the enterprise from the most remote beginnings to the present moment.
    He calls the book "a witness before the bar of history, explaining how the sublime creation of French genius was ravished from the patrimony of France, and showing how French genius completely solved the problem of joining the two oceans."
    In dealing with the international side of the question, he expresses these views on the revolution which separated Panama from Colombia.
    "Colombia may say to-day that this revolution was due to American protection. This is true, if by protection is understood solidarity in justice to and in defense of legitimate interests. But it did not arise from a plot, hatched by the American authorities. It developed through parallel movements, working at two distinct places toward the same end—the completion of the canal.
    "From the moment of the first revolutionary outbreak President Roosevelt was careful to avoid anything that might resemble unworthy collusion. Colombia may brandish her rights of title over the Isthmus, but her case was that of Shylock, claiming a pound of flesh. Shylock's rights were unquestionable, but it was impossible for him to support his claim. It is the same thing with Colombia's title to Panama."
    After defending himself and his colleagues from charges of corruption he discusses what he calls the Bunau-Varilla idea — that of a lock canal first and then a sea-level canal. The author points out that the date is still unfixed for beginning the work of transforming one into the other, and says that it should be done immediately, as no precautions were taken for the transformation during construction of the locks.
    "The engineers have obstinately refused to make the necessary modifications for the application of my method of transformation, which would permit a gradual discarding of the locks without interrupting navigation or dredging at great depths. Four or five years will be necessary for this preparatory work to get into swing before the upper levels of the canal can begin to be lowered, while the transformation itself will take ten years to carry out."
    Under the most favorable conditions, says the writer, the lock canal will be no longer workable in twenty or twenty-five years, perhaps after only fifteen. It is absolutely necessary, he asserts, that it be turned into a free strait for the following reasons: "First, because the difference between the dimensions of the largest ships, now building, and the locks are, at most, 80 feet in length and 11 feet in width, which is merely a strictly necessary margin. Thus in a few years' time the locks will be inadequate to the needs of military and commercial navigation.
    "Second, because the canal must at the earliest possible moment be relieved of the menace of destruction now overhanging it through the dangers to which the Gatun Dam is exposed.
    "Third, because of the danger that the canal will lack sufficient water because of its escape through fissures in the banks.
    "Fourth, because the huge volume of traffic which will eventually thread the canal will absolutely require a free waterway."
    The book has been received with great interest in Paris.

Special Cable to The New York Times.
    BERLIN, May 3.— German experts continue to express doubts of one kind or another on the Panama Canal question. The latest writer in a current magazine declares that the canal will already be partially antiquated when opened, because the locks are too small.
    A comparison of the Panama locks with those of the new Kaiser Wilhelm Canal shows the length of the Panama locks to be 303 metres as against 330 for the Kaiser Wilhelm; the breadth 33.53. against 45; the depth 12 1/2, against 13.77.
    The writer comes to the conclusion that the future is much more favorable for the Suez than for the Panama Canal, and declares that this may explain the striking fact that England took no part in the more recent competition for building the American canal, leaving the matter entirely to France and the United States.