A "romantic view" perhaps, sometimes a story needs a little over egging to get the message across and the feeling of horror and revulsion, like someone said "only four ships got sunk".....only! I think the point of the poem was to point out the crass stupidity of it and the writer may have been expressing what they felt and regarded a comment "only four ships sunk" maybe wasn't enough to catch peoples attention............don't you love it! Where shall i start!