Leaving forts out of consideration and searching for something else in which to use gunpowder on a large scale, we come to siege-pieces, field-pieces, and muskets. Disregarding siege-pieces and field-pieces, for the reason that the great variety of types makes it difficult to compare them with navy guns, we come to muskets.
Now the musket is an extremely formidable weapon, and has, perhaps, been the greatest single contributor to the victory of civilization over barbarism, and order over anarchy, that has ever existed up to the present time. But the enormous advances in engineering, including ordnance, during the last fifty years, have reduced enormously the relative value of the musket. Remembering that energy, or the ability to do work, is expressed by the formula: E=1/2 MV2, remembering that the projectile of the modern 12-inch gun starts at about 2,900 f. s. velocity and weighs 867 pounds, while the bullet of a musket weighs only 150 grains and starts with a velocity of 2,700 feet per second, we see that the energy of the 12-inch projectile is about 47,000 times that of the bullet on leaving the muzzle. But after the bullet has gone, say 5,000 yards, its energy has fallen to zero, while the energy of the 12-inch projectile is nearly the same as when it started.
While it would be truthful, therefore, to say that the energy of the 12-inch gun within 5,000 yards is greater than that of 47,000 muskets, it would also be truthful to say that outside of 5,000 yards, millions of muskets would not be equal to one 12-inch gun.
Not only is the 12-inch gun a weapon incomparably great, compared with the musket, but when placed in a naval ship, it possesses a portability which, while not an attribute of the gun itself, is an attribute of the combination of gun and ship, and a distinct attribute of naval power. A 12-inch gun placed in a fort may be just as good as a like gun placed in a ship, but it has no power to exert its power usefully unless some enemy comes where the gun can hit it. And when one searches the annals of history for the records of whatever fighting forts have done, he finds that they have been able to do very little. But a 12-inch gun placed in a man-of-war can be taken where it is needed, and recent history shows that naval 12-inch guns, modern though they are, have already done effective work in war.
Not only are 12-inch guns powerful and portable, but modern mechanical science has succeeded in so placing them in our ships that they can be handled with a precision, quickness, and delicacy that have no superior in any other branch of engineering. While granting the difficulty of an exact comparison, I feel no hesitation in affirming that the greatest triumph of the engineering art in handling heavy masses is to be found in the turret of a battleship. Here again, and even inside of 5,000 yards, we find the superiority of the great gun over the musket, as evidenced by its accuracy in use. No soldier can fire his musket, even on a steady platform, himself and target stationary, and the range known perfectly, as accurately as a gun-pointer can fire a 12-inch gun; and if gun and target be moving, and the wind be blowing, and the range only approximately known, as is always the case in practice, the advantage of the big gun in accuracy becomes incomparable.
But it is not only the big projectile itself which has energy, for this projectile carries a large charge of high explosive, which exploding some miles away from where it started, exerts a power inherent in itself, that was exhibited with frightful effect at the battles of Tsushima and the Skagerak.
This brings us to the auto-torpedo, a weapon recently perfected; in fact not perfected yet. Here is another power that science has put into the hands of naval men in addition to those she had already put there. The auto-torpedo, launched in security from below the water-line of the battleship, or from a destroyer or submarine, can be directed in a straight line over a distance and with a speed that are constantly increasing with the improvement of the weapon. At the present moment, a speed of 27 knots over 10,000 yards can be depended on, with a probability that on striking an enemy's ship below the water-line it will disable that ship, if not sink her. There seems no doubt that, in a very few years, the systematic experiments now being applied to the development of the torpedo will result in a weapon which can hardly be called inferior to the 12-inch or even 16-inch gun and will probably surpass it.
Controllability.—If one watches a fleet of ships moving on the sea, he gets an impression of tremendous power. But if he watches Niagara, or a thunder-storm, he also gets an impression of tremendous power. But the tremendous power of Niagara, or the thunder-storm, is a power that belongs to Niagara or the thunder-storm, and not to man. Man cannot control the power of Niagara or the thunder-storm; but he can control the power of a fleet.
Speaking, then, from the standpoint of the human being, one may say that the fleet has the element of controllability, while Niagara and the thunder-storm have not. One man can make the fleet go faster or slower or stop; he can increase its power of motion or decrease it at his will; he can reduce it to zero. He cannot do so with the forces of nature.
Directability.—Not only can one man control the power of the fleet, he can also direct it; that is, can turn it to the right or the left as much as he wishes. But one man cannot change the direction of motion of Niagara or the lightning-bolt.
Power, Controllability, and Directability.—We may say, then, that a fleet combines the three elements of mechanical power, controllability, and directability.
The Unit of Military Power.—This is an enormous power that has come into the hands of the naval nations; but it has come so newly that we do not appreciate it yet. One reason why we do not and cannot appreciate it correctly is that no units have been established by which to measure it.
To supply this deficiency, the author begs leave to point out that, since the military power of every nation has until recently been its army, of which the unit has been the soldier, whose power has rested wholly in his musket, the musket has actually been the unit of military power. In all history, the statement of the number of men in each army has been put forward by historians as giving the most accurate idea of their fighting value; and in modern times, nearly all of these men have been armed with muskets only.
It has been said already that the main reason why the invention of gunpowder was so important was that it put into the hands of man a tremendous mechanical power compressed into a very small space, which man could use or not use at his will. This idea may be expressed by saying that gunpowder combines power and great controllability. But it was soon discovered that this gunpowder, put into a tube with a bullet in front of it, could discharge that bullet in any given direction. A musket was the result, and it combined the three requisites of a weapon—mechanical power, controllability, and directability.
While the loaded gun is perhaps the clearest example of the combination of the three factors we are speaking of, the moving ship supplies the next best example. It has very much greater mechanical power; and in proportion to its mass, almost as much controllability and directability.
The control and direction of a moving ship are very wonderful things; but the very ease with which they are exercised makes us overlook the magnitude of the achievement and the perfection of the means employed. It may seem absurd to speak of one man controlling and directing a great ship, but that is pretty nearly what happens sometimes; for sometimes the man at the wheel is the only man on board doing anything at all; and he is absolutely directing the entire ship. At such times (doubtless they are rare and short) the man at the wheel on board, say theVaterland, is directing unassisted by any human being a mass of 65,000 tons, which is going through the water at a speed of 24 knots, or 27 miles, an hour, nearly as fast as the average passenger-train. In fact, it would be very easy to arrange on board theVaterlandthat this should actually happen; that everybody should take a rest for a few minutes, coal-passers, water-tenders, oilers, engineers, and the people on deck. And while such an act might have no particular value,per se, and prove nothing important, yet, nevertheless, a brief reflection on the possibility may be interesting, and lead us to see clearly into the essential nature of what is here called "directability." The man at the wheel on board theVaterland, so long as the fires burn and the oil continues to lubricate the engines, has a power in his hands that is almost inconceivable. The ship that he is handling weighs more than the 870,000 men that comprise the standing army of Germany.
Now can anybody imagine the entire standing army of Germany being carried along at 27 miles an hour and turned almost instantly to the right or left by one man? The standing army of Germany is supposed to be the most directable organization in the world; but could the Emperor of Germany move that army at a speed of 27 miles an hour and turn it as a whole (not its separate units) through 90 degrees in three minutes?
TheVaterlandbeing a merchant ship and not fully representing naval power, perhaps it might be better to take, say, thePennsylvania. The weight is about half that of theVaterland, that is, it is nearly twice the weight of the men of the British standing army; and the usual speed is about, say, 15 knots. But in addition to all the power of the ship, as a ship, or an energy greater than that of 275,000 muskets, she has the power of all the guns, twelve 14-inch guns, and twenty-two 5-inch guns, whose projectiles, not including the torpedoes fired from four torpedo-tubes, have an energy at the muzzle equal to 750,000 muskets, seven-eighths of all the muskets in the German standing army. Now any one who has seen a battleship at battle practice knows that all the various tremendous forces are under excellent direction and control. And while it cannot be strictly said that they are absolutely under the direction and control of the captain, while it must be admitted that no one man can really direct so many rapidly moving things, yet it is certainly well within the truth to say that the ship and all it contains are very much more under the control of her captain than the German standing army is under the control of the Kaiser. The captain, acting through the helmsman, chief engineer, gunnery officer, and executive officer, can get very excellent information as to what is going on, and can have his orders carried out with very little delay; but the mere space occupied by an army of 870,000 men, and the unavoidable dispersion of its units prevent any such exact control.
In other words, the captain of thePennsylvaniawields a weapon more mechanically powerful than all the muskets of the German standing army: and his control of it is more absolute than is the Kaiser's control of that army.
Mechanism vs. Men.—Now what is the essential reason for the efficient direction exercised by the helmsman of thePennsylvania, and the relative impotency of generals? Is it not that the helmsman acts through the medium of mechanism, while the generals act through the medium of men? A ship is not only made of rigid metal, but all her parts are fastened together with the utmost rigidity; while the parts of an army are men, who are held together by no means whatever except that which discipline gives, and the men themselves are far from rigid. In the nature of things it is impossible that an army should be directed as perfectly as a ship. The rudder of a ship is a mechanical appliance that can be depended upon to control the direction of the ship absolutely, while an army has no such a thing as a rudder, or anything to take its place. Again, the rudder is only a few hundred feet from the helmsman, and the communication between them, including the steering-engine itself, is a strong reliable mechanism that has no counterpart in the army.
The control of the main engines of a ship is almost as absolute as the control of the rudder; and the main engines are not only much more powerful than the legs of soldiers, but they act together in much greater harmony.
Inherent Power of a Battleship.—Possibly the declaration may be accepted now that a battleship of 30,000 tons, such as the navies are building now, with, say, twelve 14-inch guns is a greater example of power, under the absolute direction and control than anything else existing; and that the main reason is the concentration of a tremendous amount of mechanical energy in a very small space, all made available by certain properties of water. Nothing like a ship can be made to run on shore; but if an automobile could be constructed, carrying twelve 14-inch guns, twenty-two 5-inch guns, and four torpedo-tubes, of the size of thePennsylvania, and with her armor, able to run over the land in any direction at 20 knots, propelled by engines of 31,000 horse-power, it could whip an army of a million men just as quickly as it could get hold of its component parts. Such a machine could start at one end of an army and go through to the other like a mowing-machine through a field of wheat; and knock down all the buildings in New York afterward, smash all the cars, break down all the bridges, and sink all the shipping.
Inherent Power of a Fleet.—An idea of the power exertable by a fleet of modern ships may be derived from the following comparison.
When Sherman made his wonderful march to the sea from Atlanta to Savannah, he made a march whose details are historically known, which was unopposed, which was over a flat country, in good weather, and without the aid of railroad-trains. It was a march, pure and simple; and inasmuch as men are the same now as they were then, it gives excellent data of the way in which purely military or army power can move from one place to another,while still preserving its character and exercising its functions. Similarly, when Admiral Schroeder, in November, 1910, went from the east coast of the United States to the English Channel, his march was unopposed, its details are known, and it gave an excellent illustration of how naval power can move from one place to another,while still preserving its character and exercising its functions.
Now General Sherman was a man of world-wide fame, and so were some of his generals, and Sherman's fame will last for centuries. Compared with Sherman, Admiral Schroeder was obscure; and compared with Sherman's officers, Admiral Schroeder's were obscure. Sherman's soldiers, privates and all, were made glorious for the rest of their lives by having been in Sherman's march to the sea, while Admiral Schroeder's sailors achieved no glory at all. So, the next paragraph is not intended to detract in the slightest from Sherman and his army, but simply to point out the change in conditions that mechanical progress has brought about.
The statement of comparison is simply that when General Sherman marched from Atlanta to the sea his army composed 62,000 men, and it took him twenty-five days to go about 230 land miles or 200 sea miles; and when Admiral Schroeder went from our coast to Europe he had 16 ships, and he made the trip of more than 3,000 sea miles in less than fourteen days. Disregarding twenty-eight 5-inch guns, two hundred and fifty-two 3-inch guns, and a lot of smaller guns, and disregarding all the torpedoes, Admiral Schroeder took eighty-four 12-inch guns, ninety-six 8-inch guns, eighty-eight 7-inch guns, and forty-eight 6-inch guns,all mounted and available; which, assuming the power of the modern musket as a unit, equalled more than 5,000,000 modern muskets.
Such an enormous transfer of absolute, definite, available power would be impossible on land, simply because no means has been devised to accomplish it. Such a transfer on land would be the transfer of ninety times as many soldiers as Sherman had (even supposing they had modern muskets) over fifteen times the distance and at thirty times the speed; and as the work done in going from one place to another varies practically as the square of the speed, a transfer on land equivalent in magnitude and speed to Schroeder's would be a performance 90 × 15 × 302= 1,215,000 times as great as Sherman's.
This may seem absurd, and perhaps it is; but why? The comparison is not between the qualities of the men or between the results achieved. Great results often are brought about by very small forces, as when some state of equilibrium is disturbed, and vice versa. The comparison attempted is simply between thepowerof a certain army and the power of a certain fleet. And while it is true that, for some purposes, such as overcoming small resistance, great power may not be as efficacious as feeble power or even gentleness, yet, nevertheless, it must be clear that, for the overcoming ofgreatresistance quickly great power must be applied.
The existence of a certain power is quite independent of the desirability of using it. The existence of the power is all the writer wishes to insist upon at present; the question of its employment will be considered later.
Not only is the power of a fleet immeasurably greater than that of an army, but it must always be so, from the very nature of things. The speed of an army,while exercising the functions of an army, and the power of a musket, while exercising its functions as a weapon of one soldier, cannot change much from what they were when Sherman went marching through Georgia. But, thanks to mechanical science, there is no limit in sight to the power to which a fleet may attain.
The power of a navy is of recent growth, but it is increasing and is going to continue to increase. Every advance of civilization will advance the navy. Every new discovery and invention will directly or indirectly serve it. The navy, more than any other thing, will give opportunity for mechanism and to mechanism. Far beyond any possible imagination of to-day, it will become the highest expression of the Genius of Mechanism, and the embodiment of its spirit.
The amount of money now being spent by the United States on its navy is so great that the expenditure can be justified only on the basis that great naval power is essential to the country.
Is it essential, and if so, why?
Primary Use for a Navy.—To answer this wisely, it may be well to remind ourselves that the principal object of all the vocations of men is directly or indirectly the acquiring of money. Money, of course, is not wealth; but it is a thing which can be so easily exchanged for wealth, that it is the thing which most people work for. Of course, at bottom, the most important work is the getting of food out of the ground; but inasmuch as people like to congregate together in cities, the thing taken out of the ground in one place must be transported to other places; and inasmuch as every person wants every kind of thing that he can get, a tremendous system of interchange, through the medium of money, has been brought about, which is called "trade." For the protection of property and life, and in order that trade may exist at all, an enormous amount of human machinery is employed which we call "government." This government is based on innumerable laws, but these laws would be of no avail unless they were carried out; and every nation in the world has found that employment of a great deal of force is necessary in order that they shall be carried out. This force is mainly exercised by the police of the cities; but many instances have occurred in the history of every country where the authority of the police has had to be supported by the army of the national government. There is no nation in the world, and there never has been one, in which the enforcement of the necessary laws for the protection of the lives, property, and trade of the people has not depended ultimately on the army; and the reason why the army could enforce the laws was simply the fact that the army had the power to inflict suffering and death.
As long as a maritime country carried on trade within its own borders exclusively, as long as it lived within itself, so long as its people did not go to countries oversea, a navy was not necessary. But when a maritime country is not contented to live within its own borders, then a navy becomes essential to guard its people and their possessions on the highways of the sea; to enforce, not municipal or national law, as an army does, but international law.
Now the desire of the people of a country to extend their trade beyond the seas seems in some ways not always a conscious desire, not a deliberate intent, but to be an effort of self-protection, or largely an effort of expansion; for getting room or employment. As the people of a country become civilized, labor-saving devices multiply; and where one man by means of a machine can do the work of a hundred, ninety-nine men may be thrown out of employment; out of a hundred men who till the soil, only one man may be selected and ninety-nine men have to seek other employment. Where shall it be gotten? Evidently it must be gotten in some employment which may be called "artificial," such as working in a shop of some kind, or doing some manufacturing work. But so long as a people live unto themselves only, each nation can practically make and use all the machinery needed within its borders, and still not employ all the idle hands; and when the population becomes dense, employment must be sought in making goods to sell beyond the sea. The return comes back, sometimes in money, sometimes in the products of the soil and the mine and the manufactures of foreign lands.
In this way every nation becomes like a great business firm. It exports (that is, sells,) certain things, and it imports (that is, buys,) certain things; and if it sells more than it buys it is making money; if it buys more than it sells it is spending money. This is usually expressed by saying that the "balance of trade" is in its favor or against it.
In a country like the United States, or any other great nation, the amount of exporting and importing, of buying and selling almost every conceivable article under the sun, is carried on in the millions and millions of dollars; and so perfect has the organization for doing this business become in every great country, that the products of the most distant countries can be bought in almost every village; and any important event in any country produces a perceptible effect wherever the mail and telegraph go.
The organization for effecting this in every country is so excellent and so wonderful, that it is like a machine.
In fact, it is a machine, and with all the faults of a machine. Now one of the faults of a machine, a fault which increases in importance with the complexity of the machine, is the enormous disturbance which may be produced by a cause seemingly trivial. That such is the case with the machine which the commerce of every great nation comprises, every-day experience confirms. So long as the steamers come and go with scheduled regularity, so long will the money come in at the proper intervals and be distributed through the various channels; so long will the people live the lives to which they are habituated; so long will order reign.
But suppose the coming and going of all the steamers were suddenly stopped by a blockade. While it may be true that, in a country like the United States, no foreign trade is really necessary; while it may be true that the people of the United States would be just as happy, though not so rich, if they had no foreign trade—yet the sudden stoppage of foreign trade would not bring about a condition such as would have existed if we had never had any foreign trade, but would bring about a chaotic condition which cannot fitly be described by a feebler word than "horrible." The whole machinery of every-day life would be disabled. Hundreds of thousands of people would be thrown out of employment, and the whole momentum of the rapidly moving enormous mass of American daily life would receive a violent shock which would strain to its elastic limit every part of the entire machine.
It would take a large book to describe what would ensue from the sudden stoppage of the trade of the United States with countries over the sea. Such a book would besides be largely imaginative; because in our history such a condition has never yet arisen. Although wars have happened in the past in which there has been a blockade of our coast more or less complete, peace has been declared before the suffering produced had become very acute; and furthermore the conditions of furious trade which now exist have never existed before. Disasters would ensue, apart from the actual loss of money, owing simply to the sudden change. In a railroad-train standing still or moving at a uniform speed, the passengers are comfortable; but if that same train is suddenly brought to rest when going at a high speed, say by collision, the consequences are horrible in the extreme, and the horror is causedsimply by the suddenness of the change. The same is true all through nature and human nature. Any sudden change in the velocity of any mass has its exact counterpart in any sudden change in the conditions of living of any man or woman, or any sudden change in the conditions under which any organization must carry on its business. The difficulty is not with individuals only, or with the organizations themselves, and does not rest solely on the personal inability of people to accommodate themselves to the losing of certain conveniences or luxuries; but it is an inertia which resists even the strenuous efforts of individuals and organizations to meet new situations promptly, and to grapple effectively with new problems.
Every organization, no matter how small, is conducted according to some system, and that system is based upon certain more or less permanent conditions, which, if suddenly changed, make the system inapplicable. The larger the organization and the more complex it is, the more will it be deranged by any change of external conditions and the longer time will it take to adapt itself to them.
The sudden stoppage of our sea trade, including our coasting trade, by even a partial blockade of our ports, would change practically all the conditions under which we live. There is hardly a single organization in the country which would not be affected by it. And, as every organization would know that every other organization would be affected, but to a degree which could not possibly be determined, because there would be no precedent, it cannot be an exaggeration to declare that the blockading of our principal ports would, entirely apart from direct loss of money and other commodities, produce a state of confusion, out of which order could not possibly be evolved except by the raising of the blockade.
In addition to the confusion brought about, there would, of course, be the direct loss of money and non-receipt of imported things; but what would probably be the very worst thing of all would be the numbers of men thrown out of employment by the loss of foreign markets.So long as a country can keep its people in employment, so long the people will live in comparative order. But when there are many unemployed men in a country, not only do their families lose the means of subsistence, but the very fact of the men being unemployed leads them into mischief. Should the ports of any great commercial nation be suddenly closed, the greatest danger to the country would not be from the enemy outside, but from the unemployed people inside, unless the government gave them employment, by enlisting them in an enormous, improvised army.
It will be seen, therefore, that the blockading of the principal ports of any purely commercial country would be a disaster so great that there could not be a greater one except actual invasion. Another disaster might be the total destruction of its fleet by the enemy's fleet; but the onlydirectresult of this would be that the people of the country would have fewer ships to support and fewer men to pay. The loss of the fleet and the men would notper sebe any loss whatever to the country, but rather a gain. The loss of the fleet, however, would make it possible for the enemy's fleet to blockade our ports later, and thus bring about the horrors of which we have spoken.
While it is true that an absolute blockade of any port might be practically impossible at the present day, while it is true that submarines and torpedo-boats might compel blockading ships to keep at such distance from ports that many loopholes of escape would be open to blockade runners, yet it may be pointed out that even a partial blockade, even a blockade that made it risky for vessels to try to break it, would have a very deleterious effect upon the prosperity of the country and of every man, woman, and child within it. A blockade like this was that maintained during the greater part of the Civil War by the Northern States against the Southern States. This blockade, while not perfect, while it was such as to permit many vessels to pass both ways, was nevertheless so effective that it made it impossible for the Southern States to be prosperous, or to have any reasonable hope of ever being prosperous. And while it would be an exaggeration to state that the navy itself, unaided by the army, could have brought the South to terms; while it would be an exaggeration to state that all the land battles fought in the Civil War were unnecessary, that all the bloodshed and all the ruin of harvests and of homesteads were unnecessary, nevertheless it does seem that so long as the navy maintained the blockade which it did maintain, the people of the South would have been prevented from achieving enough prosperity to carry on an independent government; so that their revolt would have failed. The South, not being able to raise the blockade by means of their navy, might have tried to do so by sending an army into the Northern States, to whip the Northerners on their own ground; but this would clearly have been impossible.
The sentences above are not written with the intention of minimizing the services rendered by the army in the Civil War, or of detracting from the glory of the gallant officers and men who composed it, or of subtracting one jot or tittle from a grateful appreciation of their hardships and bloodshed; neither do they dare to question the wisdom of the statesmen who directed that the war should be fought mainly by the army. Their sole intention is to point out that, if a meagre naval force could produce so great an effect against a countrymainly agricultural, a very powerful naval force, blockading effectively the principal ports of amanufacturing country, would have an effect so great that it can hardly be estimated.
It is plainly to be seen that the effect of a blockade against a purely commercial country by a modern navy would be incomparably greater now than it was fifty years ago, for two very important reasons. One reason is that the progress of modern engineering has made navies very much more powerful than they were fifty years ago; and the other reason is that the same cause has made countries very much more vulnerable to blockade, because it has made so many millions of people dependent upon manufacturing industries and the export of manufactured things, and forced them to live an artificial life. While the United States, for instance, does not depend for its daily bread on the regular coming of wheat from over the sea, yet millions of its people do depend, though indirectly, upon the money from the export of manufactured things; for with countries, as with people, habits are formed both of system and of mode of life, which it is dangerous suddenly to break; so that a country soon becomes as dependent upon outside commerce as a man does upon outside air, and a people suddenly deprived of a vigorous outside commerce would seem to be smothered almost like a man deprived of outside air.
A rough idea of the possible effect of a blockade of our coast may be gathered from the fact that our exports last year were valued at more than $2,000,000,000; which means that goods to this amount were sold, for which a return was received, either in money or its equivalent, most of it, ultimately, as wages for labor. Of course no blockade could stop all of this; but it does not seem impossible that it could stop half of it, if our fleet were destroyed by the enemy. Supposing that this half were divided equally among all the people in the United States, it would mean that each man, woman, and child would lose about $10 in one year. If the loss could be so divided up, perhaps no very great calamity would ensue. But, of course, no such division could be made, with the result that a great many people, especially poor people, earning wages by the day, would lose more than they could stand. Suppose, for instance, that a number of people earning about $900 a year, by employment in export enterprises, were the people upon whom the actual loss eventually fell by their being thrown out of employment. This would mean that more than a million people—men, women, and children—would be actually deprived of the means of living. It seems clear that such a thing would be a national disaster, for any loss of money to one man always means a loss of money or its equivalent to other men besides. For instance: suppose A owes $20 to B, B owes $20 to C, C owes $20 to D, D owes $20 to E, E owes $20 to F, F owes $20 to G, G owes $20 to H, H owes $20 to I, and I to J. If A is able to pay B, and does so, then B pays C, and so on, and everybody is happy. But suppose that A for some reason, say a blockade, fails to receive some money that he expected; then A cannot pay B, B cannot pay C, and so on; with the result, that not only does J lose his $20, but nine men are put in debt $20 which they cannot pay; with the further result that A is dunned by H, B is dunned by C, and so on, producing a condition of distress which would seem to be out of all proportion to a mere lack of $20, but which would, nevertheless, be the actual result. So in this country of 100,000,000 people, the sudden loss of $1,000,000,000 a year would produce a distress seemingly out of all proportion to that sum of money, because the individual loss of every loser would be felt by everybody else.
Since to a great manufacturing nation, like ours, the greatest danger from outside (except actual invasion) would seem to be the sudden stoppage of her oversea trade by blockade, we seem warranted in concluding that, sincethe only possible means of preventing a blockade is a navy, the primary use for our navy is to prevent blockade.
This does not mean that a fleet's place is on its own coast, because a blockade might be better prevented by having the fleet elsewhere; in fact it is quite certain that its place is not on the coast as a rule, but at whatever point is the best with relation to the enemy's fleet, until the enemy's fleet is destroyed. In fact, since the defensive and the offensive are so inseparably connected that it is hard sometimes to tell where one begins and the other ends, the best position for our fleet might be on the enemy's coast. It may be objected that the coast of the United States is so long that it would be impossible to blockade it. Perhaps, but that is not necessary: it would suffice to blockade Boston, Newport, New York, the Delaware, the Chesapeake, and the Gulf, say with forty ships. And we must remember that blockade running would be much more difficult now than in the Civil War, because of the increased power and accuracy of modern gunnery and the advent of the search-light, wireless telegraph, and aeroplane.
It may also be objected that the blockading of even a defenseless coast would cost the blockading country a good deal of money, by reason of the loss of trade with that country. True; but war is always expensive, and the blockade would be very much more expensive to the blockaded country; and though it might hold out a long while, it would be compelled to yield in the end, not only because of the blockade itself but because of the pressure of neutral countries; and the longer it held out, the greater the indemnity it would have to pay. The expense of blockading would therefore be merely a profitable investment.
The author is aware that actual invasion of a country from the sea would be a greater disaster than blockade, and that defense against invasion has often been urged in Great Britain as a reason for a great navy; so that the primary reason for a navy might be said to be defense against invasion. But why should an enemy take the trouble to invade us? Blockade is easier and cheaper, and can accomplish almost everything that an enemy desires, especially if it be enlivened by the occasional dropping of thousand-pound shells into Wall Street and the navy-yard.
While, however, theprimaryuse of naval power seems to be to prevent blockade, a navy, like any other weapon, may be put to any other uses which circumstances indicate. For instance, the Northerners in the Civil War used the navy not to prevent blockade, but to make blockade; the Japanese used the navy to cover the transportation of their armies to Manchuria and Corea; and Great Britain has always used her navy to protect her trade routes.
A general statement of the various uses of a navy has been put into the phrase "command of the sea."
Of course, the probability of getting "command of the sea," or of desiring to get it is dependent on the existence of a state of war, and there are some who believe that the probability of our becoming involved in a war with a great naval nation is too slight to warrant the expense of money and labor needed to prepare the necessary naval power. So it may be well to consider what is the degree of probability.
This degree of probability cannot be determined as accurately as the probabilities of fire, death, or other things against which insurance companies insure us; for the reason that wars have been much less frequent than fires, deaths, etc., while the causes that make and prevent them are much more numerous and obscure. It seems clear, however, that, as between two countries of equal wealth, the probability of war varies with the disparity between their navies, and unless other nations are involved, is practically zero, when their navies are equal in power; and that, other factors being equal, thegreatest probability of war is between two countries, of which one is the more wealthy and the other the more powerful.
In reckoning the probability of war, we must realize thatthe most pregnant cause of war is the combination of conflicting interests with disparity in power. And we must also realize that it is not enough to consider the situation as it is now: that it is necessary to look at least ten years ahead, because it would take the United States that length of time to prepare a navy powerful enough to fight our possible foes with reasonable assurance of success.
Ten years, however, is not really far enough ahead to look, for the simple reason that, while we could get a great many ships ready in ten years, we could not get the entire navy ready as will be explained later. If, for instance, some change in policies or in interests should make war with Great Britain probable within ten years, we could not possibly build a navy that could prevent our being beaten, and blockaded, and forced to pay an enormous indemnity.
Is therenoprobability of this? Perhaps there is no great probability; but there certainly is a possibility. In fact, it might be a very wise act for Great Britain, seeing us gradually surpassing her, to go to war with us before it is too late, and crush us. It has often been said that Great Britain could not afford to go to war with us, because so many of her commercial interests would suffer. Of course, they would suffer for a while; but so do the commercial interests of competing railroads when they begin to cut rates. Cutting rates is war—commercial war: but it is often carried on, nevertheless, and at tremendous cost.
Just now, Great Britain does not wish to crush us; but it is certain that she can. It is certain that the richest country in the world lies defenseless against the most powerful; and that we could not alter this condition in ten years, even if we started to build an adequate navy now.
Yet even if the degree of probability of war with Great Britain, within say ten years, seems so small that we need not consider her, are there no other great Powers with whom the degree of probability of war is great enough to make it wise for us to consider them?
Before answering this question, let us realize clearly that one of the strongest reasons that leads a country to abstain from war, even to seek relief from wrongs, actual or imagined, is a doubt of success; and that that reason disappears if another country, sufficiently powerful to assure success, is ready to help her, either by joining openly with her, or by seeking war herself at the same time with the same country. As we all know, cases like this have happened in the past. Great Britain knows it; and the main secret of her wealth is that she has always been strong enough to fight any two countries.
It is plain that a coalition of two countries against us is possible now. The United States is regarded with feelings of extreme irritation by the two most warlike nations in the world, one on our eastern side and the other on the western. War with either one would call for all the energies of the country, and the issue would be doubtful. But if either country should consider itself compelled to declare war, the other, if free at the time, might see her opportunity to declare war simultaneously. The result would be the same as if we fought Great Britain, except that our Pacific coast would be blockaded besides the Atlantic, and we should have to pay indemnity to two countries instead of to one country.
A coalition between these two countries would be an ideal arrangement, because it would enable each country to force us to grant the conditions it desires, and secure a large indemnity besides.
Would Great Britain interfere in our behalf? This can be answered by the man so wise that he knows what the international situation and the commercial situation will be ten years hence. Let him speak.
WILL THE IMPORTANCE OF NAVAL POWER INCREASE OR DECREASE?
It is clear that the importance to a country of a navy varies with two things—the value of that country's foreign trade and the probability of war.
It is also clear that, other things being equal, the probability of a country becoming involved in war varies as the value of her foreign trade; because the causes of friction and the money at stake vary in that proportion.
Therefore,the importance to a country of her navy varies as the square of the value of her foreign trade.
In order to answer the question, therefore, we must first consider whether foreign trade—sea trade—is going to increase or decrease.
As to the United States alone, the value of our exports is about ten times what it was fifty years ago, and it promises to increase. But the United States is only one country, and perhaps her increase in foreign trade has been due to conditions past or passing. So what is the outlook for the future, both for the United States and other countries? Will other countries seek foreign trade?
Yes. The recent commercial progress of Germany, Argentina, and Japan, shows the growing recognition by civilized and enterprising countries of the benefits of foreign trade, and of the facilities for attaining it which are now given by the advent of large, swift, modern steamers; steamers which are becoming larger and swifter and safer every year, more and more adapted for ocean trade. For not only have the writings of Mahan brought about an increase in the sea power of every great country; but this increase has so aroused the attention of the engineering professions that the improvement of ships, engines, and other sea material has gone ahead faster than all the other engineering arts.
The reason why the engineering arts that are connected with the sea have gone ahead more rapidly than any other arts is simply that they are given wider opportunity and a greater scope. It is inherent in the very nature of things that it is easier to transport things by water than by land; that water transportation lends itself in a higher degree to the exercise of engineering skill, to the attainment of great results.
The underlying reason for this difference seems to be that it is not possible to make any vehicle to travel on land appreciably larger than the present automobile, unless it run on rails; whereas the floating power of water is such that vehicles can be made, and are made, as large as 65,000 tons. TheMauretania, of 45,000 tons displacement, has been running for eight years, larger vessels are even now running and vessels larger still will undoubtedly be run; for the larger the ships, the less they cost per ton of carrying power, the faster they go, and the safer they are.
Sea commerce thus gives to engineers, scientists, and inventors, as well as to commercial men, that gift of the gods—opportunity. The number of ships that now traverse the ocean and the larger bodies of water communicating with it aggregate millions of tons, and their number and individual tonnage are constantly increasing. These vessels cruise among all the important seaports of the world, and form a system of intercommunication almost as complete as the system of railroads in the United States. They bring distant ports of the world very close together, and make possible that ready interchange of material products, and that facility of personal intercourse which it is one of the aims of civilization to bring about. From a commercial point of view, London is nearer to New York than San Francisco, and more intimately allied with her.
The evident result of all this is to make the people of the world one large community, in which, though many nationalities are numbered, many tongues are spoken, many degrees of civilization and wealth are found, yet, of all, the main instincts are the same: the same passions, the same appetites, the same desire for personal advantage.
Not only does this admirable system of intercommunication bring all parts of the world very closely together, but it tends to produce in all a certain similarity in those characteristics and habits of thought that pertain to the material things of life. We are all imitative, and therefore we tend to imitate each other; but the inferior is more apt to imitate the superior than vice versa. Particularly are we prone to imitate those actions and qualities by which others have attained material success. So it is to be expected, it is already a fact, that the methods whereby a few great nations attained success are already being imitated by other nations. Japan has imitated so well that in some ways she has already surpassed her models.
With such an example before her, should we be surprised that China has also become inoculated with the virus of commercial and political ambitions? It cannot be many years before she will be in the running with the rest of us, with 400,000,000 of people to do the work; people of intelligence, patience, endurance, and docility; people with everything to gain and nothing to lose; with the secret of how to succeed already taught by other nations, which she can learn from an open book.
If Japan has learned our secret and mastered it in fifty years, will China not be able to do it in less than fifty years?
Before we answer this question, let us realize clearly that China is much nearer to us in civilization than Japan was fifty years ago; that China has Japan's example to guide her, and also that any degree of civilization which was acquired by us in say one hundred years will not require half that time for another nation merely to learn. The same is true of all branches of knowledge; the knowledge of the laws of nature which it took Newton many years to acquire may now be mastered by any college student in two months. And let us not forget, besides, that almost the only difficult element of civilization which other people need to acquire, in order to enter into that world-wide competition which is characteristic of the time we live in, is "engineering" broadly considered. Doubtless there are other things to learn besides; but it is not apparent that any other things have contributed largely to the so-called new civilization of Japan. Perhaps Japan has advanced enough in Christianity to account for her advance in material power, but if so she keeps very quiet about it. It may be, also, that the relations of the government to the governed people of Japan are on a higher plane than they used to be, but on a plane not yet so high as in our own country; but has any one ever seen this claimed or even stated? It may be that the people of Japan are more kindly, brave, courteous, and patriotic than they were, and that their improvement has been due to their imitating us in these matters; but this is not the belief of many who have been in Japan. One thing, however, is absolutely sure; and that is that Japan's advance has been simultaneous with her acquirement of the engineering arts, especially as applied to military and naval matters and the merchant marine.
But even supposing that China does not take part in the world-wide race for wealth, we cannot shut our eyes to the fact that Great Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, Argentina, and the United States, besides others like Sweden, Norway, Belgium, Holland, Spain, and Portugal, are in the race already; and that several in South America bid fair to enter soon. Not only do we see many contestants, whose numbers and ardor are increasing, but we see, also, the cause of this increasing. The cause is not only a clearer appreciation of the benefits to be derived from commerce across the water under conditions that exist now; it is also a growing appreciation of the possibilities of commerce under conditions that will exist later with countries whose resources are almost entirely undeveloped. For four hundred years, we of the United States, have been developing the land within our borders, and the task has been enormous. At one time it promised to be the work of centuries; and with the mechanical appliances of even one hundred years ago, it would have taken a thousand years to do what we have already done. Mechanical appliances of all kinds, especially of transportation and agriculture, have made possible what would, otherwise, have been impossible; and mechanical appliances will do the same things in Tierra del Fuego and Zululand.
Mechanism, working on land and sea, is opening up the resources of the world. And now, another allied art, that of chemistry, more especially biology, is in process of removing one of the remaining obstacles to full development, by making active life possible, and even pleasant, in the tropics. It is predicted by some enthusiasts that, in the near future, it will be healthier and pleasanter to live in the tropics, and even do hard work there, than in the temperate zone. When this day comes, and it may be soon, the development of the riches of lands within the tropics will begin in earnest, and wealth undreamed of now be realized.
The opening of the undeveloped countries means a continuing increase of wealth to the nations that take advantage of the opportunity, and a corresponding backsliding to those nations that fail. It means over all the ocean an increasing number of steamers. It means the continuing increase of manufacturing in manufacturing countries, and the increasing enjoyment in them of the good things of all the world. It means in the undeveloped countries an increasing use of the conveniences and luxuries of civilization and an increasing possession of money or its equivalent. It means, throughout all the world, an increase of what we call "Wealth."
In discussing a subject so great as sea trade, while it may be considered presumptuous to look fifty years ahead, it can hardly be denied that we ought at least to try to look that far ahead. To look fifty years ahead, is, after all, not taking in a greater interval of time than fifty years back; and it certainly seems reasonable to conclude that, if a certain line of progress has been going on for fifty years in a perfectly straight line, and with a vigor which is increasing very fast and shows no sign of change, the same general line of progress will probably keep up for another fifty years. If we try to realize what this means, we shall probably fail completely and become dazed by the prospect. We cannot possibly picture accurately or even clearly to ourselves any definite conditions of fifty years hence; but we certainly are warranted in concluding that by the end of fifty years, practically all of the countries of the world, including Africa, will be open to trade from one end to the other; that the volume of trade will be at least ten times as great as it is now; that the means of communication over the water and through the air will be very much better than now; and that there will be scores of appliances, methods, and processes in general use of which we have, as yet, no inkling, and cannot even imagine.
Now let us call to mind the accepted proverb that "Competition is the life of trade," and this will make us see that, accompanying this stupendous trade, extending over, and into, every corner of the world, there will be stupendous competition, involving in a vast and complicated net, every red-blooded nation of the earth.
We seem safe in concluding, therefore, that the importance of naval power will increase.
A great deal is said and written nowadays about the ability of arbitration to make wars unnecessary, and a good deal also about the possibility of an agreement among the nations, whereby armaments may be limited to forces adequate to insure that every nation shall be compelled to abide by the decision of the others in any disputed case.
In view of the number, the earnestness, and the prominence of many of the men interested in this cause; in view of the number of arbitration treaties that have been already signed; in view of the fact that arbitration among nations will simply establish a law among them like the law in any civilized country; in view of the fact that individuals in their dealings with each other sometimes surrender certain of their claims, and even rights, for the common good; in view of the fact that nations, like all business firms, like to cut down expenses, and in further view of the fact that a navy is not directly, but only indirectly, a contributor to a nation's prosperity, it seems probable that arbitration will be more and more used among the nations, and that armaments may be limited by agreement. It is clear, however, that the practical difficulties in the way of making the absolute agreement required are enormous, and that the most enthusiastic advocates of the plan do not expect that the actual limitation of armaments will become a fact for many years.
After the necessary preliminaries shall have been arranged, and the conference takes place which shall settle what armament each nation may have, it is plain that it will be to the interest of each nation to keep down the armament of every other nation, and to be allowed as much as possible itself. In this way, the operation of making the agreement will be somewhat like the forming of a trust among several companies, and the advantage will lie with that nation which is the most powerful.
For this reason it would seem a part of wisdom for each country to enter the conference with as large a navy as possible.
Therefore, the probability of an approaching agreement among the nations as to limitation of armaments, instead of being a reason for abating our exertions toward establishing a powerful navy, is really a conclusive reason for redoubling them.
This brings us to the important question, "how powerful should our navy be?"
This may seem a question impossible to answer. Of course it is impossible to answer it in terms of ships and guns; but an approximate estimate may be reached by considering the case of a man playing poker who holds a royal straight flush. Such a man would be a fool if he did not back his hand to the limit and get all the benefit possible from it. So will the United States, if she fails to back her hand to the limit, recognizing the fact that in the grand game now going on for the stakes of the commercial supremacy of the world, she holds the best hand. She has the largest and most numerous seaports, the most enterprising and inventive people, and the most wealth with which to force to success all the various necessary undertakings.
This does not mean that the United States ought, as a matter either of ethics or of policy, to build a great navy in order to take unjust advantage of weaker nations; but it does mean that she ought to build a navy great enough to save her from being shorn of her wealth and glory by simple force, as France was shorn in 1871.
It is often said that the reason for Great Britain's having so powerful a navy is that she is so situated geographically that, without a powerful navy to protect her trade, the people would starve.
While this statement may be true, the inference usually drawn is fallacious: the inference that if Great Britain were not so situated, she would not have so great a navy.
Why would she not? It is certain that that "tight little island" has attained a world-wide power, and a wealth per capita greater than those of any other country; that her power and wealth, as compared with her home area, are so much greater than those of any other country as to stagger the understanding; that she could not have done what she has done without her navy; that she has never hesitated to use her navy to assist her trade, and yet that she has never used her navy to keep her people from starving.
In fact, the insistence on the anti-starvation theory is absurd. Has any country ever fought until the people as a mass were starving? Has starving anything to do with the matter? Does not a nation give up fighting just as soon as it sees that further fighting would do more harm than good? A general or an admiral, in charge of a detached force, must fight sometimes even at tremendous loss and after all hope of local success has fled, in order to hold a position, the long holding of which is essential to the success of the whole strategic plan; but what country keeps up a war until its people are about to starve? Did Spain do so in our last war? Did Russia fear that Japan would force the people of her vast territory into starvation?
No—starvation has nothing to do with the case. If some discovery were made by which Great Britain could grow enough to support all her people, she would keep her great navy nevertheless—simply because she has found it to be a good investment.
The anti-starvation theory—the theory that one does things simply to keep from starving—does apply to some tropical savages, but not to the Anglo-Saxon. Long after starvation has been provided against, long after wealth has been secured, we still toil on. What are we toiling for? The same thing that Great Britain maintains her navy for—wealth and power.
The real reason for Great Britain's having a powerful navy applies with exact equality to the United States. Now that Great Britain has proved how great a navy is best for her, we can see at once how great a navy is best for us. That is—since Great Britain and the United States are the wealthiest countries in the world, and since the probability of war between any two countries is least when their navies are equal in power—the maximum good would be attained by making the United States navy exactly equal to the British navy.
NAVAL PREPAREDNESS
In a preceding chap01 endeavored to show why it is that the necessities of the naval defense of a country have caused the gradual development of different types of vessels, each having its distinctive work. If those different types operated in separate localities they would lose that mutual support which it is the aim of organization to secure, and each separate group could be destroyed in turn by the combined groups of an enemy. For this reason, the types or groups are combined in one large fleet, and an admiral is placed in command.
The command of a fleet is the highest effort of the naval art. Its success in time of war demands in the admiral himself a high order of mind and nerve and body; and it demands in all the personnel, from the highest to the lowest, such a measure of trained ability and character that each shall be able to discharge with skill and courage the duties of his station.
In order that the material fleet shall be efficient as a whole, each material unit must be efficient as a unit. Each ship must be materially sound; each pump, valve, cylinder, gun, carriage, torpedo, and individual appliance, no matter how small, must be in condition to perform its expected task. The complexity of a fleet baffles any mental effort, by even those most familiar with it, to grasp it fully. Each dreadnaught, battle cruiser, destroyer, submarine, collier, tender, hospital ship, scout, supply ship, and what-not, is a machine in itself, and is filled with scores—in some cases, hundreds—of highly specialized machines, operated by steam, oil, air, electricity, and water. A superdreadnaught is a machine which, including the machines inside of her, costs $15,000,000; a battle cruiser more.
The personnel is nearly as complicated as the material. Not only are there all the various ranks of commissioned officers in the line, medical corps, pay corps, marine corps, etc., but there are ten kinds of warrant officers besides; while in the enlisted personnel there are ninety-one different "ratings" in the navy, and thirteen in the marine corps, besides temporary ratings, such as gun-pointer, gun-trainer, gun-captain, etc. Each rank and rating carries its rigidly prescribed duties, as well as its distinctive uniform and pay. That such a multitudinous host of types and individuals, both material and personnel, can be actually combined in one unit fleet, and that fleet operated as a mobile directable organism by its admiral, is a high achievement of the human intellect.
How is it done?
By discipline, by training, by knowledge, by energy, by devotion, by will; by the exercise of those mental, moral, and spiritual faculties that may be grouped under the one term "mind": the same power that co-ordinates and controls a still more complex machine, the organism of the human body.
Despite its relative crudeness, a fleet possesses, more fully than any other fruit of man's endeavor, the characteristics of an organism, defined by Webster as "an individual constituted to carry on the activities of life by means of parts or organs more or less separate in function, but mutually dependent." And though it must be true that no fleet can approximate the perfection of nature's organisms, nevertheless there is an analogy which may help us to see how a complex fleet of complex vessels has been slowly evolved from the simple galley fleets of earlier days; how its various parts may be mutually dependent yet severally independent; and how all must be made to work as one vast unit, and directed as one vast unit by the controlling mind toward "the end in view."
The common idea is that an army consists of a number of soldiers, and a navy of a number of ships. This idea is due to a failure to realize that soldiers and ships are merely instruments, and that they are useless instruments unless directed by a trained intelligence: that the first essential in an army and the first essential in a navy is mind, which first correctly estimates the situation, then makes wise plans to meet it, then carries out those plans; which organizes the men and designs the ships, and then directs the physical power exertable by the men and the ships toward "the end in view."
Owing to the enormous mechanical power made available in ships by the floating properties of water, machinery is more used by navies than by armies; but this does not mean that machinery can take the place of men more successfully in navies than in armies, except in the sense that navies can use more mechanical power. The abundant use of machines and instruments in navies does not mean that machinery and instruments can take the place of trained intelligence—but exactly the reverse. Under the guidance of trained intelligence, a machine or instrument can perform wonders. But it is not the machinery that does the wonders; it is the trained intelligence that devised the instrument or machine, and the trained intelligence that operates it. Let the trained intelligence err, or sleep, and note the results that follow. TheTitanic, a mass of 40,000 tons, moving through the water at 20 knots an hour, a marvel of the science and skill of man, crashes into an iceberg, because the trained intelligence directing her errs—and is reduced at once to an inert mass of iron and brass. The mighty fleet of Russia meets the Japanese fleet in Tsushima Straits; and because the trained intelligence that directed its movements seriously erred, in an engagement decided in less than an hour, is stripped of its power and glory, and transformed into a disorganized aggregation of separate ships—some sunk, some sinking, some in flight. The Japanese fleet, on the other hand, because it is directed with an intelligence more highly trained than that which directs the Russian fleet, and because, in consequence, the officers and enlisted men perform their various duties not only in the actual battle, but in preparation for it, with a skill greater than that used in the Russian fleet, suffers but little damage in the fight—though the advantage in number and size of ships is slightly with the Russians. As a consequence of that battle, the war between Russia and Japan was decided in favor of Japan, and terms of peace were soon agreed upon. Russia lost practically all the ships that took part in the battle, and several thousand of her officers and sailors—andshe lost the whole object for which she went to war.
The difference between the Russian and Japanese fleets that gave the victory to the Japanese was a difference in trained intelligence and in the relative degrees of preparedness which that difference caused.
During the actual battle, the intelligence was that of the officers and men in the respective fleets, in managing the two fleets, the ships themselves, and the guns, engines, and machines of all kinds that those ships contained. It is this factor—trained intelligence—that has decided most of the battles of history, and the course that nations thereafter followed. Battles have usually been fought between forces not very different in point of numbers and material, for the reason that a force which knew itself to be weaker than another would not fight unless compelled to fight; and in cases where two forces of widely differing strength have fought, the situation has usually been brought about directly by a superior intelligence. In fact, one of the most frequent and important endeavors of strategy and tactics—used triumphantly by Napoleon—has always been such a handling of one's forces as to be superior to the enemy at the point of contact—to "get the mostest men there the firstest," as General Forrest is said to have expressed it.
The effect of superior-trained intelligence is greatest "at the top," but it can accomplish little unless a fine intelligence permeates the whole. A fine intelligence at the top will so direct the men below, will so select men for the various posts, and will so co-ordinate their efforts, that the organization will resemble a veritable organism: all the various organs fulfilling separately yet accurately their allotted functions; all the fire-control parties, all the gun crews, all the torpedo crews, all the engineer forces properly organized and drilled; all the hulls of the vessels, all the guns, all the torpedoes, all the multifarious engines, machines, and instruments in good material condition and correctly adjusted for use.
But it is not only in the actual battle that fine intelligence is required; it is required long before the battle and far distant from the scene—in the "admiralty" at home. The Japanese fleet set out fully manned with a highly trained, enthusiastic, and confident personnel; the Russian fleet set out manned with a poorly trained and discouraged personnel, only too well aware of their defects. The issue at Tsushima was decided before the respective fleets left their respective homes—though that issue was not then known to mortals. The battle emphasized, but did not prove, what had been proved a hundred times before: the paramount importance of preparedness; thatwhen two forces fight—the actual battle merely secures the decision as to the relative values of two completed machines, and their degrees of preparedness for use.
Preparedness of material is not, of course, so important as preparedness of personnel, because if the personnel is prepared, they will inevitably prepare the material. And the preparedness must pervade all grades: for while it is true that the preparedness of those in high command is more important than the preparedness of those in minor posts, yet there is no post so lowly that its good or its ill performance will not be a factor in the net result. An unskilful oiler may cause a hot bearing that will slow down a battleship, and put out of order the column of a squadron; a signalman's mistake may throw a fleet into confusion.
Perfect preparedness of personnel and material is essential because events follow each other so rapidly in war that no preparation can be made after it has begun. To fight is the most intense work a man can do; and a war is nothing but a fight. No matter how great or how small a war may be, no war can lose the essential qualities of a fight, or (save in the treatment of prisoners) be more brutal or less brutal when fought between two little savage tribes, than when fought between two colossal groups of Christian nations, civilized to the highest point. War is the acme of the endeavor of man. Each side determines that it will win at all costs and at all hazards; that nobody's comfort, happiness, or safety shall receive the slightest consideration; that everybody's strength and courage must be worked to the limit by night as well as by day, and that there must be no rest and no yielding to any softening influence whatever; that the whole strength and mind of the nation, and of every individual in it, must be devoted, and must be sacrificed, if need be, to the cause at stake.
In war, a navy's primary duty has usually been to protect the coast and trade routes of its country; and in order to do this, it has had to be able to oppose to an attacking fleet a defending fleet more militarily effective. If it were less effective, even if no invasion were attempted, the attacking fleet could cripple or destroy the defending fleet and then institute a blockade. In modern times an effective blockade, or at least a hostile patrol of trade routes, could be held hundreds of miles from the coast, where the menace of submarines would be negligible; and this blockade would stop practically all import and export trade. This would compel the country to live exclusively on its own resources, and renounce intercourse with the outside world. Some countries could exist a long time under these conditions. But they would exist merely, and the condition of mere existence would never end until they sued for peace; because, even if new warships were constructed with which to beat off the enemy, each new and untrained ship would be sunk or captured shortly after putting out to sea as, on June 1, 1813, in Massachusetts Bay, the American frigateChesapeakewas captured and nearly half her crew were killed and wounded in fifteen minutes by a ship almost identical in the material qualities of size and armament—the better-trained British frigateShannon.
For these reasons, every nation that has acquired and has long retained prosperity, has realized that every country liable to be attacked by any navy must either be defended by some powerful country, or else must keep a navy ready to repel the attack successfully. To do this, the defending navy must be ready when the attack comes; because if not ready then, it will never have time to get ready. In regard to our own country, much stress is laid by some intelligent people—who forget theChesapeakeandShannon—on the 3,000 miles of water stretching between the United States and Europe. This 3,000 miles is, of course, a factor of importance, but it is not a prohibition, because it can be traversed with great surety and quickness—with much greater surety and quickness, for instance, than the 12,000 miles traversed by the Russian fleet, in 1904, in steaming from Russia to Japan.
The 3,000 miles that separate the United States from Europe can be traversed by a fleet more powerful than ours in from two to three weeks; and the fleet would probably arrive on our shores in good condition, and manned by full crews of well-trained officers and men, habituated to their duties by recent practice and thoroughly ready to fight, as theShannonwas. We could not meet this fleet successfully unless we met it with a fleet more militarily effective; and we could not do this unless we had in the regular service and the reserve a personnel of officers and men sufficiently numerous to man immediately all the vessels that would be needed, and to man in addition all the shore stations, which would have to be expanded to a war basis. The officers and enlisted men, of course, would have to be at least as well trained as the corresponding personnel in the attacking fleet, and have as recent and thorough practice in their respective duties; for otherwise, no matter how brave and devoted they might be, the fate of the American fleet would be the fate of theChesapeake.