But a further word must be added. If every admiral at every juncture is to regulate his action by nice calculation of policy and chance, is there not a risk that the balancing of pros and cons may be pushed so far as to confuse the main issue? It is not on these principles that, when it comes to fighting, brave men with an instinct for war do in fact act. It is almost true to say that the example of Hawke and Nelson, no less than those of the light cruiser and destroyer captains in the battle we are about to consider, prove that the best way of diminishing the risk of loss is to take the risk as boldly and as often as you get the chance. Something seems to be due to fighting for fighting’s sake. What was it that Nelson said about no captain could go far wrong who laid his ship alongside an enemy’s! or as Napoleon has it, “the glory and honour of arms should be the first consideration of a general who gives battle!”

In summing up the situation on May 31, the elements appear to be as follows: The German Government was in double need of a stroke to restore the moral of its people. A Russian revival was possible, the British army in France and Flanders was growing to formidable dimensions, the blow at Verdun had failed. The German Government, and particularly the Imperial Navy, had been humiliated by the surrender to America, so that everything pointed to a stroke at sea, if one could be planned that did not involve too great a risk. Admiral Scheer and his officers of the High Seas Fleet were full of eagerness to justify themselves to their force. They believed the British naval strategy to be such that it would be possible for them to inveigle the fast division of the British Fleet into an action with greatly superior numbers, when serious damage might be inflicted on them. They counted, and with confidence, on Sir David Beatty’s eagerness to fight, and they trusted to being able to defeat him before he could break off action or could be supported by forces with whom engagement would be hopeless. They relied upon their air scouts to save them from surprise, and had no intention of coming into contact with Sir John Jellicoe if it could possibly be avoided. At the same time, however, they recognized that the defensive tactics which smoke screens and the new torpedo made possible would not only prevent contact with superior numbers being disastrous, they believed here, too, either that the British would avoid the risk of torpedo disaster, or that the keenness of the British Fleet for action must expose them to very formidable losses by under-water attack, while their gun-fire could be rendered harmless by the obscuration of the target and the manœuvres the torpedo could force upon them. And in these conditions the evasion of an artillery fight at decisive range should present no difficulties. Finally, such risks as were involved were well worth the incalculable enhancement of German prestige that would follow if a not-too-untruthful claim could be made to a naval victory. The world that has a natural sympathy with the weaker force would be inclined to regard even the escape of the German Fleet as something very like a German success.

It was the manifest duty of the British Fleet first to thwart any German naval design, whatever it might be, and, secondly, to remove from the theatre of war the only formidable sea force that the enemy possessed. For to do this would make a close investment of his ports possible, would to a large extent cut down the possibility of his submarine successes by mining them into their harbours and channels instead of netting them out of ours, would open the Baltic to British naval enterprise, and would set the whole resources of the Clyde and the Tyne free to produce merchant shipping.

CHAPTER XXI
The Battle of Jutland (Continued)
III. THE DISTRIBUTION OF FORCES

In the afternoon of May 31 the main sea forces of Great Britain and Germany were all in the North Sea. The Grand Fleet, under the command of Sir John Jellicoe, accompanied by a squadron of battle-cruisers, two of light cruisers, and three flotillas of destroyers, were to the north; the Battle Cruiser Fleet—of two squadrons—three squadrons of light cruisers, and four destroyer flotillas, supported by the Fifth Battle Squadron, all under the command of Sir David Beatty, were scouting to the southward.

The British Fleet was out “in pursuance of the general policy of periodical sweeps through the North Sea.” The disposition of the forces and the plan of operations were the Commander-in-Chief’s own. Neither was dictated from Whitehall. The despatches describing the operation do not—as some of those relating to the events off Heligoland in August, 1914—say that the ships were following Admiralty instructions. The fact has considerable importance in view of the fears expressed earlier in the spring that Whitehall was interfering with the Commander-in-Chief’s dispositions. Note also that the fleet was here in pursuit of the general policy followed since the early days of the war. This hunting for the enemy is not described as taking place at regular intervals, but as “periodic.” These searching movements would be made at the times when there was a greater likelihood of there being an enemy to find.

[(LARGER)]