“Though Japan’s naval activity is primarily significant of a purpose to secure general predominance in Oriental seas, and though, as I have suggested, there is no immediate reason for, or prospect of, trouble between Japan and the United States involving naval armaments; yet, in the broad general sense of dignity on the sea, our country can by no means safely ignore or be inattentive to the progress of our Oriental neighbor toward the rank of a first-class sea power in the Pacific Ocean. The completion of her fleet now building will, inside of three years, give Japan that rank, and the future programme already laid out will accentuate it. The superior quality of Japan’s new navy is even more significant than its enormous quantity. She has no useless ships, none obsolete; all are up to date.
“Meantime, the attitude of the United States seems quite as supine as that of Russia. It is not necessary to go into minute detail on this point. Suffice it to say that, taking Russia, Japan, and the United States as the three maritime powers most directly concerned in the Pacific Ocean, and whose interests are most immediately affected by its command, Japan at her present rate of naval progress, viewed with relation to the lack of progress of the other two, must in three years be able to dominate the Pacific against either, and in less than ten years, against both.
“I have heard the question raised as to the character and quality of the Japanese personnel; I have heard the suggestion that, magnificent as their material may be, their officers and men are not up to the European or American standard. It is not my intention to discuss this phase of the matter. But it is worth while to observe that, if the Japanese officers with whom we are in daily contact as inspectors of work we are doing for their government are average samples, they have no odds to ask of the officers of any other navy whatsoever as to professional ability, practical application, and capacity to profit by experience. And it should also be borne in mind that they have had more and later experience in actual warfare than the officers of any other navy, or of all other navies. While all other navies have been wrestling with the theoretical problems of war colleges, or encountering the hypothetical conditions of squadron evolutions, fleet manœuvres, and sham battles, the Japanese have been sinking or taking the ships, bombarding the towns, and forcing the harbors of their enemy. I do not know how others may view this sort of disparity in experience, but in my opinion it is the most portentous fact in the whole situation, and because of it no navy that has not done any fighting at all has the slightest license to question in any respect the quality of the personnel of the Japanese navy that has done a good deal of extremely successful fighting.
“On the whole, the attitude of Japan among the powers is in the last degree admirable. Her aspirations are exaltedly patriotic, and her movements to realize them are planned with a consummate wisdom, and executed with a systematic skill, which nations far older in the arts of Western civilization would do well to emulate.”
In this paper, it need hardly be said, Mr. Cramp hewed to the line. He did not flatter the Russians nor did he omit to advise them of the full extent and unquestionable consequences of their procrastination and supineness. When the paper was prepared and had been finally revised, Mr. Cramp still hesitated about publishing it in that form. “The Russians,” he said, “are extremely sensitive; they know their weakness, or the best minds among them know it quite as well as I have pointed it out in this paper. Of course, I intend it as an appeal to their patriotism and to their sense of their country’s needs; but I am afraid that it will hurt the sensibilities of some of them.” However, after further consideration, Mr. Cramp determined to print the paper as it stood, and it was done. Probably no article appearing in an American magazine in many years, if ever, received as widespread or as earnest attention in Europe as did Mr. Cramp’s paper on “The Coming Sea Power.” As soon as the North American Review arrived in Europe, the paper was translated and printed in Russian and German and a copious synopsis of it in French, in the naval periodicals of the respective countries. It was also extensively discussed and criticised in the English press, both in the service papers and in the regular daily journals. In St. Petersburg, besides being translated and printed in the principal Russian magazine and discussed in the newspapers, it was made the basis of an address by one of the most eminent Admirals in the Russian navy. Mr. Cramp’s cautious apprehension, already referred to, that it might touch the susceptibilities of Russian officers proved groundless; and it has been openly admitted by high officials of the Russian Ministry of Marine that the arguments and considerations so vigorously advanced by Mr. Cramp had an effect of no little potency in turning the scale of Russian policy, which a few months later found expression in the great naval programme of 1898.
Early in the following spring Mr. Cramp received advices from St. Petersburg that the Ministry of Marine would be glad to entertain plans and proposals from him for the construction of at least two first-class battleships, two first-class protected cruisers of the highest speed, and thirty torpedo boats, under the new programme which had then, February, 1898, been finally authorized by the Ministry and approved by the Emperor Nicholas II.
Upon receipt of this information or suggestion, Mr. Cramp lost no time in preparing for the voyage. Although the time of year, early in March, was the most inclement season for a visit to the great northern capital, he cheerfully accepted the situation. So far as the general scheme and outline plans were concerned, he had substantially worked them out in anticipation, and not much delay was caused on that account. Early in March, 1898, Mr. Cramp sailed on the American Line steamship “St. Paul,” bound for St. Petersburg by the way of Southampton. Upon his arrival at the Russian capital, he was immediately turned over to the tender mercies of what is known as the Technical Board. This in Russian naval administration is a Board composed of officers representing all the branches of the service,—Line, Construction, Engineering and Ordnance, or the Artillery Branch, as they call it. The membership of this Board is considerable in number. For several weeks they subjected Mr. Cramp to a species of inquisition which might well have appalled a man of less resources, less determination, or less confidence in his own ultimate mastery of the situation. It is not worth while, even did our limits of space admit, to go into detail of Mr. Cramp’s discussion of his proposed designs and plans with the members of the Technical Board. Suffice to say, that after some weeks of consideration, taking the widest possible range, a general agreement was reached, leaving but few questions open for subsequent determination, none of which were of vital importance. The sequel of the whole transaction was that on the 23d of April, 1898, contracts were signed by Mr. Cramp on behalf of the Company, and by Vice-Admiral V. Verhovskoy, Chief of the Department of Construction and Supply, on behalf of the Emperor, for the construction of two vessels, one first-class battleship, now known as the “Retvizan,” and one first-class protected cruiser of the highest practicable speed, known as the “Variag.”
In his operations at St. Petersburg leading up to these important contracts, which aggregated nearly seven millions of dollars, including extra work ordered during construction, Mr. Cramp encountered powerful and persistent opposition from three widely diverse sources. First, there was an element strongly intrenched in the Ministry of Marine, who opposed the award of contracts to foreign builders other than the French. This element of opposition was powerfully represented on the Technical Board, and its influences were shown particularly in the Ordnance installation and in the Engineering section, who wanted everything done in Russia. It proved factious and troublesome, though not otherwise formidable, because the decision to have some of the ships in the programme of 1898 built abroad had already been reached in higher quarters. In fact, though not definitely so announced by the Russian government, it was known by the middle of March, 1898, at least by those intending to bid, that the Ministry of Marine had decided to award contracts for the construction of two first-class battle-ships, one armored cruiser, and three first-class protected cruisers of the highest speed in foreign shipyards, and a large number of torpedo boats.
The French and German shipyards were represented not only by their own agents and experts, but they were backed, and their claims to consideration urged, with all the power and influence their respective Embassies and banking houses could command at the Court of St. Petersburg.
However, this situation was not at all unforeseen or unexpected by Mr. Cramp. To encounter opposition from the agents of the foreign banking houses and diplomats was a normal condition of this kind of business. Fortunately for Mr. Cramp, or, rather, fortunately for American industrial interests at large, we also had an ambassador at St. Petersburg in 1898. He was not of the common run of American diplomatic representatives “near” foreign Courts. He was different. Almost from the foundation of our government, a rule—amounting to unwritten law—had prevailed which forbade American diplomatic representatives abroad to do or say anything in aid or furtherance of commercial or industrial enterprises of American citizens in the country to which they were accredited.