The Submarine is the Coming Type of War Vessel for Sea Fighting.
But for that consummation to be reached we must perfect the oil engine and we must store oil.
There is a strong animus against the submarine—of course there is!
An ancient Admiralty Board minute described the introduction of the steam engine as fatal to England’s Navy.
Another Admiralty Board minute vetoed iron ships, because iron sinks and wood floats!
The whole Navy objected to breech-loading guns, and in consequence sure disaster was close to us for years and years.
There was virulent opposition to the water-tube boiler (fancy putting the fire where the water ought to be, and the water where the fire should be!)
The turbine was said by eminent marine engineers to have an “insuperable and vital defect which renders it inadmissible as a practical marine engine—its vast number of blades—it is only a toy.” 80 per cent. of the steam-power of the world is now driving turbines.
Wireless was voted damnable by all the armchair sailors when we put it on the roof of the Admiralty, and yet we heard what one ship (the “Argyll”) at Bombay was saying to another (the “Black Prince”) at Gibraltar.
“Flying machines are a physical impossibility,” said a very great scientist four years ago. To-day they are as plentiful as sparrows.