The Navy as a Fighting Machine

by Bradley A. Fiske

The construction of the material of the navy has progressed since then, but spasmodically. At every session of Congress tremendous efforts have been made by people desiring an adequate navy, and tremendous resistance has been made by people who believed that we required no navy, or at least only a little navy. The country at large has taken a bystander's interest in the contest, not knowing much about the pros and cons, but feeling in an indolent fashion that we needed some navy, though not much. The result has been, not a reasonable policy, but a succession of unreasonable compromises between the aims of the extremists on both sides.

Great Britain, on the other hand, has always regarded the navy question as one of the most difficult and important before the country, and has adopted, and for centuries has maintained, a definite naval policy. This does not mean that she has followed a rigid naval policy; for a naval policy, to be efficient, must be able to accommodate itself quickly to rapid changes in international situations, and to meet sudden dangers from even unexpected quarters—as the comparatively recent experience of Great Britain shows. At the beginning of this century the British navy was at the height of its splendor and self-confidence. Britannia ruled the waves, and Britannia's ships and squadrons enforced Britannia's policies in every sea. The next most powerful navy was that of France; but it was not nearly so large, and seemed to be no more efficient, in proportion to its size. Owing to Britain's wise and continuing policy, and the excellence of the British sailor and his ships, the British navy proudly and almost tranquilly held virtual command of all the seas.

But shortly after this century began, British officers discerned a new and disturbing element gradually developing on the horizon. The first thing which roused their attention to it was the unexpected attack of the Japanese torpedo-boats on the Russian squadron in Port Arthur. No war had been declared, and the Russian squadron was riding peacefully at anchor. The suddenness of the attack, and the distinct though incomplete success which it achieved, startled the British into a realization of the fact that there had been introduced into warfare on the sea methods and tactics requiring a higher order of preparation than had ever before been known; that the scientific methods which the Germans employed so effectively on land in 1870 had been adapted by the Japanese to naval warfare, and would necessitate the introduction into naval policies of speedier methods than had hitherto been needed.

Another event which had happened shortly before showed that naval policies would have to be modified, if they were to utilize recent advances in scientific methods. This event was the unprecedented success at target practice of H. M. S. Terrible, commanded by Captain Sir Percy Scott, which proved that by a long and strenuous training and the adoption of instruments of precision, it was possible to attain a skill in naval gunnery never attained before. Up to this moment the British navy had almost despised gunnery. Inheriting the traditions brought down from Howe, Rodney, and Nelson, permeated with the ideals of the "blue-water school," proud of being British seamen, proud of the pure white of their ships, enamoured of the stimulating breeziness of the quarterdeck and bridge, imbued with almost a contempt for such mathematical sciences as were not directly used in practical navigation, British naval officers exalted seamanship as the acme of their art, and took little interest in gunnery. All the battles of the past had been won by dash and seamanship and dogged persistence. Ships had always fought close alongside each other. No science had ever won any naval battle of the past, so why should they bother with science now—and why should they bother with target practice, except just enough to insure that the battery was in order, and that the men were not afraid of their guns? Besides, target practice dirtied the ship—a sacrilege to the British naval officer.

But the events of the war between Japan and Russia, especially the naval battles of Port Arthur, August 10, 1904, and the Sea of Japan, May 27, 1905, riveted their attention on the fact that something more than seamanship and navigation and clean ships would be needed, if the British navy was to maintain its proud supremacy on the sea; for in these battles, overwhelming victories were won purely by superior skill in gunnery, strategy, and tactics.

To these causes of awakening was added one still greater, but of like import—the rapid rise of the German navy from a position of comparative unimportance to one which threatened the British navy itself. The fact became gradually evident to British officers that the German navy was proceeding along the same lines as had proceeded the German army. Realizing the efficiency of the German Government, noting the public declarations of the German Emperor, observing the excellence of the German ships, the skill of the German naval officers, and the extraordinary energy which the German people were devoting to the improvement of the German navy—the British navy took alarm.

So did the other navies.

Beginning about 1904, Great Britain set to work with energy to reform her naval policy. Roused to action by the sense of coming danger, she augmented the size and number of vessels of all types; increased the personnel of all classes, regular and reserve; scrapped all obsolete craft; built (secretly) the epochal Dreadnaught, and modernized in all particulars the British navy. In every great movement one man always stands pre-eminent. The man in this case was Admiral Sir John Fisher, first sea lord of the admiralty, afterward Lord Fisher. Fisher brought about vital changes in the organization, methods, and even the spirit of the navy. He depleted the overgrown foreign squadrons, concentrated the British force in powerful fleets near home, established the War College, inculcated the study of strategy and tactics, appointed Sir Percy Scott as inspector of target practice, put the whole weight of his influence on the side of gunnery and efficiency, placed officers in high command who had the military idea as distinguished from the idea of the "blue-water school," and imbued the entire service with the avowed idea that they must get ready to fight to the death, not the French navy, with its easy-going methods, but the German navy, allied perhaps with some other. At the admiralty he introduced methods analogous to those of the General Staff, to maintain the navy ready for instant service at all times, to prepare and keep up to date mobilization plans in the utmost detail, and to arrange plans for the conduct of war in such wise that after a war should break out, all the various probable situations would have been studied out in advance.

The work required at the admiralty, and still more in the fleet—night and day and in all weathers—taxed mental and physical endurance to the limit; but the result was complete success; for when war broke out on the 1st of August, 1914, the British navy was absolutely ready. Many complaints have appeared in print about the unreadiness of Great Britain; but no one who knows anything of the facts supposes that these criticisms include Great Britain's navy.

The United States navy in the early part of this century occupied, relatively to others, a very ill-defined position; but the increased interest taken in it by our people after the Spanish War, combined with the destruction of the flower of the Russian fleet in the Russo-Japanese War, and the crushing blow inflicted on the French navy by the maladministration of Camille Pelletan, resulted in placing our navy, about three years ago, in a position second only to Great Britain's—a position which it recently has lost. Owing to a common origin and language, our navy has always followed the British navy, though at a somewhat respectful distance; and while it is true that in point of mechanical inventions we are ahead, in seamanship, navigation, and engineering on a par, and in gunnery and tactics not far behind, yet we must admit that in policy and in policy's first cousin, strategy, we are very far in the rear.