The Navy as a Fighting Machine

by Bradley A. Fiske

The work of this patrol system is not to be restricted, however, to getting and transmitting information. Certain of the craft must be armed sufficiently to drive off hostile craft, trying to drag or countermine the defensive mine-fields; some must be able to add to the defensive mine-fields by planting mines, and some must be able to pilot friendly ships through the defensive mine-fields; others still must be able to countermine, drag, and sweep for any offensive mines that the enemy may plant.

Vessels for this patrol work do not have to be very large; in fact, for much of the work in the mine-fields, it were better if they were small, by reason of the ability of small vessels to turn in restricted spaces.

It would seem that for the patrol service, the vessels of the Revenue Marine and Lighthouse Service (coast guard) are ideally adapted; but, of course, there are only a few in total. These would have to be supplemented by small craft of many kinds, such as tugs, fast motor-boats, fishing-boats, and trawlers. To find men competent to man such vessels and do the kind of work required would not be so difficult as to get men competent to man the more distinctive fighting ships. Good merchant sailors, fishermen, and tugboat men would fit into the work with considerable ease, and in quite a short time. Strategy declares, however, that a coast guard may be needed a very short time after war breaks out; and that the vessels and the men, with all the necessary equipment and all the necessary organization and training, should be put into actual operation beforehand.

Not only the fleet, however, but all the bureaus and offices of the Navy Department, all the navy-yards, and an the radio stations, recruiting stations, hydrographic offices, training stations, and agencies for securing information from foreign countries, will have to pass instantly from a peace basis to a war basis. To do these things quickly and correctly many preliminaries must be arranged; but if the General Staff prepares good plans beforehand, arranges measures which will insure that the plans shall be promptly carried out, and holds a few mobilization drills to test them, the various bureaus and offices in the department can do the rest. If the fires have all been lighted, the engine gotten ready, and the boilers filled in time, the engineer may open the throttle confidently, when the critical time arrives, for the engine will surely do its part.

But if the proper plans have not been made and executed, the sudden outbreak of war, in which any country becomes involved with a powerful naval country, will create confusion on a scale larger than any that the world has ever seen, and compared with which pandemonium would be a Quaker meeting. A realization of facts will come to that country, and especially to the naval authorities, that will overwhelm them with the consciousness of their inability to meet the crisis marching toward them with swift but unhurried tread—confident, determined, unescapable. Fear of national danger and the sense of shame, hopelessness and helplessness will combine to produce psychological effects so keen that even panic will be possible. Officers in high places at sea and on shore will send telegrams of inquiry and suggestion; civilians in public and private station will do the same. No fitting answers can be given, because there will be no time for reflection and deliberation. The fact that it would be impossible to get the various additions to the fleet and the patrol services ready in time, and the consciousness that it would be useless to do any less, will tend to bring on a desperate resolve to accept the situation and let the enemy do his worst. The actual result, however, will probably be like the result of similar situations in the past; that is, some course of action will be hastily decided on, not in the reasoned-out belief that it can accomplish much, but with the feeling that action of any kind will relieve the nervous tension of the public by giving an outlet for mental and physical exertion and will, besides, lend itself to self-encouragement, and create a feeling that proper and effective measures are being taken.

Such conditions, though on a much smaller scale, are familiar to naval officers and are suggested by the supposititious order "somebody do something"; and we frequently see people placed in situations in which they do not know what to do, and so they do—not nothing, but anything; though it would often be wiser to do nothing than to do the thing they do do. Many of the inane remarks that people make are due to their finding themselves in situations in which they do not know what to say, but in which they feel impelled to say "something."

Now what kind of "something" would be done under the stimulus of the outbreak of a war for which a country had not laid its plans? Can any worse situation be imagined—except the situation that would follow when the enemy arrived? The parable of the wise and foolish virgins suggests the situation, both in the foolishness of the unpreparedness and in the despair when the consequent disaster is seen approaching.

In nearly all navies and armies, until the recent enormous increase in all kinds of material took place, the work of getting a navy ready for war in personnel and material was comparatively simple. This does not mean that it was easier then than now; because the facilities for construction, transportation, communication, and accounting were much less than now; but it does mean that the actual number of articles to be handled was much less, and the number of kinds of articles was also much less; and it also means that the various mechanical improvements, while they have facilitated construction, transportation, communication, and accounting, have done so for every nation; so that none of the competing navies have had their labors expedited or made less. On the contrary, the very means devised and developed for expediting work is of the nature of an instrument; and in order to use that instrument successfully, one has to study it and practise with it; so that the necessity for studying and practising with the instrument has added a new and difficult procedure to those before existing.

Fifty years ago the various mechanisms of naval warfare were few, and those few simple. In our Navy Department the work of supplying those mechanisms was divided among several bureaus, and each bureau was given the duty and the accompanying power of supplying its particular quota. The rapid multiplication, during the past fifty years, of new mechanisms, and new kinds of mechanisms; the increased expense of those mechanisms compared with that of former mechanisms; the increased size and power of vessels, guns, and engines; the increased size and complexity of the utilities in navy-yards for handling them; the necessity for providing and using means and methods for despatching the resulting "business" speedily, and for guarding against mistakes in handling the multiplicity of details—the increase, in brief, in the number, size, and kinds of things that have to be done in preparation, has brought about not only more labor in doing those things by the various bureaus assigned to do them, but has brought about even more imperiously the demand for means whereby the central authority shall be assured that each bureau is doing its work. And it has brought about more imperiously still a demand that a clear conception shall be formed first of what must be done, and second of the maximum time that can be allowed for doing it.

Clearly, the forming of a correct conception should not be expected of men not trained to form it; clearly, for instance, mere knowledge of electricity and mere skill in using electrical instruments cannot enable a man to devise radio apparatus for naval use; a certain amount of knowledge of purely naval and nautical matters is needed in addition. Clearly, the concept as to the kind of performance to be required of radio apparatus is not to be expected of a mere technician, but is to be expected of a strategist—and equally the ability to design, construct, and supply the apparatus is not to be expected of a strategist, but it is to be expected of a technician.