[59] The latest type of 16-inch naval gun has a range of 23,000 yards or eleven and a half nautical miles, which is a little more than thirteen statute miles.... A projectile from a 12-inch rifled gun (U. S. A. coast-defense type) which was fired in the presence of the author, ricochetted seven times.
[60] Not a fanciful description. The impact of a 12-inch projectile was calculated exactly by Major General Abbot, Chief of Engineers, U. S. A., in order to formulate a precise comparison.
[61] The writer has seen iron bars two and a half inches wide, which locked the steel doors to a casemate, buckle and bend outward from the vacuum created by the blast of a rifled gun.
[62] Report, Chief of Coast Artillery, U. S. A., September 19, 1914, pages 8, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15.
[63] The ammunition now on hand and under manufacture is 73 per cent. of the allowance fixed by the National Coast Defense Board. Last report to the Chief of Staff, U. S. A.... “The actual supply of ammunition at present is very considerably behind even that modest standard,” i.e. the minimum allowance, “and in many cases of our most important sea-coast guns would be sufficient for only thirty or forty minutes of firing.”—Henry L. Stimson, former Secretary of War, March 1, 1915.
[64] Army and naval officers, both American and foreign, believe that 5,000 men would be more than sufficient to take such works if they are manned only by their Coast Artillery companies and undefended by a mobile army.
[65] We have less than one quarter of the ammunition considered necessary as an adequate supply and reserve for our full number of small-arms. (Author’s Note.) ... “We are less adequately supplied with field artillery material than with any other form of fighting equipment.”—Henry L. Stimson, Secretary of War, 1911.... “A full supply of this type of material must be stored and ready for use before war is undertaken.”—W. W. Wotherspoon, Major General, Chief of Staff, U. S. A., November 15, 1914, Annual Report.
[66] It has been said authoritatively that if all the guns of the army should have to go into action at any one time there is not enough ammunition for a single day’s engagement, even at a conservative estimate of the amount of shells expended by each gun. In some of the European battles, more guns than our whole supply were engaged on each side.
[67] There is only enough material on hand to keep our present mobile army (at its present low peace strength) in the field for six months in the event of war. There is nothing to spare.
[68] Cavalry troops in the regular army as now constituted are under law rarely filled to a number of more than 70, while their proper complement is 100.