Aviation received earnest attention. Seaplanes and flying boats were secured, and a school and station established at Pensacola, Fla., for the training of aviators. The cruisers North Carolina, West Virginia, and Washington were fitted with a launching device, from which aeroplanes could fly from ships. Operating with the fleet, our aeroplanes began developing the tactics of aircraft at sea.
During the Sussex crisis, arrangements were made for the mobilization of the communications of the entire United States radio, telegraph and telephone. This important experiment was carried out from May 6 to 8, 1916, and was a complete success, proving that in a day we could link all methods of communication and put in touch all our yards and stations and our ships at sea. Congress had previously authorized the erection of a chain of high power radio stations to span the Pacific—at San Diego, California; Pearl Harbor, Hawaii; and at Cavite, in the Philippines—and these were under construction.
The Naval Communication Service was created and under its direction all our communications, wire and wireless, were prepared for war. This entire service was mobilized the day the United States severed relations with Germany.
Admiral Dewey said, in the autumn of 1916: "The last three years have been wonderful years. I have been in the Navy since 1854, and both in material and personnel, we are more efficient today than ever before." Admiral Charles J. Badger, who, upon the death of Dewey in January, 1917, became head of the General Board, stated: "I do not mean to say that we had attained to perfection in the Navy—we never shall; that no errors of judgment or mistakes were made—they will always occur; but I assert that the Navy when it entered the war was as a whole, well prepared and administered."
CHAPTER III
THE BREAK WITH GERMANY
SURPRISE AND TERROR PLANNED IN STARTING U-BOAT WAR—BERNSTORFF WITHHELD NOTE UNTIL JUST BEFORE SUBMARINES STRUCK—AMERICA'S ENTRANCE COULD NOT AFFECT "TREND OF THE WAR," HOLTZENDORFF INSISTED—FLEET PUT ON WAR BASIS—PLANS MADE TO COOPERATE WITH ALLIES—"GET AND KEEP THE BEST MEN," PRESIDENT TOLD SECRETARIES OF WAR AND NAVY.
Germany struck practically without warning in inaugurating ruthless U-boat warfare. Surprise of Allies and neutrals, giving no time for negotiations, was one thing upon which its Admiralty insisted. Terrorizing America was a part of the plan, and if the United States entered the war, the Teuton naval authorities contended that it would exert no marked influence, and could furnish little assistance in troops or vessels.
Admiral von Holtzendorff, head of the German Admiralty, set forth all this in his memorandum detailing the arrangements for the "U-boat war." That document, one of the German official papers made public after the war, is marked "Strictly secret—B-35840-I," and is dated, "Berlin, Dec. 22, 1916."