NAUTICAL TERMS FOR ALL.
(By our Tame Naval Expert.)
It is really surprising what confusion exists in the public mind upon the exact significance of such elementary terms as "Command of the Sea," and "A Fleet in Being." Only yesterday evening I was asked by a fellow-traveller on the top of a bus why, if we had command of the sea, we didn't blow up the Kiel Canal!
It will be as well to begin at the beginning. What is Naval Warfare? It is an endeavour by sea-going belligerent units, impregnated (for the time being) with a measure of animus pugnandi and furnished with offensive weapons, to impose their will upon one another. In rather more technical language it may be described as fighting in ships.
Now in order to utilize the sea for one's own purposes and at the same time to deny, proscribe, refuse and restrict it to one's enemy it is essential to obtain command. And it must not be overlooked that Command of the Sea can only be established in one way—by utilizing or threatening to utilize sea-going belligerent units. But we must distinguish between Command of the Sea and Sea Supremacy, and again between Potential Command, Putative Command and Absolute Command. Finally let there be no confusion between the expressions "Command of the Sea" and "Control of the Sea," which are entirely different things—though both rest securely upon the doctrine of the Fleet in Being, which is at the foundation of all true strategy.
This brings us to the question of what is meant by the phrase "A Fleet in Being." "To Be or Not to Be" (in Being) is a phrase that has been woefully misinterpreted, especially by those who insist on a distinction between Being and Doing. There is no such distinction at sea. For a fleet to exist as a recognisable instrument is not necessarily for it to be in Being. Only by exhibiting a desire to dispute Command at all costs can a fleet be said to come into Being. On the other hand, by being in Being a fleet does not necessarily obtain command or even partial control. This is not simply a question of To Be or Not to Be (in Being).
In explaining these academic principles one always runs the risk of being confronted with concrete instances. I shall be asked, "Is the German Fleet in Being?" I can only reply that it is in a condition of strictly Limited Control (I refer to the Kiel Canal), while the Baltic is in Disputed Command so long as the Russian Fleet is Strategically at Large.
This brings us to the question of the phrase "Strategically at Large," which has been loosely rendered "On the War-path." Let us say rather that any fleet (in Being) which is ready (even without Putative Control) to dispute Command is said to be Strategically at Large, so long as it is imbued with animus pugnandi.
Animus pugnandi is the root of the matter. A fleet is in a state of disintegration without it. And so long as the German Fleet's activities in the North Sea are confined to peeping out of the Canal to see if the foe is in the neighbourhood one must conclude that this ingredient has been overlooked in its composition.
Bis.