National Defence (Part 3)
Another former Secretary of the Navy, Senator Chandler, ventures an imaginative glance at the navy of the twentieth century:
"According to my notion, it will be thought fifty years hence that six million dollars is too large a sum to risk in a single war-ship, and that it is better to build two or three of less size for the same money. I am strongly inclined to think, that, under twentieth-century conditions, two or three comparatively small fighting vessels, powerfully armed and very speedy, may do much more execution and accomplish more effective results than one huge floating fortress. One trouble about modern battle-ships is that they are apt to be obsolete by the time they are finished, and a few years hence we may find our boasted sea-fighters relegated to rust in the navy-yards, alongside of the old-time wooden frigates. It is the experience of foreign nations that any type of iron-clad vessel becomes so out of date in about ten years as to be almost useless.
"The use of the torpedo in naval warfare will be greatly developed in the course of the next fifty years. Of the employment of torpedo-boats I have always been a strong advocate; but the lessons of recent history point to the conclusion that small craft of this kind are too vulnerable to be of much practical service, unless for scouting duty, or to steal upon an unsuspecting foe at night. This latter move, indeed, is rendered almost impracticable by the detective search-light. Probably the torpedo-boat of the future will be of considerable size, and will carry a fair battery of rapid-fire guns, so as to be able to put up some sort of fight, while seeking a chance to deliver its more deadly and destructive missile.
"The ship of the future will possess an astonishing activity, traversing immense distances at a high rate of speed, and with a small consumption of fuel. A very notable point about our war-ships of the present day is their low fuel consumption on long voyages; but this has always implied slow going, the coal consumption running up with a startling multiple when speed is increased.
"If my theory be correct, the armored ship of the twentieth century will be regarded, like the mail-clad fighting man, as a relic of the past, and the war-vessel will take its chances in conflict, just as the soldier does to-day. Perhaps the war-ship may retain a light protective coat, very strong for its thickness, but the enormously heavy plates now in use will be dispensed with, simply for the reason that they interfere too much with the activity and serviceableness of the dirigible floating platform which carries the guns. Our new battle-ship, the Kearsarge, carries no less than twenty-seven hundred tons of armor, -- a weight so gigantic as to render her clumsy and sluggish.
"Already our own navy department has come to realize that armor has been overdone, and the thickness of the steel plates is to be much reduced in the newly ordered war-ships. This, unquestionably, is a step in the right direction.
"The increase of our navy depends wholly upon a determination to develop our merchant marine. If the latter is revived, our fighting force on the seas must be increased proportionately, and before the end of the twentieth century we are likely to find ourselves only second in rank among the nations of the world in respect to sea power, Great Britain still holding the first place. But commerce must come before a larger navy; for, lacking the pugnacity of Germany France, and Russia, we are not likely to build up a great fighting force on the ocean merely with a view to making ourselves formidable in a martial sense. Our first duty is to revive our carrying trade in ships suitable for naval service in time of war."
Senator Chandler's last remark suggests a recurrence, not strictly out of keeping with the subject in hand, to the keenly discussed question of paying bounties, to secure the growth of a merchant marine. Mr. Alexander R. Smith, writing in the Forum, in reply to a former Commissioner of Navigation, Captain Bates, closes his argument thus: