NAVAL ADMINISTRATION AND WARFARE Wofks by Capt. A. T. Mahan THE INFLUENCE OF SEA POWER UPON HISTORY. 1660-1783. THE INFLUENCE OF SEA POWER UPON THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND EM- PIRE. Two volumes. SEA POWER IN ITS RELATION TO THE WAR OF 1812. Two volumes. THE LIFE OF NELSON. Two volumes. THE INTEREST OF AMERICA IN SEA POWER. ' LESSONS OF THE WAR WITH SPAIN. THE PROBLEM OF ASIA. RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT. SOME NEGLECTED ASPECTS OF WAR. NAVAL ADMINISTRATION AND WAR- FARE. TYPES OF NAVAL OFFICERS. Naval Administration and Warfare Some General Principles With Other Essays BY CAPTAIN A. T. M AHAN, U. S. N. Author of " The Influence of Sea Power upon History 1 660-1 783," " The Influence of Sea Power upon the French Revolution and Empire," " Sea Power in Its Relations to the War of 181 2," etc. LONDON SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, & COMPANY, LIMITED 1908 Copyright, igo3, by Charles Scribners^ Sons ; Copvris;ht. igoy, by Munn b' Co. Copyright, 1908, by P. F. Collier &= Son; Copyright, 1908, by A Ifred T. Mahan. All rights reserved Published, November, 1908 Electrotyped and Printed at THE COLONIAL PRESS: C. H. Simonds C& Co., Boston, U .S. A. K/7 PREFACE THE somewhat miscellaneous appearance attaching to the collection of articles herein ' republished requires from the author the remark I that he thinks they will be found, by discriminating § readers, to possess in common one characteristic, which however is probably not so immediately obvious as to dispense with indication. The attempt in them has been in all cases to omit details to the utmost possible, in order that atten- t tion may fasten at once more readily and more I certainly upon general principles. The paper ■^ on Subordination in Historical Treatment, for ^instance, is throughout a plea for consideration towards general readers, who have not the time even to read understandingly the mass of detail with which historians are prone now to encumber their narrative. Much less can they work out for J themselves the leading features, the real deter- I minative lines, which become buried under the I accumulation of incidents, like the outlines of an ancient city hidden under the ruin of its buildings. • 3^>l;'34i vi Preface As the common proverb has it, the wood often can- not be seen for the trees. Few persons, probably, have escaped the de- spairing sense of inabihty to find on a map some particular place, because of the thicket of names spread over the surface, like the tanglewood of a forest. Fewer still have been happy enough to look at a map intelligently constructed for the special purpose of showing no more than is needed for the understanding of the subject which the map is intended to illustrate; but those who have had this experience will recognize that the advan- tage is not only that of finding readily a feature, the position of which is approximately known, but also the ease with which can be appreciated the relations of the several parts to one another, and to the whole. The composite effect, when thus obtained for the first time, is illuminative almost to the point of revelation. There is, of course, a class of readers to whom the mastery of details, close knowledge of all in- cidents, is indispensable; but such fall almost entirely under the head of students of history, — or of the particular topic treated, — which is their life work. Because it is their business, their specialty, they must, and they can, find time for minute study; but, in most other subjects than his own, the speciahst is himself a member Preface vii of the general public, and therefore he should the more remember that concerning his specialty the general public can learn, and wishes to learn, only those leading features which enable men to bring the various kinds of knowledge into correlation with one another, and with their own individual careers. The matter is one of utility, and not merely of culture ; for the onward move- ment of the whole body of mankind — which we call ** the public " — is dependent upon each man's thorough, consummate knowledge of his own business, supplemented by an adequate understanding of the occupations and needs of his neighbors. That this is profoundly true of social questions, strictly so-called, will scarcely be disputed; but in some measure, often in large measure, all questions are social, because they affect the common interest of the body politic. Adequate understanding can be had, if the de- termining features of the particular subject are exposed clear of the complication of details which cling to them, and even in part constitute them ; the knowledge of which is obligatory upon the specialist, but to the outsider impedes ac- quirement. I quote here Sir John Seeley, by specialty an historian, but who in his Expansion of England, and Growth of British Policy, gave to his public outlines of historical periods, rudi- viii Preface mentary almost as a skeleton; and thereby en- abled those not masters of the periods in ques- tion to see clearly the controlling conditions, like the single places on a skeleton map, and to appre- ciate those inter-relations of cause and effect which correspond to the determining features of a geographical area. He says: Public under- standing is necessarily guided by a few large, plain, simple ideas. When great interests are plain, and great maxims of government unmis- takable, public opinion may be able to judge securely even in questions of vast magnitude. The present writer is by specialty a naval officer, who has been led by circumstances to give particu- lar attention to Naval History and to its illustra- tions in Naval Warfare. By professional occupa- tion, and by personal choice, he has been immersed in the details pertaining to naval life on the ad- ministrative and military sides. The principal articles following bear upon matters immediately connected with these topics; and in them he has endeavored to follow Seeley's thought, by fasten- ing attention upon what he conceives to be, or to have been, the chief and determinative features in the particular subjects treated. To such treat- ment the matter of date is indifferent. General principles endure; and the illustrations of them, if judiciously selected, are as effective when taken Preface ix from one era as from another. Indeed, it may be claimed that a certain remoteness is desirable, as contributing to clearness; as one may approach a building too closely to appreciate its propor- tions. The activities, prepossessions, and discus- sions, of a current day constitute in themselves de- tails, often non-pertinent details, which go to swell the mass of considerations that obscure perception. Another remark applicable to military opera- tions, and probably to active life in general. While war is waging, much that happens is unknown, or imperfectly known, outside of a very restricted number of persons. This ignorance, whether total or partial, is an element in all con- temporary appreciation of the operations. Spe- cifically, one of the conditions which enters into the decisions of the commander-in-chief of either army is that he commonly must depend upon imperfect information as to the numbers and movements of his opponent. This ignorance of the general is just half that of the outside com- mentator, whom information fails from both sides. It may seem to follow that comment should be postponed; or at all events that, once made, it should be dismissed as obsolete when clearer light is obtained. This, however, is not so; for this imperfect intelligence has been an actual factor in the operations. To know the manner in which X Preface imperfect knowledge, or defective forecast, has affected action is not only necessary to historical accuracy, but serves also to illustrate the value of principles; because a clear eye to principle, a true appreciation of the controlling features of a mili- tary situation, will often correct an inference to which faulty intelligence points, whether the in- ference be that of the responsible general, or of the irresponsible critic. These considerations have justified to the author the reproduction of an article written during the heat of the War between Japan and Russia, without serious alteration by subse- quent knowledge. Substantial additions have been made to the articles. Retrospect on the War between 'Japan and Russia, and The Significance of the Pacific Cruise of the American Fleet, in igo8. The reasons for these, as illustrative of fundamental principles, it is hoped will appear on perusal. They are be- lieved to merit the very special attention and sober consideration of the American people. From the first of these have been also omitted some con- cluding paragraphs, treating the question of the increasing size of battleships; a tendency which the author has regretted and regrets. Progress in this direction has become so emphasized among all naval states since the article was published, that re-treatment would require a mass of detailed Preface xi explanations, foreign to the general purpose of the collection, as above indicated. A paragraph in the body of the article sufficiently summarizes certain general considerations, which can scarcely fail to assert themselves in an ultimate arrest of progress. The author expresses his thanks to the editors and proprietors of the various periodicals in which these articles first appeared for their kind consent to republication. The name of each peri- odical, and the date of issue, will be found in the Table of Contents. The dates under each chapter heading are approximately those of writing; a matter of no particular consequence in this case, but retained to conform with other similar works of the author, where it had some significance. The author desires also to acknowledge his indebtedness to Lieutenant-Commander Lloyd H. Chandler, Aid to Rear-Admiral Robley D. Evans during the cruise of the Atlantic Fleet to San Fran- cisco, for the trouble taken in supplying particular information bearing upon the practical gains to efficiency from this cruise, which has been the object of much ill-instructed and invidious comment. A. T. Mahan. July, igo8. CONTENTS PAGE The Principles of Naval Administration . . , i National Review, June, 1903 The United States Navy Department .... 49 Scribner's Magazine, May, 1903 Principles Involved in the War Between Japan and Russia 87 National Review, September, 1904 Retrospect Upon the War Between Japan and Russia 131 National Review, May, 1906 Objects of the United States Naval War College , 175 An Address at the Annual Opening, August 6, 1888 The Practical Character of the United States Naval War College 215 An Address at the Annual Opening, September 6, 1892 Subordination in Historical Treatment . . , 243 President's Address at the Annual Meeting of the American Historical Association, December 26, 1902 The Strength of Nelson 273 National Review, November, 1905 xiv Contents PAGE The Value of the Pacific Cruise of the United States Fleet, 1908 307 Prospect: The Scientific American, December 7, 1907 Retrospect: Collier's Weekly, August 29, 1908 The Monroe Doctrine 355 National Review, February, 1902 MAP Outline Map of Seat of War in Manchuria , . 173 THE PRINCIPLES OF NAVAL ADMINISTRATION, HISTORICALLY CONSIDERED American and British Systems Compared THE NATIONAL REVIEW, JUNE, I9O3 Naval Administration and Warfare THE PRINCIPLES OF NAVAL ADMINIS- TRATION February^ 19^3 DEFINITION is proverbially difficult, but the effort to frame it tends to elicit fulness and precision of comprehension. What then do we mean by administration in general, and what are the several and diverse conceptions that enter into the particular idea of naval administration ? Considered generally, administration is, I sup- pose, an office committed to an individual, or to a corporate body, by some competent authority, to the end that it may supply a particular want felt. At a point in its historical development a country finds that it needs a navy. To supply the need it institutes an office. For the special purpose it vests so much of its own power as may be necessary in a particular person or persons, and requires that he, or they, supply to it a navy. The original grant of powers carries 4 Naval Administration and Warfare the reasonable implication that they will be main- tained and amplified as occasion requires. That is the duty of the State to the administration it has created; and for that reason the State — which in Great Britain and the United States is ultimately the people — requires to understand what is involved in the office, for the existence and working of which it has made itself respon- sible. It is not, indeed, requisite to follow out all the minutiae of action, but it is essential to com- prehend the several great principles which should receive recognition in the completed scheme; which of them should govern, and which should be subordinate in function. If these relations be properly adjusted, the system is sound and may be trusted to work itself, provided continuous care be taken in the choice of persons. The engine will be good ; but the engineers must be good also. Naval administration has another side, and one more commonly familiar. It faces two ways, towards the nation and towards the service. It ministers to the country a navy; but in so doing it embraces numerous functions, and engages in numerous activities, the object of which is the navy itself, in the supply of all that is needed for its healthy existence. It is to these in their en- tirety that the term naval administration is most commonly appHed. Thus viewed the subject is Principles oj Naval Administration 5 complex and demands a certain amount of analysis; in order that by the recognition of the leading needs and principles involved there may be a clearer understanding of their individual bearings and relative importance. It will be found here, as in most practical callings, that efficiency depends upon a full appreciation of elements which, though essential, are conflicting in tendency, and upon due weight being given to each. Administration being a term of very general application, it will be expected that that of the navy should present close analogies, and even points of identity, with other forms of adminis- tration; for instance, that in it, as elsewhere, efficiency of result will be better secured by individ- ual responsibility than by collective responsibility. But, along with general resemblance, naval ad- ministration is very clearly and sharply differen- tiated by the presence of an element which is foreign to almost all other activities of life in coun- tries like Great Britain and the United States. The military factor is to it not merely incidental, but fundamental; whatever other result may be achieved, naval administration has failed unless it provides to the nation an efficient fighting body, directed by well-trained men, animated by a strong military spirit. On the other hand, many of the operations connected with it differ from those 6 Naval Administration and Warfare common to civil life only in a certain particularity of method. This is true in principal measure of the financial management, of the medical establish- ment, and to a considerable though much smaller degree of the manufacturing processes connected with the production of naval material. The busi- ness routine of even the most military department of a naval administration is in itself more akin to civil than to military life : but it by no means follows that those departments would be better administered under men of civil habits of thought than by those of military training. The method exists for the result, and an efficient fighting body is not to be attained by weakening the appreciation of military necessities at the very fountain head of their supply in the administration. This neces- sary appreciation can be the result only of personal experience of good and bad through the formative period of life. We find, therefore, at the very outset of our inquiry two fundamental yet opposing elements, neither of which can be eliminated. Nor can they be reconciled, in the sense of becoming sympa- thetic. In its proper manifestation the jealousy between the civil and military spirits is a healthy symptom. They can be made to work together harmoniously and efficiently; to complement, not to antagonize each other; provided means Principles of Naval Administration 7 are taken to ensure to each its due relative prece- dence and weight in the determination of practical questions. Historically, the institution and development of naval administration has been essentially a civil process, the object of which has been to provide and keep in readiness a national weapon for war. The end is war — fighting; the instrument is the navy; the means are the various activities which we group under the head of administration. Of these three, the end necessarily conditions the others. The proverb is familiar, " He who wills the end wills the means." Whatever is essential to the spirit and organization of the Navy afloat, to its efiiciency for war, must find itself adequately represented in the administration, in order that the exigencies of fighting may be kept well to the front in governmental and national consideration. Since armies and navies have existed as perma- nent national institutions, there has been a con- stant struggle on the part of the military element to keep the end — fighting, or readiness to fight — superior to mere administrative considerations. This is but natural, for all men tend to magnify their ofiice. The military man having to do the fighting, considers that the chief necessity; the administrator equally naturally tends to think the smooth running of the machine the most ad- 8 Naval Administration and Warfare mirable quality. Both are necessary; but the latter cannot obtain under the high pressure of war unless in peace the contingency of war has dictated its system. There is a quaint, well-worn story, which yet may be new to some readers, of an administrator who complained that his office was working admirably until war came and threw everything out of gear. The opposition between civil and military, necessitating their due adjustment, may be said to be original, of the nature of things. It is born with naval administration. Corresponding roughly to these primary factors are the two principal activities in which administration is exerted — organization and execution. These also bear to each other the relation of means to end. Or- ganization is not for itself, but is a means to an ultimate executive action; in the case of a navy, to war or to the prevention of war. It is, therefore, in its end — war — that organization must find the conditions dictating its character. Whatever the system adopted, it must aim above all at per- fect efficiency in military action; and the nearer it approaches to this ideal the better it is. It would seem that this is too obvious for mention. It may be for mention; but not for reiteration. The long record of naval history on the side of administra- tion shows a constant predominance of other con- Principles of Naval Administration 9 siderations, and the abiding necessity for insisting, in season and out of season, that the one test of naval administration is not the satisfactory or economical working of the office, as such, but the readiness of the navy in all points for war. The one does not exclude the other; but there is between them the relation of greater and less. Both organization and execution are properties alike of the active navy, the instrument for war, and of the naval administration, the means which has been constituted to create and maintain the instrument; but from their respective spheres, and in proportion to their relative nearness to the great final end of war, the one or the other char- acteristic is found predominant. The naval officer on board his ship, face to face with the difficulties of the profession, and in daily contact with the grim implements which remind him of the eventualities of his calling, naturally sees in organization mainly a means to an end. Some indeed fall short. The martinet is a man to whom the organization is more than a means; but he is the exception. Naval administration, on the other hand, in the common acceptation of the term, is mostly office work. It comes into contact with the Navy proper chiefly through official correspondence, less by personal intercourse with the officers concerned; still less by immediate contact with the daily life of 10 Naval Administration and Warfare the profession, which it learns at second hand. It consequently tends to overvalue the orderly routine and observance of the system by w^hich it receives information, transmits orders, checks expenditure, files returns, and, in general, keeps with the service the touch of paper; in short, the organization which has been created for facilitating its own labours. In due measure these are im- peratively necessary; but it is undeniable that the practical tendency is to exaggerate their impor- tance relatively to the executive end proposed. The writer was once visiting a French captain, who in the course of the interview took up wearily a mass of papers from a desk beside him. " I wonder," said he, " whether all this is as bad with you as with us. Look at our Navy Register;" and dividing the pages into two parts, severally about one-sixth and five-sixths of the whole, he continued, "This, the smaller, is the Navy; and that is the Administration." No wonder he had papers galore; administration needs papers, as a mill needs grist. Even in the case of naval officers entering ad- ministrative offices, the influence of prolonged tenure is in the same direction. The habits of a previous lifetime doubtless act as a check, in pro- portion to the strength they have acquired in the individual. They serve as an invaluable leaven. Principles of Naval Administration 11 not only to his own thought but to that of his associates. Nevertheless, the experience is general that permanence in an office essentially civil tends to deaden the intimate appre- ciation of naval exigencies; yet upon this alone can thrive that sympathy between the administrative and executive functions of the navy which is requisite to efficiency. The habit of the arm-chair easily prevails over that of the quarter-deck; it is more comfortable. For this reason, in the best considered systems, a frequent exchange between the civil and military parts of their profession, between the administrative offices and the army or fleet, is thought expedient for officers who show aptitude for the former. It is better for them personally, better for the adminis- tration, and consequently better for the service at large. It prevails extensively in the United States Navy, where it is frequently the subject of ill- instructed outside criticism on the score of sea- officers being on " shore duty." Without asserting that the exact proportions of service are always accurately observed, it may be confidently affirmed that the interchange between the civil and military occupations tends to facilitate the smooth working of both, by promoting mutual understanding of conditions and difficulties. The subject of this paper is not the navy, al- 12 Naval Administration and Warfare though that as a mihtary organization has neces- sarily its own interior administration. What we have here to consider is an organization essentially civil, although it has naval men as individual members and a military body as the subject of its activities. In the United States the naval adminis- tration has thus been continuously regarded as a civil occupation, under the two principal forms given it since the adoption of the Constitution. In its origin, in 1798, the Secretary of the Navy was the sole functionary and a member of the President's Cabinet. The Board of Naval Com- missioners, which from 18 15 to 1842 was charged with all the ministerial duties under the Secretary, was composed of three naval captains; but when one of them, Captain Charles Morris, was selected for a temporary command at sea, he insisted upon resigning his office of Commissioner, because " I believed that the exercise of the military duties of a captain, whilst holding a district commission of a civil character, would be exceedingly dis- agreeable to the feelings of the officers, even if legal." When the Board of Naval Commissioners gave way to the Bureau System which now exists, the same civil character inhered, and incumbents of Bureaus were at times taken directly from civil life. In the British Navy the understanding was the same concerning the civil nature of duties Principles of Naval Administration 13 assumed by naval officers unders the organization which we call Naval Administration. One of the earliest notable incidents of Nelson's life, when a young captain, was a flat refusal to obey the order of an officer much his senior, when holding the local position of a Dockyard Commissioner in the civil administration of the Navy. The administration of the British Navy in this and cognate matters was then in fact distinctly styled " civil." It had a large history, char- acterized through great part of its course by incessant struggle with the military administra- tion, either incorporate in the single person of the Lord High Admiral, or more usually placed in commission as the Board of Admiralty. The latter was nominally superior, but commonly strove in vain to assert its authority against an interest strongly entrenched in a traditional posi- tion. In the United States there never has been such formal duality of functions as was produced by the gradual evolution of the British system, which, like the British Constitution, rather grew than was framed. The effect in the latter, by the exist- ence of the two Boards, was to illustrate and inten- sify an antagonism always sufficiently rooted in the opposition between civil and military. Thence resulted practical evils which finally compelled 14 Naval Administration and Warfare the formal abolition of the Civil Board, and the transfer of its duties to the Board of Admiralty, suitably reinforced for that purpose by a number of subordinate technical experts, not members of the Board, and no longer so associated together as to hold the power of concerted action which attaches to an organic group. There was thus restored, or it should rather be said established, the unity essen- tial to all military administration; the unity in this case of a single, regularly constituted Board. From this, however, the logic of facts has gradu- ally evolved the accepted principle of a supreme in- dividual responsibility, that of the First Lord, who is a member of the Government. He is responsible for all the business of the Admiralty; while each of the other members has his separate functions, for the discharge of which he is responsible to the First Lord, although, as we are informed by a recent high authority, " this responsibility is not easy to define." In Great Britain, therefore, as in the United States, one man is now ultimately responsible; the Secretary of the Navy in the one State, the First Lord in the other. The difference between the two systems is that the United States Secretary, belonging to no Board, has to deal with subordi- nates only, not with associates. The First Lord, as member of the Board, which assembles fre- Principles of Naval Administration 15 quently, necessarily meets his assistants not merely singly, but together; thus undergoing an influence much weightier and more complex than that of consulting at convenience single men, each of whom appears before him strong only in his natural strength of character, modified by the military habit of submission. We are told of Sir Robert Walpole that he avoided as much as possible calling Cabinet councils, lest they should furnish the elements of an opposition. The First Lord doubtless may absent himself from the meetings of the Board, if he will, but the spirit of the system would in that case be violated. Like the American Secretary of the Navy, he is, by custom now almost invariable, a civilian. Regarding the expert professional members of the naval admin- istration as subordinate, as they properly are in both systems, it is evident that the British tends to a greater influence of the military element. It is, however, influence, not authority; two powers of very different natures. There appears to be in practice considerable indeterminateness as to the executive functions of the Admiralty Board as a body, an absence of definition charac- teristically English; but the single ultimate re- sponsibility of the First Lord necessarily carries with it single uncontrolled authority. Without that it is idle to speak of responsibility. 16 Naval Administration and Warfare In main outline, both systems consist of a single responsible civil head with a number of professional subordinates, among whom are apportioned the several executive duties of the naval administra- tion. The British provides in addition, by dis- tinct implication and by usual practice, a con- sultative body, which does not exist in the Ameri- can. Although it is, of course, open to any Ameri- can Secretary to call such into being for his own assistance, its opinions would not give him, being its creator, the moral support, nor exert over him the influence, that inheres in one established by statute. This diflFerence tends to emphasize the single responsibility of the United States Secretary of the Navy, and probably has the result of pro- ducing in him a greater sense of accountability. He has no associates; the British First Lord has. It is interesting to note that each method repro- duces the specific political genius of the nation. In the United States the executive power of the general government rests explicitly in one man; so also that of the Navy Department. In Great Britain the executive government rests in a Com- mittee of Parliament, of whom one is Prime Minister; the administration of the navy is also technically " in commission," whatever may be the practical outcome as to responsibility. There is yet another result of the Board system Principles of Naval Administration 17 as compared with ours, in that an officer of experi- ence writing about it can say, " There is no real separation of the duties of the Lords of the Ad- miralty; they are not heads of departments rigidly defined; the operations they superintend are closely inter-related." " The happy constitution of the Board enables it to handle a mass of business now grown to vast complexity, without splitting it up into over-specialized departments, presided over by independent chiefs with duties and offices sharply and precisely defined." The contrast here is pronounced; for while the duties of the bureau- chiefs, who are the professional subordinates of the American civil head of department, are neces- sarily closely inter-related, because concerning the same common profession, they are nevertheless sharply defined, and their chiefs mutually inde- pendent. This condition emphasizes their indi- vidual responsibility; but it also fosters a separate- ness of interest and of action which by some officers in the United States Navy has been con- sidered to be a fruitful cause of bad adminis- tration. The unifying force is not the consultation and interaction of a Board, but the authority of a single head; and he, being frequently inexpert in naval practical life, is not always best fitted to comprehend the relative value of technical or military points, or to adjust to the best advantage 18 Naval Administration and Warfare of the service the conflicting demands which the bureau-chiefs represent. We are here in presence of a great difficulty of naval administration; w^hich is, to attain and pre- serve substantial unity of executive action, while at the same time providing for the distribution among several individuals of a mass of detailed duties, beyond the power of one man to discharge. This need of unity applies not only to high con- siderations of policy, or a few larger questions of administration. It enters into every dockyard, and above all into every component unit of the fleet. In the United States seven bureaus have a part and a claim in every ship that is planned. When it is remembered that the necessarily con- tracted capacity of a ship of war has made the disposition of space in every period a difficult problem, it will be understood that in our day, of complicated construction and armament, we have in the various bureau demands the elements of a conflict that may aptly be called intestine. To this must be added, qualifying and, to some extent, contesting the whole result, the military requirements of the navy outside of the admin- istration, which has the combatant duties pressing upon its attention. Nautical quahties, armament and armour, speed, coal capacity, provisions and stores, accommodation of crew, sanitary provision, Principles of Naval Administratimi 19 all these, with many details attendant on each, have their special representative in the central general administration. Beyond these, but not specifically represented there, is the military body, which demands, or should demand, observance of the pre-eminent consideration that the ship should be in all respects fitted fi^r the special function she is to fulfil in a fleet; that cruisers, for instance, should not only be fast, but in all things contrived for celerity in their actions; that battle- ships, being meant to act together, should not only be individually good, but essentially homogeneous, especially in tactical qualities. In the report of one of the early American Secretaries it was noted, as being to the grave discredit of the Civil Admin- istration of the British Navy, that the existence of " numerous distinct classes of the same rate, as well in their hulls as in masts, sails, and equip- ment, and in a still greater degree in their qualities for combined action, demonstrates the prevalence of caprice and prejudice, instead of science and system." Even the interchange of parts and of stores, between vessels of the same class, upon which he further comments, though perhaps less important to-day, is a consideration not out of date. Over all hovers, not unhealthfully, the consider- ation of expense. A very high official in a navy 20 Naval Administration and Warfare which entrusts to a naval officer the final decisions as to the assemblage of qualities said once to me: " With practically unlimited money, such as your lucky nation can give, one may go to extremes in experiments; but limited as we are in means, and with large establishments, it is necessary to digest ideas, to compromise on size, and to settle on a type." In the support thus given to unity of design, in ensuring a just predominance to military considerations, considerations that think first of the day of battle, of the months of campaign, of the services of the scout, of the evolutions of the fleet, of the need for numbers as well as for individual size, it can be seen that the pressure of economy may be an invaluable ally. The two great oppositions inherent in naval administration — civil versus military, unity of action against multiplicity of activities — are but a reflection of the essential problem of warfare. A saying has been attributed by Thiers to the great Napoleon, that the difficulty of the Art of War consists in concentrating in order to fight, and disseminating in order to subsist. There is no other, he said, aphoristically. The problem is one of embracing opposites. That we have here on the one hand unity of action, and on the other diffusion of activities, in the harmonious combina- tion of which the problem of war consists, is Principles of Naval Administratimi 21 probably plain enough; but it may be less obvious how the civil element enters where all is apparently mihtary. Nevertheless it is there in full adminis- trative force. The army concentrated to fight is the army unified in the final action for which it exists; the military element in full vigour and predominance, the question of subsistence reduced for the moment to the barest minimum, yet not even so wholly discarded. The army disseminated to subsist is a force for which unity of action is temporarily subordinated to the exigency that so many men cannot live on the resources of a narrow district, in which it camps or through which it marches, nor conveniently receive even its own daily supplies from a single centre. Given over now chiefly to subsisting, against the next call for action, the administrative bodies, civil in func- tion if military in rank, assume the predominant role. Nevertheless, even here military necessity exercises the prior control; for the position of the several corps, if stationary, or the lines of march of the several columns, if in movement, must be so disposed that concentration may be effected with a rapidity which shall defy an enemy's at- tempt to strike any division in detail. This mili- rary requirement, though latent, subjects to itself the whole administrative regulation, whatever the inconvenience. 22 Naval Administration and Warfare In operations of actual war the predominance of the military end in view is easily maintained, and is personified in the officer in chief command. The principle is settled that in the field all purely administrative bodies, commonly called staff corps, are under his orders. It is less easy in peace to ensure the due balance between the end and the means; between the action, and the activities which underlie action. Administration then be- comes the bigger and more imposing activity, with an increasing tendency to exist for itself rather than for the military purposes which are its sole reason for existence. One of the greatest military administrators afloat that the British Navy has ever known was Admiral the Earl of St. Vincent. Yet, when peace supervened during his tenure of office as First Lord, preoccupation with economies of administration so prevailed with him that, when war broke out again, the material of the Navy in ships and stores was so deteriorated and exhausted as to impair dangerously the effi- ciency of the fleets. It is not that the head has ceased to be military, for in war as in peace the military as well as the administrative head of the navy may be a civil official, as he now is in Great Britain and the United States; but warlike action having ended, the importance of keeping military necessities predominant is gradually sub- i Principles of Naval Administration 23 jected to other considerations. Yet in that pre- dominance, in whatever way assured, is to be found the unifying principle of a mihtary ad- ministration. In the due relation and subordi- nation of the two ideas, mihtary and civil, unity of action with distribution of activities too copious for one man's discharge, consists the problem of military and of naval administration. It involves execution, concerning which it is a com- monplace to say that in its greatest efficiency it is the function of one solely responsible; and it involves also organization, which by its very name implies multiplicity, for organization is an assemblage of organs among which functions are apportioned. As usual, history sheds an illuminative ray on this subject by its narrative of progress. Where a naval administrative system is the result of a natural evolution, it will usually be found to begin on a small scale, in the hands of a single person. It has then but one organ, however many the functions. As it progresses in scope and number of activities, its functions differentiate more and more and it is led to evolve organs. In the process the two ideas which we have noted will be found not only to exist, but to conflict perpetually. The subordinate functions embodied in the problem of maintenance, however distributed, tend ever 24 Naval Administration and Warfare to assert their independence of one another and of the end for which they severally and collect- ively exist. The complaint of this tendency is a part of naval history, and finds its natural voice in the military sea-going body, because that is the chief sufferer. The naval administration of Great Britain, originating in a poHtical organization of much lov^er type than nov^ obtains, and so continuing for centuries, affords the best example of a purely natural evolution, controlled by circumstances, the successive steps of vs^hich can be very briefly told. Collated with that of the United States, the contrast illustrates by comparison. In the reign of John is first found a single official, called the Clerk of the Ships. He had from time to time subordinates; but as a matter of organiza- tion he stood alone, charged with all the duties connected with the maintenance of the king's ships. The navy, so far as it existed independ- ently of a temporary assemblage of merchant vessels for a particular purpose, was then re- garded less as national than as the personal prop- erty of the sovereign. This very rudimentary civil administration lasted to the days of Henry Vni., who throughout his life interested himself directly in the development of naval material; partly from political recognition of the value and Principles of Naval Administration 25 scope of a navy for England, partly through personal bent. Mr. Oppenheim, the most search- ing investigator in this field, v^rites : *' For almost thirty-eight years, nearly every year marked some advance in construction or ad- ministration, some plan calculated to make the navy a more effective fighting instrument." This close association w^ould naturally make the ruler av^are when the existing administrative sys- tem had become inadequate to the extension it had received. Hence, in the last year of his reign, Henry constituted a board of five oflScers, civil functionaries, among whom were distributed the various administrative duties. To this, with considerable interruptions under the first Stuarts and the Commonwealth, the care and develop- ment of the material of the navy was intrusted for nearly three centuries. The members were known as the Principal Oflftcers, and later as the Navy Board, their work being done under the superintendence of the sovereign, directly or through a minister. The head of the navy as a mihtary force was the Lord High Admiral; but in early days that oflBcer was not necessarily expert in naval material, not necessarily a seaman at all, nor the office itself continuous. He was there- fore entirely at a disadvantage in maintaining his side of any technical contention. 26 Naval Administration and Warfare This condition lasted till the Restoration, when the Duke of York, afterwards James II., became Lord High Admiral. He was a seaman of good administrative ability, and with the personal prestige of royal blood. He revived the Navy Board under his own control. When deprived of his position, because a Roman Catholic, the office of Lord High Admiral was placed in com- mission; an Admiralty Board, military in char- acter, succeeded to the authority which the Duke had established. From this time there were the two Boards, the Admiralty and the Navy, the military and the civil. The former was nominally superior; but the latter, vv^hich comprised sub- stantially all that we call naval administration, being older and well established, succeeded in maintaining a position which has been character- ized as of more than semi-independence. The result was a divided control, and antagonism between the two which represented respectively the civil and military functions; nor was this lessened by the fact that members of the Navy Board were not infrequently sea officers, who thus passed into a civil occupation, practically abandon- ing their former profession. The fault inhered in the system. Divided control means divided responsibility; and that in turn means no responsibility, or at Principles of Naval Administratio7i 27 least one very hard to fix. The abuses that grew up, especially in the dockyards, the effect of which of course was transmitted to the navy that depended upon them, led to a loud outcry throughout the service towards the end of the eighteenth century; but horses are not swapped when crossing streams, and the exigencies of the great wars which ended in 1815 made it long impossible to attempt the revolutionary change needed. This was carried out in 1832 by the Government which came in with the Reform Bill of 1830. The spirit of the innovation was sum- marized in the expression, " Individual (undi- vided) Responsibility." The Navy Board dis- appeared altogether. The civil functions which in the process of centuries had accumulated in its hands, and had culminated by successive additions into a very numerous and loose aggre- gation of officials, were concentrated into five heads, having separate and independent respon- sibilities; in this resembling the Chiefs of Bureau in the United States Naval Administration. Each of the five was specifically under one of the mem- bers of the Admiralty Board, who thus represented that particular interest of the Navy in the Board regarded as a consultative body. Admiral Sir Vesey Hamilton writes : '* This was a consolida- tion of functions and a subordination of the civil 28 Naval Administration and Warfare branches to the Admiralty as a whole . . . under the Board of Admiralty collectively and under the Lords individually." While the First Lord is a civilian, the majority of the other members of the Admiralty are naval officers. Authority, therefore, is in civil hands, while military influence enters strongly. While I highly appreciate the value of this latter factor, particularly as the sea lords do not consequently give up their profession, but remain actively connected with it, it appears to my ob- servation of human nature that the system has some of the disadvantages of a council of war, tend- ing to make responsibility elusive. I question, in short, the entire soundness of a scheme which by its nature, if not by specific provision, inclines to place executive action in the hands of a con- sultative body. It seems to sap individual re- sponsibility; not perhaps in subordinates, but, what is much worse, in the head, in the com- mander-in-chief of the administration, upon whom depend the great determinative lines of provi- sion and of policy. In conception, the Admiralty is primarily a Board, secondarily individual members. For individual responsibility at the head, too much depends upon the personality of the First Lord, too little upon his position. Since these lines were first written, five years ago, Principles of Naval Administration 29 it may fairly be inferred, from the language of the English Press, that very decisive changes of policy have been adopted which are attributed popularly, and even professionally, to the dominating influ- ence of one of the " Sea " Lords. During a brief period in 1827, as two centuries before, an arrange- ment more formally ideal obtained. The Duke of Clarence, afterwards Wilham IV., being ap- pointed Lord High Admiral, the Admiralty Board lapsed as a board and became his council. The modification here made in deference to royal blood might well serve as a model for naval ad- ministration; a head with advisers feels respon- sibility more than a head with associates. It should go without saying that in any case the head must be good. In the United States Naval Administration the head is one man, with no division of responsibility. His own superior, the President, may control his action, as may Congress by law; but this, as far as it goes, is simply a transfer of responsibility in its entirety. It is not a division. The Secretary of the Navy has no associates, but he has sub- ordinates. In them he has capable advisers, so far as he chooses to use them ; but he can transfer to them no responsibiHty, except that of doing as he tells them. The responsibility of decision is his alone. The law constitutes them subordinate 30 Naval Administration and Warfare executive officers, just as it constitutes a lieutenant in the navy; but it does not constitute them ad- visers, and there is in their position nothing which compels the Secretary to hear their advice, still less to accept it. Each is independent of the others, and there is nothing in law to compel conference between them. The Secretary may assemble them, or any number of them, as a board for consultation, in his presence or otherwise; but there is nothing in the system which obhges him to do so. Unity of action between several naval technical experts, each of whom is repre- sented in the planning and maintenance of every naval vessel, and some in every element of naval military efficiency, depends entirely upon the co-ordinating force of the Secretary, who is a civilian, possibly with only more or less outside knowledge of the subject. The system provides no strictly professional unifying force, such as the Board of Admiralty, which has a numerical preponderance of combatant sea-officers, each of whom has in individual control one or more of the technical administrative departments, and may be supposed therefore to be fully informed of its arguments in any technical matter under discussion. The constitution of the Admiralty Board also ensures that all technical details and their effect upon naval efficiency shall be scruti- Principles of Naval Administration 31 nized from the point of view of the men who shall do the work of war. The American plan fixes the very strictest individual responsibility in the Secretary, and in his principal subordinates, the chiefs of bureau. His duties are universal and supreme, theirs sharply defined and mutually independent. This result appears to me superior to the British, but it has the defects of its qualities; not too much independence in responsibility, but, so far as the system goes, too little co-ordination. As I said of the responsibility of the First Lord, unity of action depends too much on the person- ality of the Secretary. The naval administration of the United States has also a history; one less of evolution than of successive methods, compressed within a very few years. The evolution has been simply a progressive experience, with results formulated in ordinances. The navy of the War of Inde- pendence disappeared entirely, and with it the several systems upon which Congress had at- tempted to administer it. In the first organiza- tion of the new Government, no provision was made for a navy. When the truce between Portu- gal and Algiers in 1793 took from American ship- ping in the Mediterranean the incidental protec- tion of the Portuguese navy, it was resolved to build six frigates; but as this was to be only a 32 Naval Administration and Warfare temporary force, not to be continued in case a peaceful arrangement with the piratical community could be made, the administrative care of the vessels was attached to the War Department. It was not until the oppression of the French Revolutionary Government upon neutral com- merce culminated in the decree of January, 1798, making any neutral vessel lawful prize if it had on board a single article of English origin, that the United States determined to have a navy. On April 27, 1798, Congress authorized the President to build, or to obtain, twelve vessels of a force not exceeding twenty-two guns each; and on April 30 the office of Secretary of the Navy was established by law. The first Secretary entered on his duties the following June. Until the close of the War of 1 8 1 2, the Secretary in person, like the Clerk of the Ships, was the naval admin- istration. He no doubt had assistants and ob- tained assistance, technical and military, from experts of both classes ; but function had not yet differentiated into organization, and he not only was responsible, but had to give personal attention to various and trivial details of most diverse char- acter, which overburdened him by their mass, and prevented concentration of attention upon the really great matters of his office. A difficulty such as this of course reached its height under the pressure Principles of Naval Administration 33 of war, and led to the first statutory expansion of the system. The duties of the Secretary, as a later incumbent of the office wrote, arrange them- selves under two distinct heads. First in impor- tance are those connected with the more compre- hensive interests of the State, the general policy of the navy involved in the increase of the fleet, its employment and distribution when created. Subordinate to these are the functions connected with the construction, equipment, and mainte- nance of naval force; the designing, building, arming, and manning of ships. These latter are strictly technical; but the policy is not. It there- fore may be adequately grasped by a person with- out antecedent professional requirements, which the Secretary often must be. In this analysis it is easy to recognize the dual functions of the British Admiralty and Navy Board before consolidation. It is correct as far as it goes, and was sufficiently comprehensive for the time, 1842, when it was written. The naval seaman then might, and very shortly before did, receive the ship from the builder a bare shell; he was expected to be able to mast her, rig her, stow her, mount her guns, bend her sails, as well as to take her to sea, handle her, and fight her. The military and technical parts of the profession were so closely entwined in the same men that to i 34 Naval Administration and Warfare suggest a distinction between them, however real, would have seemed superfluous. Even in those days of very simple construction and armament, however, the evil effects of valuing the technical above the military was anticipated by some. " Keep them at sea," said Lord St. Vincent, " and they cannot help being seamen; but care must be taken to ensure efficiency at the guns." In 1812 neglect of this wise maxim showed its results to the British. Since 1842 the immense technical advances in all matters connected with naval construction, propulsion, and armament have tended, by their exaltation of the technical con- tribution to naval power, to depreciate in popular recognition the element of military efficiency. Yet, so long as navies remain they will exist for fighting; the military considerations being the end, they must necessarily continue supreme. Naval administration, to be successful, must in its constitution reflect this condition. A necessary antecedent to doing so is the intellectual apprecia- tion of the relation of civil to military in a service essentially military; and not merely in the internal politics of a nation. Upon this must follow formal provision for the due representation of both in the system. This is doubly requisite, because administration, being essentially civil in Principles of Naval Administration 35 function, will not of itself evolve military energy. This must be injected by design. The American naval captains of 1 8 15 had shown themselves thorough masters in practice of all sides of their profession, technical and military. They had learned in experience the essential underlying principles affecting the nautical quali- ties of ships, as distinguished from the mechanical processes of putting them together by the ship builder. They, therefore, were fitted to oversee the part of administration " connected with the construction of naval force," as well as the " equip- ment and maintenance." To entrust this duty to one of them, or to a board of several, was a recourse so natural that in 1801 it had been recommended by the first Secretary, after two years incumbency. " The business of the Navy De- partment embraces too many objects for the superintendence of one person. The public in- terest has suffered. The establishment of a board of three or five experienced navy officers to super- intend such parts of the duties as nautical men are best qualified to understand would be a saving to the public." Such a board, by the authority that attaches to a constituted organ as distinct from the purely personal, unorganized, and un- authorized efforts of single officers, might have saved the country from the gigantic administrative 36 Naval Administration and War] are mistake, essentially military in its effects on effi- ciency, of building gunboats to the exclusion of seagoing ships; locking up in a body of two hun- dred vessels, impotent, singly and collectively, officers and men sufficient, by a later Secretary's report, to man thirteen ships-of-the-line. The recommendation of 1801 fell fruitless. There followed eight years of a President who held navies in abhorrence, as at the best barely tolerable evils. The War of 18 12, with the vastly increased burden laid upon the Secretary, em- phasized the necessity of relief By an Act of February 7, 18 15, there was constituted a Board of Navy Commissioners, placed explicitly under the superintendence of the Secretary; to act as his agent, or, to use the terms of the Act, " to discharge all the ministerial duties " of his office, to which further it was expressly " attached." Subordination could scarcely be more distinctly affirmed. Its composition was purely military, three sea-officers of the rank of captain, then the highest in the Navy; but its duties were civil in character, and to define them the Act quoted verbatim the terms of the law of 1798, which created the Secretary's own position : " All matters connected with the naval establishment of the United States." The " establishment " is the entire organization of the navy, dockyards and Principles of Naval Administration 37 ships, material and personnel, from inception to completion, considered apart from its active use for national policy. The use of this com- pleted instrument is a military attribute, and is, of course, in the hands of the constitu- tional Commander-in-Chief, the President, who may exercise his office through the Secretary or such other person as he selects. There was much good in this plan. It preserved the single accountability of the Secretary, provided him with the responsible assistance of a compe- tent board of experts, and secured due influence to military considerations in a quarter where they tend to disappear. The grave defect was that the Board's responsibility was collective, not individual; and its action in all matters was joint, not several. There was no division of execu- tive functions. Everything done was the act of all. It needs but httle experience of life to know that under such circumstances decision is inevi- tably slow, that action shares the defect, and that the more positive and the firmer the individual members in their convictions, the more dilatory the machine, by the protraction of discussion. Ordinarily, in practice, some corrective is found in the disposition of one or more of any three to submit to the stronger character of another; and one or two will take the most of the work for ^ iS'ljt^^ 38 Naval Administration and Warfare the sake of exercising all the power. But such a result neither removes the evil of a joint responsi- bility, nor attains the beneficial result of dividing the administrative labor. Responsibility, which should be single, was divided among three; and activities beyond the ability of one, instead of being apportioned, remained the charge of all, and therefore of each. Thus examined, the legislation of 1 8 15 is seen to signalize the second step in the process of evolution, which it would seem must characterize the process of a military administration that springs from and follows the natural development of national wants. First the one man, the agent of the government; the seed in which, for the time, are embraced all the potential administrative functions. These in last analysis are reduced to two — the civil and military; all purely technical work falling under the former head. As the office grows, and outstrips the knowledge and power of one man, the next step is to provide him a body of assistants to take upon them severally and col- lectively the distinctively technical work, which the actual incumbent, either through ignorance or pressure of occupation, is unable to discharge. The Principal Officers of Henry VIII. represent the same stage as the Navy Commissioners of the United States. Principles of Naval Administration 39 This first differentiation brings out at once the fact that, whatever the personal status of the chief, whether civil or mihtary, his office is essen- tially military; for in the distribution of functions there is necessarily reserved to his immediate care just those which are essentially military : the direc- tion of the navy, when created. All that relates to the establishment, to the creation and mainte- nance of the fleet and dockyards, is the particular charge of the technical assistants; and this is essen- tially a civil function, even though the officers entrusted with it be military men. This is the essence of the step taken by Henry VIII., when he called into being the Principal Officers, who became the Navy Board. In the then compara- tively simple organization of the state, the sover- eign, who was the actual principal and head of the office, instituted in the place of a single inexpert official a body of technical expert agents, answer- able to himself in person, or to his representative. In the military direction they had no share; it remained in his hands, to be exercised directly or by such person as he might designate. Quite unconsciously, in both the British and American navies, by the simple logic of facts and felt neces- sities, and not as a result of previous analysis, the first expansion comes by aiding the head of the navy in the technical cares of the establishment, 40 Naval Administration and Warfare and leaving to him in their entirety the military attributes of the service. Althoujrh the American Secretary is by personal status a civilian, and retains full supervisory control of all technical matters, his immediate duties are comprehen- sively military. They have so remained since the first expansion of his administrative staff. The tree of naval administration in the United States had thus begun to grow. It had put forth a stem in which were latent the branches that were yet to be. The merits and defects of the scheme have been indicated. The lapse of time emphasized shortcomings, and gave rise to com- plaints which increased yearly in volume. The Secretary, however, could maintain a judicial attitude towards the whole controversy, because it involved simply the best means of giving him the technical assistance needed. His official supremacy had been preserved, and was not threatened. In the discussion preceding the Act of 1 815, the suggestion that he should be, ex- officio, the president of his board of technical experts, had been advanced by Commodore Decatur, whose distinguished name was supported in this by the equally strong ones of Perry, War- rington, and David Porter. The proposition was renewed in Congress in 1820, but the committee to whom it was referred placed the matter sue- Principles of Naval Administration 41 cinctly on the proper basis. " If the Secretary were a constituted part of the Board," a member among other members, " and at the same time possessed the control and superintendence of its proceedings, the commissioners would be little more than advisory, and in that proportion bereft of responsibility." If, on the contrary, he was simply a presiding officer, with a casting vote, " the benefit derived from the superintendence of one officer over others, under distinct responsibihties, would be entirely lost." The corporate direct responsibility of the Board, under and to the Secretary, had been thus by statute preserved distinct and unimpaired. Later secretaries were therefore able to discuss the ques- tion of modification without sense of personal jealousy, as distinguished from official interest; and the change which constituted the next stage of development was recommended on the ground of well-proved faults in the system, not in individ- uals. " Not only has there been defect of individ- ual responsibility to the public, but a vast accumu- lation of labor; since each member, being an- swerable alike for the action of the whole, became equally involved in an obligation to take personal cognizance of everything that was done. Under these circumstances it has been impossible to go through the great and increasing mass of business 42 Naval Administration and Warfare which inevitably devolved upon them with the decision and promptitude required." As the nation grew the naval administration had ex- panded; and inherent errors of system, tolerable on a small scale, became unendurable on a large. Mr. Paulding, the Secretary, whose words written in 1839 have just been quoted, recom- mended the adoption of measures to ensure in- dividual responsibility, which, it will be recalled, was the watchword of the corresponding change of system in the British administration in 1832. He emphasized also the need of a division of labor, *' a classification and distribution of duties," which likewise was a distinct, though not the dominant, note of the British reformation. In this third stage of evolution there continues in the two nations the parallelism of cause and effect noted in the second. The action of each, however, was modified by its constitutional tradition, and the American was more radical than the British. The board system disappeared altogether, giving place to that of bureaus, mutually independent. No statutory provision for their co-operation exists, except in the supreme control of the Secre- tary. The essence of the new system was the constitution, under a single head, of several dis- tinct agents, with duties sharply defined, and with individual responsibility. Among these was to Principles of Naval Administration 43 be divided a mass of work, hitherto in charge of a single body, which both in executive action and in responsibihty had been collective, not in- dividual. The details of this system, which still obtains, are relatively unimportant; but a brief statement of their historical development throws light upon the general problem of naval administration. Mr. Paulding recommended three bureaus, cor- responding in number to the former commission- ers. To one he assigned the construction, equip- ment, and maintenance of ships of war; to the second the maintenance and development of navy yards, hospitals, magazines, etc. ; to the third the purchase, manufacture, and supply of stores of all kinds to the navy. These will be seen to correspond to (i) the naval establishment afloat, (2) to that ashore, and (3) to the furnishing of supplies for both. Over each of the first two he placed a sea-ofl'icer, with one technical subordin- ate; this assistant to the first to be a naval con- structor, to the second a civil engineer. For the third bureau there was to be a " chief," — a term evidently chosen to admit a civilian, — and under him three technical subordinates, viz. : a naval captain as inspector of ordnance, a naval captain as hydrographer, and a surgeon to super- intend the provision of medical stores. This 44 Naval Administration and Warfare differentiation of the duties of the Board into three branches represents a minimum of change; while the association of technical subordinates to each of the three heads so much resembles the British Admiralty scheme of 1832 as to suggest ir- resistibly that the Secretary had had this under consideration; as he very properly might. His successor, however, thought that the duties thus distributed would be too much for the several bureaus; and of course individual responsibility, though expressed by statute, ceases to be actual when the load imposed is more than one man can bear. This raises again the question, irrepressible because one of proportion, between unity of action and a distribution of activities, framed to ensure individual responsibility. The more numerous the bureaus, the more numerous the discordant wills and interests that must be made to act to- gether; but if they be too few, and their several charges too weighty, there results for the chiefs, as for the Secretary before 18 15, the necessity of devolving work on non-responsible subordinates. Responsibility lapses. The present (1903) Con- gress has had to review the same line of thought, with reference to the proposition of a recent Secre- tary to consolidate three of the bureaus now exist- ing. Consolidation would tend to bring their Principles of Naval Administration 45 several activities into harmony; but on the other hand there is the question w^hether the whole might not be too much for one man's reasonable responsibihty. It is to be remembered that the responsibihty of a bureau chief is more precise, more detailed and immediate, than the general responsibility of the Secretary, just because the field allotted to him is restricted. There is the further question, more urgent in public than in private business, as to the amount of pov^er in- volving expenditure to be left in a single hand. After discussion, Congress in 1842 established five bureaus, and in 1862, under the pressure of the War of Secession, increased them to eight, the num- ber which now exists. The history of the consider- ations which governed this further development, though instructive and useful, is not essential. When first instituted, it was stated specifically that the bureaus were not intended to perform any more or different duties than those heretofore entrusted to the Board of Commissioners. As the functions of the latter had been defined, in 1 815, in words taken from the Act of 1798, con- stituting the office of Secretary of the Navy, continuity of legislation was preserved through- out; above all in the important matter of not impairing the sole control of the Secretary. The aim was simply to facilitate business by a division 46 Naval Administration and Warfare of labor, ensuring at the same time personal responsibility everywhere. It is to the spirit, and the underlying principles, that I have thought it instructive to direct atten- tion, rather than to the details of their application, in the subdivision of administrative work. It has been wisely observed by Sir John Seeley that " public understanding is necessarily guided by a few large, plain, simple ideas. When great inter- ests are plain, and great maxims of government unmistakable, public opinion may be able to judge securely even in questions of vast magnitude.'* The United States system of naval administration has progressed successively, and without breach of legislative continuity, from the simple rudi- mentary organ, the one man, in whom all func- tions as well as all responsibility were centred, through the phase of a complex organ with aggre- gate functions and responsibilities, defined, but still undifferentiated, into an organization elabo- rate in form, if not final in development. The process has been from first to last consistent in principle. The sole control and single responsi- biHty of the Secretary — the representative of the President — have been preserved throughout, and all other responsibiHty is, and has been, not only subordinate to him but derivative from him, as a branch derives its being from the root. Moreover, Principles of Naval Administration 47 consistency has also been maintained in restrict- ing the administration thus evolved to the civil function which it essentially is. From the first departure, in the institution of the Board of Com- missioners, to the present time, it has not had military authority properly so called. It has had necessary authority in matters pertaining to a military establishment, but it has had no direction of activities in themselves essentially military; that has remained with the Secretary, and is by him transferred only to officers properly military in function. Finally, the principle of particular responsibility has been strictly followed. Within the limits of the duty assigned, the corporate responsibility of the Board in its day was, and the individual responsibility of each bureau chief now is, as certain and defined as that of the Secretary. The defect of the system is that no means is provided for co-ordinating the action of the bu- reaus, except the single authority of the Secretary. This, in his beginning days of inexperience, to- gether with his preoccupations with the numerous collateral engagements attendant upon all posi- tions of public responsibility, will most usually be inadequate to the task. To indicate a defect is not to prescribe a remedy; and the purpose of this article is to show things as they are, not to advocate particular changes. One of the ablest 48 Naval Administration and Warfare administrative sea-officers, both afloat and ashore, that I have knov^n in my professional career, stated before a Congressional committee that he had " always believed it v^ould be v^ise to have a board of five officers for the purpose of harmoniz- ing difficulties between bureaus, settling upon a ship-building policy, and other matters that embarrass the head of the Department on account of a lack of professional knowledge." I do not undertake to pass an opinion upon this particular suggestion, but confine myself to remarking that the fault in the system certainly exists, and that any remedy requires the careful observance of two points: i, that the adviser, one or a board, be wholly clear of administrative activity; and, 2, that he or they be advisers only, pure and simple, with no power to aflFect the individual responsibility of decision. This must be preserved under what- ever method, as the Secretary's privilege as well as his obligation. THE UNITED STATES NAVY DEPARTMENT THE UNITED STATES NAVY DEPART- MENT February^ 19^3 IN the United States, the Navy Department is the constituted organ of the government for administering the navy. Naval administra- tion exists for the purpose of providing a nation v^ith an effective navy. Incidentally it also administers — directs — the navy which it has created and maintains. Provision is the object, administration the method; the one is the end, the other the means. It is desirable to keep intel- ligently and continually in mind the distinction between the two; for an invariable experience teaches that the tendency of mankind, and es- pecially of administrators, is to confound them. Not only so, but even to raise the means into the seat of the end; usurpation by gradual revolution. Administration inclines to lose itself in itself, for- getful of the end for which it has been established. It is essential to guard against this error, by keeping the end always in the foreground of consciousness, 61 52 Naval Administration and Warfare as being the standard or test by which administra- tive methods are to be judged. The method of naval administration now in force in the United States is the outcome of a gradual development, into the particulars of which it is unnecessary to enter. We are to deal with the present; with historical antecedents only so far as to throw light on existing conditions. The Navy Department began with the institution of the office of Secretary in 1798, when, also, the first incumbent was appointed; and after various experiences it reached its present constitution in 1842. Since then it has remained fixed in funda- mental principles; but has been subject, necessa- rily, to occasional considerable changes of detail and adjustment, as the navy has grown with the nation's growth, and as naval science has become more complicated in its demands. The gradual advance of the world in the mechanical arts has brought with it a corresponding application of those arts to maritime development in general, and to naval warfare in particular. The general system is as follows : The President being, by the Constitution, commander-in-chief of the army and navy. Congress has created by law the office of Secretary of the Navy, a single person, who relieves the President of the burden of details. These details are of two principal kinds; U. S. Navy Department 53 namely, those that concern the operations of the fleet all over the world, in peace and in war, which is the military side of naval administration, and those that relate to the creation and preservation of material in its several varieties, — ships, guns, engines, etc., — which is the civil side. As the aggregation of duties under these two heads has been found in practice far too great for any one man to discharge, they have been again sub- divided by law. For this purpose there exist side by side two systems, military and civil, the Secre- tary being at the head of both, as the representative of the President. For the management of the fleet in active service, in peace as in war, the end for which the navy exists, the stream of control descends through admirals, captains, and their subordinate officers. Each of these, in the measure of his particular authority, which is regulated by law, represents the Secretary, as the Secretary does the President. In practice, the extent of ocean in which the United States habitually maintains forces for the benefit of American interests is divided into districts, called stations, mutually independent; that is to say, in each such district there is one officer in supreme command of the whole, usually an admiral, responsible directly and solely to the Secretary. With him the officers in similar 54 Naval Administration and Warfare command of other districts have in general no authority to interfere. If, by particular circum- stances, it becomes necessary for the squadron of one such admiral to go, in whole or in part, into the sphere of another, the rule is that the one senior in rank takes command of the joint forces. The independence of undivided command does not then cease; it is simply transferred. Such excep- tional cases do not invalidate the general state- ment of the independence of each station. If the commander of one, say the Asiatic Station, has incidentally to pass through the district com- manded by a junior, as, for instance, going through the Mediterranean on his way to the East, he may indeed by his temporary presence exercise the authority inherent in his rank; but a serious inter- ference with the arrangements of the regular commander would need justification, and might well entail censure, for the obvious reason that the measures of a permanent incumbent should not lightly be disturbed by an ad interim and purely casual intruder, whose power would lapse entirely as he passed beyond the imaginary lines bounding the station. The military movement of the fleet, the military administration, being co-extensive with a geograph- ical area, that is to say, with the seas of the world which require the presence of the navy, is thus U. S. Navy Department 55 conducted by the Secretary through means of independent geographical districts, each with its individual head. In like manner the field of civil administration, which is concentrated and localized at the Navy Department, for the crea- tion and maintenance of material, the procure- ment and training of officers and seamen, the purchase and distribution of supplies of all kinds needed by the navy, is districted among a number of departments, mutually independent, called bureaus, each having its particular head styled the chief of bureau. Within his particular range of duties, each of these, by specific provision of law, is invested with the authority of the Secretary. Orders from him are to be regarded as issued by the Secretary, just as are the orders of the admiral of a station; and no one of his colleague chiefs of bureaus can there interfere with him. In their totality the functions discharged by the bureau chiefs embrace all that is understood by the " es- tablishment " of a navy; the establishment being the permanent constituted force, — ships and men, — together with all the antecedent activities, such as those of the navy yards, by which ships are built and kept ready for service, and seamen gathered and organized into crews. At this point, when fully prepared to act, the strict condition of establishment merges into that 56 Naval Administration and Warfare of military operation, and passes under the charge of the military officers — the admirals and their subordinates. It is true, certainly, that as material and supplies require frequent repair and renewal, and crews occasional reinforcement and relief, the functions of the establishment need in some degree to follow the ships in their career. For this purpose the several bureaus have their repre- sentatives among the official staff of each vessel, the captain being at the head of the whole, as is the Secretary over his bureau chiefs in Washing- ton. In this manner each ship, for the purposes of naval administration, reflects in miniature the Navy Department, with which it is in continual correspondence by regulated channels. In strict- ness of method, as reflecting the ultimate respon- sibility and control of the Secretary in the Depart- ment, and the commander afloat, — admiral or captain, — all such correspondence is addressed through them, and by them distributed at either end of the line. Of course, much of this is purely routine and formal; but forms which represent facts, as in this case unity and concentration of authority are symbolized, are not to be discarded lightly. What is commonly called red tape, the circuition of documents, proceeds not from concentration, but from dispersion and subdivision of responsibility. U. S. Navy Department 57 The term '* naval administration," though actu- ally co-extensive with the whole range of the Secretary's authority, both in the establishment and in the movements of the fleets, is commonly limited in application to the activities antecedent to mili- tary operations. Thus restricted, it becomes immediately apparent that naval administration is essentially civil in character, conditioned only by the fact that it subserves a military profession. In its methods it is strictly civil; it is military only in its end, which is to supply a military organiza- tion with the men and implements needed for operations of war. Carpenters use tools which they could not make; which are made for them. In this case the means and the end are both civil; but the distinction is the same as that which obtains between naval administration and naval opera- tions. The tools of the naval seaman, from ad- miral to enlisted man, are ships, guns, engines. With these he does his naval work of every kind, and they are provided for him by the naval ad- ministration. The work is military, the provision civil. For instance, one chief function of naval admin- istration is to design and build ships of war. This is only a particular problem of marine architecture, which is a civil calling; in application to naval needs it becomes conditioned, specialized, but not 58 Naval Administration and Warfare generically distinct. To make a modern gun for a specific purpose involves ingenuity of conception, as w^ell as delicate metallurgical and mechanical processes, conditioned by particular knowledge of ordnance questions; but there is nothing in this, from design to completion, that demands a military cast of mind, much less a military habit of life. The naval man, the combatant officer, can most adequately decide the kind of work he needs his ship, or his gun, to do; he ought to be, by acquirement and experience in handling, master of the reasons which make such and such qualities best for his use; but it by no means follows that this aptitude to know the thing wanted entails ability to make it. A man does not need to be a tailor or a shoemaker to know what clothes or shoes are best suited for his calling. Military capacity of a very high order may go no further than to say, What is needed in a ship, or a gun, is such and such qualities; but it no less has a right to demand that its opinions on this practical matter should be ascertained and duly heeded. Manufacturers of articles used by the public are compelled to furnish what the public requires; for if they do not they lose their customers. The man who uses the tools is the final judge, and rightly; for he best knows which of several is fittest for his purpose. This is as true of a public military service as of a U. S. Navy Department 59 private civil handicraft. In the latter, however, competition ensures the survival of the fittest, be- cause there is individual freedom of action on the part of the workman. In the other, on the con- trary, action is corporate, and there is no com- petitor; except, indeed, the foreign navies, which may become enemies on occasions of great national urgency. The eight bureaus of the Navy Department are by title as follows: Yards and Docks, Construc- tion and Repair, Steam Engineering, Ordnance, Equipment, Supplies and Accounts, Navigation, Medicine and Surgery. They are here arranged in what may be considered the chronological order of their relation to the preparation of a ship of war for sea; the completion of her as a unit in the naval estabhshment, ready to pass into the military order as part of the fleet in active service. The several navy yards, with their docks, are the scene where goes on much of the work of ship- building and repair, of gun-making, of placing on board the engines. There supplies of all sorts for the various departments are stored, and there are bestowed the final touches of preparation to ships built elsewhere. At a yard the ship receives on board her crew and goes into commission; to it she returns for repairs or to be laid up after a cruise. It underlies and concentrates the local 60 Naval Administration and Warjare activities of the several bureaus. Construction is evidently the first stage in the evolution of the finished ship; the engines probably will be being built coincidently, but cannot be placed until the hull has made a very considerable advance toward completion. Ordnance is a word which speaks for itself; the shipping of the guns is a later stage in the vessel's progress. Equipment is a term of less precise signification, because of more varied and minute detail. It corresponds to fur- nishing a building as a place to live and work in. For instance, there is embraced under this com- prehensive idea the extensive and intricate electric system of lighting and motors, with the needed dynamos. Hence, also, much that appertains to the movable house which a ship is; for example, anchors, charts, compasses, with navigation books and instruments. For this reason, the Naval Observatory and the Hydrographic and Compass Offices, whence most of these appliances proceed, or by which they are tested and corrected, are under the Bureau of Equipment. In the days of sail. Equipment supplied rigging and sails — the motive power; so, in strict derivation, it now provides coal, the motive power of to-day, distributing it both to vessels and to coaling depots on foreign stations, ^rrhe Bureau of Supplies and Accounts is the U. S. Navy Department 61 purchasing agency of the navy. It buys for other bureaus, subject to their requisition and inspec- tion. The paymaster of each ship in commission is its representative in this matter, under the responsible control of her commander, as the bureau itself is under that of the Secretary. Spe- cifically, it buys and supphes, on its own account, the stores faUing under the two great heads of provisions and clothing. It keeps, also, the pay accounts of officers and men, and pays them at stated times.^ The Bureau of Navigation has, by an historical devolution, of which its name gives no suggestion, inherited the charge of the personnel of the navy, as well officers as enlisted men. It regulates their admission, superintends their training, preserves continuous records of their service, and distributes them among the vessels of the fleet. As men are always of more account than their tools, the function of the Bureau of Navigation is the most eminent of all; but also, in the preparation of a ship for service, it is chron- ologically nearly last, as the crew do not go on board till the ship has been by the other bureaus prepared for their dwelHng upon conditions con- sistent with health. This final requirement is the charge of the Bureau of Medicine and Surgery, the importance of which may be measured by considering how far a well man is more useful than an invalid. 62 Naval Administration and Warfare The general nature of the duties of each bureau is sufficiently apparent; to particularize further in this connection would simply involve the reader in a mass of technical details. The essen- tial fact to remark is that each bureau — except Yards and Docks — has a distinct and mutually independent function in each ship built and com- missioned, as vs^ell as in the processes which precede completion. This is the essential char- acteristic of the United States Naval Adminis- tration, deliberately adopted in 1842 to ensure efficiency and responsibility, after long trial of a different system. The Secretary's function, in- trinsically one, was then, for administrative effect, divided into five, and subsequently into eight parts; the organic unity of which was found only in their subordination to him, not in their relations one to another. Consistency of action, therefore, depends upon the Secretary's appreciation of the necessities of the service in all the several broad features which the bureaus represent — not only from the side of the bureaus, but also from that of the officers afloat — and upon his power to reconcile the divergences of opinion inevitable be- tween so many parties. Both for the purposes of the establishment which the bureaus sustain, and for the direction of naval operations which admirals and captains execute, the Secretary U. S. Navy Department 63 is the only unifying force. He has further to recognize that the Navy Department, as repre- sented by the bureaus, and the Department as represented by the sea-officers, often look at important matters from divergent points of view. The Secretary frequently comes to his office without previous experience, and is necessarily immensely occupied with numerous calls on the side where the Department touches the country rather than the navy. He is apt to find himself, therefore, not only called upon to decide between several persons advocating different views on matters largely new to him, but to do so under conditions of pre-occupation which impede ade- quate attention. The system provides him neither a formulated poHcy nor an adviser; for, while the bureau chief can properly give advice and argue his views, it needs little knowledge of human nature to see that he can seldom be free from prepossession. He is, in short, rather an advocate than an adviser. Under this stress of work and of technical inexperience, a secretary will naturally seek advice by instituting boards; committees of qualified men to discuss subjects and report to him con- clusions. Such a board may be constituted, like one the differences in which were recently reported by the press, from the bureau chiefs themselves, 64 Naval Administration and War jar e with perhaps one or two outside men to hold a balance. In the case cited the matter under consideration was the qualities to be realized in a particular class of ships. Or, again, boards may be composed, like the General Board, at the head of which the admiral of the navy now is, mostly of officers external to the administrative system, to discuss questions of broad policy connected with offensive and defensive measures, requisite in case of war with this or that country. Such a board might very properly influence the general direction of administrative action, though not the detailed execution ; for the obvious reason that the policy of the Department, as regards number and qualities of ships, should rest upon a clear appreciation of the probable nature of the operations for which they will be wanted. These boards, precisely analogous to committees of Congress, and to commissions frequently insti- tuted by civil authorities for special investigation, are, in the strictest sense, advisory only. They can relieve the Secretary of no responsibility, but can assist him greatly by digestion of facts and summarizing expert opinion upon the arguments pro and con. During the Spanish war an ex tempore board was constituted to give purely military advice upon the strategic movements of the fleet. It had no powers and, therefore, no U. S. Navy Deparhnent 65 responsibility, except for expert advice given; all orders w^ere the Secretary's own. It is open to serious question whether in actual war such a recourse is desirable. Responsibility for advice, as well as for action, should then be single, un- divided; but in peace a deliberative board, con- tinuous in existence, may be of the utmost service by the maturity and consecutiveness of the policy evolved. Had there been such in 1898 there would have been no need to create an instrumental- ity specially for that occasion. In the hands of a strong Secretary it would constitute a much needed balance to the necessary, but somewhat exaggerated, independence in action of the bu- reaus ; for it would naturally regard matters from the purely service point of view. The utility of convening bodies of competent men for the discussion of particular subjects is indisputable; all experience testifies to it. The difficulty with the navy is that the Secretary's official competency to combine the action of the several bureaus, in a steady, well digested, and unified progress, demands a policy, and not merely an administrative system tempered by boards summoned by him. The test of a system of naval administration, strictly so called, is its capacity — inherent, not spasmodic — to keep the estab- lishment of the navy abreast of the best professional 66 Naval Administration and Warfare opinion concerning contemporary necessities, both in quality and quantity. It needs not only to know and to have what is best to-day, but to embody an organic provision for watching and forecasting to a reasonable future what will be demanded. This may not be trusted to voluntary action or to individual initiative. There is needed a constituted organ to receive, digest, and then officially to state, in virtue of its recognized office, what the highest instructed professional opinion, the opinion of the sea-officers, holds concerning the needs of the navy at the moment; and for the future as far as present progress indicates. It is not enough that this or that chief of bureau, to use the nomenclature of the United States administration, during his term of office takes such measures as appear to him sufficient to ascertain what is the opinion of the combatant sea-officer, of the naval workman, concerning his tools. Granting entire sufficiency on the part of such bureau chief, it is not to his office, but to himself, that it is due. The system cannot claim the credit; nor can the system be sure, for it makes no pretence to assure, that such enterprise will be shown in other bureaus, or in subsequent incumbents of the same bureau. There is in the naval administration, as consti- tuted by law, no organized provision to do the evolutionary work, the sifting process, by which U. S. Navy Department 67 in civil life the rough fighting test of supply and demand, of competition in open market and free usage, pronounces decisively upon the practical merits of various instruments or methods of manu- facture. The body of sea-officers, the v^^orkmen of the navy, receive for use instruments upon which the system provides them no means of expressing the professional opinion as to their adaptability, relatively to service conditions or to other existing instruments. Whatever harm may result from this falls not upon the work- men only, but upon those also for whom the work is done; that is, the nation. Since the above was written, there have ap- peared in the London Times a series of three papers by the late Director of Naval Construction for the British navy, Sir WilHam White, who for eighteen years supervised the designing of all its war-ships. A quotation from these articles defines aptly the just relation between the designation of necessary qualities, by the combatant sea- officers of the navy, and the embodiment of these qualities in the finished design of a naval vessel. Italics are mine. Sir William writes : " Ships have to be built for many different services, and each navy has its special requirements. It is inevitable, therefore, that the decision as to the best combination of qualities to be 68 Naval Administration and War jar e embodied in any type must be left to the respon- sible authorities. For the ships of the Royal Navy that decision rests with the First Lord of the Ad- miralty and his colleagues on the Board. The policy of naval construction, the types of ships to be built, and the quahties of offence, defence, speed, coal endurance, and other characteristics to be embodied in each type, are considered in detail and determined by the Lords Commissioners, the Board of Admiralty, acting, vv^ith the assist- ance of their technical advisers, as a * Committee on Designs.' In addition to the large experience of the distinguished officers serving on the Board, there are available reports and suggestions from officers afloat, dealing with the capabilities and performances of existing ships, possible improve- ments, and the introduction of new types. The chief responsibility for the preparation of designs, embodying the decisions of the Board, rests on the Director of Naval Construction," [called in the United States Navy the Chief Constructor] . . . " But for the conditions themselves the First Lord and his colleagues are responsible. They decide the policy of our naval construction, and determine the armament, armour, speed, and coal endurance for each class of ship added to the fleet. . . . My duty and responsibilities have been to design and direct the construction of strong. U. S. Navy Department 69 safe, and seaworthy vessels, having the offensive and defensive powers, speeds, and coal supplies, determined by successive Boards of Admiralty." In a succeeding paper Sir William writes: " In such a complex and difficult question as the selection of armaments, the responsible authority, fully informed and constituted as the Board of Admiralty is, must be more capable of balancing opposing claims, and selecting the most efficient combination, than any individual. The questions involved affect fighting efficiency, and are not pri- marily questions of naval architecture. / In^ Great Britain the Navy Department is itself a board — the Board of Admiralty; not, as with us, an individual. In general principle, and as an administrative system, I prefer our own; but in the particular relation established between mihtary specification of desired qualities, and the narrower sphere of technical design, by which those qualities are to be realized, I find the method above de- scribed much superior, for the Board of Admiralty embraces an extremely strong element of matured expert professional knowledge, chosen from the commanding officers of the Navy. There is in our administrative system nothing answering to it; and the defect not only is grave, but hes at the very source of the provision for naval warits. I As has been said, the present system of inde- 70 Naval Administration and Warfare pendent bureaus has now been in operation for sixty years. This fact in itself affords strong presumption in its favor; and it has many merits. It has also shown very good results, regarded as a machine, which every system more or less is. A machine is an organization, an assemblage of parts, which has great powers of work in certain fixed directions, purely routine. It is the essence of a machine that it moves round and round in an appointed path; but it has within itself neither motive force nor directive impulse. Both these, which are the two factors of active life, come to it from without. As the steam slackens, the engine works feebly; as the hand at the helm is weak, it errs blindly. All the time it is the same machine. Consequently, put on steam in a national impulse, or supply a strong master in a particular Secretary or President, and after a few jars of rusty joints, the renewal possibly of some worn-out coupling, it takes up at once its intended work, doing it steadily, strongly, and efficiently. Such fluctuations of efficiency, dependent upon external conditions, are characteristic of all ma- chines. They are not to be cured radically by the introduction of new parts, adding to the machinery; for that makes it none the less a machine than before, even though as a machine it may be improved. It may be possible, however, so to U. S. Navy Department 71 contrive the connection between machinery and power, which with us is, in the last analysis^ the popular understanding and will, as to cause energy to be supplied and sustained in reasonable pro- portion to the work required; which work is the maintenance and development of the navy on the lines and scale demanded by the possibilities of war to-day, and of the evident to-morrow. The grave lapses of the past, in this respect, are facts not to be ignored, nor safely to be repeated. Pro- vision against them, to be enduring, as proposed, must be more continuous in operation than a suc- cession of individual administrators can be. At present the President and Secretary, the one by the Constitution, the other by law, are the administrative connecting links between the coun- try and the navy. Broadly considered, in their official relation to the administrative system, the President and Secretary are parts of the machine, liable with the rest to feel the slackening of energy when it relaxes in the nation. The desired stead- fastness of purpose is not to be found in any succes- sion of tenures of office; for with the expiry of each there is a solution of continuity. Only cor- porate life endures, and there is none such in our present system. The experience of the great War of Secession bears abundant evidence to the capacity for work 72 Naval Administration and Warfare of the bureau system, composed as it is of a number of chiefs mutually independent in their respective spheres, and, therefore, individually and solely responsible for the work entrusted to them. Sel- dom, if ever, in the history of the world, has a naval organization had thrown upon it the sudden and immense expansion of work that the Navy Department had then to meet. In 1865 there were employed in active operations of war 7,600 officers and 50,000 seamen, more than five-fold the num- bers prior to the war; and the fleet had increased from 69 vessels to 671, 208 of which had been built or begun while hostilities were going on.' No radical administrative change was made by Con- gress. The number of bureaus was increased from five to eight, with a corresponding subdivision of labor; but each of the eight chiefs was as inde- pendent in his own office as the five had been in theirs. This was the essence of the system; there was no let or hindrance to any one of them, by the interposition of a recognized authority, — man or board, — between him and the Secretary, or be- tween him and his work. Urgent decision was not fettered by the requirement of consultation; responsibility could not be escaped under cover of colleagues, consenting or opposing. The bonds ^ These numbers are taken from Soley's " The Blockade and the Cruisers." U. S. Navy Department 73 of power and of accountability lay upon each man, spurring him to the height of his abilities, freeing him from every trammel of interference, and en- couraging him by the sense that credit as well as blame would be his alone. Individual power and individual responsibility are the fundamental merits of the bureau system. Its defect is lack of co-ordination. Happily, this lucky country, which at its first cast got Farragut for the most critical command of the War of Seces- sion, as in 1898 it found Dewey at Manila and Sampson off Santiago, in 1861 unwittingly intro- duced into the naval administration a singularly fit man; an official who filled, without particular definition, the precise place which was needed then, and is equally needed now, in peace as in war, to impart unity of direction and effort to the eight distinct impulses under which naval expansion was advancing. The labors of the chief overseer, the Secretary, under the mandate of the times and the people, plainly demanded personal assistance; and it happened — the word is exact — that there was selected for Assistant Secretary a man whose particular fitness only his subsequent performance could have demonstrated. Mr. Fox had been a naval officer until he reached maturity, and after- wards became an active business man. He there- fore brought to his position a close knowledge 74 Naval Administration and Warfare of naval conditions, which had not advanced materially beyond those of his own career, and at the same time an administrative experience which enabled him to utilize, without impeding, the separate energies of the Department's chief subordinates. There was thus introduced into the heart of the administration, in close contact with and influence upon the bureau system, the special aptitudes of the naval officer for the guid- ance of the war in its military phase, and for adapting to the particular conditions the broad lines of the huge expansion which the then estab- lishment had to undergo. The activities of the establishment, of the Navy Department on its civil side, were thus harmonized with the require- ments of the military situation. It would require more than a single article to express in detail the multifold character of the work thus done for and by the establishment; the vessels of various kinds and construction designed and built; the vessels bought and altered for spe- cific purposes; the corresponding developments of armament. All these were governed in concep- tion by the necessity to meet conditions, varying from expeditions up Southern creeks and bayous, including therein the whole vast river system of the Mississippi Valley, to deep-sea cruises extending to the waters of Asia and the Mediterranean. U. S. Navy Department 75 There was involved the creation of armored fleets to contend, some v^ith fortifications in shallow, tortuous inland streams, others with works pro- tecting seacoast harbors. There was to be insti- tuted and maintained the most extensive and grinding blockade ever yet made effective, actually as well as technically. Underlying the whole, however, was the military conception, the exact appreciation of the military necessities. Under the guidance of this were laid down the general lines upon which the bureau administrations were to advance in their activities. This was the cutting out of the work, as distinct from its executive superintendence. From this comprehension of the decisive lines, this military sense, proceeded the unity of effort and of effect wherein consists the excellence of a work of art, which warfare in its highest sense is. The specific character of any particular war creates of itself certain central features upon which attention must fasten; and to which effort must correspond, if success is to be attained. It was peculiarly fortunate that the War of Secession found, placed at the centre of the civil administration of the navy, a person es- pecially qualified, by nature and training, to con- centrate in his own person professional compre- hension, broadened to meet the case by close intercourse with leading officers; and with this 76 Naval Administration and Warfare to combine influence, real if not formal, upon the general direction to be taken by the eight several branches of the civil administration. The very great success of the navy in the War of Secession is universally admitted and needs no insistence; but, though frequently narrated historically, it is doubtful whether it is yet philo- sophically appreciated, or even understood. For present purposes it is sufficient to note the fact that there was then found within the Navy Depart- ment — not existing there before, but introduced fortuitously for the occasion — a means by which the enthusiastic determination of the nation could take shape in intelHgent comprehension of the issues and in strongly co-ordinated effort; while to the satisfactory maintenance of the activity thus directed the bureau system was found ade- quate. Adequate, that is, to meet a great emer- gency under the spur of a great impulse, communi- cated through an instrumentality which for the purposes of the war focussed the several separate energies. It is to be borne in mind, however, that there was the emergency with its pressure ; that it had its clear, distinctive features, susceptible of recognition; and that there was present somewhat accidentally the human instrument to recognize them, and to realize in the work of the Depart- ment the means necessary to meet them. All U. S. Navy Department 77 these constituted pressure, steam, directive force. Granted this, the machine showed its efficiency. Emergency is not always with us, though the need of an up-to-date navy is. The preparations of peace have their distinctive features, equally recognizable with those of war, but less clearly visible to intelligence unstartled by alarm at the doors. The bureau system carries no instru- mentality to study and formulate them; to main- tain constant attention upon, not this or that branch of naval progress, but upon the field as a whole; to co-ordinate the various elements of advance in their relative importance; and by such sustained apprehension, communicated to the nation, to maintain a pressure which shall con- stantly ensure a navy abreast of the contemporary situation in quantity and quality. It is possible for any Secretary to create such an instrumentality, and the tendency of recent Secretaries has been in that direction; but it depends upon the will of the particular incumbent; its influence is what he chooses to attribute to his own creature; and he may at any moment discontinue it. It is no part of the bureau system, and its life is always precarious. Of inferior influence to a bureau, in that it has no legal existence, its position is less that of a subordinate than of a dependent. The War of Secession showed the merits of the 78 Naval Administration and Warfare bureau system under favorable forcing conditions. Peace speedily demonstrated its defects; rather, perhaps, the defects of a system constituted wholly of independent departments — the exact opposite of cabinet government. Independent depart- ments — bureaus — through lack of concert to- gether, lose in influence upon their head more than they gain in individual freedom of action; and the loss is national. In 1865 the nation reacted violently from the extreme tension of w^ar, and the effect was manifest inevitably throughout the military branches of the govern- ment, as constituted. The principal work of the Departments of War and Navy became the reduc- duction of the huge establishments, and the dis- position of the quantities of accumulated material now no longer needed. Though the then adminis- tration had nearly four years to run, Mr. Fox retired shortly, leaving no successor in name or in fact. With him disappeared what had been virtually an institution, rather than an individual or an office. His nominal position of Assistant Secretary was not revived till over twenty years later. Retrenchment — a word never to be uttered with disrespect — now became the order of the day; but it was not graduated by any systematic provision for studying the needs of the navy as a U. S. Navy Department 79 whole, watching contemporary progress, and defining to the country the evident necessities of naval policy. There was no sentinel stationed on the watch-tower to take note of danger; and volunteers, who were not wanting, rarely have the authority or perseverance to arouse national attention. The bureaus went on doing their several works, and doubtless very respectably. Excellent boards, constituted by the Department, from time to time made wise reports. Secretary succeeded Secretary in a complacency that the country seemed fully to share. The military branch, of course, was dissatisfied. It realized the peril, concrete before its eyes in foreign ships and its own decadent, obsolete relics of former days; but the mihtary branch was not — and is not — represented in the legalized scheme of naval administration. There is in the Navy De- partment, besides the Secretary, no daysman that lays his hand on civil and military both; upon the estabhshment and upon the ships in commission. In the Navy Department, as constituted by law, there are sea-officers at the head of bureaus; but by their office they are bureau chiefs, charged with details of the establishment, not representa- tives of the military necessities. They have no obligation, and may have no inclination, to meddle with concerns of the broad naval policy which 80 Naval Administration and Warfare does, or should, determine and co-ordinate the general march of the system as a whole. It would be rash to affirm that there was, for nearly two decades following the war, any formulated determination that could be called a naval policy. In result, doubtless, there was realized a course of action, which might be styled a policy; that of apathetic drift. The system itself provided no instrument for studying the data, or evolving the policy, except the Secretary himself; and the successive Secretaries, coming often new to their work, were as chanced by choice of suc- cessive Presidents. The several bureau chiefs were personally no more responsible than any other individual official for the general regress. Each had his bureau; but, if he managed it as well as the Secretary's measures demanded, the rest was not his concern. There was nowhere in the Department any person, or any body, whose business it was to represent to the Secretary the perilous decline which was rapidly verging upon annihilation. There was nobody at fault for not speaking, nor anybody whose office required the intrusion of a scheme of resuscitation. The future depended upon the personality of a Secretary, not upon a provident system. Equally with the details of the War of Secession, it is inexpedient to enter upon the instances which U. S. Navy Department 81 illustrate the decadence of the ensuing period. To patch and repatch into temporary efficiency vessels, excellent for their day, but which, if still in their prime, would be worthless under the changed conditions ; to build a few, a very few, new ships of substantially the same type as the old, and therefore no more fitted for modern warfare; to mount contentedly on their ancient carriages the old, and in their time most useful, guns which had fought the recent war; to " convert " a few of them, from the large stock left on hand, into makeshift imitations of modern weapons — such was the general course of administration, awaiting the coming of a Secretary who should realize that the first necessity of policy was to sweep away a sham, and bring the country face to face with the fact that it had no navy. The bureaus worked on perfectly respectably, meeting the demands of that day accordingly as they had met the stren- uous period of the War of Secession, and as under a new impulse they were again to meet, and fulfil, the more complicated, if not more onerous, re- quirements of re-creating the estabhshment. As a machine, in short, the system was good; it adapted itself readily and efficiently to the work before it, be it more or less, and showed conclu- sively that it required only the impulse from with- out, and the necessary supply of grist, a work 82 Naval Administration and Warfare at high speed and high power with correspondent results. In time, though much overdue, the awaited man came, and with him a new impulse. By the accident of a Secretary determined to face the conditions, the just discontent of the active navy found voice and expression in a new and positive policy. It is, however, clearly a great evil that throughout a prolonged period of popular reaction and lethargy, a principal department of the gov- ernment should have contained within itself no principle of continuous efficiency, and have re- mained dependent upon the chances of a series of individuals, bound to no sequence of interest or of action, and very possibly, as in instances ex- perience has shown, incapable of realizing a policy or imparting an impulse. Most branches of the executive government find themselves natu- rally represented in the continuous interests of civil life, which constitute for them an abiding impulse, directive as well as motive, to keep abreast of the time. The navy and army lack this; the navy conspicuously so. It is therefore not suffi- cient that each has a Secretary, as have the De- partments of the Treasury, the Interior, and others. They need within their administrative constitution something which shall answer to the continuous interest of the people in civil details; U. S. Navy Department 83 something which, while wholly subordinate to every Secretary, shall embody a conservative and progressive service idea, and in so doing shall touch both the public, from whose sense of national needs impulse comes, and the administration, ashore and afloat, upon whose response to impulse efficiency depends. That a Secretary can do this has been abundantly shown; the dangerous possi- bility, also amply demonstrated, is that several in sequence may lack either will, or power, or pro- fessional understanding. Though the office lives, the Secretary dies every four years, and who shall guarantee the succession .? The value of the office will not be diminished by such a some- thing as here advocated, without executive author- ity, consultative only and advisory; responsible not for action taken — for it should have no power to act — but for opinion expressed ; above all, continuous in its activity, which implies corporate life, maintaining sound tradition by its consecu- tiveness, yet preserved from stagnation by changes of membership, periodical but not simultaneous. Executive authority, like executive responsibility, must be undivided, single. No qualification is admissible upon the powers of the Secretary, as the President's representative. The bureaus, mutually independent, are wholly dependent on him when he sees fit directly to interpose. Where 84 Naval Administration and Warfare they clash, as at times they do, he holds the bal- ance, and his say is final. These conditions no instructed man of affairs would wish to modify. Yet it remains that in these various matters Secre- taries have often to act upon personal judgment, with limited personal knowledge. Under such conditions one man may easily vacillate in a Hne of policy; how much more a series of men differing in personal traits and acquired information. The utility of a steadying factor, of a body of digested professional knowledge, continuously applied to the problems of naval advance, is evident. It is demonstrated also by the increasing disposition of Secretaries to assemble standing boards of officers for the consideration of professional prob- lems, the conclusions of whom constitute for him expert advice, without any infringement upon his official action. Useful though these may be, they have, nevertheless, no place in the administrative system. Creatures of the Secretary's will, there is no assurance of their permanency; yet, the essence of their utility will consist in their em- bodying a policy, which they can only do by per- manence. Such policy, like the action of a bureau chief, will ever be subject to the Secretary's alter- ation; his personal characteristics will modify it; but there can be no more doubt of the utility of such an embodied policy than there can be U. S. Navy Department 85 of a settled national tradition like those about entangling alliances, or against European inter- ference in this hemisphere. It is in the lack of permanent tenure by the Secre- tary himself that is to be seen the most cogent argument for such a continuous institution, inte- rior to the legalized system of administration. A steady incumbent, personally competent, would in time become like the president of a great railroad, or other business corporation; himself an embodied policy, the consistency of which on certain general lines is a recognized advantage. With unlimited time a Secretary should acquire that personal knowledge of details, and acquaintance with the characteristics of his subordinates, which are es- sential to the successful administrator. No such incumbency is to be expected under our general system of executive government. To supply the defect inherent in temporary tenure and period- ical change, there is required for the Navy Depart- ment a tradition of policy; analogous in fact to the principles of a political party, which are con- tinuous in tradition, though progressive in modifi- cation. These run side by side with the policy of particular administrations; not affecting their constituted powers, but guiding general lines of action by an influence, the benefit of which, through the assurance of continuity, is universally admitted. PRINCIPLES INVOLVED IN THE WAR BETWEEN JAPAN AND RUSSIA Written during the War PRINCIPLES INVOLVED IN THE WAR BETWEEN JAPAN AND RUSSIA August, 1904 A NOTICEABLE feature of the current war between Japan and Russia is the singu- lar defect and inaccuracy of details furnished concerning the successive mihtary and naval situa- tions and movements. Doubtless, a similar im- perfection of information is encountered, and must be expected, in all sequences of current events. Contemporaries seldom know the exact truth concerning that which passes around them, and only after long and patient study does the chroni- cler of a later day even approach a full and correct statement of occurrences, in their relation of cause and effect. The complete and balanced narrative, which the modern historian rightly sets before himself as an ideal standard, is, however, a very different thing from the substantially accurate information which is demanded by the man of affairs, civil or military, called upon to keep abreast of the professional movement of his day, to 89 90 Naval Administration and Warfare be prepared himself to act in the light of the fullest accessible knowledge, but content also to accept, as an inevitable condition of all practical life, some degree of obscurity, of doubt, attaching to the problem he has to solve. The " Faites moi savoir " of Napoleon is checked always by his equally imperative dictum that war cannot be made with- out running risks. No midway position betw^een these two maxims is tenable; reconcilement is to be found only in the frank and cordial em- bracing of both. It is indispensable to get the fullest data that can be had, by the exercise of every means at command ; but it is no less indispensable then to go forward, working from the basis of what has been learned, however imperfectly, and advancing tentatively, but firmly, towards the solution of the difficulty immediately in hand. The man who waits for absolute certainty, before moving, will with rare exceptions reach his decisions too late. So far as these reflections are just, they apply not only to the general officer commanding in actual war, whether by land or sea, but to all others who belong to the military professions, even though their nation at the moment be in the happy enjoyment of peace. The application is not merely to those especially charged with the collec- tion of intelligence, and the digestion from it of a Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 91 formulated military policy; whether such policy be strategic, or tactical, or involve a serious modi- fication of weapons and organization, of army or fleet, in view of novel experiences. Men thus situated, at the headquarters of information or control, are undoubtedly favored with peculiar opportunity for learning and judging; but the greater precision and certainty thus afforded to the few, in virtue of their momentary duties, by no means absolves from similar eflPort those who, at a distance and engaged in more secular routine, possess only the fragmentary data to be gathered or inferred from the daily reports of the press. Indeed, as a mere matter of exercising military intelligence, the man who thus employs his reason, upon the partial and often contradictory rumors of the flying hours, occupies more nearly the posi- tion of a responsible commander in war, whose estimate of the situations confronting him depends upon tidings coming through a dozen channels, continually flowing in from divergent quarters, all partial, mostly colored with error, and often at variance with each other. The advantage of accustoming the mind to such valuations is very great. Natural or acquired, the faculty, like every other, grows in the using, and tends ever to be most ready when most wanted. In the sphere of reflection it corresponds to the 92 Naval Administration and War jar e trained military " judgment of ground " by the physical eye, an aptitude of the highest and most universally recognized importance. I was im- mensely gratified, as well as interested, to receive a few days ago from a young officer of our Ameri- can navy just such an analysis and criticism of the respective movements of the Japanese and Russian fleets on June 23, when the latter as- tonished the world by bringing into the open the ducks long supposed to be not only lame but hopelessly crippled. The facts were those given in Admiral Togo's despatch, communicated to the world in ample detail in the Times (weekly edition) of July I ; but, abortive as the proceeding proved, the attention of the officer in question was arrested, and he supplied an interpretation and inferences which by their justness of appreciation gave evi- dence, to my mind, of one who had contem- plated the possibilities open to fleets situated as these were, and was consequently prepared at once to understand and value the several move- ments. None will question that such an one is, pro tanto, more ready to act intelligently and instantly, should occasion arise for him. Situations will not be unfamiliar; just as the eye trained to judge ground quickly detects essential identity amid superficial divergences, or at least finds the recurrence of certain features, the bearing of Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 93 which upon the field of action is at once appar- ent. An apt, and somewhat comical, illustration of the general darkness, with occasional rays of light, amid which the outside observer of the present war gropes, is to be found in the unintelligible names, variously spelled, of the unfamiliar locali- ties, which encumber without elucidating the des- patches of generals and the accounts of corre- spondents. The same feature prevails in the maps, between which and the texts there is that fre- quent discrepancy which the officer in the field finds in the reports of spies or deserters. I have just (August 5) been damaging my eyes, and keep- ing my temper, holding in one hand a map and in the other a narrative; the general result being that, with the exception of certain points of major interest, the reader must be content to find any particular name in one and not expect the luxury of seeing it in both. Nevertheless, even with these disadvantages, and the imperfect knowledge of the face of the country, which I apprehend em- barrasses most inquirers — except, perhaps, the general staffs of the contending armies — here and there a clue emerges which seems to justify some inferences as to the strategic plan of the Japanese, to whom constantly superior numbers permit the advantage of initiative. Such inferences, so far 94 Naval Administration and Warfare as correct, and after all allowance for their merely partial accuracy, possess a distinct advantage. They involve, as before said, a habit of mind which tends always to improve. Nor is this practice useful to military men only, but to laymen as well; because in these days, although military questions in their details are a specialty, the welfare of the nation, above all in representative governments, is furthered by a wide interest and appreciation of military necessities among citizens of average intelligence. To affirm this is to say no more than all recop-nize with reference to social and econom- ical questions, the solution of which depends upon general interest and understanding of the broader bearings, although minute detailed knowledge is the prerogative of specialists. Again, and more notably, the very imperfection of current information to a certain extent promotes comprehension, by preventing the intelligence from losing itself amid a mass of details — a very com- mon infirmity. This uncertainty forces attention to fasten on the broad general lines of action, which constitute the determinative features of military situations; whether these are limited to a narrow area, or are of world-wide geographical extension, as are the military interests of the British Empire. For the specialist, even, these are the most im- portant; while for the outsider, they are at once Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 95 the most easy and the only ones to be securely grasped. They resemble essentially general prin- ciples, which undoubtedly in the first instance are formulated only by the observation and colla- tion of innumerable details; but which, once established, far exceed in illuminative and directive value, as guides to opinion and action, any un- digested accumulation of the details on which they are based. A principle in warfare, Hke a generali- zation in science, is a result; but, when firmly grounded, the details by which it was reached may be disregarded by the average man, who for his own guidance needs to know only the result, not the method of its attainment. The case of weapons is precisely analogous. What a given ship, or gun, or submarine boat will do, what the result reached in it, this the military man, or the interested citizen, needs to know; but this ascer- tained, the details of construction or manipulation, which issue in the result, are not necessary to all, but only to those specially concerned in manu- facture or handling. It is this general line of thought that I propose to follow in this paper, basing my examination of the salient facts, commonly if not quite precisely known, upon the broad general principles which seem to me applicable to the particular case, and neglecting details; not as being in themselves 96 Naval Administration and Warjare immaterial, but still secondary and in a measure confusing. Imperfect and contradictory state- ments, being among the inevitable conditions of the problem, I accept in such degree as judgment may assign to them, in developing or modifying conclusions not depending primarily upon them, but otherwise reached. In this Russo-Japanese war, as in others, much that is instructive to the specialist, and ultimately must be sifted and ap- preciated by him, may safely be passed over for the moment even by the military professions themselves in general, and yet more by the lay observer. These are of the nature of details, of methods, and correspond essentially to the various processes of manufacture by which the result of a finished implement is produced; or, more nearly still, to the several stages of progress, of alternate failure, perplexity, and success, through which the conceiver of some great design advances to the full development and materialization of his idea. The particularities of tactics, the special difficulties or advantages presented by the ground over which the armies are fighting, the efficacy of the several weapons employed in the different branches of the two services, the problem of trans- portation involved, are all of this character of detail. They minister to the fulfilment of the great design of the war, and are to it indispensable Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 97 factors; but they are means, not ends. Whether well or ill managed, they are without effect upon the general principles which should dictate the direction to be given to military effort. It is not said, nor will for a moment be maintained, that the capacity or incapacity displayed in the direction of these matters will not affect very seriously the outcome of the operations involved. The worth of the best modelled ship would be seriously vitiated by bad materials used in building, or bad workmanship; but the designing of the model is after all the loftiest, as it is the most determina- tive element of efficiency, and the model of the ship, having reference to the work for which she is intended, corresponds with great precision to the plan of a campaign by land or sea, to compass the objects of a war. That plan, carried out, is the grand result to which all the minor details are the ministers. They may for the time very well remain invisible to the observer who wishes to appreciate the conduct of the war; just as the vast array of calculations, which underlie the dis- positions of weights in a finished ship, are not necessary in order fully to comprehend a state- ment of her powers or weaknesses as a weapon of war, or to criticize the manner of her handling in particular circumstances. When carried to successful conclusion, a plan 98 Naval Administration and Warfare of campaign stands revealed as a result; but while in execution, on lines known only to the few persons responsible, there is seen only a military process, a sequence of action, the study of which from day to day, by the stimulus it imparts to reasoned speculation, to forecast, is profoundly educative to military men. It is also illuminative to others, who will be at the trouble to furnish their intellects with the few chief ascertained principles of warfare. In the case before us, owing to the secluded character of the scene of war, to the care taken by both parties to conceal the essential facts of their numbers and conditions, and, it must be added, to the strong national bias color- ing the reports of many individual correspondents, and others, there is an imperfection of detailed in- formation, which gives the additional zest of diffi- culty to the problem, and of enjoyment to progress made in its solution. It is in this condition that the subject is, at this moment of writing; but a stage of development has been reached which permits, with some degree of certainty, an expres- sion of opinion on leading questions of principle. Prominent among these doubtless is that of the retention of Port Arthur by the Russians, during the moments when evacuation was possible. They did not abandon it; and, if I correctly remember, this determination was widely and severely cen- Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 99 sured as a concession to national pride, to political considerations of humiliation involved, but in contradiction to sound military principle. The question has additional interest, because analo- gous to the still recent instance of Ladysmith, in the South African War, with which possibly may be conjoined the less defensible tenure of Glencoe and Dundee. In matters of detail the two cases present large differences; but how is it as to the principle involved 1 I should imagine that there must now (August, 1904) be much less doubt of the propriety of the Russian resolu- tion than there was three months ago; just as I cannot but think that, as time leaves farther behind the period of the Boer War, there will be an increasing conviction that the occupation of Ladysmith was neither an error in the beginning nor a misfortune to the future of the war. Why .? Because, in the first place, it arrested the Boer invasion of Natal, by threatening their line of communications: and, secondly, it detained before the besieged place a body of enemies which in the later part of the hostilities would have been more formidable elsewhere. I apprehend that Port Arthur has fulfilled, and continues to fulfil, the same function towards the Japanese, though it seems much more evident now than at first. The gradual development of operations makes it 100 Naval Administration and Warfare to my mind increasingly clear that the number of Russians there, plus their artificial advantages of fortification, — which evacuation w^ould have surrendered, — are much more useful to the general plan of campaign than they w^ould be if with Kuropatkin. To carry Port Arthur, or even to maintain an investment, the Japanese must be more numerous than the garrison; therefore, had the place been abandoned, the aggregate of troops transferred to Kuroki would have exceeded de- cisively those added to his opponent. But the Japanese might have given Port Arthur the go-by. Scarcely; no more than the Boers could have invaded Natal in force, leaving Lady- smith in their rear. It is not disputed, I believe, that the control of the sea is fundamental to Japan. Abandonment of the place by Russia meant destruction to the fleet within; and that destruction meant the release of Togo's ships from a wearing and injurious blockade, with freedom to concentrate effort in protection of the general communications of his country, as well commercial as military. The recent exploits of the Vladivostok squadron would have been much curtailed, if not absolutely prohibited, had Togo been able to leave the neighborhood of Port Arthur. Apparently, if Port Arthur holds out, it will be impossible to check the Vladivostok ships Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 101 seriously before ice forms; and the derange- ment of Japanese communication with the outer world, particularly in the matter of warlike sup- plies, may prove, probably will prove, a very serious matter to a nation still relatively unde- veloped, and carrying a heavy financial burden. The Japanese Natal has been invaded, and the timidity of neutral commerce, being under no strong bonds of necessity to seek Japan, will indirectly second the direct action of the Russian commerce destroyers. It is not necessary to deny the illegality of the Russian action, in sinking an uncondemned neutral, in order to recognize the importance of the Vladivostok squadron's freedom to act as a belligerent factor. Several prizes have reached Vladivostok, and with proper provision of supernumerary crews it should be possible frequently to carry in vessels as long as Port Arthur stands. Recapture by Japanese cruisers, unless distinctly rather the rule than the exception, will not detract from the moral effect upon in- tending shippers, nor from its material result in rarer supply and enhanced cost to the custo- mer. Since this was written, a letter of a Times corre- spondent, dated July lo {Times of August i6) reveals, what was perhaps before known but had escaped my own attention, that the effect of the k 102 Naval Administration and Warfare first exploits of the Vladivostok squadron had been to transfer Kamimura's division from before the port itself to the Straits of Tsu Shima; a strategic position vital to occupy, in defence of the Japanese transports maintaining the military communica- tions with Manchuria and Korea. " Kamimura's squadron is not powerful enough to blockade the two entrances to Vladivostok. It has been com- pelled to adopt the minor role of sealing the Tsu Shima Straits, so as to cover the line of communi- cation southward of that point. The naval people pray daily for freedom to wipe out the score Vla- divostok has run up against them." It is obvious, of course, that if Port Arthur had been aban- doned, this desired freedom would be had; if it falls, Kamimura can be reinforced, Vladivostok adequately blockaded, and the whole naval situa- tion reversed. This is only another way of saying that the retention of Port Arthur has caused all this embarrassment to the Japanese, including the serious possible effects to their communications with the external world. The effect over a month ago, the date of the letter quoted, is graphically portrayed by the writer: " The three big cruisers stationed in Vladivos- tok, and their accompanying swarm of torpedo craft, are so many thorns in the side of Japan. It irks her grievously that, while winning signal Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 103 successes on the principal stage, there should be a by-play of unpunished raids against her own merchantmen, transports, and peaceful settlers; that the sea which goes by her name should be an open field for her enemy's enterprises; that her shores should be exposed to attack by a com- paratively petty force; and that, while she has swept the main body of the Russians out of Western Korea, marauding bands of Cossacks should defy her along the northwestern shore of the peninsula. It is difficult to remedy this flagrant fault in the situation, until the fleet can be freed from its all-absorbing duties at Port Arthur." With all this should be coupled the fact that after the sinking of the Petropavlovsk, April 14, Togo had detached several ships to reinforce Kamimura. It would seem probable that he had to recall them, after the Russian ships had been repaired within the port. No wonder, then, in view of all that has been quoted, and may reason- ably be inferred, that the same correspondent notes that, while a concentration in the north might be wisest from a purely military point of view, " it is commonly rumored in Tokio that the naval authorities advocate the reduction of Port Arthur at the earliest possible moment, and without any reference to developments north- ward of the peninsula. . . . After October the 104 Naval Administration and Warfare northern parts of the Sea of Japan pass under the protection of winter." Whatever criticisms may justly be passed on the details of Russian management, the Japanese themselves thus testify to the correctness of the decision to retain the port. It is to be hoped that the evidence of the value of commerce destroying, given by the Vladivostok squadron, as a hostile measure most important, though secondary, may receive timely recognition before the great naval states are induced hastily to sign away any part of their control over the com- munications of the world, on an ill-considered idea that private property, so called, is more en- titled to immunity than is human life in the persons of their citizens. After all, the life of a warrior is as really a private life as the goods of the trader are private property; and is no less entitled to respect because risked for the public welfare, in- stead of for individual gain. The whole subject has been regarded, in my opinion, in the false light of a supposed humanitarianism, rather than from the true point of view of its weight as an un- questionably effective belligerent measure. The question is not, as commonly posed, whether in- dividual property in transit for commercial pur- poses is private, in the same sense as a man's house, or clothes, or furniture. Even so, the two kinds differ essentially, regarded as contributory to Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 105 national military power, which is the point at issue. Accurately stated, the question runs thus: Is the suppression of an enemy's external commerce a means powerfully conducive to exhausting his strength, and so shortening the war ? If so — and the answer can be little doubtful — the query follows, Is it not then perfectly proper to forbid it, and to punish, by forfeiture of goods involved, belligerent citizens who disregard the prohibition, exactly as the neutral w^ho disregards a blockade is punished by confiscation of vessel and cargo ? I admit that, logically, the neutral who carries the belligerent goods which the belligerent no longer can, also violates the lawful command of the other party to the war; and so Charles James Fox, an eminent and most liberal authority, said that " Free ships, free goods," was neither good law nor good sense. The principle, however, has been adopted by consent of the great naval states; but the making of one mistaken concession is no reason for another. The true standard of civilized warfare is the least injury consistent with the end in view; but the end should not be lost to sight in glittering generalities. Russia herself may now see cause to regret that she thus lost sight of, or could not anticipate, what in an hour of need would be the result of her ancient zeal, and consequent treaties, which now deny her 106 Naval Administration and Warfare the old belligerent right to capture enemies' goods in neutral ships. It is yet to appear whether the Russian retention of Port Arthur will prove as distinctive and deter- minative a factor in the general campaign as Lady- smith did in the Transvaal. In the present war, there is not between the opponents the same dis- parity of ultimate strength as in the earlier; and the approach to equality is still closer because of the evident great superiority in organization of the one weaker in material power, which possesses also the immense advantage of nearness to the scene, with consequent shortness and facility of communications. Yet, while the final outcome — the result, — to which the parties are working, remains unknown while these words are writing, the process which we are watching tends more and more to confirm the forecast that the tenure of the port may prove, and still more might have proved, the turning-point of final success for the one which lost the first and very important moves of the game, through being inexcusably unpre- pared, and still more inexcusably off her guard, at a most perilous moment. Port Arthur has meant, and still means, delay, the great need of all defence, but especially of that particular defensive which requires time to organize resources incontestably superior. Whether it avails finally has yet to be Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 107 shown in the result; but in the process its influence is steadily visible, with a clearness to which even success can scarcely add demonstration. It im- posed upon the Japanese at once two objectives; two points of the utmost importance, between which they must choose, whether to concentrate upon one or divide between the two; and at a moment of general numerical inferiority, it re- tained, in the fortifications of the place, a passive strength, which is always equivalent to a certain number of men; the number, namely, by which besiegers must always outnumber the besieged. These divergent objects were Port Arthur and the discomfiture of the northern Russian army, nec- essary to assure the Japanese the control of Korea and the release of Manchuria, the professed motives of the war. That the Japanese leaders realized and gravely appreciated the dilemma may be confidently in- ferred from their action, immediately after their first prompt and judicious steps had secured for them the control of the sea, in degree sufficient for military transportation. The frequent des- perate attempts to seal the mouth of the harbor were meant in efi^ect to destroy the military value of the place; for it has none other than that of a seaport containing an effective squadron. Closed to ingress or egress, there would have remained 108 Naval Administration and Warfare for the Japanese army but one position to assume; that is, a concentration between the two hostile corps. Having failed in their efforts, and unable decisively to injure the Russian fleet as an efficient entity, the port remains essentially untouched. It either must be taken, or, if neglected, remains a naval potentiality, of evil omen to their cause. It can be neutralized only by a naval blockade, a temporary measure, which accident, or weather, or some fortuitous unexpected disaster — such as the sinking of the Hatsuse — may cripple or remove. Doubt, amounting to derision, has been expressed as to the Baltic fleet going to the Far East. I have been myself too far away from sources of informa- tion to know how far it was possible for that fleet to start, or in what force; but I have always be- lieved that, if properly equipped to start, it was perfectly feasible for it — so far as coaling was involved — to proceed to the scene during the summer weather, and this season has been pecul- iarly propitious. Had it so done, and the Port Arthur fleet been as far restored as it has given demonstration of being, its enemy would have found on the sea, as on land, two divergent ob- jects, two mobile opponents, unitedly very superior to himself, co-operation between which, or even junction, would have been difficult to prevent. These various possibilities, some of which have Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 109 been realized already in the sequel, were to my mind ample justification for the Russian deter- mination to hold the place, quite apart from the secondary, but not therefore unimportant, consid- erations of general policy. Of more interest than my personal opinion, however, is the divergence of views witnessed in military observers; some condemning the Russian course, while others find fault with the Japanese for being by it lured to a division of their forces, which apparently is making itself felt in a certain dilatoriness in pushing their otherwise very correct strategic dispositions and movements, in the advance toward Liao-Yang, or Mukden — whichever be their ultimate goal. This dilatoriness, which begins to affect the tone of critics hitherto favor- able even to the verge of partiality, may be the result of caution, due or undue; or it may reflect an actual deficiency of strength, attributable to the corps detached for the siege of Port Arthur. The army confronting Kuropatkin is evidently nu- merically superior to his; but is this superiority as great as is needed to carry on the flanking move- ments, and the assaults upon the successive posi- tions, presumably well selected and reasonably strengthened, which it is the privilege of a well- conducted defence to oppose to the advance of heavier numbers ? To outflank means to overlap. 110 Naval Administration and Warfare so threatening doubly, from front and side, the flank involved, and by its defeat or disorder men- acing the rear of the army and its communications. To eff^ect this, however, requires largely superior numbers, or else a weakening of some other part of the line attempting it; thereby offering the enemy an opportunity for a severe counter-stroke, as was the case at Austerlitz. Despite the diflSculty of following the reported movements, owing to the confusion of names, it seems clear that the Japanese from the first have been continuously massing and extending beyond Kuropatkin's left (east) flank; and his recent incidental mention of their apparent intention to operate along the right (north) bank of the Tai-tse-ho, which runs westward through Liao- Yang, indicates distinctly a purpose to crush that flank, and thereby either intercept his retreat, or throw him westward, off^ the railroad which is his main line of communication. Success in either would mean to the Russians utter material dis- aster, irrespective of moral effect; but that a scheme so well conceived should be executed with so little apparent impetuosity inevitably elicits comment. Is there here traceable just that inadequate superiority which means caution rather than vigor of attack .? And is this attributable to the Port Arthur siege .? Data for positive reply Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 111 are wanting; but, as before remarked, the transfer of both the opposing forces at the port to their respective main bodies would redound much more to the advantage of the Japanese than of the Rus- sians, and in every event the influence of the port upon the course of the campaign is conspicuous. Nor can the final result, whichever way it turn, impair the significance of this renewed illustration of the determining effect of well-placed fortresses upon military operations — and upon naval also. And here I may well quote an incidental, but very significant, expression from the Times corre- spondent already quoted, whose letter had not been published when I was writing hitherto : " The Japanese undoubtedly intended to send forward the correspondents, and undoubtedly expected that the military situation would speedily enable them to do so. But events did not shape them- selves to order, and every one has been disap- pointed." On the naval side, the tenure of the fortress not only has constrained the presence before it of the main Japanese navy, which is the strategic effect, but also has afforded in some measure lessons, tactical in character, as to the probable dispositions and operations of blockading and blockaded fleets under modern conditions. The most important and decisive novel factor is the torpedo, and es- 112 Naval Administration and War jar e pecially the automobile torpedo, which it is scarcely too much to say now makes its first ap- pearance in actual war. The distinguishing feature of the torpedo of course is that it directs its attack against the ship's bottom. This is the part most difficult to reach; but, like the heel of Achilles, it is likewise the least protected, and therefore both most vulnerable and most fatal, if attained. The stationary torpedo, more accu- rately styled a submarine mine, is deadly, if struck, as was shown full forty years ago, in the American War of Secession, by several appalling disasters; but under ordinary conditions it could be avoided, and at all events it did not entail the same continual anticipation of a stab in the dark, from behind, nor the sustained anxiety, necessarily occasioned by the automobile, capable of projection from a long distance. The moral strain, and consequent physical exhaustion, as well as the material danger, from this cause has been recognized to be among the very disturbing factors in future attempted blockades; and the question how best to deal with such a condition has weighed heavily upon the naval mind. No solution can be said to have received uni- versal acceptance. In default of experience it was plausible to argue, a priori, and upon gen- eral principles, that whatever may be said of Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 113 torpedoes launched from one battleship against another, which is a separate problem, the attack by torpedo vessels upon a blockading fleet is simply a particular form of the general question of surprises, and must be met by precautions anal- ogous to those used by all great armed masses, which cover their front and flanks with a system of advanced detachments, diminishing in numerical strength until the outermost of all, called the picket line, is reached. By these means is ensured, to a greater or less degree, that timely alarm will be given, and also a certain amount of resistance opposed, all tending to prolong the period during which the main body will be preparing to meet the attack, thus reduced from a surprise to the normal conditions of warfare. This is the simply defensive resource by which an investing body, military or naval, protects itself against attack unawares from within or without, whether by sortie in force, or by some special enterprise on a minor scale in- tended to inflict a particular injury; such as dis- abling a battery approaching completion, inter- cepting a train of supplies, etc. The oflFensive purpose, whether it be siege or blockade, demands further dispositions; but, whatever these may be, there is always necessity to guard against offensive returns, by surprise, from the opponent within. It appears to me, from the numerous though 114 Naval Administration and War jar e often very brief and partial accounts which reach us, that Admiral Togo's measures have reflected these conditions. Since the discontinuance of the bombardments by the fleet, and of the efforts to close the harbor's mouth, the conspicuous feature of the naval operations, as reported, has been the recurrent encounters between small ves- sels, singly or in groups. These have been mainly of the torpedo class, or unarmored cruisers, evi- dently engaged in outpost work, for which their size particularly designates them. The Japanese battle fleet has presumably maintained a position where its commander believed that, under all ordinary circumstances, by its system of lookouts, it would receive timely notice of an attempt on the part of the enemy to come out in force. In offensive purpose we know that on more than one occasion, conspicuously on June 23, these precautions were adequate, for the fleet came up in accordance with signals; while on the defensive side we also know that no successful attack has been made by a torpedo vessel on the Japanese main blockading fleet, the Hatsuse having been sunk by a station- ary mine. I have been told, by a person in a posi- tion to speak with assurance, that the inactivity of the Russians, with the very respectable torpedo flotilla at their command, is attributed in part to the personal characteristics of their naval Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 115 commander-in-chief; to his excess of caution or lack of enterprise. To this correspond expres- sions attributed by a correspondent of the Times (June 1 8) to Captain Arima, the Japanese naval officer who commanded in the first two attempts to block the entrance. " The one thing essential to Russia above all others was to prevent Japan from securing undisturbed use of the waterways to the continental seat of war. It was for her to assume and to hold the offensive. Her passivity has been astonishing. It may be doubted whether she yet knows where the Japanese have their naval base. When Makaroff had reorganized his fleet, we expected to find his destroyers and torpedo boats scouting through an arc of a hundred miles radius. We expected to find him taking active steps to discover what route our vessels habitually followed in approaching Port Arthur. Even if, having tracked us to our base, he found it in un- surveyed waters, knowledge of our course must have afforded him many opportunities. But he did nothing. His vessels lay tamely awaiting our attacks." If these criticisms be just, — and it is not easy to contest them, — they qualify by so far the natu- ral inference from the present operations; which, with that exception, have been confirmatory of the opinion, already held by some, that torpedo vessels 116 Naval Administration and War jar e would find it exceedingly difficult to get within range — at night even within sight — of a hostile battle fleet, well picketed by lookouts close in with the harbor mouth, and itself occupying a position unknown to the would-be assailants. Judging from reports at this moment of writing (August 13), the annual manoeuvre period of the British fleet points to the same conclusion. There is also a statement, made upon good authority, that in one of the sorties of the Vladivostok squadron, it v/as sighted by Kamimura's division and kept in view till nightfall, the pursuing torpedo vessels reaching within two or three miles; but upon the Russian lights being extinguished all trace was lost. Like- wise it is familiar to students of naval history that a chased vessel, the exact position of which at dusk was visible, frequently escaped by the simple trick of shov^ing no lights, or false lights, and changing her course. This expedient was effective even against intent eyes looking towards a point already discerned, and from a comparatively lofty deck. Owing to the lowness of torpedo craft, vision is much more restricted in range; and through their unsteadiness, it is more difficult to retain. That " frigates are eyes of the fleet " is a saying probably older than Nelson, by whom it is known to have been adopted. In his day, however, the eyes were almost wholly for ofi'ensive purposes; Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 117 to ascertain the whereabouts of the enemy, in order to jjuide one's own movements of attack. The ancient Hne-of-battle ships were not Hable to sur- prise, in the strict sense of the word, although the unexpected doubtless often occurred. Now, however, the seaman is reduced to the full level of the exposure which in this respect has long dogged the soldier, and the eyes of Argus scarcely would exceed the demand for defensive outlook. If the unusually smooth weather, which has marked the recent British manoeuvres, enlarged in consequence the range of action and effect of the submarine, as is thought, it suggests also that many steamboats of the outside fleet, not capable of meeting heavy seas, could be utilized for de- fence in such circumstances. It will remain a question for some time how near a harbor's mouth a blockading battle-force will venture to lie. If its object be merely to support a commercial blockade, maintained chiefly by lighter and swifter cruisers, this end may be se- cured without very close approach ; but, if charged with preventing the escape of a division within, distance will be a matter of importance. The latter has been the condition of Admiral Togo's block- ade, and the escape of the Russians, to which every motive should prompt them, has so far been thwarted. We do not know what his proceeding 118 Naval Administration and Warfare has been, but we do know that his battle fleet is frequently out of sight; and yet, on the un- expected appearance of the enemy with his re- paired ships, on June 23, Togo was promptly on hand. Under the particular conditions of Port Arthur, which made the issue of a fleet onerous and protracted, the vessels having to come out one by one, ample time is allowed for conveying warning to a distance. The difficulty would be far greater where egress was easy, and could be effected independently of tide conditions. Under such circumstances, to sustain its offensive role, the outside battle fleet must take a position which will greatly increase its danger, and impose further strain upon its defensive powers. By day the range of modern ordnance, and by both night and day the establishment of outside mine fields to the extreme limit of the belligerent's waters, suffice to prevent very close approach by ar- mored vessels, the draft of which is unavoidably heavy. These factors, however, are stationary, and can readily be allowed for. It is, as always, the mobile foes, in this case the division wishing to escape, the enemy's defensive body, with the torpedo flotilla as its offensive covering arm, which constitute the difficulty. The problem is probably no more troublesome, nor more unequal between the two contestants, than those which our Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 119 predecessors encountered; but the particular danger of unexpected sudden assault, directed at a peculiarly vital spot, by assailants not readily visible, is new, and v^e have not yet the experi- mental data necessary for even an approximate answer as to its degree, or as to the facility of counteraction. One thing we know; risks must be run by those who would make war. Admiral Sampson well said in one of his general orders, the escape of the Spanish squadron is so serious a matter that the risk of the torpedo must be accepted. Yet how far may not such a sound general maxim be qualified by conditions of political urgency, or of ultimate military success, as con- trasted with immediate victory. There is such a thing as the " sterile glory " of fighting battles, and still more of running risks, the object of which is not worth the possible loss. The best victories, said Tourville, are those which cost least in blood, hemp, and iron. It has been noted of Nelson, truly, I think, that he was more cautious about his top-gallant masts in bad weather than about his whole fleet in battle. It has seemed to me all along very much of a question whether Admiral Togo would be well advised to court action with his battleships, provided he could prevent the enemy's escape without it. It would be better 120 Naval Administration and War jar e to throw the weight of the destruction of the enemy's squadron upon his torpedo vessels and upon the army. His conditions are not those of Sampson, though even in that case obvious poHt- ical considerations precluded all needless hazard of battleships. Japan has abundance of men, but she has not superabundance of ships. For an adequate object she can afford to risk much, and under some conditions must risk everything, if necessary; but, after all, the winning of victories is worth while only to the one supreme decisive object of her naval operations — the control of the sea ; and if that can be attained equally well by other means, the battle fleet should be pre- served as both a political and military factor of the first importance. There did not seem to me eagerness to engage in his operations of June 23 ; although here again information, still imperfect, prevents positiveness of judgment. Opinion con- cerning his motives must repose rather upon apparent expediency, conjoined with such indica- tions as the reports contain. Again, what force has he had recently before Port Arthur ? Has he not drawn thither the greater part of the armored cruisers which once appeared to be with Kami- mura before Vladivostok ? This measure, if rec- ognized by the Russians, would deter them from desperate attempts to leave, and, should they try Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 121 it, would ensure comparative immunity for his own fleet by an overwhelming superiority of force, thus shortenmg the time of engagement, and lessening, as well as distributing, the amount of injury which the enemy could effect. It would account also for the apparent inefficiency of the Japanese Vladivostok squadron, which has so far failed to bring to book the audacious enemy within. After writing these words, rummaging through some cuttings relative to the war, which I had put aside, I turned out, among other things, the report of Captain Arima's remarks, before forgotten, from which I have already introduced one quotation. He further confirms, and was doubtless in a position to speak knowingly, that the necessity for care of the battleships was clearly recognized, and was a dominant motive in Japan- ese councils: " Our general strategy has been largely guided by the consideration that our navy is not elastic. Whatever resources we take into the fight must suffice us until the finish. Our first thought, therefore, was to expose our squadrons to a mini- mum of danger, so long as their destructive po- tency was not thereby impaired. We have not courted conflicts at close ranges. We have avoided them, preferring to utilize to the full the immense 122 Naval Administration and Warfare potentialities of modern cannon. Hence our fre- quent employment of high angle fire, which it is not our experience is specially severe on a gun. Besides, we have no lack of guns. . . . Our attempts to seal Port Arthur were inspired pri- marily by these same economical considerations. Whatever we could do to paralyze the enemy's squadron without hurting our own ships, that we had to do." The reasoning, I think, is conclusive, and justi- fies Arima's further remark : " The same considerations that dictated for us a programme as economical as possible should have impelled our enemy to assume the offensive with all the destructive force he could command. Russia had reserves to draw on; and she has building yards on an incomparably larger scale than those of Japan. The loss of a few ships could not have mattered for her, could she have crippled or destroyed an equal number of Jap- anese vessels. With regard to Makaroff's strategy, and the Russian naval strategy in general, it appears to us that they have erred seriously throughout." In these words I infer a very evident reference to the Baltic fleet; for in Far Eastern waters Russia certainly had neither original equality, nor re- serves, nor dockyard capacity to vie with Japan. Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 123 Apparently, Japanese naval authorities reckoned the coming of a Baltic squadron as among very possible contingencies. The nautical difficulties of every kind confronting it were in no wise insuperable; in fact, were very moderate; and its failure to appear can be attributed only to a very serious lack of appreciation of naval conditions, or to the general unpreparedness which made a timely start impracticable. The process of re- pairing, which finally on June 23 enabled the Russian fleet to put into line the two battleships, Cesarevitch and Retvizan, would have justified Makaroff in delaying action until he could bring his whole force against an enemy so decidedly superior; but that accomplished, — and its period would be known antecedently at St. Petersburg, — the despatch of the Baltic fleet, coincident in purpose, if not in time, with a determined attack upon the Japanese fleet by the Port Arthur division, would be a combination not only feasible but highly promising of decisive eflPect. Port Arthur has held out to a time apparently far exceeding Japanese anticipations at the date (May 14) when Arima uttered the words reported; for, speaking of certain attempts that might be made by the Russian fleet within, he concluded his remarks by saying, " We believe that, unless our estimate of our army be erroneous, there will not remain to 124 Naval Administration and Warfare Port Arthur much time for such enterprises." The garrison has endured beyond the expectation of many; but where is the reheving force ? This article was begun, and mostly written, before the sortie of the Russian fleet from Port Arthur, August lo; but it has been concluded — and revised — under the full impression produced by its failure. Precision of details as to what actually occurred, of the successive stages of the combat which led up to the final result, are still wanting; but the material outcome is sufficiently evident for all practical purposes, for forming a workable estimate of the situation as it now is, and of the probabilities of the immediate future. As the matter of the engagement of August lo now (August 19) stands, there could scarcely be asked an apter illustration of that aspect of the subject of warfare — and of all practical action — upon which I dwelt at the beginning. There can be little doubt that when the details are known, and have been collated, studied, and weighed, by men of special aptitudes, there will be found much that will throw needed experimental light upon the conditions of modern warfare, and much room for criticism, favorable or adverse, upon the conduct of the respective fleets. But important as all this is in its place and time, and conducive as it may prove, when w^ell digested, to the formu- Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 125 lation of professional opinion upon questions still in dispute, it is not immediately imperative; nay, it is necessarily a matter of time and delibera- tion. Those who have tried to balance opposing statements of eye-w^itnesses, to reconcile official reports, to supplement defective testimony, know how troublesome it is to reconstruct the course of a naval battle. At present the one feature which engages my own attention, standing out from the fog of unexplained details, is the apparent continued care of Togo to preserve his battleships. It is incredible that after the experience of June 23 he should not have been in superior force, and certainly he had the best of the fighting; his fleet remains on the field, and his enemy dispersed. But why did he not push home his advantage : Why was the Cesarevitch permitted to escape, and the other battleships to return .f* He can scarcely expect, if the place falls, that they will be given up "alive;" or have felt about battering them, as Nelson about using shell against an enemy, that it would be burning " our own " ships. To surmise that there may remain more life in the place than appears may cover me with confusion, ere the words appear in print; but under the most natural conclusion, that Japan does not feel even yet that she has any margin of sea power to spare, what a comment on Russian naval management, 126 Naval Administration and Warfare and what a justification of the tenure of Port Arthur, and the consequent harassment of the enemy's httle navy ! This battle in fact is part of the process, of the method, of the detail, appertaining to the drama of war passing before our eyes; and it is not so much the particulars of its own action which is important, but the part which it itself, as a whole, bears to the final result. Due consideration of this part demands reference not only to that which is to come, intervening between the present and the anticipated future, but also to the irrecoverable past. Properly to value it, we should work back- ward as well as forward, and regard the broad aspect of the general contest not only with eyes enlightened by recognition of fundamental prin- ciples of war, but also with attention undistracted by multiplication of irrelevant detail. Whatever the cause, and wherever the fault, Russia, though much the greater in ultimate resources, permitted herself to drift into war unprepared, and gravely inferior in force upon the decisive scene of con- flict. This was especially the case upon the sea; the control of which was, and has continued, so absolutely essential to Japan, that apart from it she would be helpless for the offensive action she had to take. Under these circumstances two things were nee- Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 127 essary to Russia — delay, in order to gather her resources, and promptitude in repairing the neglect of the past. Herein appears the importance of Port Arthur in the past; it has obtained delay. The time occupied in the siege has been ample for a government, which recognized that the whole Jap- anese movement turned upon the control of the sea, to have despatched a fleet that by this time could have reached the scene, and very well might have turned the scale — allowing only for the fortune of war. Before this writing, the aggregate of Russian naval force in the East might have been made very decidedly superior to that of Japan; and the prob- lem of bringing the separated sections into co- operation against a concentrated enemy, though difl^cult, would be by no means hopeless. Success would have ended the war. The Japanese, having this danger staring them in the face, have, I think, seen it more clearly than many of their critics. As shown by the course of the war, by their action, they have recognized that Port Arthur was the key, not only to the naval war but to the whole campaign, land and sea. It would have been to them an immeasurable calamity had the naval season, already approach- ing its close, ended with Port Arthur in the hands of the enemy. Amid all the uncertainty in which we are as to the respective numbers of the oppos- 128 Naval Administration and Warfare ing armies, one thing seems clear, — that Kuro patkin up to the present has profited, and con- tinues to profit, by the siege of Port Arthur; aid that to a degree which still renders inconclusive the whole Japanese movement against him. They gain ground, undoubtedly; but the Russian army continually escapes them. It is not to be believed that leaders with the high order of military intelligence shown by them would permit this had they the power to prevent it. Each successful retreat leaves the Russian army still an organized force, still " in being; " draws it nearer to its resources, and lengthens its enemy's communica- tions. A naval base is an element of sea-power. It may be no less determinative of a naval issue than the fleet itself, because it is essential to its existence. The tenure of Port Arthur, equally with the control of the Far Eastern waters, has contributed to the demonstration of the influence of sea-power. It has modified the whole tenor of the land operations, and who shall say that even the delay so far procured may not sensibly affect the outcome of the war, even though the place itself shortly fall '^. The defence of Port Arthur must not be looked upon as an isolated considera- tion dependent upon its particular merits, but as part of a general plan of operations. Every day it holds out is a gain; not perhaps for itself but for Principles Involved in Japan-Russia War 129 Russia. No principle of warfare is more funda- mental than that no one position stands, or falls, for itself alone, but for the general good. The ques- tion is not. Can Kuropatkin bring the Japanese to a stand as yet ? Probably he cannot, if the besieg- ing force is released. It is. Can he continue a suc- cessful retreat, until the season brings theoperations to a close ? " Though our military position was im- posing," wrote Bonaparte to the Directory in 1797, " it must not be thought that we had everything in our hands. Had the enemy awaited me, I should have beaten him ; but had he continued to fall back, continually augmenting his resources, the situation might have become embarrassing." Whether Port Arthur has, or has not, obtained for Kuropatkin all the time needed to organize a campaign of this character, remains to be seen; but I think the verdict of history must be that such was the tendency of its resistance, and that failure, if it comes, must be attributed to insufficiency of means, not to error in strategic conception. The time it has held out justifies the risk taken in the original calculation. Lake Lucerne, August 19, 1904. RETROSPECT UPON THE WAR BETWEEN JAPAN AND RUSSIA RETROSPECT UPON THE WAR BE- TWEEN JAPAN AND RUSSIA March, 1906 MEASURED by the external and obvious incidents of its progress, time certainly flies in these days. Momentous events come swiftly into view^, shoot rapidly by, and with equal speed disappear into the past, crowded out of sight and mind by the successors which tread upon their heels. Nor is this due only to the immediate- ness with which intelligence is transmitted to the four quarters of the globe. The facility of physical movement, and for the communication of facts and interchange of thought, between persons or nations co-operating to a common end, the be- quests to us of the last century, have accentuated perceptibly the pace of mankind, the making of history. The still recent war between Japan and Russia is a conspicuous instance. Not merely the first thunderbolt blow of Admiral Togo upon the Russian fleet exposed before Port Arthur, but the final maturing of the quarrel, and the progress 133 134 Naval Administration and Warfare of the war itself, were marked by a quick decisive- ness unattainable under similar conditions a century ago. Among similar conditions I include, of course, the capacity of the leaders, as well as the circumstances under which they are called to act; the difference between a Napoleon and lesser men would be as great to-day as it was in his own time, and likewise as great under one set of external conditions as under another. Again, when the fighting in Manchuria had reached what proved to be its end, the peace itself, owing to the ease with which the plenipotentiaries and their governments could exchange ideas and mes- sages, was concluded with a suddenness which took by surprise a doubting world ; while no sooner is the war over than it is forgotten in public inter- est. Here and there a professional writer gives forth his views, to which some brief comment is accorded ; but that the war itself, and its lessons, have ceased to engage general attention, is at- tested alike by the columns of journals and the lists of articles in the reviews. Underlying the external and obvious character- istics, that thus pass out of sight and mind, there are in every period factors more permanent in operation and longer in development, which for these reasons demand closer scrutiny and more sustained attention. For instance, the recent Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 135 elections (1906) in Great Britain have probably corresponded in kind, in general outcome, to general expectation, as did also the issue of the war between Japan and Russia; but in degree each has taken the world — at least the outside world — by surprise. The events are obvious; but, in the one case as in the other, what account is to be given ? Does the magnitude of the imme- diate result indicate in either case a final deter- mination of the current of history, definitive direc- tions to be henceforth maintained by three mighty nations ? or is there reason to suppose that, like a river forced to adapt its course to the country through which it flows, we see only a mo- mentary deflection, or a momentary persistence, beyond which may be discerned already condi- tions which must substantially change what may now appear an irreversible decision ? Has the war itself revolutionized, or seriously modified, ante- cedent teachings of military and naval history ? In military matters, so far as they can be sepa- rated from political, the obvious and external be- long chiefly to the field of tactics, as distinguished from strategy. The relative significance of these two terms may be assumed familiar to the pubHc through the discussions of the past score of years. Great battles, great surrenders, the startling mile- stones of a campaign or a war, remain vividly 136 Naval Administration and Warfare impressed upon minds that may never have ap- preciated or suspected the underlying stream of causes which from time to time emerges in these conspicuous results. And as such popular recog- nition is essentially narrow in scope, so the matters to which it relates are the most narrowly technical, and consequently those which in fact the general public can least accurately weigh. A broad out- come — victory or defeat — is within its compre- hension; the fitness or the errors of the military means employed are much less so, except in very general statement. Politicians, doubtless, find the same in their campaigns. Great considerations of policy, appreciation of conditions, especially those of the future, which correspond to the strate- gic diagnosis of the warrior, are much less effect- ive at the moment than some teUing phrase, or suggestion of immediate interest, which can be quickly fashioned into a campaign cry that hal- loes down reasonable opposition. Such victories, however, are fruitless in war or in politics. Unless the position won is strategically decisive, by its correspondence to the conditions of the war or of the nation, the battle might as well, or better, never have been fought. In military affairs the choice of action, being in the hands of one man, may by him be determined, for good or ill, with- out regard to his followers; and in the analogous Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 137 position of a despotic ruler, if an able man, a for- tunate solution may be reached independent of popular will. Happily for those who love freedom, this case is rare. In popular government the fore- sight of the statesman must wait upon the con- version of the people, often extorted only by the hard logic of experience. The good of national conviction and support must be purchased at the expense of national suffering, consequent upon the slowness with which nations comprehend condi- tions not at once apparent. Yet in the end it is the country ahead, not that behind, which will control the future course of the river. Justly appreciated, military affairs are one side of the politics of a nation, and therefore con- cern each individual who has an interest in the government of the state. They form part of a closely related whole; and, putting aside the purely professional details, which relate mostly to the actual clash of arms, — the province of tactics, — military preparations should be deter- mined chiefly by those broad political considera- tions which affect the relations of states one to another, or of the several parts of the same state to the common defence. Defence, let it be said parenthetically to the non-military reader, implies not merely what shall be done to repel attack, but what is necessary to do in order that attack may 138 Naval Administration and War jar e not be attempted, or, if undertaken, may be resisted elsewhere than at the national frontier, be that land or sea. From this point of view, which is strictly accurate, defence may be defined broadly as provision for national well-being by mihtary means. It was the primary misfortune, or, more correctly, the primary error of Russia, that by neglect of this provision her statesmen placed her in such a condition that, upon the out- break of the recent war, she was forced at once into a position of pure defence; the scene of which was her land and sea frontiers, as constituted through her several measures of acquisition or aggression during the preceding years of peace. From what has been said, it will appear that such considerations as may naturally arise from the naval point of view, through reflection upon the still recent war, will divide into two classes: those that concern the direction of national policies, and those which affect the construction, armament, and management of fleets, which, in the last analy- sis, are simply instruments of national poHcy. The question, for instance, of the possession, fortification, and development of Port Arthur, as a naval station, as was done by Russia, is one of broad national policy; one upon which every naval state has to reach decisions in reference to the ports available for naval purposes, which it Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 139 may control in various quarters of the world; one also concerning which there obtain, in both military and naval circles, differences of opinions that have to be weighed by governments. On the other hand, the question whether Port Arthur, developed as it had been by Russia, and under the other existing conditions, should have been abandoned at the beginning, as some contend, or retained and obstinately defended, as it actually was, is more closely mihtary in scope; although, belonging as it does to the province of strategy, the arguments pro and con can be more easily and quickly apprehended by the non-professional mind. Conversely, it is open to argument whether Japan was well advised to attach as much im- portance as her course of action indicated to the downfall of the fortress, to its actual capture, as distinguished from neutralizing its military effect by a simple corps of observation, sufficient to pre- vent evacuation by the garrison to reinforce the Russian field army, or to stop the entrance of reinforcements or supplies from without, which might prolong resistance. This question also is military in character; and strategical, not tactical. It affects the conduct of the war, and by no means necessarily the wisdom of the decision of the Rus- sian government to establish an adequate naval base at that point. Whatever opinion may be held 140 Naval Administration and Warfare as to the proper line of action in the particular in- stance, after war had begun, it is quite conceivable that a government may be perfectly justified, by considerations of general policy, in establishing a military or naval base for the support of one of its frontiers at some particular point; and yet that, by conditions of a subsequent moment, the com- mander-in-chief on the spot, or his superiors at home, may properly decide that the exigencies of the immediate situation dictate its abandonment. These immediate conditions may be imputable as a fault to either the government or its general; they may arise from inadequate preparation by the one or mistaken management by the other; but they do not therefore necessarily impeach the wisdom of the original decision, which rested upon quite other grounds. It is precisely the same in other incidents of statesmanship. One administration may secure a national advantage of far-reaching importance, which a successor may forfeit by carelessness in improvement, or by some mis- managed negotiation; by prolonged neglect, or by a single mistake. Neither outcome would con- demn the original measure, which rests on its own merits; recognizing the possibilities, and presupposing — quite legitimately — a consistent furtherance of the steps first taken. Such considerations are so obvious that the Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 141 statement of them at length may probably seem tedious. Yet I am confident that it is the failure thus explicitly to analyze to oneself the several lights in which a complex problem may be re- garded, the tendency to view them too exclusively together, as a composite single result, that leads to much confusion of thought, with the probable consequence of erroneous determination. Take, for instance, the question of the speed of battle- ships. No one will deny for an instant that, other things being equal, additional speed — the high- est — is desirable. This, however, is not the question. It is the question mixed up with the assumption that other things are equal, that you are getting your additional speed for nothing; or, to express it otherwise, there is the momentary forgetfulness that something else in the w^ay of efficiency must be sacrificed, and that, when a certain speed has been attained, a small increment must be purchased at a very great sacrifice. What shall the sacrifice be } Gun power ? Then your vessel, when she has overtaken her otherwise equal enemy, will be inferior in offensive power. Ar- mor .? Then she will be more vulnerable. Some- thing of the coal she would carry '^. But the ex- penditure of coal in ever increasing ratio is a vital factor in your cherished speed. If you can give up none of these things, and it is demon- 142 Naval Administration and Warfare strable that without some sacrifice you cannot get the speed, will you then — and this is what all navies are now doing — increase the size of the ship ? Yes, you say, by all means. Well, then, where will you stop ? Or, the same question in other words, what will you sacrifice in order to get your greater dimensions ? Will you have fewer ships; smaller numbers with larger in- dividual power ? You will sacrifice numbers ? Then you sacrifice so far that power of com- bination which is essential to military dispositions, whether they relate to the distribution of the fleet in peace, with reference to possible war, or to the exigencies of the campaign, or to the battlefield. But, if the final decision be we will have numbers as well, then the reply is you must sacrifice money; which, starting from the question of speed, brings us face to face with one of the great present prob- lems of national policy among all naval nations, the size of the budget. For the line of reasoning which applies to the 18,000 or 20,000 ton ship will hold good when you have reached 30,000, and your neighbor " goes one better," by laying down one of 32,000. No matter how big your ship may be, a bigger can be built. The skill of the naval architect and engineer is equal to producing it, and the open sea at least will be able to float it. Whether it can enter harbors is another question; Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 143 some at least will be deep enough. But it must be borne in mind that this progression is endless; the same problems recur with each increase. Those who remember the geometry of their boy- hood will recall that similar triangles remain similar, be the sides ten feet, or ten yards, or ten miles. The determining angles remain the same, and in this matter the above considerations are the constant angles. This question of speed, thus developed, may be illustrated perfectly aptly from that of Port Arthur. In the case of that port, the question, fully stated, was not simply, " Is the position in itself one good for Russia to keep, or for Japan to capture .? '* It was, " Is the place worth the sacrifice which must be made to hold or to win it ^ " If Russia wished to keep it, she must sacrifice from Kuro- patkin's too small army some forty or fifty thou- sand men. If Japan was bent on taking, she must withdraw from her field army to the siege opera- tions, from first to last, from seventy-five to one hundred thousand; and, if she was in a hurry, she must be prepared for the further sacrifice, otherwise unnecessary, of many thousands of lives, in the desperate assaults made to hasten the end.' It is to be supposed that each party meas- ' The Japanese losses at the siege have been estimated at 59,000. " Journal of the Royal Artillery," October, 1905, 322- 144 Naval Administration and Warfare ured adequately the sacrifice either way, and took the alternative adopted in full view of the cost; yet it is by no means sure that this was the case. It is at least very possible that to each Port Arthur derived its importance from attention fixed upon it to the exclusion of qualifying considerations; as may be supposed the case with speed, from the extravagant demands now made for it in ships, the chief function of which should be to give and to take hard knocks, and that not severally, but in conjunction with others of their like, which we style a fleet. The question of Port Arthur, indeed, was one so important in the general campaign up to the moment of its fall, and afterwards by the effect of the delay caused by the siege upon subsequent operations, that among military critics it has given rise to very diverse opinions, affecting more or less the question of national policy in establish- ing such bases. There is found on the one side the unqualified assertion of a cardinal mistake by the Russians in not at once evacuating a posi- tion which could not be ultimately held, and con- centrating with Kuropatkin every available sol- dier. On the other there is an equally sharp criti- cism by soldiers — not by seamen — of Japan, for having diverted so many troops from Oyama as seriously to affect the vigor and conclusiveness Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 145 of his operations, thereby enabling the enemy con- tinually to escape. It is clear that the argument is not wholly one-sided. If the Japanese were compelled, or induced, it matters little which, to devote to the siege a number of men who in the early part of the war might have been used de- cisively against Kuropatkin's relatively feeble army, it follows that the leaving the place garri- soned had an effect favorable to the Russians at a very critical moment. That the Japanese felt compelled, and really were compelled, to their course can scarcely be doubted, unless one views the land and sea campaigns as wholly separate operations. For purposes of discussion they may be so severed, but actually they were one whole; and ultimate conclusions cannot be accurately reached without bearing in mind their inter-rela- tion. It was essential to the Russians to protract the land campaign, to gain time to develop their naval strength; it was essential to the Japanese to destroy the fleet in Port Arthur before such development, in order to secure the sea communica- tions upon which their land campaign depended. To ensure this end it was imperative to gain con- trol of the port. That the Russians actually made no adequate use of the chance obtained for them by its prolonged resistance is nothing to the purpose. It is difficult to find an adjective 146 Naval Administration and Warfare fitted to characterize the delays in despatching the Baltic fleet. The fact remains that they had their chance through the protraction of the siege. My own opinion from the first has been, and now continues, that regarded in itself alone, and with reference to the land campaign only, the retention by Russia was correct; and that, had her naval campaign in its entirety been managed with any- thing like the ability shown by Kuropatkin, the event of the war in Manchuria might have been different. That to naval success a long tenure of Port Arthur was absolutely essential is too obvious for comment; but imagine the effect upon nego- tiations, had the conditions on shore, including the fall of Port Arthur, been precisely as they were when peace was signed, but that a timely previous co-operation between the Port Arthur and Baltic divisions had left the Russians in sure control of the sea. That the view here outlined was held by the Japanese, rightly or wrongly, is clear from the persistence of Admiral Togo in his attempts to block the port, and to injure the fleet within by long range firing; and afterwards from the sustained vigorous character of the prolonged siege operations. We now know that in the Russian naval sorties of June 23 and August 10 the Japanese had but four battleships to the Russian's six on the spot. Togo, doubtless, could Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 147 not have anticipated so cruel a stroke of fate as that which, on May 15, 1904, deprived him of two battleships in one day by submarine mines. Yet, whatever the value of his fleet in its largest numbers, it was quite evident that the Russian fleet, ** in being " in Port Arthur, by itself alone constituted a perpetual menace to the sea communications of Japan, the absolutely determining factor of the war; while taken in connection with the Russian Baltic fleet, still in existence, the possibilities of fatal disaster to the Japanese depended wholly upon the skill with which the Russians managed the naval resources remaining to them after the first torpedo attack of Februarys, and upon the time they were able to obtain for that object by the resistance of Port Arthur. Whether that resistance was protracted as long as it could be is beyond my competency to say; but it certainly continued long enough to afford Russia oppor- tunity to bring into play all her naval means, if her schemes for imperial defence, in its broadest sense, had corresponded to the necessities of the situation. In fact, on land. Port Arthur bore to this war much the relationship that Ladysmith did to that in South Africa. Whether Sir George White should have retreated towards Durban, to concen- trate with other British forces to be expected; 148 Naval Administration and War fare whether the Boers should have settled down to a siege protracted by their indolence, as that of Port Arthur was by the inherent and developed strength of the position, are questions which will be differently answered. What admits of little doubt is that the effect produced upon the Japanese action in the later instance was the same as that upon the Boers in the earlier, and with greater reason; for, while the menace of Port Arthur was in kind the same as that of Ladysmith, it was far greater in degree. The characteristics may be more convincingly illustrated by recalling the effect of Mantua upon Bonaparte's operations of 1796. The parallelism is here confined to the land operations, reserving the very direct influence of Port Arthur upon naval operations for further discussion. The entire distance advanced by the Japanese from Chemulpo to Mukden, and by the French from Savona to Leoben, where the pre- liminaries were dictated by Bonaparte, is about 350 miles in each case. Two months after leaving Savona the French reached Mantua, 120 miles. There they were delayed eight months, June 4 to February 2, during which period Bonaparte fought several battles, or rather made several cam- paigns, to defeat the attempts of the-Austrians to relieve the place; but he could make no a9t^lTrce, for he had no disposable force beyond that needed Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 149 for the blockade. The Japanese were more for- tunate, through their previous preparations and their full control of the sea. Nevertheless, from the victory of Liao-Yang, August 30, to the battle of Mukden, February 24, they advanced but thirty-five miles. The siege of Port Arthur lasted from May 27 to January i, seven months; upon its fall followed a period of preparation, corre- sponding to that passed by Bonaparte after the surrender of Mantua in securing his rear against possible enemies. Then advance in each case was resumed, with forces thenceforth liberated from the fear as to their communications, which was the detaining- effect exerted in their several days by Mantua, Ladysmith, and Port Arthur. The conduct of the Japanese with relation to Port Arthur, prior to its surrender, and even to its serious investment, cannot but exert a salutary in- fluence upon the celebrated theory of the " fleet in being," to which has been freely attributed a determining influence that has always to me appeared exaggerated. From the argument de- veloped above, it must appear that I appreciate vividly the bearing of the fleet in Port Arthur upon the war. It is not too much to say that, in the strategic -sense, the fleet was the Port, which with- ouVit possessed no value and would never have been fortified nor acquired. The naval possibili- 150 Naval Administration and Warfare ties involved were the strongest inducement to the acquisition of the Liao-tung Peninsula; and the fact that the Japanese main communications were by sea constitutes the analogy of the position to Mantua. The signal of Admiral Togo to his fleet off Tsu-shima may be invoked to show that the Japanese thus regarded the Port, purely as harboring the fleet. If the fate of the Empire depended upon the results of that day, when only the Baltic division was in face, how much more serious the situation so long as the Port Arthur ships remained a valid force, before they had supinely allowed their throats to be cut like stalled cattle. Yet, while recognizing by their acts all the menace of that " fleet in being," the Japanese did not hesitate to adventure the fortunes of a war essential to national progress upon an over- sea expedition, which not only was to make a passage once for all across a belt of water, but must there be maintained until a settled peace restored freedom of transit. Even before knowing the issue of the first torpedo attack, of February 8, 12,000 troops put to sea to land at Chemulpo, like the advanced detachment hazarded to seize the opposite bank of a river, and hold there a position at which the remainder of the army can disembark. The instance is the more impressive because of the immensity of the stake, when it is remembered Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 151 what defeat would have meant to Japan in this infancy of her progress, economical and political, in the new world of modern civilization. It may certainly be replied, and justly, that the very greatness of the emergency demanded the hazard, upon the sound principle that desperate conditions require desperate remedies. It is likely enough that to attempts important, yet secondary, where the danger incurred by failure exceeds the advantage to be gained by success, a " fleet in be- ing " may prove a sufficient deterrent. This was the case with Louis XIV's projected landing in England in 1690, which elicited Admiral Tor- rington's historic phrase, " fleet in being." In expeditions of similar secondary importance, how- ever. Great Britain continually adventured bodies of troops during the Napoleonic wars; not to men- tion Wellington's army in the Peninsula, rein- forcements and supplies to which were certainly to some extent endangered, and occasionally molested, by the cruisers or naval divisions of an inferior enemy. But, after attributing the utmost effect upon the councils of an enemy produced by the presence of a " fleet in being," at a point favorable for acting upon communications, the fact remains that in this very crucial instance the Japanese have practically defined its actual powers. They met the threat to them, not by 152 Naval Administration and Warfare submitting to inaction until the enemy's fleet was destroyed, but by doing just what a general on shore does, when he cannot at once capture a fortress menacing his line of advance. Port Arthur was masked by the Japanese fleet, stationed at a fitting position, and kept informed of the enemy's movements by a well-developed scouting system. To these measures for repelling a sortie in force was committed the safety of the army to be transported in the rear; and the undoubted possibilities of occasional, even serious, injury to a body of transports was accepted, secure that the " fleet in being," being essentially inferior to the Japanese navy as a whole, could not perma- nently interrupt the forward flow which consti- tutes communications. If, as I have understood the advocates of the " fleet in being " theory, the mere existence of a powerful, though inferior, body of ships should deter an enemy from committing himself to over-sea operations, the Japanese have certainly demonstrated a contrary possibility. Were they therein wrong ? Though successful, has their success been achieved in defiance of a clear rule of warfare, or has it rather been in observance of a well-established practice, with its necessary precautions ? The example is the more provocative of inquiry, and of reconsideration of accepted maxims, in that, Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 153 as a matter of fact, the Japanese sea communica- tions, though maintained substantially secure, did not escape harassment, and yet more serious threat. Here and there a transport, here and there a merchant vessel, was captured by the not too excessive activity of the Vladivostok squad- ron, the operations of which might have been increased in scope and frequency had the Port Arthur division, taking its hfe in its hands, flung itself desperately upon Togo's fleet, determined to effect the utmost injury at whatever cost. The irresolute sortie of August lo produced results sufficient to show that the consequence of such a move might be so far to weaken Togo as to com- pel him to draw upon Kamimura's squadron to reinforce the watch over Port Arthur; a step which would by so much facilitate the move- ment of the Vladivostok ships. Such increase of activity, with consequent Japanese necessary precaution, would not only have illustrated further the pros and cons of the *' fleet in being " theory. It would have thrown desirable light also upon the question of the influence which the molestation of commerce, whether by direct capture or by the paralysis induced by menace and apprehension, can exert upon the economical conditions of a state, and through them upon military efl&ciency. The contemporary files of papers published in 154 Naval Administration and Warfare Japan bear witness to the immediate effect pro- duced; but the danger passed too rapidly to demonstrate the possible reaction from this dis- play of the proverbial timidity of capital, whether invested in shipping or otherwise. Such result as was open to the Vladivostok squadron to produce was further limited by the fact that it was composed of armored cruisers, a compromise double-faced type of vessel, the ad- visability of which has long been questioned by respectable professional opinion, and now more and more loudly than ever. The decision is one of national policy, by no means purely of technical character; the considerations on which it must turn are perfectly easy of comprehension. If, instead of being ships built with one eye on fighting and one on speed, the Vladivostok ships had been fairly and frankly cruisers, pure and simple, un- armored, and gunned only so as to meet their like, and if the tonange thus economized had been devoted to speed and coal endurance, their fitness for the work of molesting commerce and trans- portation would have been distinctly increased. The same aggregate tonnage might have given two or three additional swift ships of the type suggested. But the armored cruiser is a fighting ship, though grievously marred as such by the lack of the single eye, of unity of design, of Na- Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 155 poleon's " exclusiveness of purpose." Those in Vladivostok constituted a respectable portion of the total Russian battle fleet in the far East, and therefore could not be freely hazarded as ordinary cruisers might. It is very probable that their pres- ence in Vladivostok induced the merely tentative character of the sortie of August lo from Port Arthur; that the desire to concentrate the whole fleet dictated an attempt to escape, instead of the pitched naval battle which the exigencies of the Russian general situation then demanded. It is to this, rather than to the effect of a fortified port upon the navy using it, that I should be in- clined to ascribe the failure of the Port Arthur division to improve its opportunities with military intelligence and energy. Having kept the Jap- anese at a distance, and obtained for Russia the opportunity to restore her fleet after the torpedo attack of February 8, the fortifications can scarcely be held responsible for the failure to use the ad- vantage thus gained. There are indications, however, in a forthcoming book by Captain Klado, of the Russian Navy, advance sheets of which I have been permitted to see, that there is prevalent in high military circles in Russia a radically erroneous conception of the relations of a fleet to coast operations, and especially to coast defence. This conception is held so strongly as 156 Naval Administration and Warfare to take form in the phrase " fortress-fleet," under which misguiding title the movement of the fleet is restricted to the neighborhood of the port, is made subordinate to the defence of the position, and to the orders of the fortress commander. By this school of thought it is considered a positive calamity, almost a catastrophe, that the fleet should launch out in vs^ide independent action, leaving the fortress to its own resources. It de- mands the dispersion of force, among several for- tresses, as opposed to concentration in a single port. Such conclusions are difl&cult to under- stand, especially when we recall the signal histori- cal example of the siege of Gibraltar, which so conspicuously illustrated the relative functions of fleet and fortress. Although these views are vigorously contested and refuted by Captain Klado, it would seem probable, from the opinions in support of them quoted by him, that they may have dictated the futile and abortive management of the Port Arthur division; and that this did not represent the professional judgment of its own ofiicers, but the burden of a command laid upon them by higher and non-naval authority. Cer- tainly Klado's own opinion, formulated and set down before the final catastrophe, shows con- clusively that in intelligent naval circles there obtained much juster and more comprehensive Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 157 recognition of the part to be played by a fleet, even regarded from a distinctly defensive standpoint of national policy. " The only rational defence of the shores is a strong fleet, and in this case the chief hope must be placed in it, and not in the army. The fortress is subsidiary." Incidentally to the discussion he makes also a remark relative to the Chinese fleet in 1894, which not only illus- trates his general argument but may throw light upon the purposes of the Port Arthur division in its last sortie of August 10. " In abandoning Port Arthur the Chinese fleet, under the given circum- stances, acted quite rightly, since that port was so situated that it could be taken from the land; and, if this had happened, the fleet would have found itself in an inland roadstead, and would not have been able to take part in repelling the land attack. Had it remained in Port Arthur, it would have been taken alive when the fortress fell. Instead of this, by going over to Wei-hai-wei, it forced the Japanese to a most difficult winter expedition in order to gain this last port. If only the Chinese had had a fleet capable of vanquishing that of their enemies, they would have been victorious in the end despite the sad condition of their army." For " Chinese " read " Russian," and for " Wei-hai- wei " " Vladivostok," and we may have in this comment on the past the explanation of the Rus- 158 Naval Administration and Warfare sian attempt, as we certainly have a prophecy of the necessary outcome of the war. In the general deplorable result, something must be attributed to the lack of initiative, so general as to appear almost .a national quality, that was shown in the Russian operations; but original faults of distribution at least tended to increase the paralysis which in every direction characterized their action. By the tenure of two ports, remote from one another, they in the begin- ning possessed the advantage which a two-fold source of danger imposes on an enemy's disposi- tions. Under most conditions of coast conforma- tion, two ports, so far separated, would have much increased the perplexity of Admiral Togo, had the Baltic fleet been despatched so as to reach the scene while the defence of Port Arthur was still hopeful. Even minimized as the difficulty would have been by the projection of Korea, giving him at its southern end a central position, well adapted for moving towards either port, he would still have been obliged somewhat to uncover Port Arthur, in order to be on hand to meet Rozhest- vensky, because ignorant of which destination he would seek. Such conditions, which were as evident the first month of the war as they are now, rightly determined the Japanese to reduce Port Arthur at the earliest possible moment, and equally Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 159 rightly determined the Russians to hold it. What- ever may be considered the effect of the place upon the land operations, it threatened the Jap- anese communications by sea so long as it held out effectively, and it kept open to the Baltic fleet two ports of entry to distract Togo's attention, and to move him, rightly or wrongly, to divide his fleet between them. Such considerations, if valid, afford matter for reflection to all govern- ments and people, as to the constitution and de- fence of naval bases in regions where their interests may induce naval operations. As soon as Port Arthur fell, the Japanese admiral knew that there was but one port open to his opponent; that, turn or twist as he might, there he must at last turn up. But, while the embarrassment to an enemy of such a double objective is clear and proverbial, it is not in itself sufficient, unless improved by proper dispositions. It is not enough to fortify the ports. For the offensive purposes which alone constitute danger to the enemy, they are helpless, almost as turtles on their backs, unless they con- tain forces, adequate to issue with intent and power to inflict injury. The Russians being at the outset locally inferior in battleship strength, estimating therein the armored cruisers of both parties, every ship of that description should have been con- centrated in one of the two ports; the other 160 Naval Administration and Warfare should have been utihzed for commerce destroy- ing, and such other desultory operations as are open to cruisers. Instead of this, the same nonchalance — essentially consistent with the lack of initiative already noted — that exposed the whole division, improperly picketed, before Port Arthur, and left the Varyag and Korieits a helpless prey at Che- mulpo, retained also at Vladivostok three powerful armored cruisers, the proper place of which, being in the line of battle, was wherever the main fleet was. It would be interesting to know, if know- able, how far the appellative " cruiser " was re- sponsible for this error. This much at least can be said; that in treating them as cruisers, not as battle-vessels, the Russian officer responsible was at least consistent with the original idea of armor- ing cruisers, the efficiency of which should depend primarily upon speed and coal endurance, not upon armour; and to which fighting — except with equals — is not committed, and should rarely be indulged. To this same double eye to two sets of functions, radically distinct, is to be attributed the undue stress upon extreme speed for battleships, with the consequent reckless progress in the size of these vessels. They, by the accepted spirit of the day, are not only to fight but also to run; between which two stools a fall may be looked for. Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 161 That Vladivostok, at least during the open season, was the proper rendezvous for cruisers is evident for two reasons. First, being easier to leave and to enter than Port Arthur, it is so far favorable to vessels whose mission is evasion; and, secondly, it could not be the position for the battle- fleet, because that, when frozen in, became to the enemy a fleet non-existent. At this port should have been the protected — unarmored — cruisers, which were, on the contrary, congregated at Port Arthur, and thence accompanied the fleet in its futile attempt to get away to Vladivostok. From this centre, itself possessing two exits, and leading equally to the Japan Sea and to the east coast of the islands by way of Tsugaru Straits, the field to commerce destroyers was as clear as conditions often allow. In the particular kind of vessel needed for this, the Japanese had largely superior numbers; but as the mission of the Russian cruisers would be to escape detection, while that of the Japanese was to find, it is plain that the latter needed to be much the more numerous. Also, as the respective objects, the destruction and protection of commerce, required that the Rus- sians should run and the Japanese fight, the former could act singly while the latter must con- gregate in squadrons. Uncertainty whether the enemy were acting severally or in groups would 162 Naval Administration and Warfare compel concentration to some extent, to avoid being surprised by a superior force, and so would decrease the dispersion of the look-outs, while in- creasing their strength. I will not deny my belief that, despite all this, in the long run the Russian cruisers would one by one have been picked up — that is the necessary penalty of inferior numbers; but if their design provided both speed and coal endurance, as it should, the time should have been protracted sufficiently to demonstrate to some de- gree what influence such operations may in this day exert upon the general war-power of a nation, thus assailed in its financial resources which de- pend upon the freedom of commerce. As it is, the indications are clear, though slight. In the Japan Times of July 23, 1905, it is stated that up to that time the Vladivostok squadron had captured only twenty-two Japanese vessels, of which nine were steamers. Such paucity of results shows most probably that the armored cruisers were too valuable to be freely exposed to capture by Kamimura's superior division, and that their enterprise was fettered by this consideration, which would not have applied to unarmored ships of half their tonnage. The result, such as it is, is merely direct; and it is the indirect effect upon commercial movement which most weighs when the attack is well concerted and vigorous. During Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 163 the cruise of the Vladivostok squadron on the east coast of Japan, which lasted but little over a week at the end of July, 1904, although only four steamers were captured by it, sailings from the ports of Japan were generally stopped. At a meet- ing of the Nippon Yusen Kaisha, held but two days before the battle off Tsu-shima, May 27, 1905, the report stated that in consequence of the Govern- ment's requisitions for transports the Company's business had been carried on by hiring foreign steamers. At the beginning of the war the charter rate was extremely high, but had lately depre- ciated owing to the secure retention of the control of the sea by the navy. This, it will be observed, was nine months after the Russian naval disasters of August, 1904, at which time the Port Arthur and Vladivostok divisions attempted to unite. The report continued, that in the current fiscal term the presence of the Russian Baltic fleet in Far Eastern seas would affect the shipping trade to some extent, but the Company was determined to endure to the end. The same paper states that, a Russian transport having entered Shanghai, May 26, the local underwriters were refusing to insure. June 17, it is announced that the steam- ship services to China and Korea, which had been suspended by Rozhestvensky's approach, would now be resumed; and mention is made of the 164 Naval Administration and War] are fall of freights in the coastwise coal trade, in con- sequence of the victory, as well as an easier coal market. It appears also that in India even, insurance on cotton for Japan, which Russia was reported to have declared contraband, rose threefold upon a report of Russian cruisers in the Indian Ocean. Considering the complete control of the sea, in a military sense, held by the Japanese, and the lethargy of the Russian naval conduct in general, the results have a meaning which will be recog- nized immediately by any one who has had even casual opportunity to note the effect of apprehen- sion, and of fluctuations in trade, upon the welfare of a community, which in turn affects the income of the state. The significance is increased in the present instance by the unfavorable situation of the Russian ports, in point of distance from the Japanese main lines of sea communication, mili- tary and commercial. Had control been reversed, by a Russian naval victory, the Japanese army in Manchuria would have been isolated; but a glance at the map will show that Russian communi- cations by ships to Port Arthur would have been much more easily molested, through the nearness of Japanese ports to the waters through which vessels must pass. As Cuba lies across the ap- proaches to the Mississippi, and Ireland across Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 165 those to Great Britain, so does Japan to the communications of Manchuria and Vladivostok with the outer world. There seems to be a general professional consent that the experience of this war has confirmed the supremacy of the battleship relative to the control of the sea, which is the great object of naval war- fare. The torpedo vessel has achieved less than was expected — at least outside of naval circles — and what it has accomplished has been almost exactly that which was anticipated twenty years ago by naval men. It has come in at the end of the battle, to complete the disaster of the defeated. I have not seen attention called to the diffi- culty experienced by vessels of this class in find- ing the object of their attack, when once lost to them in the dark, their own most suitable moment for action. In measure, of course, all vessels feel this; but especially these, which from lying low in the water have a limited hori- zon, and from their small size and consequent liveliness have particular trouble in catching and holding sight of an object. Admiral Togo's report states that during the night succeeding the battle his torpedo flotillas were searching in every direction for their flying enemy, but with little or no success until 5.20 A. M., when returning daylight showed smoke. It will doubt- 166 Naval Administration and Warfare less be found in the future that these vessels, and submarines, seeking to harass a blockading fleet, will be gravely hampered by these draw- backs, when ignorant of the whereabouts of the enemy's main force; an ignorance easily imposed by the latter shifting its position after nightfall. The value of the cruiser class, as scouts and equipped with modern facilities, was abundantly established by the certainty with which Togo, though invisible beforehand, appeared betimes at each attempted sortie from Port Arthur; and yet more notably by the in- formation of Rozhestvensky's appearance when the Baltic division was still over a hundred miles distant from his anchorage. He was thus en- abled not merely to choose his field of action, and anticipate the enemy there, but to plan his battle with full knowledge of his opponent's order; a result facilitated by Rozhestvensky's failure, or inability, to advance his scouting line so far as to drive in that of his antagonist, thereby concealing his own motions and probable in- tentions. Comparatively little attention has been given to this singular advantage, although Togo himself in his report dwells upon it at large, and with the reiteration of satisfaction. The possible contribution of cruisers to the ends of war by endangering an enemy's commerce has Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 167 not received adequate elicitation, owing to the reasons already mentioned. But among the most important lessons of this war — perhaps the most important, as also one easily understood and which exempHfies a prin- ciple of warfare of ageless application — is the inexpediency, the terrible danger, of dividing the battle-fleet, even in times of peace, into frac- tions individually smaller than those of a pos- sible enemy. The Russian divisions at Port Arthur, at Vladivostok, and in the European ports of Russia, if united, would in 1904 have outweighed decisively the navy of Japan, which moreover could receive no increase during hos- tilities. It would have been comparatively im- material, as regards effect upon the local field of operations, whether the ships were assembled in the Baltic, in Vladivostok or in Port Arthur. Present together, the fleet thus constituted could not have been disregarded by Japan without a risk transcending beyond comparison that caused by the Port Arthur division alone, which the Japanese deliberately put out of court. For, while they undertook, and successfully carried out, measures which during a period of four months disabled it as a body menacing their sea communications, they none the less before the 168 Naval Administration and Warfare torpedo attack of February 8 had begun the movement of their army to the continent. It is most improbable that they would have dared the same had the available Russian navy been united. It would have mattered nothing that it was frozen in in Vladivostok. The case of Japan would not have been better, but worse, for having utilized the winter to cross her troops to the mainland, if, when summer came, the enemy appeared in overwhelming naval force. If Togo, in face of Rozhestvensky's division alone, could signal his fleet, " The salvation or the fall of the Empire depends upon the result of this engage- ment," how much more serious the situation had there been with it the Port Arthur ships, which had handled his vessels somewhat roughly the preceding August. To an instructed, thoughtful, naval mind in the United States, there is no contingency affecting the country, as interested in the navy, so men- acing as the fear of popular clamor influencing an irresolute, or militarily ignorant, adminis- tration to divide the battle-ship force into two divisions, the Atlantic and the Pacific. A de- termined President, instructed in military matters, doubtless will not yield, but will endeavor by explanation to appease apprehension and quiet outcry. Nevertheless, the danger exists; and Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 169 always will exist in proportion as the people do not understand the simple principle that an efficient military body depends for its effect in war — and in peace — less upon its position than upon its concentrated force. This does not ig- nore position, and its value. On the contrary, it is written with a clear immediate recollection of Napoleon's pregnant saying, *' War is a business of positions." But the great captain, in the letter in which the phrase occurs, goes on directly to instruct the marshal to whom he is writing so to station the divisions of his corps, for purposes of supply, around a common centre, that they can unite rapidly; and can meet the enemy in mass before he can attack any one of them, or move far from his present position against an- other important French interest. Concentration indeed, in last analysis, may be correctly defined as being itself a choice of position; viz. : that the various corps, or ships, shall not be some in one place, and some in others, but all in one place. We Americans have luckily had an object lesson, not at our own expense, but at that of an old friend. There is commonly be- lieved to have been little effective public opinion in Russia at the time the war with Japan was at hand; such as did manifest itself, in the use of dynamite against officials, seems not to have 170 Naval Administration and Warfare taken into consideration international relations, military or other. But in the councils of the Em- pire, however constituted, and whatever the weight of the military element, there was shown in act an absolute disregard of principles so simple, so obvious, and so continually enforced by pre- cept and experience, that the fact would be incomprehensible, had not we all seen, in civil as in military life, that the soundest principles, perfectly well known, fail, more frequently than not, to sustain conduct against preposses- sion or inclination. That communications dom- inate strategy, and that the communications of Japan in a continental war would be by sea, were clear as daylight. That the whole navy of Russia, united on the scene, would be sufficient, and half of it probably insufficient, certainly hazardous, was equally plain. Yet, ship by ship, half was assembled in the far East, until Japan saw that this process of division had been carried as far as suited her interests and declared war; after which of course no Russian battle-ship could go forward alone. From the military point of view the absurdity of the procedure is clear; but for national safety it has to be equally clear to statesmen and to people. An outside observer, with some little acquired knowledge of the workings of men's Retrospect upon Japan-Russia War 171 minds, needs small imagination to hear the argu- ments at the Russian council board. " Things are looking squally in the East," says one; " the fleet ought to be increased." " Increased," says another, " you may say so. All the ships we have ought to be sent, and together, the instant they can be got ready." ** Oh but," rejoins a third, " consider how exposed our Baltic shores would be, in case of war against us should be declared by Great Britain, which already has an under- standing with Japan." The obvious reply, that, in case Great Britain did declare war, the only thing to be done with the Baltic fleet would be to snuggle it close inside of the guns of Cronstadt, would probably be made; if it was, it was not heeded. In a representative government would doubtless have been heard the further remark, *' The feeling in our coast towns, at seeing no ship left for their protection, would be so strong, that I doubt if the party could carry the next election." Against this there is no provision, except popular understanding; operative per- haps in the interior, where there Is no occasion for fright. The most instructive feature of this Russian mistake, inexcusable in a government not brow- beaten by political turmoil, is that it was made in time of peace, in the face of conditions threat- 172 Naval Administration and Warfare ening war. In fact, as is often the case, when war came it was already too late to remedy ade- quately the blunders or neglects of peace. More than twenty years ago the present writer had occasion to quote emphatically the words of a French author, " Naval Strategy" — naval stra- tegic considerations — " is as necessary in peace as in war." In 1904, nearly a decade had elapsed since Japan had been despoiled of much of her gains in her war with China. Since then Russia had been pursuing a course of steady aggression, in furtherance of her own aims, and contrary to what Japan considered her " vital interests and national honor." It is not necessary to pronounce between the views of the two parties to see that the action of Russia was militarily preposterous, unless her fleet grew in proportion to that of Japan, and of her own purposes, and was kept in hand; that is, kept concentrated. It would have mattered little whether, being united, the outbreak of war found it in the Baltic, or in Vladivostok. That it could come, as did Ro- zhestvensky, but in double his force, would have been a fact no less emphatic when in the Baltic than in the farther East. It is precisely the same, in application as well as in principle, with the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of the United States. Both are exposed. f~ > 2^ o n o :sssss>z CO o ^ oo ID 33 to j mo Hii' • 1 ititi TT ^rmu r^ ■\ I i \