oil. Yet without a good margin of speed, superiority in artillery fire cannot be exploited.

It is just here that a comparison of the three fleets in tonnage and gunpower is likely to be misleading. In modern naval warfare the fleet possessing the 'speed gauge' can take the initiative under practically any cir

cumstances.

Since the average speed of the American fleet is at least two knots less than the Japanese and three knots below that of the British, it would gain nothing by its slight lead in weight of broadside fire, and would fight under a severe tactical handicap. An increase in the elevation of its guns would mitigate this disadvantage, but could not overcome the fatal drawback of poor speed.

Taken for all in all, therefore, the American battle-fleet is tactically inferior to the British, and considerably less than two fifths superior to the Japanese; nor is it easy to see how this disparity could be adjusted without violating the ruling of the Treaty by laying down new ships of the capital type.

At the same time, there can be no two unbiased opinions as to the right of the United States to modernize its older ships by endowing them with the shooting range and oil-burning facilities already enjoyed by corresponding units of the British and Japanese navies.

Objections to such a course which may be raised, officially or otherwise, in London or Tokyo cannot be sustained by reference to the wording of the treaty. As regards the spirit of that Covenant, surely its purpose was to stereotype the 5-5-3 ratio, not only in tons and guns, but in actual fighting power; and unless and until the older American ships are modernized on the lines indicated, that ratio

will remain illusory and ineffectual.

Furthermore, the writer submits that the entire discussion as to the right or otherwise of the United States to increase the elevation of its battleships' guns has been stultified by the fact that France, also a signatory to the Treaty, has in the last two years raised the elevation of the turret guns in the battleships Courbet, Jean Bart, Paris, Bretagne, Lorraine and Provence from eighteen degrees to twenty-three. Japan, too, has officially announced her intention of effecting similar improvement in the main armament of her earlier capital ships.

Why, then, should the United States alone be inhibited from taking similar steps?

As regards the substitution of liquid for solid fuel, there is every reason to believe that Japan has already made this change in two of her battlecruisers of the Kongo class, and is now preparing to convert the other two coal-burning ships of the class to oilfuel.

Improved protection against plunging gunfire, air bombs, and torpedoes is expressly allowed for in the Treaty, an addition of 3000 tons to the displacement of each ship being permitted for this purpose. According to the statements by the English service journals, many British battleships have been equipped with new bulge protection against torpedoes since 1921, the Royal Oak being the latest vessel so treated.

Yet every suggestion that American ships should be similarly fortified against the deadliest form of underwater attack is met by protests from quarters where, apparently, the view prevails that the 'Limitation Treaty' was designed to keep the United States Navy permanently in a state of subjection, and must be rigidly interpreted in that sense.

III

Turning from capital ships to airplane carriers, the position from the American viewpoint is far from reassuring. In this type, as in capital ships, tonnage parity as between the United States and the British Empire is allowed for by the Treaty, with a threefifths allotment for Japan, the respective figures being: U. S. A., 135,000 tons; British Empire, 135,000 tons; Japan, 81,000 tons. At the present moment, however, the American fleet is dependent on a single carrier of obsolete design - the Langley, a converted navy collier - which would be practically useless for war operations. Whereas the efficient airplane carrier should be at least six knots faster than the swiftest unit of the fleet with which it is operating, the Langley is five knots slower than the slowest American battleship.

A big margin of speed is necessary in order that the carrier, having dropped astern to retrieve the planes she has sent out to scout or to engage enemy machines, shall be able to resume her place in the cruising formation without compelling the rest of the fleet to slow down. But any fleet to which the Langley was attached would have to reduce its speed to 142 or 15 knots, and, if she dropped behind to fly off and recover airplanes, would have to dawdle along at 8 knots until she had rejoined. This leisurely rate of progress would be impossible in war, to say nothing of the risk of submarine attack, to which slow steaming ships are particularly subject. Matters will be improved when the ex-battle cruisers Lexington and Saratoga, now being transformed into airplane carriers, are ready for service, but unless the appropriations are largely increased these ships will be held up for several years. Meanwhile the British Navy has six

fast and efficient carriers in commission or completing, and Japan three, all of which will be available by the summer of 1925. If a war should develop at any time during the next year or two, the American fleet would put to sea without a single efficient airplane carrier, which means that it would operate under a fatal disadvantage.

For this state of affairs we must blame not the Limitation Treaty, but the legislators who have consistently ignored the demands of the Navy Department for funds wherewith to complete the two big carriers already authorized. It is to be hoped that no sudden emergency will arise to drive home the lesson that one ship at sea is worth three on the stocks.

We come now to the question of light cruisers, which has figured so prominently in recent discussions. In this class of vessel, which plays a highly important part in modern fleet operations, the United States is so far behind Britain and Japan that scarcely any basis for comparison exists. Fast cruisers are essential for scouting ahead of the battle-fleet, screening it from torpedo-boat and submarine attack, leading destroyers against the enemy flotillas, patrolling the ocean routes for the protection of friendly commerce, and, if need be, for raiding the enemy's lines of communication. Ships allocated to any one of these duties require to be very fast - with a speed of not less than 30 knots — wellarmed, with good sea-keeping qualities and a wide radius of action. As the Washington Treaty permits the construction of cruisers up to 10,000 tons, armed with 8-inch guns, this very powerful type is coming into universal adoption. Taking cruisers less than ten years old from date of launch, including those building and authorized but not yet complete, we find the position as in the following table:

UNITED STATES GREAT BRITAIN

Total

JAPAN

Total

UNITED STATES GREAT BRITAIN

JAPAN

None

This gives a grand total of 44 modern cruisers for Great Britain, 25 for Japan, and only 10 for the United States.

Exception may be taken to the above table on the ground that it lists the ten American cruisers as 'ocean-going,' 'ocean-going,' whereas they are officially designated 'scouts.' On the other hand, their displacement of 7500 tons entitles them to be placed in the former category, and the prolonged 'shake-down' cruises which several of them have undertaken in the past twelve months have fully demonstrated their ocean-going qualities. For all practical purposes we may safely rate a cruiser of 7000 tons as an oceanic ship.

As a matter of fact, ships of much smaller displacement are able to make deep-sea voyages of long duration. The British light cruisers now steaming around the world with the Special Service Squadron are of less than 6000 tons in displacement, and the Japanese 'Kuma' class, of 5500 tons, have a steaming range of 11,000 nautical miles. Nor should it be forgotten that the German cruiser Emden, the most successful commerce-raider of the World War, was a puny craft of no more than 3650 tons.

nautical

The present ratio of cruiser strength for the three leading Powers is approximately: Great Britain 5, Japan 2.5,

United States 1. This glaring disparity is, or should be, a matter of profound concern to the American people. It means that the fleet is desperately short of units which have a tactical and strategical value second only to that of the dreadnought. It is impossible to visualize a naval campaign in which this dearth of cruising ships would not impose an almost crippling handicap on the American fleet. In Nelson's day the cry of the admirals was always for 'more frigates,' which corresponded to the modern light cruiser. More than a century later the Allied sea commanders were calling incessantly for additional cruisers, and in spite of intensive building the demand was never adequately met. Yet, thanks to public apathy and the short-sighted policy of Congress, the United States Navy is left to-day with only ten cruisers, or barely one fifth of its proper complement.

In the event of war, heavy penalties would be exacted for this neglect. Little or nothing could be done to check the activity of hostile commerce raiders. The value of American property destroyed in one month would probably exceed the cost of a whole squadron of new cruisers, which, had they been completed betimes, might have kept the sea routes safe from

attack. Many people seem to think that the deficiency in cruisers, as in other naval types, could be made good after the outbreak of war by rapid. construction. This is a delusion. To build and equip a cruiser of the modern class in twelve months would be a remarkable achievement, and the writer has good reason to doubt whether it could be done. Those who suppose that the United States Navy can be adequately reinforced subsequent to the outbreak of war are living in a fool's paradise. Meanwhile it is an open secret that the lack of cruisers is gravely impeding the preparation of defensive war plans by those who would be responsible for controlling Navy operations in a time of national crisis.

The outlook, bad enough before, has changed for the worse since Japan embarked on the construction of heavilyarmed cruisers. Four of these shipsKako, Furutaka, Kinugasa, Aoba now building, will each mount a battery of six 8-inch guns, according to an Admiralty statement to the British House of Commons on April 16. Two larger vessels, Nachi and Myoko, also building, will carry eight 8-inch guns apiece, and two further ships of the same type are to be laid down next year. An artillery duel between one of these ships and an American scout of the Omaha series would almost inevitably result in the defeat of the latter, judging from recent war experience; for the 8-inch gun, with its 250-pound shell, can far outrange the lighter 6-inch piece, whose projectile weighs only 105 pounds. In the writer's judgment, reached after an exhaustive survey of all available data, a programme of fifteen 10,000-ton ships, all to be completed by the end of 1927, is the absolute minimum required. The building of these ships would not bring the Navy up to its treaty strength in cruising types, but it would tend to

ease a situation which all American naval students view with the deepest misgiving.

Great play is made in Congress, and equally by foreign naval critics, with the fact that the United States possesses nearly three hundred destroyers of fairly modern construction, thus giving it a definite superiority over all other Powers in this type of fighting ship. It must be remembered, however, that the majority of these boats are laid up at various navy yards, where, in spite of every care, they are probably deteriorating in structure, machinery, and equipment. Moreover, they are outclassed in size and armament by the newest British and Japanese destroyers, which embody war lessons to a greater degree than the American 'flush-deckers.' The American Navy does not as yet possess a single flotillaleader, or super-destroyer, though the General Board regards such craft as indispensable and other navies have built them by the dozen. Our numerical lead in destroyers is admittedly an advantage, but it is a trump card of too small a denomination to win any important trick in the game of naval strategy.

IV

Owing to its persistent misuse by Germany in the late war, the submarine has lost caste in the eyes of the American public. It has been vilified -not always by disinterested foreign critics as a murderous which weapon no decent seaman should handle. This is sheer camouflage. Irrespective of its employment as an assassin of women, children, and other noncombatants, the submarine performed legitimate service of incalculable value during the world conflict. To none of the belligerents was it more useful than to Great Britain. The famous 'Bight Patrol,' which enabled the British commander

in-chief to maintain close touch, day in day out, with the movements of the German fleet, was maintained entirely by submarines. So valuable was their reconnaissance work that orders were actually issued forbidding them to attack German warships observed to be coming out of the Heligoland Bight. In fact, it is as a fleet scout and an ocean patrol, not as a torpedoer of merchant ships, that the long-range submarine is now prized so highly by naval strategists.

Modern submarines fall under two heads: sea-going and ocean-going. The former may have a displacement of anything from 600 to 1000 tons, and a cruising radius of as much as 12,000 nautical miles. In practice, however, their range is circumscribed by the health of the crew, which suffers if the boat remains at sea more than a few weeks. Narrow, badly ventilated berthing accommodation and restricted deck space for exercise soon tell on the physical and mental fitness of the personnel. For this reason, the socalled sea-going submarine would be of problematical value in an oceanic campaign where the belligerents were separated from each other by a distance of several thousand miles.

According to the latest returns, the United States Navy contains 126 submarines, built and building. This seems a formidable total when compared with Great Britain's 68 and Japan's 77. But when the American figure is examined more closely, it is found to convey an erroneous impression. In the first place, no less than 70 boats are of a pre-war model which later developments have rendered practically obsolete, and of these 70 all displace less than 600 tons. They are, therefore, 'coastal boats,' useful enough for such short-range work as harbor defense, but of exceedingly limited value for any duty which in

volved oversea cruising operations. It is worthy of note that nearly all submarines of corresponding size and power in the British Navy have already been scrapped. In the 'sea-going' class we have 50 boats designated by the letter 'S.' They, also, were designed during the World War, before its technical lessons could be fully digested. They average 900 tons in displacement, their best surface speed is 15 knots, and the class as a whole has been unfortunate in respect of machinery trouble. Nevertheless, these 50 boats form the backbone of the American submarine service, and upon them would fall the brunt of all wartime underseas work which had to be performed outside coastal waters. In the ocean-going' class we have only the three 1106ton boats of the 'T' class, completed in 1920, and which, when last heard of, were tied up at Hampton Roads owing to defective machinery. Three larger boats, V-1 to V-3, of 2025 tons, are under construction. This analysis reduces our sea- and ocean-going submarine force to 56 units, built and building. The British Navy indulged in such ruthless scrapping after the war that it now contains only 68 submarines. Nine of these are large oceangoing boats, 31 are sea-going craft of a very efficient model, and the balance consists of small coastal boats. Compared with Great Britain we are fairly well off as regards submarines, though that country is believed to meditate a big programme of new construction when the experimental types, such as X.1 and 0.1, now building, have been tried out.

Japan was the first Power to apply herself energetically to the development of the submarine as soon as the world war was over. Since the armistice she has despatched several expert missions to Europe to study the latest improvements in the design, machin