While the spectacle of the Great White Fleet's epic globe-circling journey captured the world's imagination, there was substance behind the show. The voyage initially appeared to be an exercise in "Big Stick" diplomacy directed at Japan, but it actually eased the way for a rapprochement with that country and allowed for the continued concentration of the American battleship fleet in the Atlantic.
In the early months of 1907, racial fears associated with the quickening flow of Japanese labor to California had caused growing concern along the West Coast. A sector of the press exploited the situation, playing on American workingmen's fear that cheap Oriental labor would displace them. Also, the San Francisco School Board had passed discriminatory regulations, and the California state legislature was considering enacting several similar-type laws. Although the federal government vigorously opposed these measures, the continuing arrival of significant numbers of Japanese immigrants undermined its efforts to resolve the situation.
The specter of Japanese military prowess reinforced existing economic fears caused by Japanese labor competition. Following its smashing defeat of Russia on land and at sea in the 1904-5 Russo-Japanese War, many Americans viewed Japan as a distinct military threat to the virtually defenseless West Coast and Hawaii. The possibility, however remote, that the Japanese government might take military action in response to local and state actions in California rapidly transformed an immigration problem into a war scare.
While actively seeking to resolve the problem and West Coast reactions to it, President Theodore Roosevelt had the Army and Navy review their plans for war with Japan. In response, the Joint Board of the Army and the Navy submitted a war plan to the President and outlined a set of preparatory measures it recommended for immediate implementation in the event of increased tension with Japan. These included withdrawal of the armored cruiser division then in Asian waters to the eastern Pacific, the concentration of remaining naval units in Asian waters at Subic Bay in the Philippines, and the deployment of the entire battleship fleet—the U.S. Atlantic Fleet—to the Pacific. Much to the military planners' surprise, Roosevelt ordered the immediate implementation, for practice purposes, of all these measures. Later, the President expanded the Pacific cruise of the battleships into their famous around-the-world voyage.
Patriotism and Mission
Despite the importance of Far Eastern developments in this period, the world cruise represented an anomaly in American naval deployment policy. The voyage of the Great White Fleet (so called after the event because of the white-painted battleships' hulls) has taken its place in the annals of U.S. naval history as the singlemost significant American naval event of the Roosevelt administration. This assessment falsely suggests a pre-eminence of the Far East in American naval concerns of the period. In reality, the Navy's preoccupation with the defense implications of the "war scare" of 1907 was quite short-lived, a brief distraction from the traditional concentration on events in the Caribbean and Europe.
American leaders, naval officers particularly, remained convinced that Germany under Kaiser Wilhelm II represented the greatest threat to peace. While the Japanese immigration situation on the West Coast dictated a temporary diversion of American planning and naval strength to the Pacific, the Navy leadership did not forget the main theater, the Caribbean-Atlantic. The need to resolve difficulties with Japan, important for further development of bilateral relations, assumed even greater weight on the global scale because rapprochement with Japan would permit continued concentration of the battleship fleet in the Atlantic. By ultimately contributing to the development of amicable Japanese-American relations, the cruise of the battleships would strengthen America's defense position in the Atlantic. Although the defense situation of America's insular possessions—Hawaii and the Philippines—remained particularly weak, improved relations with Japan reduced the seriousness of that weakness to an acceptable level. Throughout the period 1903-13, the main thrust of American naval deployments was clearly in the direction of Europe, generally reflecting the continuing Anglo-French bias of American feelings.1
From the perspective of a much more skeptical early 21st century, the intensity of the emotional, almost palpable patriotism of that Progressive era and the commonly shared belief that America was predestined to loom large on the world stage might seem difficult to fathom. Nevertheless, patriotism and a sense of national mission were real and forceful aspects of the American scene. Theodore Roosevelt reflected that sense of America's mission in a 1903 speech:
We have no choice as to whether or not we shall play a great part in the world. That has been determined for us by fate, by the march of events. We have to play that part. . . . All that we can decide is whether we shall play it well or ill.2
Contemporary Americans unabashedly waxed poetic about the glory of the fleet and of the cruise. Europeans might decry such demonstrative American pride in their navy and its doings, and disparage the battleship cruise, but regardless of their attitudes, the shifting of the bulk of American naval might to the Pacific forced countries with interests in that region to reappraise the balance of power there.
Global Impact
For the Imperial Japanese Navy, the successful completion of the battleship fleet's world cruise could only confirm its earlier conclusion that the U.S. Navy had become the main force that might interfere with realization of its goals in the Pacific. The British government, meanwhile, saw the cruise as a double-edged threat to the fine balance it had achieved in the Pacific after the Royal Navy's fleet reorganization of 1904. Alliance with Japan and friendship with the United States had become the two pillars on which the Royal Navy had rationalized the redeployment of her warships from Asia to European waters. Both were jeopardized by the strained relations between her ally, Japan, and her friend, the United States. Additionally, Australia's and New Zealand's strong anti-Japanese stand, and the emphasis they placed on identifying their interests with the United States in the Pacific while the mother country remained allied with their potential enemy, further complicated the British position.
The cruise offered Germany an opportunity to fish in troubled waters. If German diplomacy could disturb the delicate balance of British defense arrangements by driving a wedge between Japan and America, the changed international situation would require redeployment of Royal Navy forces and a consequential reduction in British strength in the North Sea.
The schedule of South American port visits inadvertently drew the United States into the perennial Argentine-Brazilian competition for leadership of the continent. The visits stirred concern in other countries. With examples of recent U.S. intervention in Latin America still fresh in mind, they worried about the role the greatly expanded American Navy seemed destined to play in the region.
At home, general disbelief had greeted the early announcements of plans for the fleet to cruise to the Pacific. Many observers saw them as a ploy designed by the President to extract congressional authorizations for more battleships. Naval officers worried, too, that an extended cruise to the Pacific would adversely affect training programs for the fleet, particularly in gunnery, and that valuable time would be lost. Ultimately, though, official orders were issued directing 16 battleships of the fleet to prepare for a cruise to the Pacific.
Turning Out to See the Fleet
During the summer of 1907, the fleet was distracted from preparations for the cruise by the need to participate in the naval portions of the Jamestown tercentennial celebration, an event of major proportions compared to the relatively low-key 400th anniversary in 2007. Between official ceremonies, however, individual ships, divisions, and squadrons conducted training in the "Southern Drill Grounds," the area more recently known as the Virginia Capes Operating Area. Later that year, the battleships spent time in home yards, making final preparations for departure. By the first week of December 1907, the fleet had assembled in Hampton Roads.
The world cruise of the Great White Fleet began with a formal presidential review in Hampton Roads on 16 December. Unprecedented in distance steamed, size of the fleet, and many other aspects, the voyage commanded the world's attention. For the people of the ports visited, it provided a truly unique entertainment opportunity the significance of which local inhabitants were quick to grasp. Indeed, for most, the arrival of 16 gleaming white and buff first-class battleships was the dramatic event of a lifetime. One million people lined the shores of the Golden Gate to watch the fleet's arrival at San Francisco; half a million saw it steam into Sydney, Australia; and hundreds of thousands viewed it at other ports around the world.
The splendid effect of the fleet's arrival in a foreign port was only the curtain-raiser. In each port, local governments arranged extensive programs of entertainment. In most cases these contributed to a general carnival atmosphere in which the local populace and the many thousands of visitors from outside the city participated. Aside from the political and defense implications people chose to attribute to it, each visit of the fleet offered locals the opportunity to interrupt life's routine and enjoy a government-sponsored week-long holiday. Few failed to respond to the stimulus.
There seems a remarkable but understandable air of innocence about the peoples' attitudes toward the fleet and the crew members' attitude toward the cruise. The world would enjoy six more years of military and naval pageantry and splendor before the horrors of trench warfare in France and the ever-mounting casualty lists from the Western Front extinguished forever the generation's romantic notions of and preoccupation with the glory of things military and naval. But in 1908, the public unreservedly applauded naval parades, few dark fears were expressed, and people along the battleships' route—particularly those in remote places never before visited by a great fleet—gladly surrendered themselves to the festivities.
Steaming to Improve the Breed
Although minor incidents occurred during the voyage, the cruise was an unqualified success. The 16 battleships would return to Hampton Roads, in some ways, in much better condition than when they left. The long periods at sea steaming in close formation and conducting intensive drills welded ships' complements into efficient crews, and squadron and division commanders, commanding officers, and officers of all ranks became practiced and efficient at maneuvering the fleet. As Rear Admiral Charles S. Sperry, the Fleet's commander, reported to Secretary of the Navy Victor H. Metcalf in a letter sent from the fleet's anchorage at Punta Arenas, Chile, the long hours of station-keeping in formation had paid off. Now, the admiral reported, "the sixteen ships, which a month ago were perpetually backing and filling to keep position, are jogging along in a square of four ships over a tide as if they were tied together."3
Further, taking the fleet away from the East Coast shipyards meant that crews had to rely on their own skills for maintenance and repair. By the time the battleships were in the South Atlantic en route to Punta Arenas, they had experienced a marked reduction in engineering casualties. Rear Admiral Sperry attributed the increasing self-sufficiency to the fleet's distance from Navy shipyards. "It is only since leaving Rio that daily accidents more or less important, due to carelessness at the Navy Yards . . . have ceased."4 Sperry's overall assessment of the ships' progress just five weeks after leaving Hampton Roads was most encouraging. In his opinion the fleet "except for docking, will be in far worse condition after its next visit to a Navy Yard than it will be when it gets there."5 Further, after reviewing the many beneficial effects of the extended cruise on the efficiency of the ships, Sperry summed up the cruise: "It is the birthday of the fleet, and a Navy without a fleet is simply a mob of ships." Sperry's report made its way to the President, who was "delighted" with it, and had it read to the Cabinet, where it was "highly appreciated."6
End of an Era
After 14 months, on the morning of Monday, 22 February 1909—George Washington's birthday—the fleet reappeared off Cape Henry, Virginia. It was an overcast day, but the weather did not dampen the enthusiasm of the welcoming fleet of boats, and particularly, it could not diminish the excitement of President Theodore Roosevelt, then in the final month of his presidency.
After the fleet anchored in Hampton Roads, the President went aboard each of the four division flagships, where he addressed representatives of the crews of the ships in each division, stating:
This morning the hearts of all who saw you thrilled with pride as the hulls of the mighty warships lifted above the horizon. You have been in the Northern and the Southern Hemispheres; four times you have crossed the line [equator]; you have steamed through all the great oceans; you have touched the coast of every continent. Ever your general course has been westward; and now you come back to the port from which you set sail.
The President concluded:
This is the first battle fleet that has ever circumnavigated the globe. Those who perform the feat again can but follow in your footsteps.7
In a sense, the end of the world cruise of the Great White Fleet also was the end of an era. The December 1906 commissioning of HMS Dreadnought, whose main battery bristled with ten 12-inch guns, had already made obsolescent the designs of the Great White Fleet's ships, whose main batteries consisted of only four 12- or 13-inch guns.
Immediately after their return from the cruise, the battleships went to home yards, where workers removed the ornate gold scrollwork on bows and sterns and painted the ships a dull color that came to be known as battleship gray. At the same time, in an effort to reduce topside weights, the solid, military masts on the ships were removed and replaced by cage structures that provided a more stable, lighter platform for fire control. U.S. battleships would retain the new color and profile into the 1930s.
Answers to Battle Fleet Questions
Domestically, the cruise was highly successful as a national public-awareness exercise. It greatly expanded popular understanding of American foreign relations and defense considerations, particularly regarding the Pacific Basin, and raised the level of public knowledge of, interest in, and sympathy for the Navy in every corner of the nation.
The experience of the cruise provided answers to some fundamental questions concerning the U.S. battle fleet's capabilities while highlighting grave deficiencies. The defeat of Russia's Baltic Fleet by the Japanese at the Battle of Tsushima Strait in 1905 had cast serious doubt about the ability of battleships to undertake long voyages and arrive at their destination ready for combat operations. The Great White Fleet's cruise proved conclusively that this was possible. In the context of War Plan Orange—the U.S. plan for war with Japan—this was critical knowledge.
The cruise also showed that a fleet could greatly improve gunnery efficiency and fleet maneuvering skills in the course of a long voyage. Sailors would later readily recognize that ships' crews are at peak condition at the end of a deployment, but this was a revelation for the Navy of 1908. Further, confronted with some very long, uninterrupted transits, such as those from Trinidad to Rio de Janeiro and from Hawaii to Auckland, New Zealand, the fleet had to implement stringent procedures to increase fuel efficiency. In the process, it realized that achieving a corresponding increase in cruising range was possible.
On the negative side, the world cruise graphically re-emphasized the critical shortage of supporting infrastructure on the Pacific coast, in Hawaii, Guam, and the Philippines, and the equally critical shortage of mission-designed fleet colliers and American-flag merchant ships to support the Fleet. The General Board of the Navy continued to develop plans for use in the event of war with Japan. Nevertheless, the most significant conclusion drawn from the cruise was that until adequate support facilities were in place, the United States was unprepared for the battleship fleet to conduct extended combat operations in the Pacific.
Ships of the Circumnavigating FleetOn the morning of 16 December 1907, the battleships of the Great White Fleet set out from Hampton Roads, Virginia, on their around-the-world cruise. Perceptive observers along the nearby shores might have appreciated that they were viewing the history of U.S. battleship design as the vessels steamed past in divisions of four, from newest to oldest.The 1st Division, headed by the fleet flagship, the Connecticut, included her sisters: the Kansas, Vermont, and Louisiana. The 2nd Division followed with four of the five slightly older Virginia class: the Georgia, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Virginia. Another of the Connecticuts—the Minnesota—led the 3rd Division, which included all of the Maine class: the Ohio, Missouri, and Maine. Finally, the 4th Division was formed by the oldest ships of the fleet, two Illinois-class and the two Kearsarge-class vessels—the Alabama and Illinois, and the Kearsarge and Kentucky.1 Ship classes are built based on the strategy at the time of the ships' authorization. The Naval War College class of 1894 concluded, and the 1895 and 1896 classes confirmed, that the Navy should deal with any superior naval force on the Atlantic coast (i.e. Britain's Royal Navy) by "effectively using bays, sounds, and interior waterways for engagements with the enemy." Therefore, American battleships should "draw less water" than foreign battleships.2 Not surprisingly, the ships authorized in 1895 and 1896 (the Kearsarge, Kentucky, Illinois, Alabama, and Wisconsin, each displacing about 11,500 tons) were designed with moderate speed, shallow draft, and relatively low freeboard. These characteristics were significant limitations when the Navy adopted a distinctly blue-water outlook. With a design speed of 16 knots and relatively small bunker capacity, these ships regularly encountered fuel shortages during the longer legs of the around-the-world voyage. In the event of hostilities, their speed would determine that of the entire battle line. In 1895 the Navy adopted a novel armament arrangement for the Kearsarge class: dual 8-inch turrets mounted directly on top of the two dual 13-inch turrets. Initially supported because of the wide arcs of fire it provided to the two superposed 8-inch mounts and for saving nearly 500 tons, the arrangement had major drawbacks—the smaller guns could not rotate independently of the main guns. The three Illinois-class ships authorized in 1896 and the three 11,500-ton Maines authorized immediately after the Battle of Manila Bay in 1898 did not incorporate superposed turrets, although many line officers advocated that arrangement. In 1899 and 1900, Congress authorized five first-class battleships of the 15,000-ton Virginia class. They entered service in 1906 and 1907, and all participated in the Great White Fleet cruise.3 The Navy Department, however, was unable to settle on an intermediate battery arrangement for these ships. The often bitter debates resulted in a decision to build the class with dual 8-inch turrets superposed on top of the two dual 12-inch main turrets. Even before the builders laid the Virginia's keel, criticism of the superposed arrangement of the newly commissioned Kearsarge class began. By 1904, with the five Virginias under construction, the basic design of their main turrets was generally condemned. It was regarded as an "unmitigated nuisance, if not a positive menace," but the Navy then had seven battleships built or being built with superposed turrets.4 Fortunately, this arrangement was never tested in battle. The 16,000-ton Connecticut class returned to a more traditional arrangement of four 12-inch guns in dual center-line turrets without superposed guns. Line officers demanded and received a mixed intermediate battery of eight 8-inch guns in turrets and twelve 7-inch guns in casemates. While this arrangement was superior to that of the Virginias, it complicated ammunition supply and spotting fall of shot. Five Connecticuts entered service in 1906-7, and all participated in the world cruise. With a coal-bunker capacity of 2,400 tons, the sisters had an operating radius of 7,579 nautical miles at ten knots. The sixth and final unit, the New Hampshire, did not enter service until March 1908.5 The Connecticuts represented the highest development of the predreadnought battleship design within the U.S. Navy. Before even the first entered service, however, HMS Dreadnought, mounting ten 12-inch guns and capable of 21 knots, made them obsolescent. The Naval War College's 1903 class had recommended an all-big-gun ship for the U.S. Navy; however, bureaucratic resistance within the Navy Department resulted in years of delay. —James R. Reckner 1. At San Francisco, the Nebraska replaced the Maine and the Wisconsin replaced the Alabama. 2. John B. Hattendorf, B. Mitchell Simpson III, and John R. Wadleigh, Sailors and Scholars: The Centennial History of the U.S. Naval War College (Newport: NWC Press, 1984), pp. 42-43. 3. For details of individual ships consult John C. Reilly Jr. and Robert L. Scheina, American Battleships 1886-1923: Predreadnought Design and Construction (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1980). 4. Army & Navy Register 35 (18 June 1904), p. 1. 5. The 13,000-ton Mississippi-class is not addressed here. The two ships of this class were not completed until 1908, and did not participate in the world cruise. |
The Eagle and the Kangaroo: The Great White Fleet's Visit to AustraliaDavid Stevens On 20 August 1908 some half a million people turned out to watch the arrival of President Theodore Roosevelt's Great White Fleet in Sydney, Australia. This was no mean achievement for a city whose population was just under 600,000. The largest crowd yet assembled in Australia, the gathering far exceeded the numbers that had celebrated the founding of the commonwealth just seven years before. Indeed, the warm reception accorded the U.S. fleet in Australia was generally regarded as the most overwhelming of any of the ports it visited. The unbroken succession of civic events and all-pervading carnival spirit severely tested the endurance of the American Sailors—and encouraged more than a few to take their chances and stay behind when the fleet sailed.One man no doubt well pleased with the results was Australian Prime Minister Alfred Deakin, who had not only initiated the visit but had persisted in the face of opposition from both the British Admiralty and the Foreign Office. By making his invitation directly to American diplomats rather than through the imperial authorities, Deakin was taking one of the first steps in asserting Australia's post-colonial independence. His motives for doing so were complex. He was, after all, a strong advocate for the British Empire and Australia's place within it, but Deakin also wished to send a clear message to London that Australians were unhappy with Britain's apparent strategic neglect. The nascent nation's ultimate defense might still depend on the global power of the Royal Navy, but the ships of the small, rarely seen, and somewhat obsolescent British squadron based in Australia did little to engender a sense of security. The more so since the passage of the unpopular Naval Agreement Act in 1903 had meant that the squadron could be withdrawn in times of danger to fulfill imperial defense priorities. The growing fear among Australians was that during even a transitory enemy cruiser raid, coastal commerce would face the choice of being driven into harbor or destroyed while local ports might be bombarded or held to ransom. Feeling both isolated and vulnerable, it was easy for the small Australian population to believe that Britain was ignoring its antipodean responsibilities. The 1902 Anglo-Japanese Alliance (renewed in 1905), which had allowed the Admiralty to decrease its presence in the Pacific, did little to alleviate these fears. Remote from the empire's center, Australians had no confidence that their interests, and in particular their determination to exclude Asiatic immigrants, would be accommodated in imperial foreign policy. Japan's evident desire for territorial expansion, its recent naval victory over Russia, and its expectation of equal treatment for its citizens all seemed to reinforce the need for Australia to explore alternative security strategies. Staunchly Anglophile, Deakin was not necessarily seeking to establish closer defense ties with the United States, but more than a few elements in Australian society were prepared to see in America the obvious replacement for Britain's waning regional power. A new and growing presence in the Pacific, the United States possessed a similar heritage and traditions, and as even Deakin took care to note in his letter of invitation, "No other Federation in the world possesses so many features [in common with] the United States as does the Commonwealth of Australia."1 Attitudes toward Asiatics, and more particularly hostility toward Japan, seemed likewise to be shared. President Roosevelt might claim that his fleet's cruise was not directed against Japanese interests, but for Deakin the visit to Australia became an unmistakable expression of Anglo-Saxon solidarity. No British battleship, let alone a fleet, had ever entered Australasian waters. So with the arrival of the 16 white battleships, Australians were treated to the greatest display of sea power they had even seen. While the public admired the spectacle, for those interested in defense and naval affairs it was an inspiration. This too was a part of Deakin's plan, for although he was a firm believer in Australia's maritime destiny, where defense was concerned national priorities still tended toward the completion of land, rather than naval, protection. The prime minister's own scheme for a credible local navy was making slow progress, and he recognized the need to rouse popular support. In this, the visit of the Great White Fleet played a crucial role for it brought issues of naval defense to the fore and made very clear the links between sea power and national maturity. Aiming to foster both national unity and spirit, Deakin used the visit to provide context for his own vision for an Australian Navy, one capable of announcing the nation's entry as a new player on the world stage: But for the British Navy there would be no Australia. That does not mean that Australia should sit under the shelter of the British Navy. Those who say we should sit still are not worthy of the name Briton. We can add to the Squadron in these seas from our own blood and intelligence something that will launch us on the beginning of a naval career, and may in time create a force which shall rank amongst the defences of the Empire. . . . We live in hopes that from our own shores some day a fleet will go out not unworthy to be compared in quality, if not in numbers, with the magnificent fleet now in Australian waters.2 Deakin left office before his plan could be fully set in motion, but his words proved prophetic. In 1909 the Commonwealth Parliament agreed to First Sea Lord Sir John Fisher's proposal that Australia acquire a "Fleet Unit" from British shipyards. Comprising a battlecruiser, several supporting light cruisers, and a local defense flotilla of destroyers and submarines, the Fleet Unit represented an ideal force structure—small enough to be manageable in times of peace but in war capable of effective action with the imperial fleet. On 4 October 1913 the newly commissioned battlecruiser HMAS Australia and her escorts sailed into Sydney Harbor for the first time to a welcome no less enthusiastic than that accorded the Great White Fleet five years before. Just ten months later, the Australian fleet set out to face the harsh test of global war, and neither its commitment nor its professionalism were found wanting. For a newly created navy it was a remarkable achievement. 1. J. R. Reckner, Teddy Roosevelt's Great White Fleet (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1988), p. 76. 2. A. W. Jose, The Royal Australian Navy, (University of Queensland Press, 1987) reprint of 1928 edition, pp. lvii-lviii. |
1. See Seward W. Livermore, "The American Navy as a Factor in World Politics, 1903-1913," American Historical Review, v.63, no. 4 (July 1958), pp. 863-79 for further assessment.
2. Howard K. Beale, Theodore Roosevelt and the Rise of America to World Power (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1956), p. 173, citing "Address at Mechanics' Pavilion," San Francisco, 19 May 1903, in Roosevelt, California Addresses, p. 95.
3. Sperry to Metcalf, 27 January 1908, Sperry Papers, Library of Congress.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid.
6. Roosevelt to Sperry, 21 March 1908, Sperry Papers, Library of Congress.
7. New York Times, 23 February 1909.