Of recent years, in our navy, competition has become the power of powers. It is no new thing, as we shall see, but it has been put to new uses, and has grown and spread until it permeates the naval atmosphere and largely dominates naval thought. Many look upon competition almost as a sacred institution: the open sesame to all achievement and success, without which every desirable naval quality would languish and die. To these the mere questioning of the value of competition will seem as nothing less than high treason. When a thing gets to be too sacred for criticism, it is very safe to presume that it is sadly in need of it. If criticism be well merited, then it must surely serve a useful purpose; if it be without merit, it falls away from its subject, leaving it all the brighter in the clarified atmosphere.
The following is not an indictment against competition of itself, but a few simple reasons are herein gathered together, to show the fallacies of competition run riot, and to point out some of the attendant dangers of uncurbed competition, that at times degenerates into a veritable orgy of competition. It is a plea for sate and sane competition under control and restraint, and at the same time a plea for some of those immensurable things that go to make up the ideal leader, and are believed to be unfavorably affected by competition as it now exists in our service. Also what follows is believed to fairly represent the ideas of a large and rapidly increasing number of officers, and therefore entitled at least to careful consideration.
Let us first briefly look into the condition that led to the adaptation of competition as the great healer of our modern navy. Forty years of unbroken peace prior to the Spanish-American War had seen our navy reduced, at one time, almost to a condition of inutility, and certainly to a condition of woeful inadequacy. True, such duties as came in peace were well done, but the insidious teachings of peace led to false standards and erroneous conceptions. Preparedness for war, the sole justification for the existence of a navy, was lost sight of in the pleasanter pursuits of peace. Our navy became essentially a show navy, and our ships were scattered in small and heterogeneous groups to the four corners of the earth. Showing the flag became the acknowledged function of our ships, and the appearance of a ship was the generally accepted measure of her efficiency. A long unbroken state of peace, with no actual prospect of war, usually plays havoc with the rugged military virtues, and warps the good judgment necessary to the proper perspective of professional matters. It is feared that during this long period of peace our service often worshipped false gods, and judged itself by artificial standards. The requirements of peace were well met, and complacency and self-satisfaction grew and thrived.
The war with Spain but tended in a large part to confirm self-satisfaction, for its results were surely of a satisfactory nature from a naval standpoint, though it must be confessed that we were blessed with an enemy only more steeped in the false standards of peace than we were.
After the Spanish-American War, our government took a step unprecedented in our national history. It had been a time-honored custom of our country, at the conclusion of each war in which it had been engaged, to reduce and curtail the navy and army, the weapons by which the war had been brought to a more or less successful termination, until they remained but skeletons of what they had been. After the war with Spain, however, both branches of our military force were largely increased, due no doubt to our increased responsibilities through having become a colonial power, and to the insurrection in the Philippines.
Now it was that certain ones, in the service, of keener perception or more analytical turn of mind, began to sound a note of warning that soon was heard throughout the navy. Here a weakness was pointed out, there a conceit was punctured, and louder and more insistent became the cry of warning, that would not down however much it were flouted. Gradually the truth dawned that the war efficiency of our navy was at low ebb and through indifference and self-satisfaction tending to get lower. Then came the search with zeal and energy for the remedy, and all honor must be given to those that brought forward as the revivifier, competition, for whatever else may be said of it, it did arouse interest and remove lassitude. It is charged in China that frequently, during a particularly healthful season in a city, the coffin guild will have rats infected with bubonic plague introduced to stimulate their business. Unquestionably it accomplishes its object, though doubtless rather depressing in other ways. Has competition proved an unmixed blessing to our service, or has it introduced an infection with it? That is what we wish to look into.
When a doctor finds a patient weak and low in vitality he often prescribes a violent stimulant. Our patient, the navy, was most noticeably weak in that prime essential of war efficiency, gunnery, and the "gun-doctors" prescribed a violent stimulant, competition.
Almost immediately the patient began to show signs of renewed vigor. Lassitude was replaced by interest and improvement crowded upon the heels of intelligent endeavor. It has ever been the desire of a great many of those belonging to the profession of arms to find some cure-all for the weaknesses to which their profession is prone; some sure and certain nostrum to insure success in war. Seeing the first invigorating effect of the application of competition to gunnery, a large number of officers straightway seized upon competition as the long-sought nostrum and henceforth it became the guiding genius of our navy, and the spirit of competition was disseminated through its every branch.
Let us see what this great cure-all is that we term competition, and that seems of recent years to have become woven into such an integral part of the fabric of our naval being. Whence came it and what is its history? Are its associations and influences good, bad or indifferent? These, and other things, it behooves us to look into well and earnestly, for surely competition has become a power. As we understand the term, competition may be defined as "a striving to win," and the degree of success is measured not in actual accomplishment, but in relative standing of all competitors. Thus by gradation an attempt is made to determine &e relative efficiency of all the competitors in the subject in competition, whereas what is really determined is the relative degrees of success of the different competitors in the elements entering into the competition. For example, at our Naval Academy, the midshipmen of a class throughout the course are in competition, each with the other. The academic board awards a weight to mathematics, another weight to ordnance, to practical navigation, and so on through all the different branches. The total of each midshipman represents his standing in his class, but not necessarily his efficiency as an officer. It is perfectly well recognized that a good officer is about as likely to come from the foot of a class as from its head, for many of the intangible attributes that go to make up the good officer cannot be graded in competition. We are developing the material elements in competition, but at the expense of more important elements not in competition. We are letting competition run riot and retarding the development of character—that moral force without which wars cannot be won, however perfect the war material may be.
Competition is nothing new, for records of its many forms have come down to us from earliest times. It is not necessary, however, to search ancient history to learn the effect of competition on character. In our colleges and universities of the present day competition has been developed to a degree probably never exceeded. In its relation to college students we may learn something of its effects, and also the opinions of many learned men as to what they consider its effects to have been.
Until comparatively recent years it was the custom of most of our colleges to grade their students according to proficiency in each study. In other words, each study became a competition, just as at present it is at the Naval Academy, and each student taking that study became a competitor for the prize of leading his class in relative standing. Now such gradation of students has generally ceased. A student may be graded "excellent" or "good" or "bad" in a study, but how excellent or good or bad is left undetermined. This change came about after the most mature and intimate thought and discussion by college authorities, because it was believed that the fierce competition engendered by the old system injuriously affected the development of character. The degree of excellence in a study was not in itself so much the object sought as the character built up through study. The intense rivalry due to competition often led to cheating, excessive and injurious "cramming" and various forms of unfair and unworthy practices, and generally tended to lower the moral tone.
In college athletics we find very similar results. The desire to win in competition with teams representing other colleges quite submerged the real object of the game, and led to misrepresentation, deception, extravagance, roughness and brutality. Some colleges have absolutely prohibited intercollegiate contests, and all have hedged these contests about with many corrective rules.
It must be acknowledged that in colleges, at least, competition has not proved itself an unmixed blessing, and from analogy we might expect somewhat similar results in our service. In the first place, competition is no new thing in our navy. How long it has existed therein is not known, but certainly it reached a keen pitch among the sailing ships in the years subsequent to our civil war. Light yards and topgallant masts came down on the run, and "gil-guys" of almost human intelligence were developed. Some ships became so expert in competition that it was dangerous to touch anything without warning when the actual necessity arose.
So, after all, competition was no new thing discovered after the Spanish-American War. It was only rediscovered, and through rules made applicable to modern conditions, and put upon in official basis. It has always been recognized that competition to stimulate interest must be governed by such rules, and held tinder such conditions, as not to favor any participant at the expense of another. So, at this time, more or less elaborate rules governing conditions and procedure in competition were promulgated.
The sea is proverbially an uncertain element, and in order that competition may be fair, various forms of artificiality have to be introduced into the competitions, and sanctioned officially, for now our competitions differ from those of sailing-ship days in that they are official. Having introduced artificial conditions into the competitions, false deductions are drawn therefrom, false ideas of training encouraged and real preparation for real conditions thereby injuriously affected.
From the beginning of official competition the opinion has been generally held that anything not actually prohibited by the rules was permissible, thus, while holding to the letter of rules, in many cases violating their spirit. This, from time to time, led to elaboration of rules, until the very rules themselves in some cases became a study of no mean proportions. Mere complication of rules in itself is of minor importance, but it tends to show the complexity of artificial conditions and the extent to which regulation has had to go. Every contingency that may arise has its corresponding rule, while umpires and observers check and crosscheck each phase and each feature. No officer or man is longer expected or required to make correct report, except in so far as it is required by his checkers, for no unchecked report is taken into consideration. If this be necessary, then is the laborer not worthy of his hire, and character development is needed above all else.
The general effect of a stimulant is well known. If a reaction of constant intensity is desired, larger and larger quantities of the stimulant have to be administered, until, finally, it not only loses its power to stimulate, but actually depresses. Competition is unquestionably a stimulant, and avowedly so administered to our service, but it is feared that we are actually trying to keep our quondam patient alive by this stimulant. Louder and more insistent grows the cry for more and still more competition, and more and more neglected are the non-competitive features that enter into naval efficiency, until their very importance is forgotten and their utility denied. So fierce becomes the competition that frequently the object of the competition is lost sight of in the competition itself, thus making it the end rather than the means to an end. Competition develops the desire to win rather than the desire to excel, and with the desire to win at all hazards is also developed a tendency to trickery, imposition and subterfuge. It is not meant that this is general in our service, but the direction of the wind may be learned from the way the spray flies.
Official competition was first introduced into the service, as has been stated, in connection with gunnery, and in that branch it has reached its most violent development. Let us see how it works. As the time for target practice approaches, interest in the competition (not necessarily in gunnery) increases until all else is lost sight of in the one possessing idea of standing well. As our competition is conducted and emphasized, the desire to win is inordinately stimulated alike by the vanity of officers and the cupidity of men, until in many cases it becomes such a passion that erstwhile good judgment is so warped that prudence and discretion are thrown to the winds. Small wonder that competition and accident have so frequently gone hand in hand.
As soon as the practice is over the artificially stimulated interest collapses like a punctured balloon, and the art of gunnery languishes until the approach of the next target practice. However, some of the bad results of too violent competition follow dose upon the heels of target practice. Insinuations, jealousies, disputes and protests are belched forth ad nauseam. Some protest in relation to their own scores, and others, having exhausted every effort to pull themselves up, attempt, by protest, to pull some fellow competitor down. One ship protests because she had to fire too nearly in the direction that the sun bore; another because she had the wind from an unfavorable quarter; still another because her pointers were unadvantageously affected by being kept "standing by" for a few hours. Now these and many other protested conditions are but natural, and that they are looked upon as things to be avoided in practice only shows what artificiality obtains and is accepted as the standard. Of course, it is the duty of the tactician in actual battle to eliminate as far as may be within his power disadvantageous conditions, but surely the gunnery training should not preclude them, for they may be forced upon one by an adversary more highly skilled in the art of tactics, at which time good gunnery becomes all the more essential, since that alone may then serve to regain the lost advantage.
It is not alone the features that enter into competition that are affected by competition, for there is a decided reactionary effect upon the non-competitive features that go so far to make up real efficiency. The artificial stimulant competition, by directing an exorbitant amount of effort into competitive channels, withdraws it often from its natural and logical channel and retards development in the features not in competition.
It is very difficult to get every element that goes to make up war efficiency into competition, for many of them cannot be expressed in units of a standard, thus precluding exact gradation, the prime requisite of competition as at present applied in our service. This is particularly true of such elements as strategy, tactics and that fundamental upon which all war efficiency is so largely dependent, moral force or character. The material things may easily be arranged for competition. Thus the number of hits per minute may be prescribed as the measure of gunnery efficiency; the coal and water and oil used, or the speed developed may be designated as the standard measurement of steam engineering efficiency; the money value of stores used may be taken as the measure of economical efficiency, but we can get no material standard by which we may measure degrees of proficiency in such intangible things as ability to command in its broadest sense, to lead or to inspire in subordinates that confidence so intimately associated with success in war. These things are largely based upon character or moral force, and this is not developed by our materialistic competitions, but is rather retarded by being apparently relegated to a place of lesser importance. In the wild scramble for success in competition our whole perspective becomes so warped that there is danger of our losing our ability to differentiate between essentials and non-essentials. The very roots of character formation are being contaminated by the virulent and noxious growths springing from competition.
The enlisted personnel of our service is in a constant state of change, and is replenished largely by young, impressionable and untrained men, and to a lesser degree the same is true of the commissioned personnel. These young men receive their most vivid impressions of the service through the competitions in which they take part. All stress is placed upon these competitions, purely as competitions, and everything else is relegated to the background of unimportance. Every appeal is made to vanity and cupidity, the twin foci of the ellipse of competition about which, as centers, so many of the evils of competition revolve. It is not surprising that one who does well in competition magnifies his own importance out of all proportion to the true case. He puffs himself up, much as does the star player upon some minor college team, until the very success of the team is held in his hand and subject to his every caprice. He holds himself to be superior to his fellows, and not subject to ordinary rules and regulations. The indispensable man should not be tolerated aboard ship, and a man, though qualified through competition, may thereby be ruined as a military asset.
That a gun pointer, for example, should do the best of which he is capable, regardless of competition, is not among the precepts taught to-day. That it is his duty to do his best, and he is ordered by his officers to do so, and it is right that he should do so, and his responsibility demands that he do so, are, it is feared, unheard-of dicta to the present-day pointers, and but meaningless phrases to the young- officers. Unquestioning obedience and staunch loyalty, the foundation stones of all true discipline, are being undermined to such an extent that, if it continues to go as of recent years, ere long officers and men will undertake aught not pertaining to some competition only when, where and as they fee fit, or at least only at the very earnest solicitation of their responsible seniors. The performance of duty not relating to competition is often most perfunctory, and if perchance it should interfere (or be thought to interfere) with preparation for a competition, it is resented as being untimely, unfair and inopportune, however important in itself the duty may be. Competition is so emphasized that in the minds of many young officers and men nothing else is of any importance.
For more than 10 years now we have happily been blessed with peace, but we must beware of the false teachings and unsound standards of peace, now as ever. During our last long period of peace our standard in material things wandered far from the naval ideal, but through all this period of peace, ideals c4 duty, of character and moral force were clung to, and despite our weakness in many respects we passed safely through the trial of war. The pendulum is swinging the other way during this period of peace, and we are concentrating more upon material things, but let us not lose sight of the actual military value of character. Competition was officially introduced into the service shortly after the close of a war as an aid to the preparation for war, but it has been allowed, even encouraged, to run riot, and may by its very intensity have defeated its own object.
If the reasoning herein set forth is true, the remedy is apparent. Restrain and control competition. Make it serve as a means instead of an end. Do not sacrifice anything important to competition. Keep down artificiality. Do not attempt to grade all competitors with exactitude. If a ship be excellent in gunnery, or very good in steam engineering, it is quite enough that she know this, without attempting through some more or less artificial standard, to express to all just how excellent she is, or just where she comes among all those that are very good. Allow all the crew of an excellent ship to wear some badge of honor, as an E upon their sleeves or a colored cap ribbon, but do not attempt to buy war efficiency with dollars and cents. If it be real it cannot be bought, and bogus efficiency but leads to a false sense of security. Above all else look to the development of character, for that is the great immensurable military quality that sustains in adversity, comforts in suffering, perseveres under discouragement, sacrifices self to duty, and will be in the future, as it has been in the past, ever associated with military success.