It is practically thirteen years since the Armistice. A new generation is here; a generation that knows nothing of the hardships, deprivations, and sufferings of 1914-18, except from reading or listening to tales of personal experiences. It is true that many novels of the war now appearing are realistic, but there is a certain glamour about them that discounts the hell of those four years. Yarns, no matter how interestingly spun, lose most of their horror as time dims the events which gave them life. So we have with us a growing generation utterly ignorant of war, a generation which we all hope will never meet it. The costs of the last war are mounting yearly. Hospitalization, adjusted compensation, bonuses have already reached tremendous sums. Every possible means should be taken to prevent another such holocaust.
In the last twenty years two branches of the service have advanced by leaps and bounds—aviation and communications. It is the latter with which I wish to deal, not simply with our internal communications which transmit orders and information within the service, but rather with those communications which form the service of information between the Navy and the general public.
Communications of every conceivable type have expanded about as rapidly in the last twenty years as aviation. Think of the number of books, magazines, newspapers, and advertisements today and cast your mind back fifteen or twenty years ago for comparison. How many radio broadcasts were thrown country wide ten years ago? I can remember distinctly listening, on the edge of an interested crowd, to the Yale-Harvard game being read from a ticker, about 1905. Now everyone turns a dial. There is the Yale-Harvard game. If that is uninteresting we shift to the Army- Notre Dame game or even to the Pacific coast. Everyone is expressing himself freely, some inadvisedly, but in the main with an attempt to tell the truth as he sees it. Is it right and proper for the Navy to remain continually quiescent? Should we issue from the department or high commands uninteresting statements of fact? Can we afford not to teach our personnel to explain our need for existence at every opportunity to the citizens of this country? Is it disloyal for us to do so? Should we be discouraged if we make a few errors of fact provided we are loyal to the Navy? I think the answer is “No,” and, that unless we do so, the Navy will not be ready if the time ever should occur when the nation needs us immediately.
The power of that intangible asset known as public good-will is so far-reaching and so important to us that no effort should be spared to cultivate it. Our very system of government requires the fullest publicity on all subjects—the public demands it. To the average American the only purpose of a navy is to permit him to proceed in the even tenor of his way without interference or molestation from an outside source. We may talk about protection of trade routes, communications, containing an enemy’s fleet, etc., in military terms, but unless the listener has much leisure, or is a student of military affairs, these terms and phrases will pass off his back as water off a duck. We must express our needs to him in a language he will readily understand. For example, recently, while glancing over the Congressional Record, I came across the following remarks by a Congressman in regard to the modernization of battleships, which are quoted in part.
We propose by this modernization program to increase the elevation to 30°, thereby giving a range of 35,700. We have already done so on four ships—Nevada, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Arizona.
On older ships than these the elevation of these guns increases the range 11,200 yards ... In addition to the elevation of guns, it is proposed to increase the deck protection from 3.5 to 5.5 inches, an increase in deck protection of over 60 per cent, making the ship far superior to her present condition . . .
The penetrative effect of the nest AP bomb today might be 3.5 inches at 6,000 feet. To penetrate 5 inches would require an altitude of 13,000 feet, and to penetrate 5.5 inches would require an altitude of 15,000 feet . . . The ship is, therefore, far less vulnerable to bomb attack with the added deck protection . . .
The Navy is the first line of our national defense. In the case of national emergency it must hold the battle line while the resources of the nation are being mobilized. It must ever be in a state of readiness both in material and personnel . . .
The Navy has no better friend than this Congressman. Furthermore his general, yet vast detailed knowledge of matters of policy, personnel, and material is probably far greater than that of many naval officers. His speech is quoted only to indicate the detailed facts required by the public.
Education and indoctrination in the Navy has always been along lines of “not talking” for publication. Even in some assignments to duty (publicity bureau, aide to commandant, etc.), there has been ever present the idea, “careful what you say.” In an attempt to analyze the reasons therefor, its foundation appears to lie in the fact that we try to keep too much secret and end by keeping little or nothing. There is a physical limit to the length of time a secret may be retained as such. It is doubtful, for instance, whether the fact that we had a 40-knot cruiser, a 50-knot torpedo, or a 300-knot plane could be retained a secret after its manufacture had once reached the quantity production stage. It seems that the time has come when we must radically develop our naval publicity and “service of information” policy to educate our officers to go amongst the people and talk.
After listening for two years to many congressional hearings and other public meetings, most of which are published, it appears that we need have little or no fear about divulging national or naval secrets. So far as the average naval officer in the field (not at a design desk) is concerned there is no danger. Before any piece of machinery goes far beyond the design stage money must be spent and with that goes attendant publicity.
With the exception of aviation, which has grown to be one of the most important arms of the service in the last decade, the Navy has designed and built few new ships since the Armistice. There are a few submarines and cruisers of post-Armistice design and eleven new destroyers will shortly be laid down. Whether any more battleships of 35,000 tons will be built is somewhat problematical. Our submarine and destroyer tonnage is of old design. The Navy is, and has been for some years, advocating a progressive building program which it has not been altogether successful in obtaining. Pressure from the pacifists is being applied throughout the country to prevent our replacing ships. In fact, so great is this pressure, that the very operation of vessels is limited. If the pacifists could, they would keep us swinging at anchor the year round. They use every means to prevent the Navy from accomplishing its legitimate purpose, so why should we not use every fair means and argument to acquaint the citizens of this country with its needs?
To change from one type of armament to another is expensive. The very cost of operating ships is tremendous. Often when a war game or problem is completed, with few apparent results, one feels that his actions are similar to that of the King of France marching an army up a hill and marching down again. But any thinking civilian must realize that such problems, or war games, are necessary for successful training. Before any weapon is adopted or discarded its usefulness must be thoroughly investigated. We are only human; we make mistakes, plenty of them, but it must be in the back of everyone’s mind that we wish continually to develop new means, methods, and materials, the better to use our existing ships to defend our country. If the civilian knows what we are endeavoring to accomplish he will back us by advancing funds. If, however, only the pacifist reaches his ear it makes our position doubly difficult.
It is necessary for us to inform civilians constantly that, should a war break out, the only navy available (during the first eighteen months) would be, with hardly an exception, that navy which is in being when war is declared. This, very few people realize. It is extremely doubtful if a single ship, submarine, destroyer, cruiser, battleship, not yet laid down would appear for twelve months, and the number prior to eighteen months would not sway the balance of any war. Certain merchant ships may be converted to auxiliary cruisers, airplane carriers, and tenders but, while useful, they will not decide any major issue.
After eighteen months the tremendous power of organization and manufacture of this nation will produce war material so rapidly that we need fear no other nation. This is an unanswerable argument to maintaining a navy virile, strong, and active. The peace of mind of 122,000,000 citizens should demand it and will do so, if it is explained by every officer at every opportunity.
Any explanation of the necessity for a strong navy must be in terms readily understandable to the public. The average citizen has so many other matters to think about that, unless we put the duties and necessities for a navy in the language he speaks, we shall not succeed. Despite the great advance in communication and general knowledge there is not sufficient time for the average person to know more than one language, his own. If we speak in terms of advance guards, main bodies, attacks from the flanks, we are defeated before we begin, for we are talking technical terms which go over his head. We must learn to talk to the civilian in his own language.
I have heard it often expressed that the Navy is the insurance the country pays for peace. So it is, if it is sufficiently strong to prevent any nation from attacking us. In the event that any nation is foolhardy enough to attack us, the citizen may rest assured he need not fear for his family’s safety while making preparations to bring the war to a successful conclusion.
In this respect the Navy is totally different from the Army. The Navy realizes that it must fight with the material at hand. The peace-time Army is largely a skeleton organization which relatively will be more greatly expanded in time of war than the Navy. Therefore, the real insurance, the type that pays immediately half the policy without question upon notification of death, is a navy. It must be ready. If it is not, the insured (citizens of the country) will finally pay greatly increased premiums in unnecessary loss of life and property. To a large degree the country has been borrowing on its premiums since the Armistice. This is due to three causes. First, a tremendous excess of certain types of ships built during the last war, but not completed when hostilities ceased, second, a reserve of man power still of an age and sufficient experience to man our existing Navy; and, third, the very necessary and natural desire to economize in order to discharge our huge indebtedness. The time has now arrived when the first two assets have, to a large degree, passed their years of usefulness and are rapidly being placed in an inactive reserve of doubtful value.
What is the difference in cost of a first- class navy, ready in all respects, ships modern or being replaced, officers and men well trained in seamanship, gunnery, and tactics, together with a high standard of morale as against a navy inferior to our needs as the richest nation in the world? A penny a day for each citizen will more than meet our total requirements of operation, replacement, and morale. Viewed in that light it is not a large sum. At present it is somewhat over three-quarters of a cent a day per person.
So it appears that the time has come for the Navy Department to develop actively its present broad information policy, to encourage officers, young and old, to tell the country its needs, and to cease to be the “silent” service.
The information service maintained in the Navy Department is invaluable, not only to the Navy, but the public. It renders a great service, not only to the press for current views, but also to any interested person desiring information. However, there should also be such an organization in each district available to furnish facts in regard to the various policies of the Navy Department to any officer or civilian who may have occasion to need them. There should be constant endeavor to keep the Navy before the country.
As an example of what could be accomplished let us take our annual fleet concentration. The public hears little or nothing in regard to the problems being worked out until the ships actually leave the navy yards or bases, at which time accredited correspondents are present. Usually the problems are issued to each commanding officer concerned early in the previous summer. Estimates of the situation are prepared by each side. There is little that must be confidential insofar as the public is concerned. Each commander in chief will come to his own decision and put his plan in effect.
Our Navy Day occurs in October. It would be a good plan if a presentation of the winter problem were broadcast on that day to the nation. The fact that we must conduct our maneuvers in strategic areas, over thousands of square miles of sea, away from the public gaze could be stressed. Such a presentation would arouse the public interest and from year to year the public would look forward to hearing of the Navy’s plans.
Then later, but well previous to the actual date of departure, the public interest could be further held if two well- known officers, one representing each side, who are not in either fleet, prepared their own estimate of the situation, decisions, and plans, and gave it as a news item to the press for use in Sunday supplements, etc. If well handled, an able discussion of the coming problem could be spread over a considerable period of time. The actual events which occur, as reported by the correspondents present, would be of greater interest to the public who would then understand more readily the necessity for our carrying out such extended operations.
Future international conferences are not far distant. If the Navy has carefully educated the rising generation it need have little to fear about the outcome of any conference or of the country maintaining a strong navy afterwards. We have many friends anxious to help, but there are also many enemies with large funds available ready to crush us. Let us go to the country frankly and freely, but as naval officers let us go to the nation in the language it understands—the country’s, not the Navy’s.