*This article was submitted in the Prize Essay Contest, 1935.
"Salus Populi Suprema Est Lex"
Equality of Security
The maritime nations are striving to establish a formula upon which to base comparative warship needs in order to eliminate unrestrained construction competition. The national leaders realize that unless success is achieved in this undertaking, the world will sooner or later be given another baptism of blood.
Peoples of all nations seem distrustful of the binding power of agreements. Their leaders, in consequence, are fearful of compromise that might not be acceptable to their countrymen, yet compromise there must be, if mutual accord is to be reached and a warship race prevented.
Each nation is firmly resolved that its own security on the seas must not be jeopardized. This fundamental reservation, about which any conference necessarily must revolve as a pivotal point, constitutes an almost insurmountable obstacle. National interests, intentions, hopes, and fears, most often hidden behind veils of diplomatic secrecy, muddy the waters of understanding, while the definitions of this security itself are obviously at variance and almost if not quite impossible to bring into harmony.
The people of the United States, being removed geographically from personal contact with the peoples of Europe and Asia, learn only through the press of the national and racial passions, together with disastrous economic impositions, that are violently agitating the people of those continents. These breeders of war, accompanied by the martial tread of armies, fully panoplied, are keeping the world in a turmoil of uncertainty and fear.
Public opinion in the United States, being pacifically inclined and therefore liable to accept at its face value protestations of good intentions on the part of commercial rivals, should be on its guard and chary of making sacrifices too readily on important matters, the future consequence of which might prove most deleterious to the prosperity and even the safety of the nation.
Many of our people look upon this continent as a veritable mine of resources, practically inexhaustible, and able to subsist the population indefinitely, even should the nation be cut off from the seas. Their only fears seem to be of a possible invasion and, in a lesser degree, of a blockade by a hostile force. The vital importance of foreign trade to the nation and the means to give it security on the seas are not widely understood, especially in the interior of the country. These beliefs and pacific desires have made the nation most vulnerable to insidious propaganda, circulated by our competitors, aimed to prevent the nation from taking its rightful place among the great sea powers of the world.
Foreign Trade
Foreign trade and shipbuilding developed in the United States long before we became, to any extent, a manufacturing nation. Americans from the start were successful traders, merchant adventurers, and shipowners. In our earlier days, theorizing on the economics of trade: the multi-angular exchanges of goods, trade balances, etc., were given small concern. Our Merchant Marine was content with a favorable money balance at the end of the voyage. If a ship could not make profits, it was laid up to await more prosperous times.
When we know that early American traditions were seafaring, it is all the more surprising that the nation today seems unable to realize the great importance of the sea. Before the days of iron and steel, our seamen in American built trading vessels roved the Seven Seas. Yankee skippers, skillful in the handling of their ships, in navigation, and in business ability, almost unaided, developed the nation's early foreign commerce.
The Merchant Marine of this country dotted the seas of the world because of profits. When profits could no longer be realized, it faded away.
It has taken our people many decades to learn that sea power is a most useful handmaiden to our prosperity as a nation. The lack of adequate sea power in every crisis of our history has resulted in the greatest loss to our people.
The rise of a mercantile marine may usually be traced to the need of the people for commercial outlets by sea. History shows us, however, that this element cannot survive unless the genius of the people, through the instrumentality of their government, creates and maintains the other two interdependent elements of sea power.
In 1779, due to favorable laws passed by Congress, our citizens became interested in foreign trade by sea. American forests provided in abundance materials of which our ships were built. In 1810 our shipping reached the million-ton mark and in 1812 the nation was forced to wage war in its defense.
Adverse legislation and an unfortunate treaty with Great Britain after the war almost caused our flag to disappear from the seas.
Remedial legislation again gave it a chance to flourish, and in 1845 our shipping for ocean trade once more reached the million-ton mark. Those were the days of the fast clipper ships that made our vessels and our seamen famous throughout the world. In 1856, our mercantile marine was carrying 75 per cent of our commerce with a tonnage of nearly 2,500,000.
When the Civil War began, the United States Merchant Marine registered for ocean service was second only to that of Great Britain, being 5,500,000 tons, and two-thirds of our foreign trade was being carried under our flag. At the end of the war, in 1865, our ocean tonnage had decreased to 1,500,000, carrying 30 per cent of our trade.
Great Britain turned more readily to iron and steel and far outdistanced this country in merchant ship construction. Our nation had been reluctant to give over the vast material resources of its forests and was almost painfully slow in developing its iron and steel facilities for building ships.
In 1914, at the outbreak of the World War, in spite of having become one of the greatest industrial nations, United States shipping for foreign trade had dwindled to scarcely 1,000,000 tons, carrying less than 9 per cent of our trade. (Data from Our Merchant Marine and National Prosperity by Garnault Agassiz.)
The nation accumulated about 14,000,000 tons of shipping during war days and manned the ships in large measure with men of alien blood. Since that time, the tonnage for over-seas service has been reduced to about 3,000,000.
Today, the nation has a large exportable surplus of agricultural and animal products. Our industrial capacity ranges far in excess of the needs of home consumption. Theorists are expounding to the nation perplexing economic suggestions. Our foreign trade leaders are striving to expand our foreign outlets. At the root of everything is the fundamental principle which the nation must accept before reciprocal trade with the world at large can return. It is that our exports can be paid only by accepting commodities in return payment.
It seems natural enough that the United States should be a great sea power. Many of our people have recognized its vital usefulness and have struggled hopelessly for over 150 years to create a mercantile marine to carry the nation's goods to foreign markets. They have met at least partial defeat through dissensions within the councils of the nation itself.
Our People have expanded to the limits our continental territory and the population of nearly 130,000,000 is divided between the farms and the cities. The nation's prosperity, as we are beginning to find out, is a factor of the close interrelation between agriculture and industry. An insect pest or a drought on the one hand, or the drastic curtailment of our vital raw materials from foreign lands across the seas on the other, we know only too well to our sorrow, will act to dislocate the balance between the economic factors involved and bring unemployment, suffering, and short rations to millions of our people. The industrial world today is composed of most complicated organizations. There are millions upon millions of people in congested areas—our cities—whose livelihood is dependent upon industrial pursuits. The continuance of industry to them is all important. These industrial activities in large measure depend upon a continuous supply of articles, raw materials of various kinds, many obtainable only outside the limits of the national territory and across the seas.
The United States during one of our prosperous years, 1926, imported $2,250,000,000 worth of raw materials for our factories. The Department of Commerce in that year told the country that without these essential imports the nation would have been deprived of foods necessary to our well-being, metals needed to support our industrial civilization, chemicals and drugs upon which medical science rests, and raw products without which many of our factories would close and our labor population suffer privations, if not starvation.
The imports into the United States fell off between the years 1930 and 1934 to the value of one and a quarter billion dollars. The value of our exports decreased a similar amount. In the light of the Department of Commerce's prophecy, cannot we place the guilt of some of our unemployment today on the shoulders of this loss of foreign trade? This ill-effect on employment in our industrial pursuits is a guidepost to what will happen on a vaster scale in war through the vicissitudes of blockade or captures at sea, unless the nation maintains adequate sea power. The need of minerals is a vital one in our national industry. The twenty more important minerals used in the manufacturing processes within the country and where mostly mined are tabulated on the following page.
Mineral | Percentage mined within the United States | Percentage mined in other countries |
Aluminum | 56 | Norway 10, Canada 10, France 10 |
Copper | 47 | Chile 16 |
Iron | 45 | France 26 |
Lead | 36 | Mexico 15 |
Chrome | 0 | Africa 54, Philippine Islands – only lately discovered |
Manganese | 0 | Russia 35, India 30, Africa 10 |
Mercury | 15 | Spain 44, Italy 36 |
Molybdenum | 94 |
|
Nickel | 0 | Canada 90, New Caledonia 10 |
Nitrates | 0 | Chile |
Potash | 2 | Germany, France |
Silver | 24 | North and South America |
Sulphur | 85 |
|
Tin | 0 | Malay States 36, Bolivia 25 |
Tungsten | 4 | China 55, India 21 |
Vanadium | 17 | Peru 60, Africa 20 |
Zinc | 42 | Germany 8, Austria 8 |
Gold | 11 |
|
Antimony | 0 | China 75 |
Cadmium | 65 |
|
This recognized vital need for raw materials, of which we have not an adequate supply within the country and must therefore fill our demands from outside markets where foreign controls might act either to increase the price to the destruction of our economic stability, limit the supply to us, or prohibit it altogether, has caused billions of dollars of our capital to be invested abroad. The people of this country in 1925 had invested $10,500,000,000 abroad in copper, tin, and iron ore mines, in paper and pulp mills, in petroleum, silver, asbestos, manganese, and rubber. All are quite essential to our well-being. These investments were made to gain us greater security from exploitation to our manufacturers and consuming public. These investments also have enormously increased the purchasing power of the regions where our capital was spent to the world's advantage. Since 1925, many more billions of United States money has gone into investments in foreign lands to give the nation even greater freedom from the harmful results of foreign controls.
The vital need of the raw materials, and also our enormous investments abroad, are hostages handed over to those nations who may for their own selfish end desire to harm us through a ruthless control of the seas in war.
The Foundation of Sea Power
The functions of the naval armed forces of the nation in war are to deny the enemy the use of the sea, not only for purposes of war but also for commercial purposes while at the same time keeping the seas open for the use of our warships and merchant ships. This use of the seas is for the purpose not only of supplying our military needs but also of supplying the demands of the neutral world at large for our economic benefit.
In time of war, international law call be enforced only through the combined actions of the neutrals. If the neutrals are sufficiently powerful, the laws will be enforced; if not, they will be ruthlessly violated on the plea that military necessity knows no law.
The United States, relative to its contacts with the greater part of the world, is virtually an island. The routes taken by the great bulk of our imports and exports lie across oceans. The sea is a realm under the law of might. The unrestricted right to trade anywhere in the world and the security of that trade on the seas can be assured to a nation only through the instrumentality of an adequate sea power, potentially in peace, dynamically in war.
We are discovering almost daily other elements almost as vital to our economic security as those considered in discussion of sea power. Security on the seas cannot be said to be an absolute quantity arrived at through algebraic formulas. As between nations, "equality of security" on the seas is a relative factor containing both constants and variables. These are intricately involved not alone in war fleets, auxiliaries, naval, mercantile, and air bases, and a merchant marine, but also in world markets available for surplus production the availability of supply of essential raw materials at moderate prices, submarine cables, radio stations, colonies, and many other vital things that in their aggregate might be said to constitute that powerful weapon, sea power, upon which a nation's continued prosperity and prestige in world affairs have always depended.
The fundamental concern of all industrial nations is for a free exchange of goods, raw materials, and fabricated articles. Sea power must be reared upon the premise that it is not only adequate to defend the nation’s territory from attack by sea but also to maintain the security of its mercantile marine and the nation's trading rights in all parts of the world.
Industrial nations with pacific leanings only too often construct their economic empires upon foundations both unstable and insecure. In consequence, their organic structure is demolished when the seas are closed to them by the action of a superior sea power at war.
A nation dominant in sea power can exclude competitors from a vital trade area unless those nations are willing to invoke war to redress the injury. The commercial prosperity of nations is involved in many factors outside themselves. Nations, dependent upon maintaining a delicate balance between agriculture and industry, are so sensitive economically to the actions of other nations that, even from day to day, the economic barometer within the country may be alarmingly disturbed.
Pacifically inclined nations endeavor through diplomacy to protect their trade in unstable world markets from the harmless effect of adverse actions of ruthless competitors. Less trusting nations have learned that diplomacy alone is ineffectual to prevent the crippling of essential industries within the country, bringing as a consequence unemployment and suffering to the people of the nation. These nations have provided themselves with an adequate sea power to uphold the prestige of their diplomacy. Such nations will be found to be willing to go to the greatest lengths, even to war, to insure the integrity of supply of essential raw materials and to continue uninterrupted the ready availability of markets for their surplus industrial output.
An adequate and well-balanced sea power is an instrument that has its principal use outside the nation to insure free and open competition for trade. Less than 100 years ago, this power was used dynamically; today, the tendency is not as prone to invoke war in deciding trade disputes. The potential power is yet found to be most useful and a potent factor to prevent a nation from suffering economic losses due to unbridled acts of other nations.
The Elements of Sea Power
Sea power is said to consist of three elements: the war fleets, naval bases, and a merchant marine. These elements are interdependent.
There is a difference between just a navy and a sea power. With the most formidable war fleets if, at the same time, there are no well-equipped naval bases in important trade areas and an inadequate merchant marine to support the war fleets and carry on foreign trade, it must be concluded that there is no sea power, only a navy.
Our people for generations have turned their energies inwards upon the vast resources of the continent and have given slight attention to the political situations in the numerous localities of the world where the fruits of their labor may find a secure and profitable market. The government, not feeling the insistent urge of the people for outside commercial expansion, has neglected to encourage or provide those other two elements of sea power—transport and secure harbors in localities where our trade could flourish and where our interests might be threatened by the ruthless acts of competing nations.
Lacking these vital elements, the United States has adopted the doctrine of a mobile navy; a navy in which all types of warships are of sufficient size to operate a maximum time at sea without the necessity of replenishing supplies and fuel. It is a doctrine of expediency.
(1) Naval ships.—Germany has designed and constructed a ship, the Deutschland, that will influence the characteristics of all future battleship construction. On a displacement of 10,000 tons, this so-called pocket battleship carries a main battery of six 11-inch guns and is armored on belt, turrets, and with bomb-proofed decks. The ship is engined with Diesels of a combined horsepower giving a maximum speed of 26 knots and a steaming radius at 20 knots of 10,000 miles. This ship is in commission, while three sister-ships are under construction.
France, Germany's old enemy, has replied to this type with the Dunkerque. It is to be of 26,500 tons displacement, heavily armored throughout, battened with eight 13.2-inch guns, with a maximum speed of 29.5 knots and a radius at 15 knots of 7,500 miles. Of the ship's total weight, 10,000 tons will be absorbed in armor, the highest percentage yet recorded given over to protection.
The recent construction of these heavily armored and fast ships has aroused renewed interest in the need for battle cruisers in well-balanced fleets. Although the speed of the Dunkerque would place it as a battle cruiser, the battery and weight given over to armor protection might class it as a fast battleship.
Great Britain and Japan have battle cruisers among their capital ship strength and, when the ban is taken off battleship building, we may expect our authorities, in order to meet the threat of the existing battle cruisers, to advocate either battle cruisers or a compromise fast battleship.
The battle of Jutland discredited for all times the lack of defensive integrity in the old battle cruisers. No nation will be likely to duplicate the pre-Jutland type.
The custom yet holds of the concentrated battleship fleet. A major reason, of course, is concentration of striking power also the speed and radius of the older battleships are low. Should a 30-knot battleship become the new capital ship, a rigid concentration might be found restrictive. No one contemplates the perpetual concentration of the 34-knot heavy cruiser.
Some appear to believe that for the United States, with no outlying naval bases, the battleship has become a purely defensive weapon. Whether there is truth in this idea or not, we all shall agree that the safeguarding of the battleship has become a most expensive undertaking.
The causes of war nearly always have been traced to an economic origin. We may assume, therefore, that the objective, when two or more sea powers are engaged, will be for economic results. Warships useful to this end become important.
The history of the last war seems to point to the possibility that in the next war there may not occur a decisive sea battle of concentrated fleets where the battleships form the armored citadels. May it not be possible that rather it will be a contest at sea where the warships will be dispersed over the seas seeking out and destroying the enemy's merchant marine, thus obeying the age-old principle of the destruction of the vital lines of communication?
For the United States, the heavy cruiser has come to be considered not only a long-distance raider against the enemy's lines of communication but also a "mopping-up" vessel against the enemy's small cruisers and armed auxiliary merchant ships. It is a warship that is considered more or less self-contained for long periods, capable of offensive action at great distances from its base. The high speed of this type, given at great sacrifice of other important characteristics, enables it to avoid action with all warships of greater fighting power.
The United States government has stood firmly against a decrease in size or gun power of its cruisers. It was forced, however, to accept a reduction in gun power.
Having in mind the nonexistence of numerous bases, such as has Great Britain, the greatest emphasis has been put upon speed, fuel capacity, a plurality of guns of maximum caliber permitted, and space for stores and supplies. Utmost expertness in design has been required. Within the limit of 10,000 tons, the elements of offense, defense, and endurance had to be satisfied. Side armor, deck armor, and turret armor were forced to compete with speed, fuel capacity, and gun power. The result has not been satisfactory entirely and, should the limit of tonnage be removed, doubtless the size of this type will be increased, possibly emerging into an armored cruiser of very high speed and endurance.
Knowing all the disadvantages, weaknesses and vulnerabilities of this type, the naval experts of the world powers, nevertheless, have clung to it and nations have produced the heavy cruiser in large numbers. It was not an economic achievement, for the final cost of one of these ships in this country comes very close to $15,000,000.
Possibly an underlying reason for the persistence of the experts in producing the heavy cruiser is their uncertainty as to the importance placed by naval strategists in the much heralded fleet action which it might not be possible to stage. If great fleet actions could not be materialized in order to bring the war to an end, an alternative method must be sought. Commerce is the lifeblood of sea power; it produces the financial circulation of the nation's life and credit. The maintenance of this commerce by an industrial nation is so precious that it must be guarded to the very limit of a nation's capabilities. Against a commercial enemy, why not utilize to the utmost this type to completely sever all vital lines of communication and shut the enemy off from all outside contacts? This method of isolation might result in a fleet action.
We cannot ever lose sight of the importance of the battleship. It is a primary instrument of sea power. It is the most formidable, least vulnerable, and heaviest hitting. It is capable of withstanding maximum punishment from guns, torpedoes, mines, and bombs. The battleship remains the nation's bank account. No fleet can afford to lack them if they are contained in an enemy's fleet. As a reserve of power and a rallying point for all other types of warship, the battleship is yet the backbone of sea powers.
The submarine's appearance as a weapon of sea power has called into being many new types of vessel to encompass its destruction. It has also caused the designers of all ships to look to their underwater protection against the torpedo. The advent of the submarine has in no measure decreased the cost of navies; on the contrary, it has increased their cost. The submarine is not the inexpensive weapon many would make us believe. Expense has not been confined just to building the submarine, the antidote had also to be constructed; this has been the greater expense.
The submarine has called forth in all navies large destroyer flotillas to combat it and these in turn have brought into existence larger cruiser forces to combat the destroyers. To go even further, it might be said that the submarine has been responsible for some of the increase in size of the battleship itself. Under-water protection from the submarine's torpedo requires more weight to be carried by the big ships.
The effectiveness of the submarine in war has been as much a subject of contention as the airplane. The German submarine brought starvation very close to the British Islands despite a victorious grand fleet and hundreds of warships of all types under allied flags scouring the seas for this elusive antagonist.
The United States has built two classes of submarine, the fleet submarine of from 1,300 to 2,600 tons and a smaller one of less than 1,000 tons. The original intention for the former was that of accompanying the fleet and taking part in the tactical battle. For this ambitious purpose, a surface speed of about 20 knots was given these vessels. The fleet submarine in battle would be used to attack with its torpedoes enemy big ships, battleships, aircraft carriers, and cruisers. The strategy and tactics of fleets counting these submarines in their line-up must give importance to dispositions that could grant these vessels an opportunity to find themselves in advantageous positions to utilize their torpedoes at close range—a none-too-easy task for the admiral to accomplish.
In spite of all agreements between the powers to regulate the attack of submarines on merchant ships in war, we must be prepared to discover that in war necessity acknowledges no law. Submarines probably again will sink merchant ships without warning, while crew and passengers will be put in jeopardy.
Agreements have been signed outlawing the piratical role played by German submarines in the World War, yet experts of all nations know only too well that the technique of the submarine does not permit of the new procedure outlined for it. It was evident to the experts that, in carrying out these humanitarian agreements, the submarine attack would be rendered innocuous, besides endangering the safety of the submarine itself. The statesmen, however, were willing to sign the articles of agreement restricting the action of the under-water vessel, leaving it to the conscience of the nations at war to accept the responsibility for the violation of a solemn treaty stipulation.
The United States Navy believes implicitly in the effectiveness of the naval airplane in carriers with the fleet and has allotted to them most important roles in the naval battle. The value of the airplane for the destruction of lines of communication of the enemy at sea in the next war may be found even greater than that of the submarine.
There are those who violently contend that the airplane is the most important weapon of both sea power and land power. These enthusiasts recommend scrapping all surface warships, utilizing only airplanes and submarines as weapons to control the seas.
It is a recognized fact that almost every weapon, even the battleship itself, is dependent upon something else. A war fleet is dependent upon a base. An army in the field depends upon the security of its lines of communication to its base of supply.
The airplane is particularly dependent upon outside facilities for upkeep, repair, and refueling. To have mobility on land, the airplane requires landing fields and hangars for security and refit; the greater the number of correctly located landing fields in a country, the greater the mobility possible for the airplanes of the country.
It is most logical to apply the same principles to the sea. An airplane can either land on board a carrier ship designed or converted for the purpose or alongside a ship provided with the means of raising the airplane on board and after refit and refueling project it again on its flight.
This dependency of the airplane upon resources outside itself will always exist. The long flights of airplanes overseas during peace time have put figures in the minds of people all out of proportion to what may be expected of the airplane in war. From the standpoint of war usefulness, two characteristics must be considered: endurance in the air and offensive power. The former is concerned with weights of fuel, lubricating oil and stores, also the weight of the personnel carried. The latter is dependent upon the military had carried—guns, ammunition, material for smoke or gas screens, and bombs. These two factors, endurance and military load, are interchangeable. In peace, military load is omitted and the weight used for more fuel, lubricant, personnel, and supplies.
The airplane is in competition with the guns on warships but not with the ships themselves. The airplane carrier is the sea landing field and hangar.
One hears it frequently claimed that because the air is above both the land and the sea the airplane will dominate both elements and has made the strategy and tactics of land and sea forces obsolete.
It must be realized that commerce is not as yet in very great bulk venturing in the air, especially over the sea. Trade is still following the old and secure methods. The merchant ships and their cargoes, the transportation lines at sea, are the reasons for navies. The protection or destruction of these is the aim of sea power.
The airplane above the surface of the guns and the submarine beneath the surface will prove themselves effective weapons to accomplish the mission of sea power. Each, however, is vitally interested that the surface of the sea be rendered safe for them. The control of the surface of the sea is a most important objective and can be maintained only through the use of surface warships.
The existence of the airplane and its great destructive possibilities have made it all the more important to gain this control of the surface of the sea in order to give this new weapon full and complete mobility.
The destroyer is a type of warship over which there is little controversy. It guards the battleships from attack by enemy destroyers or submarines. The size has stabilized, also speed and armament of guns and torpedo tubes. The destroyer leader, in size almost a small cruiser, is, as its name implies, to lead in an attack.
(2) Naval bases.—The United States by agreement at the Washington Conference on Limitation of Naval Armament gave up the right to develop a first-class naval base in the Philippine area. Our statesmen and naval men seem to have agreed, at the time, that having such a base might arouse Japanese resentment and, considering the drastic cut in the warships of the navies, it was thought the United States would be unable to supply sufficient units to shield such a base from a major joint attack by a first-class sea and land power.
Naval strategists now are convinced that sea power cannot successfully operate in distant areas without the facilities of secure harbors or bases for replenishment of supplies, fueling, and refit. Honolulu is our fleet's most western base in the Pacific.
(3) The Merchant Marine.—The Navy and the Merchant Marine are interdependent elements of sea power. The Navy historically owes its existence to merchant shipping requiring protection. Today, the protection of our ocean-borne commerce is as vital as ever. No nation can maintain effectively its foreign commerce without the potential power of the Navy behind it. There are parts of the world where competition in trade is so violent that a nation's trade will be obliterated unless the government steps in to save it. The potential instrumentality of an adequate navy, an efficient and modern merchant marine, and a public opinion conscious of the importance of world trade are elements and factors essential to keep our flag on the seas. The principle involved of naval bases in areas where competition is violent, maintained by successful sea powers, is that of the dependency of warships on outside resources for continuous mobility.
The Navy keeps in commission a nucleus of auxiliary ships. These are supply, repair, hospital, refrigerator ships, gunboats, sloops, mine layers, net layers, mine sweepers, depot ships, tankers, tenders, and others. The Merchant Marine furnishes the source for expansion in auxiliary strength in war.
There is every reason to believe that the United States shipyards, if given the backing, could produce as excellent merchant ships as they have warships. A merchant ship like a warship is but a lifeless hulk without a crew of trained and loyal officers and men to give it life. Our competitors in trade have established well-equipped merchant marine academies, schools, and ships for the training of personnel. They have long since acted upon the principle that the ever increasing complication of modern ships and machinery, the elaborate and delicate instruments installed in the ships, require, for safe and successful management, the most expert skill of the personnel. Four states of the Union maintain school ships for Merchant Marine officers. These are inadequate. The United States government should establish academies and schools for the nation's mercantile personnel. The efficiency of our Merchant Marine is a national concern equal to that of the Navy.
The best-informed opinion in the country has urged the need of more modern and faster merchant ships to carry a larger share of our foreign trade, but the shipping industry, it appears, has failed to find satisfactory conditions to create a merchant marine capable of successfully competing with systems under foreign flags.
There are several reasons advanced for this failure: lack of education and training of our seafaring men available to man our ships; the high cost of ship construction and ship repair in our shipyards; and the high wages that must be paid to sea going personnel. Many of these handicaps can be at least partially overcome by wise national legislation aimed to create and maintain an efficient and adequate merchant marine. It would appear that the national help given in mail subsidies and loans has not been sufficient or else the money has been unwisely used.
Problems in the Pacific
It is yet too early to predict the effect upon world opinion of the radical suggestions to abolish offensive types of warships or to decrease the size of all warships to the lowest possible limit. An anxious world is seeking an avenue of escape from a threatened war. Should the principal nations be convinced that such ideas hold out some hope, they might embrace them.
The nations who would be least willing to make such sacrifices, naturally, are those most dependent upon the seas for their prosperity and territorial security. Nations with globe-wide responsibilities could not meet, with such feeble instruments, the obligations to their far-flung empires. It is difficult to surmise the exact effect upon the strategy of war on the seas of the abolition of offensive types, but it seems evident enough that disputes between the nations over policies will still occur and the causes of war, therefore, will not be removed.
The loss of United States naval prestige in the Far East was due primarily to the abandonment of our naval bases in those seas. Great Britain wisely insisted upon a new naval position at Singapore, where the British fleet will find itself at an important focus of oriental trade routes and in a position to discourage any hostile attempts by sea upon India, the Dutch East Indies, Malaysia, and Australasia.
The United States was obliged to be content with her nearest possession, the Hawaiian Islands, where a fleet base is yet in process of construction.
Limitation in naval armaments will always favor the nations that are fortunate to be strategically consolidated in one area, for more ships in defense are available, as none need be held outside the home areas.
The United States today is realizing the great potential value of the China market, while our sea power is held fast at Hawaii in the Eastern Pacific. The course of economic empire evidently lies to the westward.
Japan successfully has usurped the leading role, both economical and political, in the affairs of the Orient once held by the mistress of the seas and the United States, has accomplished this victory with the potential power of a navy only three-fifths as numerous in warships as either. Great Britain is disturbed over her commercial losses in the Orient and India and both nations are uneasy over their political losses.
Equality of security was the aim of the Washington and London treaties. Does it not seem fundamental that the requirements of a nation for the instruments of war on the seas to give this security are intricately concerned with that nation's aspirations, desires for expansion of territory at the expense of other nations, and the spirit and temper of its people? Basing sea power haphazardly on types of warships, ratios, etc., while omitting even the mention of these vital questions on individual national policies, the very pith of the question, seems illogical and unlikely to lead to results averting war.
Japan's territorial expansion has been intermittent since 1865. Much of this expansion was through war conquests. The four islands of Japan have an area of 147,651 square miles, about the size of our Montana. Since that time, there have been acquired Korea, Formosa, the Kuriles, the Luchus, the Pescadores, part of Sakhalin, the Carolines, the Marshalls, the Ladrones (except Guam) and, on lease, a part of Kwangtung, a province of China. In consequence, the Japanese Empire today has an area of 256,678 square miles, about equal to the area of Texas, with a population of about 90,000,000 people, 350 people to the square mile. The question of emigration to relieve the congestion of population in Japan is already a live issue.
Japan's insecurity lies primarily in her position in Manchuria. She must needs defend the new State of Manchukuo, Korea, and the leased territory of Kwangtung against both China and Russia.
It has been a corollary for Japan to link this territorial expansion to adequate national defense. Fear of foreign aggression is uppermost in the psychology of the Japanese people and their leaders.
Japan, due to her geographical situation, lying across the doorsteps of China, visions herself as the champion of a backward sister nation against grasping Western industrial systems. Her announced intention is to exclude all activities of other nations in China if it can be shown that they are inimical to Japan's interests. She alone will decide what is good for China and, with adequate sea power on the spot, what single nation will dispute her?
Japanese commercial penetration into the great river valleys of China, the centers of population, despite periodical boycotts, is progressing. Japan some day doubtless counts upon becoming the middleman or compradore of China to control China's industrial development and to regulate her foreign trade.
Japan, since embracing Western industrial methods, is finding her islands too circumscribing. She burst the restricting bonds of rival powers twice through her victorious wars with China and Russia. Eventually she may consider it necessary to break the bonds in other directions.
Investing money in foreign lands is frequently at great risk to the investors. Especially is this true when the investment is made in localities where governments are unstable. This risk is often met by obtaining backing from the investors' government and has been termed "dollar diplomacy."
Many Japanese statesmen have endeavored to link Japan's military incursion into Manchuria with our wars with Mexico and Spain and our annexation by treaty of the Canal Zone in Panama. It is difficult for nations to see eye to eye, but posterity usually decides the right or wrong of an act of this nature by the results. Should the results of Japan's ventures on the Asiatic mainland be as successful and happy for the inhabitants of the territories annexed or liberated as were those of the United States in annexing the "states" now bordering on Mexico, the liberation of Cuba, and the creation of the Panama Canal, posterity will give Japan the credit for achieving, even against world opposition, a highly beneficial act for humanity.
With the record of the past glories of Great Britain on the seas as a guide, Japan's economic dream for the future may be based upon the illustrious example of her former ally—no doubt blaming the Western world for not having awakened her earlier.
Japan is fully aware of the importance of sea power in all its elements and is forging this vital force gradually, methodically, and scientifically. She is consolidating her position as she goes and imagines herself among a hostile world.
The claim made by Japan recently for parity with Great Britain and the United States in warships alarmed the powers vitally interested in the Orient because, due to Japan's consolidated situation, achieving naval parity would give her complete dominance in the Far East.
The abolition of the treaties may result in political cohesions between the powers. Neither Great Britain nor the United States could play a lone hand in the Orient in maintaining the security of their trade. Nations seek their helpmates among the most powerful.
The power of the great mistress of the seas, with obligations of empire and a world-wide trade, will be curtailed in the Orient by the predominance of Japan's military and sea power. That nation is thus faced either with the building of adequate naval strength for the Far Eastern area, or else cohering to Japanese sea power, an unlikely alternative.
The Japanese nation has succeeded in entering most of the markets of the world with its low-priced goods. Both Great Britain and the United States are counting their losses in the millions. This situation has brought the Western commercial empires closer together in a bond of common interest. Japan's trade successes can only be won at the expense of these older commercial nations. Japan's urge for equality of security is based upon the belief that she stands opposed by the nations from whom she has taken trade profits. Japan's great concern for security is genuine. It may be said also that Japan is beginning to realize that she has over-extended herself. Her rise to power and wealth has been too sudden. She must needs maintain expensive armies and navies, else lose all she has won.
Marquis Ito, a great Japanese statesman of a few generations past, left this warning to his people:
It is necessary for us always to act with great caution; particularly must we refrain from the abuse of military power, for if we abuse military power and suffer a complete defeat, not only our national prestige is greatly injured, but the rule of the country is not unlikely.
These words must seem almost prophetic to Japan today. Japan visions herself surrounded by a hostile world. She feels bound to maintain a great army for use in Manchuria, and a navy equal to any sea power that might challenge her ambitious policies in the Orient. It is a gigantic financial undertaking.
It seems reasonable to believe that, in asking for parity, Japan would wish not to be obliged to build additional warships. She has in fact suggested that parity be achieved ting through the stronger powers cutting their navies down to her level.
When one realizes the unpleasant economic situation that is being faced by Great Britain, and in a lesser degree the United States and other Western powers, caused by Japan's high-power inroads into world markets, would it be surprising should the great sea powers induce Japan further to extend her capital outlay by refusing to reduce the size of their navies, forcing her, if she desires parity, to build up to their levels?
The greatest fear is that the people of the United States will be unwilling to risk crossing Japan in her present humor by completely repairing the breach in our sea power made by ill-advised treaties and unwise, even foolish, neglect to build up to warship ratios and replace the over-age ships. Our trade with China and the Far East at present is not large compared to our total foreign trade, but, when one considers the investment possibilities due to occur when the 400,000,000 Chinese have settled their internal dissensions and decide to modernize their backward country, then there appear dreams of wealth of profits almost staggering to contemplate. China will require enormous amounts of manufactured articles, machines of all descriptions, that our industries can produce unlimited quantities.
Great Britain with her sea power at Singapore will have her eyes open for trade to possibilities and will be in a position to demand her share of the trade.
The efficient Japan, having outgrown her available islands and seriously committed herself on the continent of Asia, has in consequence other and possibly more difficult worries than the supposed menace of the Western sea powers.
Russia is said to be continuing the double tracking of the Trans-Siberian Railroad and projecting a rail cut-off around the north end of Lake Baikal to avoid the formidable menace of a possible Japanese military concentration about Manchouli at the western end of the Chinese Eastern Railroad, now to all intents and purposes, through the new national entity Manchukuo, under Japanese control. This cut-off makes more secure the Russian lines of communication from Western Russia to Khabarovsk, where military concentration is reported to be fast continuing. The so-called dagger, with Vladivostok at the point, is a dire menace to Japan's industrial centers. Even her capital is within easy bombing range by airplane from Khabarovsk and Vladivostok.
The Russian Eastern Siberian provinces are being rendered an economic desert, it is claimed, by carefully planned and executed Japanese railroad strategy. The harbor of Vladivostok, needed in the Soviet plans for the industrialization of this part of Russia, is said to be denuded of shipping and slowly sinking into decay.
It has been rumored lately that Russia is turning her attention away from her Pacific provinces toward Mongolia. The purchase of the Chinese Eastern Railroad by Manchukuo may be a forerunner of a reduction of Russian military forces in the Far East.
The people of the United States, since surrendering at the Washington conference their right to be secure in the seas of the Orient, almost have been persuaded that to preserve their trade in that region it would be wise to provide all the elements of sea power.
The intention to abandon our sovereignty in the Philippines, actually a selfish internal and sectional economic measure, formerly was looked upon with complacence. Now a doubt seems to have crept into the councils of government as to the wisdom of this course. This strategical group of tropical islands is coming to be recognized as a valuable spearhead of economic and political power. Freedom for the Filipino nation many believe spells for the people economic ruin, else annexation to a strong oriental power.
If the commercial aspirations of our people are to be given political recognition and an effort made toward gratification, we cannot further sacrifice our relative standing in any of the instruments of sea power. We must maintain a sea power adequate to maintain the open-door policy in China.
Japan, in renouncing the Washington and London treaties, has untied the hands of the great industrial giant, the United States. These shackles should never again be resumed. The right to construct naval and commercial bases in territory under our flag for the safeguarding of our vital interests is one that never should be renounced lightly. Japan can take no umbrage at this decision.
An adequate fleet, commercial and naval bases in the waters of the Far East, and a modern and sufficiently numerous merchant marine only can keep open the door in China and in the Far East in general for the free circulation of our goods and restore to us again both the security and the prestige in world affairs that were lost when we made a futile gesture at Washington in 1921.