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July 1920—Nobody ever accused Renaissance man Bradley Allen Fiske of failure to see the big picture. In “Invention in War,” this most prolific of all naval-officer inventors urges readers “to keep in order and to operate the parts of the naval machine with which each of us is entrusted: e.g., a gun, a turret, or a ship ... If all the officers of the Navy had done no more (many did no more) during the years between 1881 and 1920, we should now have only ships like the Constitution and Hartford . . . While we toil on, therefore, let us raise our eyes from time to time, and try to get a general view of what the Navy as a whole is trying to do, and see if there is not a chance to invent something that will help.”
His “raise our eyes” words may remind some readers that his own eyes have been fixed on the skies since 1909, when his old boss at Manila Bay, Admiral George Dewey, assigned him to study the General Board’s plans for the defense of the Philippines. Fiske, who has never seen an aircraft in flight, recommends that the islands be defended from four naval air stations, each with 100 planes to repel the anticipated Japanese invasion fleet. His plan is branded a “wildcat scheme” by one General Board member—but not by aviation enthusiast Dewey. Unruffled, Fiske invents the Navy’s first torpedo bomber two years later.
July 1940—When he retired last month, Captain George V. “Jeb” Stuart ended a 35-year career. During its final four years, he made himself far and away the finest Secretary-Treasurer the Naval Institute ever had. He had graduated 49th in the Naval Academy’s 114-man Class of 1905, well behind Admiral Royal Ingersoll (4th) and Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz (7th).
Rightly did the Board of Control (presided over by Admiral H.R. “Betty” Stark and including Brigadier General Alexander A. Vandegrift and Jeb’s classmate Captain Albert T. Church) hail him as “universally admired, respected, and loved [for his] combination of common sense, character, courage, and vision. ...”
Why, then, did they permit this brilliant man to publish “Design for War—To Promote Peace,” an absolutely wrongheaded article? Stuart began by citing Genghis Khan’s 13th Law: “Every man who does not go to war must work for the Empire, without reward.” But he wound up sounding like an echo of Haile Selassie’s celebrated “Mobilization Order,” which directed all men who could walk to come with their spears to Addis Ababa “or they would be shot.” Jeb, God love him, was just asking Americans to donate their birthright to the government—for the duration.
July 1960—Whether tickling us with droll anecdotes, skewering a fellow author in the C&D section, or wowing us as he does this month with “After Communism, What?” Captain Paul R. Schratz can lay claim to being Proceedings’s most versatile author. If you agree with Carl Amme that the worst thing in the world is losing a nuclear war and the second worst thing is winning one, you may like Paul’s topper: “We are now confronted with the most terrible prospect of all, total war with massive nuclear weapons promising, optimistically, annihilation to both sides.” Optimistically?
He is confident that we can destroy the Soviets if we have to, but still he wonders, “Will not total destruction of Soviet Russia, like total destruction of Germany twice already in our lifetime, result in the creation of still another monster, perhaps one grinning inscrutably from the East. . . ?” Thirty years later, that’s still a good question.
Nevertheless, he may make a 1990 reader wince at his 1960 opinion that “Freedom of the individual is too enlightened for most foreign nations to appreciate.” On balance, however, it’s an excellent paper, considering that it can now be read by people who have watched the Berlin Wall come down— whereas Paul wrote it a full year before the miserable thing went up!
Clay Barrow
Crowe, Notable Aviators, Draw Crowd in Florida
The U.S. Naval Institute’s co-sponsored symposium—“Carrier Aviation: Past, Present, and Future”—with the Naval Aviation Museum Foundation in Pensacola, Florida, 10-11 May, was a success. Noted speakers for the morning panel on Current Employment in Carrier Aviation included Vice Admiral Robert F. Dunn, USN (Ret.), Admiral Wesley L. McDonald, USN (Ret.), Admiral Huntington Hardisty, USN, Rear Admiral Richard C. Macke, USN, Rear Admiral Frederick L. Lewis, USN, and Captain Gerald G. O’Rourke, USN (Ret.).
Just back from speaking to the Supreme Soviet, featured luncheon speaker Admiral William J. Crowe, Jr., USN (Ret.), drew a sizeable crowd and shared some telling insights into the changing world scene.
The afternoon panel, addressing the future of carrier aviation, included Vice Admiral Gerald E. Miller, USN (Ret.), Mr. Henry S. Rowen, Vice Admiral Robert J. Kelly, USN, Mr. Edward J. Campbell, and Mr. Brian Anthony Joseph Flatley.
A videotape of the program will be available by this fall and can be ordered directly through the museum by calling 1-800-327-5002.
The next issue of Proceedings will contain information about our fall symposium in San Diego. Local members will receive invitations in the mail, and all others may register by telephone (1- 800-233-USNI) or by using the form in the magazine.
Past Presidents: A0M 0 D. Porter; RADM J. L, Worden; RADM C. R. P. Rodgers; COMO F. A. Parker; RADM J. Rodgers; RADM T. A. Jenkins; RADM E. Simpson; RADM S B. Luce; RADM W. T. Sampson; RADM H. C. Taylor; RADM C. F. Goodrich; RADM R. Wainwright; RADM B A. Fiske' VADM W. L. Rodgers; ADM H. B. Wilson; ADM H. P. Jones; RADM E. W. Eberle; ADM S. S. Robison; RADM M. L. Bristol; ADM W H, Standley; ADM D. F Sellers; ADM W. D. Leahy; ADM H. R. Stark; FADM C. W. Nimitz; FADM E. J. King; ADM L. E. Denfeld; ADM R, B. Carney; ADM W. M. Fechteler; ADM A A. Burke; ADM J. Wright; ADM G W. Anderson, Jr.; ADM D. L. McDonald; ADM T, H. Moorer; ADM E. R. Zumwalt, Jr; ADM J. L. Holloway III; ADM T. B. Hayward; ADM J. D. Watkins.
Proceedings / July 1990