[Footnote 79: London, 1894.]
A great deal has been made of the strict audit of the accounts of Howard's fleet. The Queen, says Froude, 'would give no orders for money till she had demanded the meaning of every penny that she was charged.' Why she alone should be held up to obloquy for this is not clear. Until a very recent period, well within the last reign, no commanding officer, on a ship being paid off, could receive the residue of his pay, or get any half-pay at all, until his 'accounts had been passed.'[80] The same rule applied to officers in charge of money or stores. It has been made a further charge against Elizabeth that her officers had to meet certain expenditure out of their own pockets. That certainly is not a peculiarity of the sixteenth-century navy. Till less than fifty years ago the captain of a British man-of-war had to provide one of the three chronometers used in the navigation of his ship. Even later than that the articles necessary for cleaning the ship and everything required for decorating her were paid for by the officers, almost invariably by the first lieutenant, or second in command. There must be many officers still serving who have spent sums, considerable in the aggregate, of their own money on public objects. Though pressure in this respect has been much relieved of late, there are doubtless many who do so still. It is, in fact, a traditional practice in the British Navy and is not in the least distinctly Elizabethan.
[Footnote 80: This happened to me in 1904.]
Some acquaintance with present conditions and accurate knowledge of the naval methods prevailing in the great Queen's reign—a knowledge which the publication of the original documents puts within the reach of anyone who really cares to know the truth—will convince the candid inquirer that Elizabeth's administration of the navy compares favourably with that of any of her successors; and that, for it, she deserves the admiration and unalloyed gratitude of the nation.
IX[81]
[Footnote 81: Written in 1905. (_Cornhill_Magazine_.)]
NELSON: THE CENTENARY OF TRAFALGAR
[The following article was read as an address, in compliance with the request of its Council, at the annual meeting of the Navy Records Society in July 1905. It was, and indeed is still, my opinion, as stated to the meeting in some prefatory remarks, that the address would have come better from a professed historian, several members of the Society being well known as entitled to that designation. The Council, however, considered that, as Nelson's tactical principles and achievements should be dealt with, it would be better for the address to be delivered by a naval officer—one, moreover, who had personal experience of the manoeuvres of fleets under sail. Space would not suffice for treating of Nelson's merits as a strategist, though they are as great as those which he possessed as a tactician.]
Centenary commemorations are common enough; but the commemoration of Nelson has a characteristic which distinguishes it from most, if not from all, others. In these days we forget soon. What place is still kept in our memories by even the most illustrious of those who have but recently left us? It is not only that we do not remember their wishes and injunctions; their existence has almost faded from our recollection. It is not difficult to persuade people to commemorate a departed worthy; but in most cases industry has to take the place of enthusiasm, and moribund or extinct remembrances have to be galvanised by assiduity into a semblance of life. In the case of Nelson the conditions are very different. He may have been misunderstood; even by his professional descendants his acts and doctrines may have been misinterpreted; but he has never been forgotten.
The time has now come when we can specially do honour to Nelson's memory without wounding the feelings of other nations. There is no need to exult over or even to expatiate on the defeats of others. In recalling the past it is more dignified as regards ourselves, and more considerate of the honour of our great admiral, to think of the valour and self-devotion rather than the misfortunes of those against whom he fought. We can do full justice to Nelson's memory without reopening old wounds.
The first thing to be noted concerning him is that he is the only man who has ever lived who by universal consent is without a peer. This is said in full view of the new constellation rising above the Eastern horizon; for that constellation, brilliant as it is, has not yet reached the meridian. In every walk of life, except that which Nelson chose as his own, you will find several competitors for the first place, each one of whom will have many supporters. Alexander of Macedon, Hannibal, Cæsar, Marlborough, Frederick the Great, and Napoleon have been severally put forward for the palm of generalship. To those who would acclaim Richelieu as the first of statesmen, others would oppose Chatham, or William Pitt, or Cavour, or Bismarck, or Marquis Ito. Who was the first of sculptors? who the first of painters? who the first of poets? In every case there is a great difference of opinion. Ask, however, who was the first of admirals, and the unanimous reply will still be—'Nelson,' tried as he was by many years of high command in war. It is not only amongst his fellow-countrymen that his preeminence is acknowledged. Foreigners admit it as readily as we proclaim it ourselves.
We may consider what it was that gave Nelson this unique position among men. The early conditions of his naval career were certainly not favourable to him. It is true that he was promoted when young; but so were many other officers. Nelson was made a commander only a few months after the outbreak of war between Great Britain and France, and was made a post-captain within a few days of the declaration of war by Spain. An officer holding a rank qualifying him for command at the outset of a great war might well have looked forward confidently to exceptional opportunities of distinguishing himself. Even in our own days, when some trifling campaign is about to be carried on, the officers who are employed where they can take no part in it vehemently lament their ill-fortune. How much more disheartening must it have been to be excluded from active participation in a great and long-continued conflict! This was Nelson's case. As far as his hopes of gaining distinction were concerned, fate seemed to persecute him pertinaciously. He was a captain of more than four years' seniority when the treaty of Versailles put an end to the war of American Independence. Yet, with the exception of the brief Nicaragua expedition—which by the side of the important occurrences of grand naval campaigns must have seemed insignificant—his services during all those years of hostilities were uneventful, and even humdrum. He seemed to miss every important operation; and when the war ended—we may almost say—he had never seen a ship fire a broadside in anger.
There then came what promised to be, and in fact turned out to be, a long period of peace. With no distinguished war service to point to, and with the prospect before him of only uneventful employment, or no employment afloat at all, Nelson might well have been disheartened to the verge of despondency. That he was not disheartened, but, instead thereof, made a name for himself in such unfavourable circumstances, must be accepted as one of the most convincing proofs of his rare force of character. To have attracted the notice, and to have secured the confidence, of so great a sea-officer as Lord Hood constituted a distinction which could have been won only by merit so considerable that it could not long remain unrecognised. The war of American Independence had still seven months to run when Lord Hood pointed to Nelson as an officer to be consulted on 'questions relative to naval tactics,' Professor Laughton tells us that at that time Nelson had never served with a fleet. Lord Hood was one of the last men in the world to go out of his way to pay to a youthful subordinate an empty compliment, and we may confidently base our estimate of an officer's merits on Lord Hood's belief in them.
He, no doubt, gave a Wide signification to the term 'tactics,' and used it as embracing all that is included in the phrase 'conduct of war.' He must have found out, from conversations with, and from the remarks of, the young captain, whom he treated as intimately as if he was his son, that the latter was already, what he continued to be till the end, viz. a student of naval warfare. This point deserves particular attention. The officers of the navy of the present day, period of peace though it be, can imitate Nelson at least in this. He had to wait a long time before he could translate into brilliant action the result of his tactical studies. Fourteen years after Lord Hood spoke of him as above related, by a 'spontaneous and sudden act, for which he had no authority by signal or otherwise, except his own judgment and quick perceptions,' Nelson entirely defeated the movement of the enemy's fleet, contributed to the winning of a great victory, and, as Captain Mahan tells us, 'emerged from merely personal distinction to national renown.' The justification of dwelling on this is to be found in the necessity, even at this day, of preventing the repetition of mistakes concerning Nelson's qualities and disposition. His recent biographers, Captain Mahan and Professor Laughton, feel constrained to tell us over and over again that Nelson's predominant characteristic was not mere 'headlong valour and instinct for fighting'; that he was not the man 'to run needless and useless risks' in battle. 'The breadth and acuteness of Nelson's intellect,' says Mahan, 'have been too much overlooked in the admiration excited by his unusually grand moral endowments of resolution, dash, and fearlessness of responsibility!'
In forming a true conception of what Nelson was, the publications of the Navy Records Society will help us greatly. There is something very remarkable in the way in which Mr. Gutteridge's volume[82] not only confirms Captain Mahan's refutation of the aspersions on Nelson's honour and humanity, but also establishes Professor Laughton's conclusions, reached many years ago, that it was the orders given to him, and not his amour, which detained him at Naples at a well-known epoch. The last volume issued by the Society, that of Mr. Julian Corbett,[83] is, I venture to affirm, the most useful to naval officers that has yet appeared among the Society's publications. It will provide them with an admirable historical introduction to the study of tactics, and greatly help them in ascertaining the importance of Nelson's achievements as a tactician. For my own part, I may say with gratitude that but for Mr. Corbett's valuable work I could not have completed this appreciation.
[Footnote 82: _Nelson_and_the_Neapolitan_Jacobins_.]
[Footnote 83: _Fighting_Instructions_, 1530-1816.]
The most renowned of Nelson's achievements was that performed in his final battle and victory. Strange as it may seem, that celebrated performance has been the subject of much controversy, and, brilliant as it was, the tactics adopted in it have been freely, and indeed unfavourably, criticised. There is still much difference of opinion as to the preliminary movements, and as to the exact method by which Nelson's attack was made. It has been often asserted that the method really followed was not that which Nelson had expressly declared his intention of adopting. The question raised concerning this is a difficult one, and, until the appearance of Mr. Julian Corbett's recent work and the interesting volume on Trafalgar lately published by Mr. H. Newbolt, had not been fully discussed. The late Vice-Admiral P. H. Colomb contributed to the _United_Service_Magazine_ of September 1899 a very striking article on the subject of Nelson's tactics in his last battle, and those who propose to study the case should certainly peruse what he wrote.
The criticism of Nelson's procedure at Trafalgar in its strongest form may be summarised as follows. It is affirmed that he drew up and communicated to the officers under his orders a certain plan of attack; that just before the battle he changed his plan without warning; that he hurried on his attack unnecessarily; that he exposed his fleet to excessive peril; and, because of all this, that the British loss was much heavier and much less evenly distributed among the ships of the fleet than it need have been. The most formidable arraignment of the mode of Nelson's last attack is, undoubtedly, to be found in the paper published by Sir Charles Ekins in his book on 'Naval Battles,' and vouched for by him as the work of an eye-witness—almost certainly, as Mr. Julian Corbett holds, an officer on board the Conqueror in the battle. It is a remarkable document. Being critical rather than instructive, it is not to be classed with the essay of Clerk of Eldin; but it is one of the most important contributions to the investigation of tactical questions ever published in the English tongue. On it are based nearly, or quite, all the unfavourable views expressed concerning the British tactics at Trafalgar. As it contains a respectfully stated, but still sharp, criticism of Nelson's action, it will not be thought presumptuous if we criticise it in its turn.
Notwithstanding the fact that the author of the paper actually took part in the battle, and that he was gifted with no mean tactical insight, it is permissible to say that his remarks have an academic tinge. In fact, they are very much of the kind that a clever professor of tactics, who had not felt the responsibilities inseparable from the command of a fleet, would put before a class of students. Between a professor of tactics, however clever, and a commanding genius like Nelson the difference is great indeed. The writer of the paper in question perhaps expressed the more general opinion of his day. He has certainly suggested opinions to later generations of naval officers. The captains who shared in Nelson's last great victory did not agree among themselves as to the mode in which the attack was introduced. It was believed by some of them, and, thanks largely to the Conqueror officer's paper, it is generally believed now, that, whereas Nelson had announced his intention of advancing to the attack in lines-abreast or lines-of-bearing, he really did so in lines-ahead. Following up the path of investigation to which, in his article above mentioned, Admiral Colomb had already pointed, we can, I think, arrive only at the conclusion that the announced intention was adhered to.
Before the reasons for this conclusion are given it will be convenient to deal with the suggestions, or allegations, that Nelson exposed his fleet at Trafalgar to unduly heavy loss, putting it in the power of the enemy—to use the words of the Conqueror's officer—to 'have annihilated the ships one after another in detail'; and that 'the brunt of the action would have been more equally felt' had a different mode of advance from that actually chosen been adopted. Now, Trafalgar was a battle in which an inferior fleet of twenty-six ships gained a victory over a superior fleet of thirty-three. The victory was so decisive that more than half of the enemy's capital ships were captured or destroyed on the spot, and the remainder were so battered that some fell an easy prey to the victor's side soon after the battle, the rest having limped painfully to the shelter of a fortified port near at hand. To gain such a victory over a superior force of seamen justly celebrated for their spirit and gallantry, very hard fighting was necessary. The only actions of the Napoleonic period that can be compared with it are those of Camperdown, the Nile, and Copenhagen. The proportionate loss at Trafalgar was the least in all the four battles.[84] The allegation that, had Nelson followed a different method at Trafalgar, the 'brunt of the action would have been more equally felt' can be disposed of easily. In nearly all sea-fights, whether Nelsonic in character or not, half of the loss of the victors has fallen on considerably less than half the fleet. That this has been the rule, whatever tactical method may have been adopted, will appear from the following statement. In Rodney's victory (12th April 1782) half the loss fell upon nine ships out of thirty-six, or one-fourth; at 'The First of June' it fell upon five ships out of twenty-five, or one-fifth; at St. Vincent it fell upon three ships out of fifteen, also one-fifth; at Trafalgar half the loss fell on five ships out of twenty-seven, or very little less than an exact fifth. It has, therefore, been conclusively shown that, faulty or not faulty, long-announced or hastily adopted, the plan on which the battle of Trafalgar was fought did not occasion excessive loss to the victors or confine the loss, such as it was, to an unduly small portion of their fleet. As bearing on this question of the relative severity of the British loss at Trafalgar, it may be remarked that in that battle there were several British ships which had been in other great sea-fights. Their losses in these latter were in nearly every case heavier than their Trafalgar losses.[85] Authoritative and undisputed figures show how baseless are the suggestions that Nelson's tactical procedure at Trafalgar caused his fleet to suffer needlessly heavy loss.
[Footnote 84:
Camperdown 825 loss out of 8,221: 10 per cent.
The Nile 896 " " 7,401: 12.1 "
Copenhagen 941 " " 6,892: 13.75 "
Trafalgar 1,690 " " 17,256: 9.73 " ]
[Footnote 85: ——————————————————————————————————— | | | | | | Trafalgar | | Ship | Action |Killed|Wounded|Total|——————————| | | | | | |Killed|Wounded|Total| |———————————————————————————————————| |Ajax | Rodney's | 9 | 10 | 19 | 2 | 9 | 11 | | |(Ap. 12, 1782)| | | | | | | |Agamemnon | " | 15 | 22 | 37 | 2 | 8 | 10 | |Conqueror | " | 7 | 22 | 29 | 3 | 9 | 12 | |Defence | 1st June | 17 | 36 | 53 | 7 | 29 | 36 | |Bellerophon| The Nile | 49 | 148 | 197 | 27 | 123 | 150 | |Swiftsure | " | 7 | 22 | 29 | 9 | 8 | 17 | |Defiance | Copenhagen | 24 | 21 | 45 | 17 | 53 | 70 | |Polyphemus | " | 6 | 25 | 31 | 2 | 4 | 6 | ———————————————————————————————————
[In only one case was the Trafalgar total loss greater than the total loss of the same ship in an earlier fight; and in this case (the Defiance) the number of killed at Trafalgar was only about two-thirds of the number killed in the other action.]
It is now necessary to investigate the statement that Nelson, hastily and without warning, changed his plan for fighting the battle. This investigation is much more difficult than that into the losses of the British fleet, because, whilst the latter can be settled by arithmetic, the former must proceed largely upon conjecture. How desirable it is to make the investigation of the statement mentioned will be manifest when we reflect on the curious fact that the very completeness of Nelson's success at Trafalgar checked, or, indeed, virtually destroyed, the study of tactics in the British Navy for more than three-quarters of a century. His action was so misunderstood, or, at any rate, so variously represented, that it generally passed for gospel in our service that Nelson's method consisted merely in rushing at his enemy as soon as he saw him. Against this conception his biographers, one after another, have protested in vain.
At the outset of this investigation it will be well to call to mind two or three things, simple enough, but not always remembered. One of these is that advancing to the attack and the attack itself are not the same operations. Another is, that, in the order of sailing in two or more columns, if the ships were 'by the wind' or close-hauled—the column-leaders were not abeam of each other, but bore from one another in the direction of the wind. Also, it may be mentioned that by simple alterations of course a line-abreast may be converted into a line-of-bearing and a line-of-bearing into a line-ahead, and that the reverse can be effected by the same operation. Again, adherence to a plan which presupposes the enemy's fleet to be in a particular formation after he is found to be in another is not to be expected of a consummate tactician. This remark is introduced here with full knowledge of the probability that it will be quoted as an admission that Nelson did change his plan without warning. No admission of the kind is intended. 'In all cases of anticipated battle,' says Mahan, 'Nelson was careful to put his subordinates in possession both of his general plans and, as far as possible, of the underlying ideas.' The same biographer tells us, what is well worth remembering, that 'No man was ever better served than Nelson by the inspiration of the moment; no man ever counted on it less.'
The plan announced in the celebrated memorandum of 9th October 1805 indicated, for the attack from to windward, that the British fleet, in what would be called on shore an echelon of two main divisions and an 'advance squadron,' would move against an enemy assumed to be in single line-ahead. The 'advance squadron,' it should be noted, was not to be ahead of the two main divisions, but in such a position that it could be moved to strengthen either. The name seems to have been due to the mode in which the ships composing the squadron were employed in, so to speak, 'feeling for' the enemy. On 19th October six ships were ordered 'to go ahead during the night'; and, besides the frigates, two more ships were so stationed as to keep up the communication between the six and the commander-in-chief's flag-ship. Thus eight ships in effect composed an 'advance squadron,' and did not join either of the main divisions at first.
When it was expected that the British fleet would comprise forty sail-of-the-line and the enemy's fleet forty-six, each British main division was to be made up of sixteen ships; and eight two-deckers added to either division would increase the strength of the latter to twenty-four ships. It is interesting to note that, omitting the Africa, which ship came up late, each British main division on the morning of 21st October 1805 had nine ships—a number which, by the addition of the eight already mentioned as distinct from the divisions, could have been increased to seventeen, thus, except for a fraction, exactly maintaining the original proportion as regards the hostile fleet, which was now found to be composed of thirty-three ships.
During the night of 20th-21st October the Franco-Spanish fleet, which had been sailing in three divisions and a 'squadron of observation,' formed line and stood to the southward, heading a little to the eastward of south. The 'squadron of observation' was parallel to the main body and to windward (in this case to the westward) of it, with the leading ships rather more advanced.
The British main divisions steered WSW. till 1 A.M. After that they steered SW. till 4 A.M. There are great difficulties about the time, as the notation of it[86] differed considerably in different ships; but the above hours are taken from the Victory's log. At 4 A.M. the British fleet, or rather its main divisions, wore and stood N. by E. As the wind was about NW. by W., the ships were close-hauled, and the leader of the 'lee-line,' i.e. Collingwood's flag-ship, was when in station two points abaft the Victory's beam as soon as the 'order of sailing' in two columns—which was to be the order of battle—had been formed.
[Footnote 86: Except the chronometers, which were instruments of navigation so precious as always to be kept under lock and key, there were no clocks in the navy till some years after I joined it. Time on board ship was kept by half-hour sand-glasses.]
About 6 A.M. the enemy's fleet was sighted from the Victory, and observed to bear from her E. by S. and be distant from her ten or twelve miles. The distance is corroborated by observed bearings from Collingwood's flag-ship.[87] Viewed from the British ships, placed as they were relatively to it, the enemy's fleet must have appeared as a long single line-ahead, perhaps not very exactly formed. As soon as the hostile force was clearly made out, the British divisions bore up and stood to the eastward, steering by the Victory's compass ENE. The position and formation of the British main divisions were by this made exactly those in which they are shown in the diagram usually attached to the celebrated memorandum of 9th October 1805. The enemy must have appeared to the British, who were ten or twelve miles to windward of him, and on his beam, as if he were formed in line-ahead. He therefore was also in the position and formation assigned to him in that diagram.
[Footnote 87: It would necessitate the use of some technicalities to explain it fully; but it may be said that the bearings of the extremes of the enemy's line observed from his flag-ship prove that Collingwood was in the station that he ought to have occupied when the British fleet was in the Order of Sailing and close to the wind.]
At a time which, because of the variety in the notations of it, it is difficult to fix exactly, but somewhere between 7 and 8 A.M., the enemy's ships wore together and endeavoured to form a line to the northward, which, owing to the direction of the wind, must have been about N. by E. and S. by W., or NNE. and SSW. The operation—not merely of wearing, but of both wearing and reforming the line, such as it was—took more than an hour to complete. The wind was light; there was a westerly swell; the ships were under easy sail; consequently there must have been a good deal of leeway, and the hostile or 'combined' fleet headed in the direction of Cadiz, towards which, we are expressly told by a high French authority—Chevalier—it advanced.
Nelson had to direct the course of his fleet so that its divisions, when about to make the actual attack, would be just opposite the points to which the respective hostile ships had advanced in the meantime. In a light wind varying in force a direct course to those points could not be settled once for all; but that first chosen was very nearly right, and an alteration of a point, viz. to E. by N., was for a considerable time all that was necessary. Collingwood later made a signal to his division to alter course one point to port, which brought them back to the earlier course, which by the Victory's compass had been ENE. The eight ships of what has been referred to as the 'advance squadron' were distributed between the two main British divisions, six being assigned to Collingwood's and two to Nelson's. They did not all join their divisions at the same time, some—probably owing to the distance at which they had been employed from the rest of the fleet and the feebleness of the breeze—not till several hours after the combined fleet had been sighted.
Collingwood preserved in his division a line-of-bearing apparently until the very moment when the individual ships pushed on to make the actual attack. The enemy's fleet is usually represented as forming a curve. It would probably be more correct to call it a very obtuse re-entering angle. This must have been largely due to Gravina's 'squadron of observation' keeping away in succession, to get into the wake of the rest of the line, which was forming towards the north. About the centre of the combined fleet there was a gap of a mile. Ahead and astern of this the ships were not all in each other's wake. Many were to leeward of their stations, thus giving the enemy's formation the appearance of a double line, or rather of a string of groups of ships. It is important to remember this, because no possible mode of attack—the enemy's fleet being formed as it was—could have prevented some British ships from being 'doubled on' when they cut into the enemy's force. On 'The First of June,' notwithstanding that the advance to the attack was intended to be in line-abreast, several British ships were 'doubled on,' and even 'trebled on,' as will be seen in the experiences on that day of the Brunswick, Marlborough, _Royal_Sovereign_, and _Queen_Charlotte_ herself.
Owing to the shape of the hostile 'line' at Trafalgar and the formation in which he kept his division, Collingwood brought his ships, up till the very moment when each proceeded to deliver her attack, in the formation laid down in the oft-quoted memorandum. By the terms of that document Nelson had specifically assigned to his own division the work of seeing that the movements of Collingwood's division should be interrupted as little as possible. It would, of course, have been beyond his power to do this if the position of his own division in the echelon formation prescribed in the memorandum had been rigorously adhered to after Collingwood was getting near his objective point. In execution, therefore, of the service allotted to his division, Nelson made a feint at the enemy's van. This necessitated an alteration of course to port, so that his ships came into a 'line-of-bearing' so very oblique that it may well have been loosely called a 'line-ahead.' Sir Charles Ekins says that the two British lines 'afterwards fell into line-ahead, the ships in the wake of each other,' and that this was in obedience to signal. Collingwood's line certainly did not fall into line-ahead. At the most it was a rather oblique line-of-bearing almost parallel to that part of the enemy's fleet which he was about to attack. In Nelson's line there was more than one alteration of course, as the Victory's log expressly states that she kept standing for the enemy's van, which we learn from the French accounts was moving about N. by E. or NNE. In the light wind prevailing the alterations of course must have rendered it, towards the end of the forenoon, impossible to keep exact station, even if the Victory were to shorten sail, which we know she did not. As Admiral Colomb pointed out, 'Several later signals are recorded which were proper to make in lines-of-bearing, but not in lines-ahead.' It is difficult to import into this fact any other meaning but that of intention to preserve, however obliquely, the line-of-bearing which undoubtedly had been formed by the act of bearing-up as soon as the enemy's fleet had been distinguished.
When Collingwood had moved near enough to the enemy to let his ships deliver their attacks, it became unnecessary for Nelson's division to provide against the other's being interrupted. Accordingly, he headed for the point at which he meant to cut into the enemy's fleet. Now came the moment, as regards his division, for doing what Collingwood's had already begun to do, viz. engage in a 'pell-mell battle,'[88] which surely may be interpreted as meaning a battle in which rigorous station-keeping was no longer expected, and in which 'no captain could do very wrong if he placed his ship alongside that of the enemy.'
[Footnote 88: Nelson's own expression.]
In several diagrams of the battle as supposed to have been fought the two British divisions just before the moment of impact are represented as converging towards each other. The Spanish diagram, lately reproduced by Mr. Newbolt, shows this, as well as the English diagrams. We may take it, therefore, that there was towards the end of the forenoon a convergence of the two columns, and that this was due to Nelson's return from his feint at the hostile van to the line from which he intended to let go his ships to deliver the actual attack. Collingwood's small alteration of course of one point to port slightly, but only slightly, accentuated this convergence.
Enough has been said here of Nelson's tactics at Trafalgar. To discuss them fully would lead me too far for this occasion.
I can only express the hope that in the navy the subject will receive fuller consideration hereafter. Nelson's last victory was gained, be it remembered, in one afternoon, over a fleet more than 20 per cent. his superior in numbers, and was so decisive that more than half of the hostile ships were taken. This was the crowning effort of seven years spent in virtually independent command in time of war—seven years, too, illustrated by more than one great victory.
The more closely we look into Nelson's tactical achievements, the more effective and brilliant do they appear. It is the same with his character and disposition. The more exact researches and investigations of recent times have removed from his name the obloquy which it pleased some to cast upon it. We can see now that his 'childlike, delighted vanity'—to use the phrase of his greatest biographer—was but a thin incrustation on noble qualities. As in the material world valueless earthy substances surround a vein of precious metal, so through Nelson's moral nature there ran an opulent lode of character, unimpaired in its priceless worth by adjacent frailties which, in the majority of mankind, are present without any precious stuff beneath them. It is with minds prepared to see this that we should commemorate our great admiral.
Veneration of Nelson's memory cannot be confined to particular objects or be limited by locality. His tomb is wider than the space covered by dome or column, and his real monument is more durable than any material construction. It is the unwritten and spiritual memorial of him, firmly fixed in the hearts of his fellow-countrymen.
X
THE SHARE OF THE FLEET IN THE DEFENCE OF THE EMPIRE[89]
[Footnote 89: Written in 1907. (_Naval_Annual_, 1908.)]
At the close of the Great War, which ended in the downfall of Napoleon, the maritime position of the British Empire was not only predominant—it also was, and long remained, beyond the reach of challenge. After the stupendous events of the great contest such successes as those at Algiers where we were helped by the Dutch, at Navarino where we had two allies, and at Acre were regarded as matters of course, and no very grave issue hung upon any one of them. For more than half a century after Nelson's death all the most brilliant achievements of British arms were performed on shore, in India or in the Crimea. There were also many small wars on land, and it may well have seemed to contemporaries that the days of great naval contests were over and that force of circumstances was converting us into a military from a naval nation. The belief in the efficacy of naval defence was not extinct, but it had ceased to operate actively. Even whilst the necessity of that form of defence was far more urgent, inattention to or ignorance of its true principles had occasionally allowed it to grow weak, but the possibility of substituting something else for it had not been pressed or even suggested. To this, however, we had now come; and it was largely a consequence of the Crimean war. In that war the British Army had nobly sustained its reputation as a fighting machine. For the first time after a long interval it had met in battle European troops, and had come out of the conflict more renowned for bravery than ever. Nothing seemed able to damp its heroism—not scantiness of food, not lack of clothing amidst bitter cold, not miserable quarters, not superior forces of a valiant enemy. It clung to its squalid abodes in the positions which it was ordered to hold with a tenacious fortitude that had never been surpassed in its glorious history, and that defied all assaults. In combination with its brave allies it brought to a triumphant conclusion a war of an altogether peculiar character.
The campaign in the Crimea was in reality the siege of a single fortress. All the movements of the Western invaders were undertaken to bring them within striking distance of the place, to keep them within reach of it, or to capture it. Every battle that occurred was fought with one of those objects. When the place fell the war ended. The one general who, in the opinion of all concerned, gained high distinction in the war was the general who had prolonged the defence of Sebastopol by the skilful use of earthworks. It was no wonder that the attack and defence of fortified places assumed large importance in the eyes of the British people. The command of the sea held by the allied powers was so complete and all-pervading that no one stopped to think what the course of hostilities would have been without it, any more than men stop to think what the course of any particular business would be if there were no atmosphere to breathe in. Not a single allied soldier had been delayed on passage by the hostile fleet; not a single merchant vessel belonging to the allies had been captured by a hostile cruiser. Supplies and reinforcements for the besieging armies were transported to them without escort and with as little risk of interruption as if the operations had been those of profound peace.
No sooner was the Crimean war over than another struggle took place, viz. the war of the Indian Mutiny, and that also was waged entirely on land. Here again the command of the sea was so complete that no interruption of it, even temporary, called attention to its existence. Troops and supplies were sent to India from the United Kingdom and from Hong-Kong; horses for military purposes from Australia and South Africa; and in every case without a thought of naval escort. The experience of hostilities in India seemed to confirm the experience of the Crimea. What we had just done to a great European nation was assumed to be what unfriendly European nations would wish to do and would be able to do to us. It was also assumed that the only way of frustrating their designs would be to do what had recently been done in the hope of frustrating ours, but to do it better. We must—it was said—depend on fortifications, but more perfect than those which had failed to save Sebastopol.
The protection to be afforded by our fleet was deliberately declared to be insufficient. It might, so it was held, be absent altogether, and then there would be nothing but fortifications to stand between us and the progress of an active enemy. In the result the policy of constructing imposing passive defence-works on our coast was adopted. The fortifications had to be multiplied. Dependence on that class of defence inevitably leads to discovery after discovery that some spot open to the kind of attack feared has not been made secure. We began by fortifying the great dockyard ports—on the sea side against a hostile fleet, on the land side against hostile troops. Then it was perceived that to fortify the dockyard ports in the mother country afforded very little protection to the outlying portions of the empire. So their principal ports also were given defence-works—sometimes of an elaborate character. Again, it was found that commercial ports had been left out and that they too must be fortified. When this was done spots were observed at which an enemy might effect a landing in force, to prevent which further forts or batteries must be erected. The most striking thing in all this is the complete omission to take note of the conditions involved in the command of the sea.
Evidently it had not been understood that it was that very command which alone had enabled the armies of western Europe to proceed, not only without serious interruption, but also without encountering an attempt at obstruction, to the field in the Crimea on which their victories had been won, and that the same command would be necessary before any hostile expedition, large enough to justify the construction of the fortifications specially intended to repel it, could cross the sea and get within striking distance of our shores. It should be deeply interesting to the people of those parts of the British Empire which lie beyond sea to note that the defensive system comprised in the fortification of the coast of the United Kingdom promised no security to them in the event of war. Making all proper allowance for the superior urgency of defending the heart of the empire, we must still admit that no system of defence is adequate which does not provide for the defence of other valuable parts of the great body politic as well.
Again, the system of defence proved to be imperfect. Every part of the empire depended for prosperity—some parts depended for existence—on practically unrestricted traffic on the ocean. This, which might be assailed at many points and on lines often thousands of miles in length, could find little or no defence in immovable fortifications. It could not be held that the existence of these released the fleet from all duty but that of protecting our ocean commerce, because, if any enemy's navy was able to carry out an operation of such magnitude and difficulty as a serious attack on our home territory, it would assuredly be able to carry out the work of damaging our maritime trade. Power to do the latter has always belonged to the navy which was in a position to extend its activity persistently to the immediate neighbourhood of its opponent's coast-line.
It is not to be supposed that there was no one to point this out. Several persons did so, but being mostly sailors they were not listened to. In actual practice the whole domain of imperial strategy was withdrawn from the intervention of the naval officer, as though it were something with which he could not have anything to do. Several great wars had been waged in Europe in the meantime, and all of them were land wars. Naval forces, if employed at all, were employed only just enough to bring out how insignificant their participation in them was. As was to have been expected, the habit of attaching importance to the naval element of imperial defence declined. The empire, nevertheless, continued to grow. Its territory was extended; its population, notably its population of European stock, increased, and its wealth and the subsequent operations of exchanging its productions for those of other countries were enormously expanded. At the same time the navy, to the strength and efficiency of which it had to look for security, declined absolutely, and still more relatively. Other navies were advancing: some had, as it were, come into existence. At last the true conditions were discerned, and the nation, almost with one voice, demanded that the naval defences of the empire should be put upon a proper footing.
Let no one dismiss the foregoing retrospect as merely ancient history. On the contrary, let all those who desire to see the British Empire follow the path of its natural development in tranquillity study the recent past. By doing this we shall be able to estimate aright the position of the fleet in the defence of the empire. We must examine the circumstances in which we are placed. For five-and-thirty years the nations of the world have practically lived under the rule of force. The incessant object of every great state has been to increase the strength of its armed forces up to the point at which the cost becomes intolerable. Countries separated from one another only by arbitrary geographical lines add regiment to regiment and gun to gun, and also devise continually fresh expedients for accelerating the work of preparing their armies to take the field. The most pacifically inclined nation must do in this respect as its neighbours do, on pain of losing its independence and being mutilated in its territory if it does not. This rivalry has spread to the sea, and fleets are increased at a rate and at a cost in money unknown to former times, even to those of war. The possession of a powerful navy by some state which has no reason to apprehend over-sea invasion and which has no maritime interests, however intrinsically important they may be, commensurate with the strength of its fleets, may not indicate a spirit of aggression; but it at least indicates ability to become an aggressor. Consequently, for the British fleet to fill its proper position in the defence of the empire it must be strong. To be strong more than large numbers will be required. It must have the right, that is the best, material, the best organisation, the best discipline, the best training, the best distribution. We shall ascertain the position that it should hold, if we examine what it would have to do when called upon for work more active than that of peace time. With the exception of India and Canada no part of the empire is liable to serious attack that does not come over-sea. Any support that can be given to India or Canada by other parts of the empire must be conveyed across the sea also. This at once indicates the importance of ocean lines of communication.
War is the method adopted, when less violent means of persuasion have failed, to force your enemy to comply with your demands. There are three principal ways of effecting this—invasion of his country, raids on his territory, destruction or serious damage of his sea-borne commerce. Successful invasion must compel the invaded to come to terms, or his national existence will be lost. Raids upon his territory may possibly so distress him that he would rather concede your terms than continue the struggle.[90] Damage to his sea-borne commerce may be carried so far that he will be ruined if he does not give in. So much for one side of the account; we have to examine the other. Against invasion, raids, or attempts at commerce-destruction there must be some form of defence, and, as a matter of historical fact, defence against each has been repeatedly successful. If we need instances we have only to peruse the history of the British Empire.
[Footnote 90: Though raids rarely, if ever, decide a war, they may cause inconvenience or local distress, and an enemy desiring to make them should be obstructed as much as possible.]
How was it that—whilst we landed invading armies in many hostile countries, seized many portions of hostile territory, and drove more than one enemy's commerce from the sea—our own country has been free from successful invasion for more than eight centuries, few portions of our territory have been taken from us even temporarily, and our commerce has increased throughout protracted maritime wars? To this there can only be one answer, viz. that the arrangements for defence were effectual. What, then, were these arrangements? They were comprised in the provision of a powerful, well-distributed, well-handled navy, and of a mobile army of suitable strength. It is to be observed that each element possessed the characteristic of mobility. We have to deal here more especially with the naval element, and we must study the manner in which it operates.
Naval war is sea-power in action; and sea-power, taken in the narrow sense, has limitations. It may not, even when so taken, cease to act at the enemy's coast-line, but its direct influence extends only to the inner side of a narrow zone conforming to that line. In a maritime contest each side tries to control the ocean communications and to prevent the other from controlling them. If either gains the control, something in addition to sea-power strictly defined may begin to operate: the other side's territory may be invaded or harassed by considerable raids, and its commerce may be driven from the sea. It will be noticed that control of ocean communications is the needful preliminary to these. It is merely a variant of the often employed expression of the necessity, in war, of obtaining command of the sea. In the case of the most important portion of the British Empire, viz. the United Kingdom, our loss of control of the ocean communications would have a result which scarcely any foreign country would experience. Other countries are dependent on importations for some part of the food of their population and of the raw material of their industry; but much of the importation is, and perhaps all of it may be, effected by land. Here, we depend upon imports from abroad for a very large part of the food of our people, and of the raw material essential to the manufacture of the commodities by the exchange of which we obtain necessary supplies; and the whole of these imports come, and must come to us, by sea. Also, if we had not freedom of exportation, our wealth and the means of supporting a war would disappear. Probably all the greater colonies and India could feed their inhabitants for a moderately long time without sea-borne imports, but unless the sea were open to them their prosperity would decline.
This teaches us the necessity to the British Empire of controlling our maritime communications, and equally teaches those who may one day be our enemies the advisability of preventing us from doing so. The lesson in either case is driven farther home by other considerations connected with communications. In war a belligerent has two tasks before him. He has to defend himself and hurt his enemy. The more he hurts his enemy, the less is he likely to be hurt himself. This defines the great principle of offensive defence. To act in accordance with this principle, a belligerent should try, as the saying goes, to carry the war into the enemy's country. He should try to make his opponents fight where he wants them to fight, which will probably be as far as possible from his own territory and as near as possible to theirs. Unless he can do this, invasion and even serious raids by him will be out of the question. More than that, his inability to do it will virtually indicate that on its part the other side can fix the scene of active hostilities unpleasantly close to the points from which he desires to keep its forces away.
A line of ocean communications may be vulnerable throughout its length; but it does not follow that an assailant can operate against it with equal facility at every point, nor does it follow that it is at every point equally worth assailing. Lines running past hostile naval ports are especially open to assault in the part near the ports; and lines formed by the confluence of two or more other lines—like, for example, those which enter the English Channel—will generally include a greater abundance of valuable traffic than others. Consequently there are some parts at which an enemy may be expected to be more active than elsewhere, and it is from those very parts that it is most desirable to exclude him. They are, as a rule, relatively near to the territory of the state whose navy has to keep the lines open, that is to say, prevent their being persistently beset by an enemy. The necessary convergence of lines towards that state's ports shows that some portion of them would have to be traversed, or their traversing be attempted, by expeditions meant to carry out either invasion or raids. If, therefore, the enemy can be excluded as above mentioned, invasions, raids, and the more serious molestation of sea-borne commerce by him will be prevented.
If we consider particular cases we shall find proof upon proof of the validity of the rule. Three great lines—one from the neighbourhood of the Cape of Good Hope, one from the Red Sea, and a third from India and Ceylon—converge near the south-western part of Australia and run as one line towards the territory of the important states farther east. If an assailant can be excluded from the latter or combined line he must either divide his force or operate on only one of the confluents, leaving the rest free. The farther he can be pushed back from the point of confluence the more effectually will he be limited to a single line, because the combining lines, traced backwards, trend more and more apart, and it is, therefore, more and more difficult for him to keep detachments of his force within supporting distance of each other if they continue to act against two or more lines. The particular case of the approaches to the territory of the United Kingdom has the same features, and proves the rule with equal clearness. This latter case is so often adduced without mention of others, that there is some risk of its being believed to be a solitary one. It stands, however, exactly on all fours with all the rest as regards the principle of the rule.
A necessary consequence of an enemy's exclusion from the combined line as it approaches the territory to be defended is—as already suggested—that invasion of that territory and serious raids upon it will be rendered impracticable. Indeed, if the exclusion be absolutely complete and permanent, raids of every kind and depredations on commerce in the neighbourhood will be prevented altogether. It should be explained that though lines and communications are spoken of, it is the area crossed by them which is strategically important. A naval force, either guarding or intending to assail a line, does not necessarily station itself permanently upon it. All that it has to do is to remain, for the proper length of time, within the strategic area across which the defended or threatened line runs. The strategic area will be of varying extent, its boundaries being determined by circumstances. The object of the defence will be to make the area from which the enemy's ships are excluded as extensive as possible. When the enemy has been pushed back into his own waters and into his own ports the exclusion is strategically complete. The sea is denied to his invading and important raiding expeditions, and indeed to most of his individual cruisers. At the same time it is free to the other belligerent. To effect this a vigorous offensive will be necessary.
The immediate theatre of operations, the critical strategic area, need not be, and often ought not to be, near the territory defended by our navy. It is necessary to dwell upon this, because no principle of naval warfare has been more frequently or more seriously misapprehended. Misapprehension of it has led to mischievous and dangerous distribution of naval force and to the squandering of immense sums of money on local defence vessels; that is, vessels only capable of operating in the very waters from which every effort should be made to exclude the enemy. Failure to exclude him from them can only be regarded as, at the very least, yielding to him an important point in the great game of war. If we succeed in keeping him away, the local defence craft of every class are useless, and the money spent on them has been worse than wasted, because, if it had not been so spent, it might have been devoted to strengthening the kind of force which must be used to keep the enemy where he ought to be kept, viz. at a distance from our own waters.
The demand that ships be so stationed that they will generally, and except when actually cruising, be within sight of the inhabitants, is common enough in the mother country, and perhaps even more common in the over-sea parts of the British Empire. Nothing justifies it but the honest ignorance of those who make it; nothing explains compliance with it but the deplorable weakness of authorities who yield to it. It was not by hanging about the coast of England, when there was no enemy near it, with his fleet, that Hawke or Nelson saved the country from invasion, nor was it by remaining where they could be seen by the fellow-countrymen of their crews that the French and English fleets shut up their enemy in the Baltic and Black Sea, and thus gained and kept undisputed command of the sea which enabled them, without interruption, to invade their enemy's territory.
The condition insisted upon by the Australasian Governments in the agreement formerly made with the Home Government, that a certain number of ships, in return for an annual contribution of money, should always remain in Australasian waters, was in reality greatly against the interests of that part of the empire. The Australasian taxpayer was, in fact, made to insist upon being injured in return for his money. The proceeding would have been exactly paralleled by a householder who might insist that a fire-engine, maintained out of rates to which he contributes, should always be kept within a few feet of his front door, and not be allowed to proceed to the end of the street to extinguish a fire threatening to extend eventually to the householder's own dwelling. When still further localised naval defence—localised defence, that is, of what may be called the smaller description—is considered, the danger involved in adopting it will be quite as apparent, and the waste of money will be more obvious. Localised defence is a near relation of passive defence. It owes its origin to the same sentiment, viz. a belief in the efficacy of staying where you are instead of carrying the war into the enemy's country.
There may be cases in which no other kind of naval defence is practicable. The immense costliness of modern navies puts it out of the power of smaller states to maintain considerable sea-going fleets. The historic maritime countries—Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Portugal, the performances of whose seamen are so justly celebrated—could not now send to sea a force equal in number and fighting efficiency to a quarter of the force possessed by anyone of the chief naval powers. The countries named, when determined not to expose themselves unarmed to an assailant, can provide themselves only with a kind of defence which, whatever its detailed composition, must be of an intrinsically localised character.
In their case there is nothing else to be done; and in their case defence of the character specified would be likely to prove more efficacious than it could be expected to be elsewhere. War is usually made in pursuit of an object valuable enough to justify the risks inseparable from the attempt to gain it. Aggression by any of the countries that have been mentioned is too improbable to call for serious apprehension. Aggression against them is far more likely. What they have to do is to make the danger of attacking them so great that it will equal or outweigh any advantage that could be gained by conquering them. Their wealth and resources, compared with those of great aggressive states, are not large enough to make up for much loss in war on the part of the latter engaging in attempts to seize them. Therefore, what the small maritime countries have to do is to make the form of naval defence to which they are restricted efficacious enough to hurt an aggressor so much that the victory which he may feel certain of gaining will be quite barren. He will get no glory, even in these days of self-advertisement, from the conquest of such relatively weak antagonists; and the plunder will not suffice to repay him for the damage received in effecting it.
The case of a member of the great body known as the British Empire is altogether different. Its conquest would probably be enormously valuable to a conqueror; its ruin immensely damaging to the body as a whole. Either would justify an enemy in running considerable risks, and would afford him practically sufficient compensation for considerable losses incurred. We may expect that, in war, any chance of accomplishing either purpose will not be neglected. Provision must, therefore, be made against the eventuality. Let us for the moment suppose that, like one of the smaller countries whose case has been adduced, we are restricted to localised defence. An enemy not so restricted would be able to get, without being molested, as near to our territory—whether in the mother country or elsewhere—as the outer edge of the comparatively narrow belt of water that our localised defences could have any hope of controlling effectively. We should have abandoned to him the whole of the ocean except a relatively minute strip of coast-waters. That would be equivalent to saying good-bye to the maritime commerce on which our wealth wholly, and our existence largely, depends. No thoughtful British subject would find this tolerable. Everyone would demand the institution of a different defence system. A change, therefore, to the more active system would be inevitable. It would begin with the introduction of a cruising force in addition to the localised force. The unvarying lesson of naval history would be that the cruising division should gain continuously on the localised. It is only in times of peace, when men have forgotten, or cannot be made to understand, what war is, that the opposite takes place.
If it be hoped that a localised force will render coast-wise traffic safe from the enemy, a little knowledge of what has happened in war and a sufficiently close investigation of conditions will demonstrate how baseless the hope must be. Countries not yet thickly populated would be in much the same condition as the countries of western Europe a century ago, the similarity being due to the relative scarcity of good land communications. A part—probably not a very large part—of the articles required by the people dwelling on and near the coast in one section would be drawn from another similar section. These articles could be most conveniently and cheaply transported by water. If it were worth his while, an enemy disposing of an active cruising force strong enough to make its way into the neighbourhood of the coast waters concerned would interrupt the 'long-shore traffic' and defy the efforts of a localised force to prevent him. The history of the Great War at the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth teems with instances of interruption by our navy of the enemy's coast-wise trade when his ocean trade had been destroyed. The history of the American War of 1812 supplies other instances.
The localised defence could not attempt to drive off hostile cruisers remaining far from the shore and meaning to infest the great lines of maritime communication running towards it. If those cruisers are to be driven off at all it can be done only by cruising ships. Unless, therefore, we are to be content to leave our ocean routes, where most crowded and therefore most vulnerable, to the mercy of an enemy, we must have cruisers to meet the hostile cruisers. If we still adhere to our localised defence, we shall have two distinct kinds of force—-one provided merely for local, and consequently restricted, action; the other able to act near the shore or far out at sea as circumstances may demand. If we go to the expense of providing both kinds, we shall have followed the example of the sage who cut a large hole in his study door for the cat and a small one for the kitten.
Is local naval defence, then, of any use? Well, to tell the truth, not much; and only in rare and exceptional circumstances. Even in the case of the smaller maritime countries, to which reference has been made above, defence of the character in question would avail little if a powerful assailant were resolved to press home his attack. That is to say, if only absolute belligerent considerations were regarded. In war, however, qualifying considerations can never be left out of sight. As the great Napoleon observed, you can no more make war without incurring losses than you can make omelettes without breaking eggs. The strategist—and the tactician also, within his province—will always count the cost of a proposed operation, even where they are nearly certain of success. The occupation of a country, which would be of no great practical value to you when you got it, would be a poor return for the loss to which you would have been put in the process. That loss might, and probably would, leave you at a great disadvantage as regards enemies more nearly on an equality with yourself. It would, therefore, not be the improbability of breaking down the local naval defence of a minor maritime state, but the pressure of qualifying and only indirectly belligerent considerations, that would prevent its being attempted.
In a struggle between two antagonists of the first rank, the circumstances would be different. Purely belligerent considerations would have fuller play. Mistakes will be made, of course, for war is full of mistakes; but it may be accepted that an attack on any position, however defended, is in itself proof that the assailant believed the result hoped for to be quite worth the cost of obtaining it. Consequently, in a struggle as assumed, every mode of defence would have to stand on its intrinsic merits, nearly or quite unaided by the influence of considerations more or less foreign to it. Every scrap of local defence would, in proportion to its amount, be a diminution of the offensive defence. Advocates of the former may be challenged to produce from naval history any instance of local naval defence succeeding against the assaults of an actively aggressive navy. In the late war between Japan and Russia the Russian local defence failed completely.
In the last case, a class of vessel like that which had failed in local defence was used successfully, because offensively, by the Japanese. This and many another instance show that the right way to use the kind of craft so often allocated to local defence is to use them offensively. It is only thus that their adoption by a great maritime power like the British Empire can be justified. The origin and centre of our naval strength are to be looked for in the United Kingdom. The shores of the latter are near the shores of other great maritime powers. Its ports, especially those at which its fleets are equipped and would be likely to assemble on the imminence of war, are within reach of more than one foreign place from which small swift craft to be used offensively might be expected to issue. The method of frustrating the efforts of these craft giving most promise of success is to attack them as soon as possible after they issue from their own port. To the acceptance of this principle we owe the origin of the destroyer, devised to destroy hostile torpedo-boats before they could reach a position from which they would be able to discharge with effect their special weapon against our assembled ships. It is true that the destroyer has been gradually converted into a larger torpedo-boat. It is also true that when used as such in local defence, as at Port Arthur, her failure was complete; and just as true that she has never accomplished anything except when used offensively.
When, therefore, a naval country's coast is so near the ports of another naval country that the latter would be able with swift small craft to attack the former's shipping, the provision of craft of a similar kind is likely to prove advantageous. War between great powers is a two-sided game, and what one side can do the other will at least be likely to attempt. Nothing supports the view that it is well—either above or beneath the surface of the water—to stand on the defensive and await attack. Everything points to the superiority of the plan of beating up the enemy's quarters and attacking him before he can get far from them on his way towards his objective. Consequently the only justification of expending money on the localised vessels of which we have been speaking, is the probability that an enemy would have some of his bases within reach of those vessels' efforts. Where this condition does not exist, the money expended is, from the belligerent point of view, thrown away. Here comes in the greatest foe of belligerent efficiency, viz. political expediency. In time of peace it is thought better to conciliate voters than to prepare to meet an enemy. If local defence is thought to be pleasing to an inexpert electorate, it is only too likely to be provided, no matter how ineffectual and how costly in reality it will turn out to be.
Not only is the British Empire the first of naval powers, it is also the first of colonial powers. One attribute is closely connected with the other; neither, without the other, would be applicable. The magnitude of our colonial domain, and especially the imposing aspects of some of its greater components—the Dominion, the Commonwealth, South Africa, New Zealand—are apt to blind us to a feature of great strategical importance, and that is the abundance and excellence of the naval bases that stud our ocean lines of communication. In thinking of the great daughter states we are liable to forget these; yet our possession of them helps greatly to strengthen our naval position, because it facilitates our assuming a far-reaching offensive. By themselves, if not too numerous, they can afford valuable support to the naval operations that are likely to prove most beneficial to us. The fact that they are ours, and not an opponent's, also constitutes for us an advantage of importance. Of course, they have to be defended, or else they may fall into an opponent's hands. Have we here a case in which highly localised or even passive defences are desirable? No doubt we did act for a time as though we believed that the question could only be answered in the affirmative; but that was when we were under the influence of the feelings engendered by observation of the long series of land wars previously discussed.
Perhaps we have not yet quite shaken off the effects of that influence; but we have at least got so far as to tolerate the statement of the other side of the question. It would be a great mistake to suppose that the places alluded to are meant to be ports of refuge for our ships. Though they were to serve that purpose occasionally in the case of isolated merchant vessels, it would be but an accident, and not the essence, of their existence. What they are meant for is to be utilised as positions where our men-of-war can make reasonably sure of finding supplies and the means of refit. This assurance will largely depend upon their power of resistance if attacked. Before we can decide how to impart that power to them we shall have to see the kind of attack against which they would have to be prepared. If they are on a continent, like, for example, Gibraltar, attack on them by a land force, however improbable, is physically possible. Against an attack of the kind a naval force could give little direct help. Most of our outlying naval bases are really or virtually insular, and are open to attack only by an expedition coming across the sea. An essential characteristic of a naval base is that it should be able to furnish supplies as wanted to the men-of-war needing to replenish their stocks. Some, and very often all, of these supplies are not of native production and must be brought to the base by sea. If the enemy can stop their conveyance to it, the place is useless as a base and the enemy is really in control of its communications. If he is in control of its communications he can send against it as great an expedition as he likes, and the place will be captured or completely neutralised. Similarly, if we control the communications, not only can supplies be conveyed to it, but also no hostile expedition will be allowed to reach it. Thus the primary defence of the outlying base is the active, sea-going fleet. Moderate local defence, chiefly of the human kind, in the shape of a garrison, will certainly be needed. Though the enemy has not been able to obtain control of the communications of the place, fitful raids on it will be possible; and the place should be fortified enough and garrisoned enough to hold out against the inconsiderable assaults comprised in these till our own ships can drive the enemy's away.
Outlying naval bases, though but moderately fortified, that contain depots of stores, docks, and other conveniences, have the vice of all immobile establishments. When war does come, some of them almost certainly, and all of them possibly, may not be in the right place with regard to the critical area of operations. They cannot, however, be moved. It will be necessary to do what has been done over and over again in war, in the latest as well as in earlier wars, and that is, establish temporary bases in more convenient situations. Thus much, perhaps all, of the cost and trouble of establishing and maintaining the permanent bases will have been wasted. This inculcates the necessity of having not as many bases as can be found, but as few as it is possible to get on with.
The control of ocean communications, or the command of the sea, being the end of naval warfare, and its acquisition being practicable only by the assumption of a vigorous offensive, it follows as a matter of course that we must have a strong and in all respects efficient mobile navy. This is the fundamental condition on which the continued existence of the British Empire depends. It is thoroughly well known to every foreign Government, friendly or unfriendly. The true objective in naval warfare is the enemy's navy. That must be destroyed or decisively defeated, or intimidated into remaining in its ports. Not one of these can be effected without a mobile, that is a sea-going, fleet. The British Empire may fall to pieces from causes as yet unknown or unsuspected: it cannot be kept together if it loses the power of gaining command of the sea. This is not a result of deliberate policy: it is inherent in the nature of the empire, scattered as its parts are throughout the world, with only the highway of the sea between them.
Such is the position of the fleet in the defence of the empire: such are its duties towards it. Duties in the case are mutual, and some are owed to the fleet as well as by it. It is incumbent on every section of the empire, without neglecting its land forces, to lend zealous help in keeping the fleet efficient. It is not to be supposed that this can be done only by making pecuniary contributions to its maintenance. It is, indeed, very doubtful if any real good can be done by urging colonies to make them. It seems certain that the objections to this are greater than any benefit that it can confer. Badgering our fellow-subjects beyond sea for money payments towards the cost of the navy is undignified and impolitic. The greatest sum asked for by the most exacting postulant would not equal a twentieth part of the imperial naval expenditure, and would not save the taxpayer of the mother country a farthing in the pound of his income. No one has yet been able to establish the equity of a demand that would take something from the inhabitants of one colony and nothing from those of another. Adequate voluntary contribution is a different matter.
There are other ways in which every trans-marine possession of the Crown can lend a hand towards perfecting the efficiency of the fleet—ways, too, which would leave each in complete and unmenaced control of its own money. Sea-power does not consist entirely of men-of-war. There must be docks, refitting establishments, magazines, and depots of stores. Ports, which men-of-war must visit at least occasionally in war for repair or replenishment of supplies, will have to be made secure against the assaults which it has been said that a hastily raiding enemy, notwithstanding our general control of the communications, might find a chance of making. Moderate fixed fortifications are all the passive defence that would be needed; but good and active troops must be available. If all these are not provided by the part of the empire in which the necessary naval bases lie, they will have to be provided by the mother country. If the former provides them the latter will be spared the expense of doing so, and spared expense with no loss of dignity, and with far less risk of friction and inconvenience than if her taxpayers' pockets had been nominally spared to the extent of a trifling and reluctantly paid money contribution.
It has been pointed out on an earlier page that a country can be, and most probably will be, more effectually defended in a maritime war if its fleet operates at a distance from, rather than near, its shores. Every subject of our King should long to see this condition exist if ever the empire is involved in hostilities. It may be—for who can tell what war will bring?—that the people of some great trans-marine dependency will have to choose between allowing a campaign to be conducted in their country or forcing the enemy to tolerate it in his. If they choose the latter they must be prepared to furnish part at least of the mobile force that can give effect to their choice. That is to say, they must be prepared to back up our sea-power in its efforts to keep off the tide of war from the neighbourhood of their homes. History shows how rarely, during the struggle between European nations for predominance in North America, the more settled parts of our former American Colonies were the theatre of war: but then the colonists of those days, few comparatively as they were, sent strong contingents to the armies that went campaigning, in the territory of the various enemies. This was in every way better—the sequel proved how much better—than a money contribution begged or extorted would have been.