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426 , THE MARINE REVIEW designer, for the sum of all the weights must equal the displacement at a given line of flotation. There- fore, no one feature can be abnormal- ly emphasized except at the expense of some other; for instance, to carry a great number of heavy guns and ammunition means thinning down the protection in shape of armor. The vessel may be strong in offense but correspondingly weak in defense. The speed may be. made extremely high, and combined with heavy armament will produce a vessel that can deliver a blow and run, but she cannot take punishment, for she must lack com- mensurate protection. It seems, therefore, that the wiser policy is one of good speed and equally balanced armament and protection. These are the general features followed for American dreadnaughts. The amount of weight devoted to the comfort and health of the ship’s complement can well be considered as belonging equal- ly to offense and defense, for the sound mind and the sound body are pre-eminently necessary for the suc- cessful issue of the battle. The features of offense may be grouped under three heads: Ist, the battery of primary or heavy guns; 2d, the torpedo battery; and 3d, speed, when considered as a means of over- taking an enemy and choosing the weather gage at the time of engaging. The features of defense may like- wise be grouped under three heads: 1st, armored protection; 2d, the auxil- iary battery, as a means of repelling torpedo boat attack; and 3d, speed, as a means of refusing an engage- ment only. The two divisions are so closely interwoven as to make it hard to consider them apart except in general terms. We may, therefore, take up the features in a general way and afterwards combine them. Main Feature of Offense First comes the main feature of of- fense, i. e., the primary battery. Al- most all nations have come to the one-gun battery for its chief weapon of offense. These guns range from 12 inches to 15 inches in diameter of bore, with the prospect of going as high as 16 inches. The weight of ar- mor-piercing shell and ‘the bursting charge vary in general terms as the cube of the diameter of the bore of the gun. It will be seen, therefore, that the impact from a 15-inch shell is practically double that from a 12- inch shell. : The emplacement of the heavy guns, therefore, is one of the first importance, for the gun must be so placed as to command the greatest arc of fire at such a distance from the water as to be fought in moderately heavy weather, and so placed that its protection by heavy armor is feasible. This opens the question as to whether head and stern fire or broadside is the more valuable. Some designers sacrifice weight for the supposed ad- vantage of head and stern fire. - In coming up with and engaging an en- emy no doubt head and stern fire will be valuable in the hope of getting in a crippling shot at very long range, but when the vessels are within good fighting distance it is most natural to suppose that the pursued will sheer enough to bring the greater number of guns, or her broadside, to bear on the pursuer, who will also adopt like tactics so that the fight will con- tinue, the vessels circling in parallel lines. | The South Carolina Class In fleet action the use of the battery in broadside is the one giving the greatest delivery of metal. It, there- fore, seems that the greater advan- tage is to be gained from a moderate degree of head and stern fire com- bined with the heaviest possible broadside fire. To obtain this with the least weight of protection we are irresistibly led to placing the guns on the center line so that they may fire on either broadside. To have the advantage of this system and at the same time obtain good head and stern fire the United States designers were forced to place the second set of turret guns from the forward and after ends, so that they could fire over the guns in front of them. This emplacement was brought out in the South Carolina class and_ strongly criticised at first, especially by Eng- land, who feared the effect of the blast from the upper guns upon the crew of the lower turret. Exhaustive experiments in this line have proven that the fear is groundless with the result that this emplacement has be- come the standard of all nations. In the early American dreadnaughts the heavy guns were mounted in pairs in turrets, using the standard Ameri- can emplacement. This arrangement gave at the best four guns ahead and astern, with the broadside varying in accordance with the number of tur- rets mounted. This has given place to mounting three, and in the French navy even four, heavy: guns in a single turret. With a battery of 10 or 12 heavy guns the emplacement may be made in four turrets, the forward guns and their ammunition being en- tirely clear of and forward of the machinery, while the after guns and ammunition abaft the machinery. This December. 1916 is a most desirable arrangement, as it lends itself to the better ventilation of magazines and prevents interrup- tion between engine and fire rooms. In one case we may have three guns each in the lower turrets and two each in the upper firing over the tur- rets below. This would give five heavy guns ahead and astern and ten on either side. By using three guns in each turret the head and stern fire may be increased to six guns and the broadside to 12. The French in their latest design have placed four guns in one turret. With 12 guns, if mounted in four turrets, this would mean no increase in head fire over the three-gun turret, but renders it possible to mount all 12 guns in three turrets, with the second turret firing over the first, giving eight guns ahead, 12 on broadside and _ four astern. All sorts of variants may be made by using the several types of turrets here spoken of. Personally, I do not believe the four-gun turret will prove successful. The outboard pair of guns must be placed so far from the center that in firing a single pair the whip must be enormous. Of course, in firing in salvo this objec- tion is not a serious one. However, the number of guns per turret may vary. - The mounting of all heavy guns in turrets protected by armor and placing these upon the center line has been universally adopted and the United States must be given the credit for originating this plan, em- bodying the greatest efficiency with the least weight. Torpedo Battery The next feature of offense is the torpedo battery. The use of torpe- does on battleships is almost univer- sally confined to submerged tubes. As these are placed generally in broadside below the waterline, they are from their location well protected. There seems to be little actual expe- rience from which we may measure the value of this arm of offense. The range has been greatly increased, and from the fact of their power to dam- age a vessel so much greater than the gun they must have serious consider- ation. They are used at comparative- ly close range and, therefore, must necessarily be the weapon to aid in giving the finishing touch to the con- flict. A vessel may be fought after she has been hit by many projectiles from the main battery, but she can- not survive many hits from modern torpedoes. These weapons deliver their blows below the armor belt and at the most vulnerable part of the ship, so that one explosion from a successful de- - : 3 eae 4 Rk SEN EN nt oO a eee GOT ee SENSES a ae TEES SE TLS RP RE NOR By OR NONE Pee MS rey SRST ROTTEN Ee