Chapter VI: German Ships, Officers, and Men

In material, in the art of constructing and equipping ships of war, Germany at the beginning of the war ranked far above most of the Great Powers, and she was little, if anything, behind even Great Britain in workmanship, rapidity and cheapness. Her personnel also stood high, for she had succeeded in translating into naval terms the professional and disciplinary codes which have raised the German Army to a position of pre-eminence. Above all she had succeeded, in a degree never before attempted by any country, in keeping ships and men in constant association. The German naval authorities recognized that, while a conscriptive system of manning a fleet brings into the organization certain grave and ineradicable disadvantages, it did at least enable large numbers of officers and men to be borne for service at a relatively small annual cost. Realising this economic benefit of conscription, the Marineamt had no hesitation in increasing its personnel rapidly from year to year. The expansion of this element of naval power kept pace with the activity of the shipyards. This policy of simultaneous increase of ships and of men, accompanied as it was by the expansion of her shipbuilding and allied industries and of her dockyards, has been the secret of the rapid rise of Germany as a maritime Power wielding world-wide influence.

Within the memory of the present generation German ships of war, if not built in England, were constructed in Germany with materials obtained entirely or in part from England. Her earliest armoured ships of any account--the _Deutschland_, the _Kaiser_ and the _Konig Wilhelm_--were all constructed on the banks of the Thames at the old Samuda Yard. The great industry which Germany and other foreign nations helped to support is now dead, and on the other side of the North Sea is to be seen an activity more intense and on a far larger scale than the Thames establishments could boast even in the day of their greatest prosperity.

Though there are many shipbuilding yards and engine-making establishments in Germany, the naval authorities depend exclusively upon the vast establishment of Krupp for armour and guns, and the repute of the firm in both respects stands high. The vast establishment which supplies the German and many other Governments was founded in 1810 by Friedrich Krupp, who bought a small forge and devoted himself, with little commercial success, to the manufacture of cast steel. In this he was ahead of Germany's requirements, but on the basis thus laid by the father, the son built; and in 1851 a solid steel ingot which he exhibited at the Great Exhibition in London completely took the metallurgic world by surprise, and his fortune was made. He turned his energy and knowledge to the making of guns, armour, weldless steel rails, and other manufactures; and the modest works at Essen continued to expand until to-day they and the associated establishments give employment to about 70,000 men, not all of whom, of course, always are engaged on the manipulation of armaments.

For many years the Krupp process of armour manufacture was adopted in every country of the world, but later on the British Admiralty, it is common knowledge, adopted a superior process which produces a plate of greater resisting power, and the German cemented type of armour no longer holds the premier position which it occupied when its advantages over the Harvey plate were demonstrated. On the other hand, the Krupp firm still claim that their ordnance is not equalled by any in the world, and on the strength of this claim they have obtained most valuable orders, extending over a long series of years, from foreign Governments. British guns are made on the wire-wound system--that is, steel ribbon is wound under great pressure round the gun, and over this is placed an outer hoop; Krupp's, on the other hand, still remain faithful to the solid steel tube to resist the gas pressures exerted, arguing that their method of steel manufacture enables them to submit it to strains which other steel might not stand. There has been endless controversy as to the merits of the two systems; and the subject was again discussed as recently as the end of 1912, when the Italian Minister of Marine laid a report before the Italian Parliament with reference to the armaments of the principal fleets. According to this statement the British, Italian, and Japanese are the only Navies to mount wire-wound guns; the probable life of the Italian and Japanese 12-inch guns was given at 80 rounds, whereas the English gun was good for only 60 rounds. On the other hand, the Austrian and German guns were given from 200 to 220 rounds, and the American 14-inch gun was estimated to have a probable life of 150 rounds. Particulars with reference to British and German guns were given as follows:

+---------------------+-------------+--------------------+ | | British. | German. | +---------------------+------+------+------+------+------+ |Calibre in inches | 12| 13.5| 12| 14| 15| |Length in calibres | 50| 45| 45| 50| 50| |Weight in tons | 69| 80| 53| 83| 102| |Weight of projectile | | | | | | | in pounds | 850| 1,240| 850| 1,360| 1,650| |Initial velocity | 2,950| 2,800| 3,000| 3,000| 3,000| |Energy at muzzle in | | | | | | | metric tons |16,540|22,150|17,520|27,650|33,910| |Energy per kilogramme| | | | | | | in kilometres | 240| 277| 330| 330| 330| |Probable life in | | | | | | | rounds | 60| 60| 200| 200| 200| +---------------------+------+------+------+------+------+

The attention of the First Lord of the Admiralty was directed to these statements in the House of Commons, and he reiterated the assurance of former Ministers that the expert advisers were satisfied as to the wisdom of retaining the wire-wound system. He gave no data as to the foundation of this confidence, and in the German technical Press--no doubt with an eye to foreign orders--the superiority of the German gun over the British was repeated with at least equal assurance.

The great advantage of the wire-wound system, it has always been claimed, is that after much use, when the rifling is worn, the gun can be given a new inner tube, a comparatively simple and cheap operation which results in practically a new gun being made available for sea service in a short time. All that can be said as to the two systems from practical experience is that the Japanese found the British-made weapons give eminently satisfactory results during the war with Russia, while the Krupp artillery guns used by the Turkish Army in the Balkan War of 1912 did not realize expectations.

Probably in naval material--in ships, their armour, armament, and engineering equipment--there is little difference as between the leading navies. One may be thought to have an advantage in some particular respect, but this may possibly be counterbalanced by the rival's superiority in another. Generally, the British ships mount fewer guns but of larger calibre, and to the experienced eye they look very workman-like; while the German ships carry smaller guns in greater number and have a crowded appearance which does not appeal to British naval opinion in its desire for simplicity of design and plenty of working room. Virtually, all the instruments for exerting naval power as they exist to-day are experimental, based upon the empirical knowledge. When the war between the United States and Spain occurred, it was anticipated that it would throw light upon these problems, but these anticipations were not realized, and even the struggle between Russia and Japan failed to satisfy fully the natural curiosity of the naval constructor and the naval officer owing to the inefficiency with which the Russian ships were handled, and the deplorable slackness of the administration.

It is the fashion to calculate the relative strength of fleets in tons and guns, but the probability is that on the day of trial in a great battle at sea these nice paper computations will be entirely upset by the course of events. Morale, as Napoleon observed, dominates war. This dictum is no less true to-day than it was in the past. Man is still greater than the instruments of his creation, and the experience of war on a grand scale will certainly confirm the teaching of history--that the important element in naval power is men rather than ships. On the eve of the Battle of St. Vincent, when Jervis, in command of fifteen ships, was pacing the quarter-deck of his flag-ship and the Spanish Fleet was entering the field of vision, the numbers of the enemy were reported by the Captain of the Fleet to the Commander-in-Chief as they were counted. "There are eight sail of the line, Sir John," "Very well, sir," answered the Admiral. "There are twenty sail of the line, Sir John." "Very well, sir," Jervis responded. "There are twenty-five sail of the line, Sir John." "Very well, sir," the Admiral again replied imperturbably. "There are twenty-seven sail of the line, Sir John," the Captain of the Fleet at length reported, and when he had the temerity to remark on the great disparity between the British and Spanish Fleets, the Admiral, confident in the efficiency of his small fleet, replied: "The die is cast, and if there be fifty sail, I will go through them." We may be sure that the victor of the Battle of St. Vincent, who by stern but wisely directed measures created the fleet which Nelson used with such dramatic effect at Trafalgar, would have scorned and ridiculed an entire reliance on mere paper calculations of guns and tons, realizing that victory or defeat depends mainly upon the personal element and morale.

It is in respect of officers and men that there is the greatest contrast between the British Fleet and the Navies of the Continent of Europe. The British service is organized on a voluntary system, while the Continental fleets are manned mainly by conscripts; the former serve for many years, while the latter for the most part submit to only the short period of duty required by law and then pass into the reserve. In the matter of officers, however, the German Fleet is certainly not worse served than the British Navy; though the cadets begin their training at a somewhat later age, a thoroughly good sea officer is produced. The marked distinction between the two services is that, whereas under the White Ensign special duties are assigned to special classes of officers--gunnery, torpedo, navigation, signalling and physical training--in the German Navy no hard-and-fast lines are drawn. It is held that the British system would entail a larger number of officers than are available on the other side of the North Sea. However this may be, the German authorities can certainly pride themselves upon a corps of executive officers which in many respects is not excelled in any country. As in the British service, special lines of officers are trained for engineering, medical, and accountant duties and these have no executive standing.

The method of training executive officers for the German Fleet differs in some important respects from that which obtains in England. In the British service the cadets, who enter when they are, on the average, thirteen and a half years of age, have not completed their general education, and consequently spend four years at the Naval Colleges at Osborne and Dartmouth respectively before they go afloat in a training ship. The German naval officer receives much the same general education as any other boy before he enters the navy, whereas the British cadet, after entering, is submitted to an educational course specially devised with a view to his future naval career; his studies embrace physical science and practical engineering, and emphasis is laid upon athletics and as much sea experience as can be obtained in small craft. When the four years ashore are completed he goes afloat at about the same age as the average German cadet and makes a six months' cruise. Which is the better system? Who shall say? This is certain, however, that British naval officers have always held that lads for the sea service cannot be caught, broken in, and inoculated, so to speak, too early.

Throughout the years of naval expansion the German authorities have been struggling to eliminate as far as possible the disadvantages of conscription in its application to naval conditions. The War Department is responsible for putting in force the conscription law, and periodically the navy sends in its requisition, stating the number of recruits who will be needed, and where and when they are to join. The men selected are passed direct into the fleet without preliminary training each October. Under the British system boys are entered at about sixteen years of age, and receive a short training first in one of the shore or stationary sea establishments, and are subsequently drafted into one of the ships of the Training Squadron, thence joining the sea-going fleet. A certain number of youths are also entered at an average age of about seventeen and a half years, and these recruits dispense with the preliminary course, but are also drafted to the Training Squadron before joining the fleet. Nearly all the men of the fleet sign on for twelve years' active service, and the best of these are permitted to re-engage for another ten years in order to earn pensions. A relatively small number of men, not boys, join the British Navy for a term of only five years, with the obligation to remain in the Reserve for seven years. Five years, consequently, is the minimum in the British Navy, and applies to only a relatively small number of men; but three years is the maximum period of German conscripts, and during this time the officers and warrant officers have to do their best to transform the raw material provided by the State into skilled seamen.

It is easy to imagine the difficulties which assail the administration in Germany in these circumstances. Every year one-third of the naval conscripts complete their period of active service and are passed into the Reserve, and their places are taken by an equivalent batch of raw recruits. The result is that in the winter months the officers and petty officers of the fleet are occupied in licking into shape these embryo sailors, and from October until May the fighting ships of the Empire become practically training vessels.

If this were a complete representation of the conditions in the German Fleet its efficiency would be of a low order. The Navy is, however, stiffened by a proportion of conscripts who re-engage voluntarily, and by a certain number of volunteers who enter as boys. These lads engage at ages ranging from fifteen to eighteen years. They agree to undergo an apprenticeship of two years followed by seven years of active fleet service. Volunteers are not trained ashore or in fixed naval establishments as in the United Kingdom, but are drafted to sea-going training ships, which cruise in home waters during the summer months and pass into the Mediterranean during the winter. By these two expedients the German naval authorities have been able to secure about 25 per cent. of the German personnel on what passes in Germany for a long-service system. The boy volunteers and the conscripts who re-engage constitute the class from which petty officers are drawn, and these men are the backbone of the naval organization ashore and afloat, and it is to their efforts that the high standard of efficiency which Germany's Navy has attained may in a large measure be traced.

Year by year, in order to provide crews for the larger number of ships passed into the fleet, the Marine Office has been compelled to increase the number of conscripts required for sea service, and thus the task of training the Navy has been increased in advance of the expansion of the material, because men must begin training before their ships are ready for sea. The officers and petty officers have had not only to train raw recruits embarked to take the place of conscripts at the end of their three years' term, but to find means also of training additional recruits entered as net additions to the naval strength. When it is added that in 1894 the number of officers and men in the Navy was less than 21,000, whereas it is now nearly 80,000, and under the Navy Act of 1912 is to be raised to 107,000, some conception may be formed of the character of the problem which has presented itself, not only to the central administration ashore, but to the officers afloat, intent upon attaining the highest standard of efficiency at sea. Admission of these difficulties was made by Admiral von Tirpitz in the explanatory Memorandum which accompanied the last Navy Bill presented to the Reichstag and which directed attention to "two serious defects" in the organization of the fleet:

"The one defect consists in the fact that in the autumn of every year the time-expired men--_i.e._ almost one-third of the crew in all ships of the battle fleet, are discharged and replaced mainly by recruits from the _inland population_. Owing to this, the readiness of the battle fleet for war is considerably impaired for a prolonged period."

When it is recalled that the maritime population of Germany amounts only to 80,000, and that compulsory service in the active fleet lasts for only three years, it will be realized that most of the recruits taken for the German Navy must necessarily be landsmen. The personnel in 1914 numbered roughly over 70,000, after deducting from the total the executive officers, engineers, cadets, and accountants. If approximately 17,000 of these are regarded as long-service men there remain roughly 54,000 conscripts, one-third of whom pass annually into the Reserve, and are replaced by raw hands. Under the new Navy Law it was intended to strengthen the personnel in the next few years by 6,400 annually. While the average period of service in the British Navy, including the relatively small number of five years' men entered for short service, is about ten years, the average in the German Fleet does not amount to as much as half this period.

It is possible to attach too much importance to the fact that the German Navy is recruited "mainly by recruits from the inland population." The inherited sea habit counts for less to-day than at any time since men attempted to navigate the seas. Ships of war have become vast complicated boxes of machinery, and naval life requires the exercise of qualities different from those it demanded in the sail era. Then brute courage, endurance, and familiarity with the moods of the sea were the main attributes of sailors, but to-day a large proportion of the crews must be experts in the handling of complicated mechanical appliances. In these changed conditions the compulsory system of education in Germany has proved of the greatest advantage in providing recruits of a high standard of intelligence, who probably acquire in six months as complete a familiarity with their work as it would have taken a seaman of the old school as many years to attain. At the same time, while resisting the temptation to place too great importance upon the inherited sea habit, it would be no less a mistake to ignore entirely its influence upon naval efficiency. Familiarity breeds contempt for the terrors of the sea and for the horrors of a naval action, and it is reasonable to expect that in the hour of trial the long-service men of the British Navy will exhibit a moral standard when projectiles are falling fast and thick far higher than that of the conscript. A modern Dreadnought is intended to fire its guns in broadsides and not in succession, and when it is borne in mind that at one discharge these guns will deliver on an enemy's ship, if they are fired accurately, between five and six tons of metal, it will be realized that at such a moment the calibre of men will count more than the calibre of guns.

When the Act of 1900 was introduced the Reichstag was informed by Admiral von Tirpitz in a Memorandum that "as, even after the projected increase has been carried out, the number of vessels in the German Navy will still be more or less inferior to that of other individual Great Powers, our endeavours must be directed towards compensating this superiority by the individual training of the crews and by tactical training by practice in larger bodies.... Economy as regards commissioning of vessels in peace time means jeopardizing the efficiency of the fleet in case of war." Never since navies existed have a body of officers and men been worked at higher pressure than those of Germany; drill has never ceased; no effort has been spared to obtain the last ounce of value out of every one on board the ships. The promotion of officers rests with the Emperor, and he is unsparing in his punishment of anything like slackness; an officer who is not enthusiastic, alert, and competent, stands no chance of rising in rank. The German Navy has no use for anything but the best which the Empire can provide, and in order that the highest expression of the _esprit de corps_ which has contributed to German influence on shore may be instilled into the Navy, no officer, however influential or brilliant, can enter either the executive or engineering branch unless his claims are endorsed by all his contemporaries; one black ball--if the term may be used--is sufficient to disqualify an aspirant, though he may have passed all the prescribed examinations brilliantly.

The German Fleet has its limitations, but within those limitations it probably has no superior in the world: the ships are well built, the officers are capable sailors, and the men are raised to the highest pitch of efficiency possible under a short-service system.