The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1899-06-03
CLARK'S COMMENT ON
CERVERA'S STRATEGY


to q question by the editor, Captaia |
Clark gives in the Century the follow
ing opinion Of the Spanish Admiral's
strategy:
Assuming that the Spanish fleet
had to come out (and I, for one. had
sol, it is my judgment that Admiral
Cervera should have preferred night
to day as the time for the sortie, not
withstanding the searchlight watch so
rigidly maintained at the entrance.
He could have placed as guides to the
channel, along the shore, and on the
smokestack of the sunken Merrimac,
lights screened towards the sea, so
that we could not have detected them.
His best chance would have been to
get up his anchors and begin to move
about dusk, when he would have had
light enough to see the shore and the
channel marks, timing the movement
so that he should dash out just as
soon as darkness fell. We could not
then have closed in upon him without
would have had to be done virtually in
the dark, for the searchlights (even
suppOsing that others than the one
regularly in use had been turned ON
would soon have become ineffective on
account of the smoke and from the
SCATTERING force of the guns, which
probably would have extinguished
them. The direction of the enemy
could thus have been masked, and as
each of our captains would have been
concerned with the risk of his ship
being rammed or tOrpedOed, our on
slaught would have had a far different
result than it actually had when full
daylight enabled every commander to
see what all the others Gas well as the
enemy were doing. and exactly what
was to be done. 1t was the difference
between certainty and uncertainty.
In the daytime we We're able to choose
our distance from the enemy with re-
lation to the danger of being torpe-
decd. AS all his ships were supposed
to be provided with Whitehead torpe-
does, | determined, unless an emergen-
cy required it, not to go inside of half
a mile, that being the effective torpe-
do range, since our superiority in ord
nance and armor would thus have
been neutraliZed.
Considering the courses that were
open to Cervera, | should, probably, in
the circumstances, have done as he
Il = he
the fleet together in the hope of de-
Stroying any vessel which might be
able to overtake me. CienfuegOs was
his nearest and natural port, and
! there he would have been in direct
communication with Havana by rail,
and, so to speak, would have been in
Spanish environment. If he had in
| tended to go to Havana, it would have
| been better to go westward than east
ward for, although the distance Is
| somewhat greater, the current would
| have favored, and there was no addi-
| tional force to be considered like that
at Guantanamo. To have divided his
| fleet, part going eastward and part
| westward would have been to leave
| one half to Admiral Sampson and the
other half to Commodore Schley.
| There remained one other course.
The result of the Sortie shows that he
might have stood a better chance of
saving one or two or even more of his
ships by the policy of scattering. with
an ultimate rendezvous. Only three
of our ships were superior in speed to
his vessels, namely, the New York, the
| Brooklyn and the Oregon-possibly
the Texas. Even if each of these
| could have selected and pursued a
| Spanish ship, it is possible that not
every one would have been equal
to the task Of destroying her chosen
antagonist. The armored cruisers.
the Brooklyn and New York, might
have found that they had caught Tar
tars.' They could not have pierced the
armor of the Spanish vessels, while
| the Spanish guns could readily have
| pierced theirs. There were no orders
| to our vessels for such separate action
for neither Admiral Sampson nor any
one else could have anticipated such
| tactics. 1t is matter of pure conjec-
ture, but j am inclined to thing that
the confusion resulting from such a
ed Cervera.'