The Democratic banner. (Mt. Vernon, Ohio) 1898-192?, 1914-12-22
five YEARS
Needed To Build Up The
Navy Of U. S.
FiSke Tells The House Com
mittee In An Address

dohiuSbOA, ~ u, DeC. 10 nat
1t will take five years to bring the
American navy up to fighting eflicien
cy against an efficient enemy was the
statement of Rear Admiral Fiske,
aide for operations, before the House
naval committee Thursday. Admiral
FIske said the greatest need of the
navy was coordination.
81 doubt If in five years we could
get the navy up to a state of efii-
cheney that one of the navies is in
now," he added.
"If every navy under the present
status should be supplied with train
ed and intelligent officers and men
how long would it take?" he was
asked.
put 1t down to three years, ap-
proximately," he replied. ITO fight
effectively we must have coherent
plan Of organization from top down
and bottom up, in every fleet and d.
vision. Every navy except ours has
an organization which is military
every persons responsibility marked,
plans laid carefully, contingencies
prepared for, each ship manned and
officered by experienced men,"
"How many ships are supplied in
that respect"
"The twenty-one battleships and
some Of the destroyers."
The admiral said there was one
other nation which he did not name,
superior to the United States in gun
merry and other nations had been 60
ing ahead in naval affairs much more
rapidly.
The admiral said an adequate"
number of British submarines might
have repelled the German cruisers
which raided the English coast We'd
nesday.
''If the German vessels were going
fast, however, 1t would be very hard
for submarines to stand them off," he
declared III they had had a-dozen
or fifteen submarines at Hartlepool
the British would have been pretty
hard to tackle.
Admiral Fisk thought the real sig
nificance of the German shelling of
the British ports probably was to
draw out the British fleet and string
the British fleet along the North sea
in such way that it could be attack
ed by German fleet.
Members OF the committee sug-
gested that the attack had caused
considerable apprehension on the
coast.
"Yes, and probably will bring hun
dreds of thousands of British to the
colors,' interjected Representative
| Hobson
| England has seventy-fve subma-
rines," said Representative Brown
ing. How many of these could Eng
land have spared to go to the defense
OF the British coast cities bombarded
Yesterday"
81 would have to know the plans of
the British admiralty before could
answer that" said the admiral. "The
admiralty might have had some other
employment for the submarines
The admiral told the committee
that whether we could take our
submarines to Japan is doubtful ;
Immediately, at the instance OF sew
eral members the mention OF Japan
was stricken out.
I'm case OF an attack on the Amer
lean coast" said the admiral. "our
inadequaoy as 10 mines and aircraft
would be very serious There Is con
siderable development along that line
in the foreign nations. II we got into
war we might expect an attack on
our coast very quickly, possibly in
the vicinity of New York"
Senator lodge on Thursday intro
duoed bill embodying Secretary
Garrison's plans for increasing the
aggregate mobile army to full
strength; for 1000 additional officers
and for the discharge OF soldiers after
eighteen months service in the reg
ular army to constitute an army re
serve.