Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1921-11-11
VIVID EXAMPLE
Of NAVAL GROWT H
LOCKS OF THE PANAMA CANAL
ALREADY ALMOST TOO SMALL
FOR BIGGEST WARSHlPS.
ADVANCES OF EIGHT YEARS
Continuous and Rapid Development in
Size and Efficiency of War MaterieI
Has Bearing on the Conference on
Armaments.
By EDWARD 3. CLARK.

BY EDWARD B. CLARK.
Washington.-It was only eight
years ago chat the water from Gatun
lake was turned into the Culebra cut,
now known as the Gaillard cut. The
canal then was opened for commerce
and for the passage of battleships.
| 1t was thought at that time, October,
1913, that the locks had been made
large enough to accommodate any war
vessel which was likely to be built
for a century to come. Yet today,
only eight years from the time of the
opening of the waterway, there are
ships of the American navy which have
! to "scruncho in order to get through
the Gatun, the Pedro Miguel and the
MirafiOres locks.
This fact has some bearing on the
conference for the limitation of arma-
ments and Far East problems, al
| though on the surface it may not seem
! In any way to be related to the prob
lens to be solved. There may be
| limitation set on the number of ships
which any nation may keep in COM
mission, and there may be ordered
| q reduction in the number Of vessels
at present commissioned in the various
navies, but it is known, of course,
| that every country will be allowed
to keep a navy of sufficient size to
protect its various interests.
OF course there will be navies in the
future Just as there are navies today,
and it is not believed that anything
will be done at the conference to pre-
vent improvements and engagements
of the ships of the present time when
vessel requirements are necessary and
are authorized under the rules govern
ing limitation agreements.
1t has been suggested from time to
time, more because of the humor Of
fancy than for any other reason, that
the nations of the world go back to the
days of old wooden ships and smooth
bore guns in order to save money for
the taxpayers. The argument was that
If no nations had anything but wood
en- ships and smooth bOreS they would
be on the same war level as they are
when each possesses its steel-clads and
its 16-inch rifles.
What Future Battles May Be.
Of course any such suggestion as
this instantly was repudiated, but it
is within the range of remote posi-
bilities that something may be sug-
gested at the coming conference to
bring a pause to the further develop
ment Of destructive engines of war
fare. Probably, of course, this will
not be done, and if science and inven-
ton go forward as they have gone for
ward in the last so years, the day will
come when man cannot go to war on
sea or land without knowing that
either his army or his fleet, or the
army or the fleet of the enemy is to
be annihilated. No one left to tell
the tale, may be the history of some
great battle of the future.
A few weeks ago 1000 marines of
the United States navy engaged in
battle maneuvers at the Wilderness
where the Grant and Lee forces met
fifty-odd years ago. Such has been
the improvement, if you want to call
it improvement, in the machinery of
war that if those 1000 marines, armed
as they were the other day and with
all the modern machinery OF warfare
at theic command, had met in actual
battle on the field force numerically
equal TO the combined armies of Grant
and Lee, armed as those armies were
in 1864, the marines could have swept
the combined forces opposed to them
off the face Of the earth and never
have lost a man.
In the Spanish war there was an
American merchant vessel which had
been converted into cruiser. 1t
mounted four 5-inch guns. 1t was just
a merchant vessel, and yet alone it
could have destroyed in battle every
man-of-war which the North and the
South together put on the seas in the
days of the Civil war, and could have
done it in a single fight.
One of our newest and greatest bat
tleships today could destroy without
much of an effort the combined Ameri-
can and Spanish fleets as they existed
in the days of the Spanish war. The
Brooklyn, the New York, the Oregon,
the Indiana, the Iowa, and all the
rest plus the steel clads Of Cervera
would have been sent to the bottom
after short engagement with one cap
ital ship of our present day navy.
Ignorance in Reds Attack.
In the attempt of the Red element
of human society to assassinate the
American ambassador to France,
Myron T. Herrick, and in threats OF
violence to United States ambassadors
and consuls elsewhere, there is seen
new evidence of the fact that certain
foreigners still are unable to differen-
tate between the federal government
of the United States and the indiy1du-
al governments of the states.
Ambassador Herrick, directly or in
directly, had as much to do in an OIL
cial way with the trial and conviction
of the two Italians who committed
murder in Massachusetts as he had or
hoe had tO do with tha market Uric0