The Eclipse Of American Sea Power (1922) (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III THE GKEAT LIBERALITY OF THE AMERICAN OFFER The 5-5-3 ratio in capital ships was determined by omitting purely paper programs and by including as a part of the capital ship strength of each nation not only those ships already built but also those under construction, to the extent to which construction had already progressed. Japan later maintained that a ship was not a ship until finished and contested strongly the inclusion of ships under construction. Such omission would have brought their status quo ratio up to about 5-5-31/2. But manifestly a new ship, say 98 per cent ready for service, represented a state of naval power that could not be ignored, and in fact an element of strength greater than a completed ship that might be of antiquated design or out of repair. The logic and justice of the American view was finally conceded by the Japanese after somewhat prolonged discussion. In reality America was extremely liberal in not assigning much greater weight than was assumed by the plan to her building program of 15 capital ships. Construction was proceeding rapidly upon this vast project, which already averaged about 35 per cent completion, and which would be finished in about two years. The designs incorporated all the principal lessons of the war so that the completed ships would entirely outclass most of the existing ships of the British and Japanese navies, which had no equivalent number of ships under construction. Japan had 5 capital ships under construction, together with a paper program for 10 more which were omitted from the status quo calculations. But she was on the verge of an acute financial crisis due to excessive taxation and to the spending of more than 50 per cent of her revenue upon military and naval activities. Her prospect was that shew...