conditions, be undertaken by officers who should preferably be Flag
Officers, with experience in command at sea, having the titles of
Directors of Operations, whose emoluments should be commensurate with
their position and responsibilities.

I did not consider it advisable to carry out this alteration during the
war, and it was also difficult under the hour to hour stress of war to
rearrange all the duties of the Naval Staff in the manner most
convenient to the conduct of Staff business, although its desirability
was recognized during 1917.

It may be as well to close this chapter by a few remarks on Staff work
generally in the Navy. In the first place it is necessary in the Navy to
give much weight to the opinions of specialist officers, and for this
reason it is desirable that they should be included in the Staff
organization, and not "attached" to it as was the case with our Army in
pre-war days. The reason for this is that in the Army there is, except
in regard to artillery, little "specialization." The training received
by an officer of any of the fighting branches of the Army at the Staff
College may fit him to assist in the planning and execution of
operations, provided due regard is paid to questions of supply,
transport, housing, etc.

This is not so in a navy. A ship and all that she contains is the
weapon, and very intimate knowledge of the different factors that go to
make a ship an efficient weapon is necessary if the ship is to be used
effectively and if operations in which the ship takes so prominent a
part are to be successfully planned and executed, or if a sound opinion
is to be expressed on the training necessary to produce and maintain her
as an efficient weapon.