the country.




CHAPTER XV

Scope Of The Navy's Work In Various Particulars--Food--Fuel--Naval
Consulting Board--Projectile Factory--Expenditures--Increase Of
Personnel


In the way of progress in naval construction or appliance, it is not the
opinion of our naval technicians that the war from its inception to the
present time has developed any hitherto unknown feature. Guns and ships,
to be sure, have increased in size, and details of the submarine and
airplane have vastly improved these weapons of offense, but
substantially no weapon hitherto known has been discredited by use in
this war, and even all classes of war-ships built before the war have
withstood the test of new conditions as to their usefulness along the
lines for which they were originally designed.

Germany has not improved the submarine, except in detail. Undersea craft
of that country which have been recently captured show little deviation
from the original lines of the submarine as used in the German Navy four
years ago. They are larger--the new ones, that is--but the principle of
their construction is fundamental, and the development not unnatural.

Our modern submarine-chasers are merely a modified form of the
torpedo-boat destroyer. The depth-bomb was known before it was employed