The Navy as a Fighting Machine by Bradley A. (Bradley Allen) Fiske
page 82 of 349 (23%)
page 82 of 349 (23%)
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be mutually dependent yet severally independent; and how all must
be made to work as one vast unit, and directed as one vast unit by the controlling mind toward "the end in view." The common idea is that an army consists of a number of soldiers, and a navy of a number of ships. This idea is due to a failure to realize that soldiers and ships are merely instruments, and that they are useless instruments unless directed by a trained intelligence: that the first essential in an army and the first essential in a navy is mind, which first correctly estimates the situation, then makes wise plans to meet it, then carries out those plans; which organizes the men and designs the ships, and then directs the physical power exertable by the men and the ships toward "the end in view." Owing to the enormous mechanical power made available in ships by the floating properties of water, machinery is more used by navies than by armies; but this does not mean that machinery can take the place of men more successfully in navies than in armies, except in the sense that navies can use more mechanical power. The abundant use of machines and instruments in navies does not mean that machinery and instruments can take the place of trained intelligence--but exactly the reverse. Under the guidance of trained intelligence, a machine or instrument can perform wonders. But it is not the machinery that does the wonders; it is the trained intelligence that devised the instrument or machine, and the trained intelligence that operates it. Let the trained intelligence err, or sleep, and note the results that follow. The _Titanic_, a mass of 40,000 tons, moving through the water at 20 knots an hour, a marvel of the science and skill of man, crashes into an iceberg, |
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