ARMY & NAVY: Pratt’ s Fleet

ARMY & NAVY

The far-flung radio network of the U. S. Navy crackled last week with messages of doom. The cruiser Pittsburgh, flagship of the Asiatic Fleet, heard its death-sentence at Tsingtao, China. Fatal news reached the cruiser Rochester, oldest U. S. fighting ship (TIME, Sept. 1) and flag-bearer of the Special Service (Caribbean) Squadron, at Corinto, Nicaragua. Lying at Philadelphia and Norfolk the battleships Florida and Utah received word that they were to be scrapped, the Utah taken to sea as target for aerial bombs and big guns. Sixteen destroyers were notified that their lives would soon be over. Twenty-five submarines, snuggled like schools of fish into Pearl Harbor, Hawaii and New London, Conn., learned they were to be shelved or scrapped. Two headquarters of the mine force heard they were to be abolished in a process of unification. In all, 49 ships were affected by the week’s news. Most of them made ready to steam at once to dismantling yards or anchored retirement.

Thus last week the new Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral William Veazie Pratt, announced his reorganization of the Fleet. He also reorganized the air force. The Admiral felt, and Secretary Charles Francis Adams said, that the scrapping, shelving, unifying would make primarily for increased efficiency, would only “incidentally save some money.” The savings will amount to $3,440,000 in fiscal 1931 and $7,758,949 in fiscal 1932.

Some of the scrapping was necessitated by the London Naval Treaty. But the general effect of the Treaty will be to enlarge the U. S. Navy. Present savings will vanish if and when 188,500 tons of new “Treaty” cruisers are built. Of this total, 70,000 tons (seven cruisers) are now in construction or appropriated for. Also permitted by the Treaty are 56,300 tons of new aircraft carriers, of which 13,800 tons (one carrier) has so far been ordered by Congress.