Whatever may be said of the wisdom of the ancient prudent doctrine of "a fleet in being," I shall always believe that, if, at the opportune time, such fighting sailors as Beatty and Carpenter, Mayo and Rodman and Wilson, could have joined in a combined assault, they would have found a way or made one, to sink the German fleet, in spite of Heligoland and all the frowning German guns.
PRESIDENT IN 1914 LAID DOWN POLICY WHICH GUIDED THE NAVY IN YEARS OF PREPARATION--ON VERGE OF WAR IN 1916--FLEET PREPARED TO MOBILIZE--"DEUTSCHLAND" AND U-53 WARNED US TO EXPECT SUBMARINES--CONGRESS AUTHORIZED BUILDING OF 157 WARSHIPS--MERCHANT SHIPS LISTED, MUNITIONS ACCUMULATED, COUNTRY'S INDUSTRIES SURVEYED.
"We shall take leave to be strong upon the seas," declared President Wilson in his annual message to Congress in December, 1914, and this was the guiding policy in the years of preparation that preceded the war. And the two years that followed were the busiest the Navy has ever known in time of peace.
The United States was on the very verge of war a year before it was declared. All preparations were made to mobilize the Fleet when President Wilson, after the sinking of the _Sussex_, sent his ultimatum to Germany declaring:
Unless the Imperial Government should now immediately declare and effect an abandonment of its present methods of submarine warfare against passenger and freight-carrying vessels, the Government of the United States can have no choice but to sever diplomatic relations with the German Empire altogether.
That note was despatched on April 18, 1916. Germany did not reply promptly and in a few days the following order was issued:
The following order had this day been approved by the Secretary of the Navy:
"1. In case of mobilization for war in the Atlantic the organization of the naval forces will be as indicated in the mobilization sheets published from time to time by the Department.
"2. Plans will be developed by all officers concerned for execution upon the receipt of the order to mobilize.
"3. The order to mobilize when received will be construed as an order to take all necessary action for the rapid assembly of ships at the rendezvous in all respects ready for war service.