THE TRAINING OF -NAVAL OFFICERS. ,
ITO THE EDITOR OF TIM SPIIIOTAT0R.9 13334—With reference to a correspondence which has taken "Pane in the Spectator; Lord SelbOrne's official decision was that there should be permanent separation of naval officers into three branches of executive, engineer, and marines at about the age of twenty. This has since been altered to Sep-ars:lion about the age of twenty-two. His opinion and hope, expressed in 1903, was 'that a future Board of Admiralty about "ten years hence or more" would develop the plan so that there would be no permanent specialisation, and engineer specialists would be eligible for the commands of ships and fleets. Had Lord Selborne translated that opinion into a decision, it is well known that three out of four of the Naval Members of his Board would have resigned. Disapproving as they did of. the original scheme, and committed as they were alike with Lord Selborne by the decisions of the Board meeting of November.19th, 1901, to a very different policy, it is a pity they remained at the Board when their ideas were overruled. Sir John Fisher, whatever his detractors may say, showed conspicuous courage in announcing his determination to resign unless he had "the Bill, the whole Bill, and nothing but the Bill." He saw clearly enough that the Cawdor Memorandum was the inevitable outcome of the Selborne document. I saw it plainly, and deliberately reserved my fire , until I started the present Press controversy in the Navy League Journal and the Daily Graphic just a few weeks prior to the issue of the Cawdor Memorandum. This latter document decided in favour of complete interchangeability over seven years before the time stipulated by Lord Selborne. 'it is amusing to see the totally different argu- ments put forward. Parliament was assured concerning the Selborne scheme that there would be no lack of candidates for the engineering branch. In fact, it would be the most popular branch. In the Cawdor Memorandum they are told the precise contrary, and that it would be unfair to expect any of the Cadets to sacrifice the chance of becoming Admiral. This is, however, only a trivial instance among many as to how little the sponsors of the proposals knew of the prob- abilities of how the scheme would work out. To my mind, the saddest part of the whole business is the gambling spirit in which the sole safeguard of the country has been staked in a wild experiment which cannot be justified by a single example of practice ashore or afloat, or in the history of our own and foreign navies. Indeed, afloat and ashore, specialisa- tion of a more and more pronounced type is the general tendency. Surely such a profession should have been reverentially handled, instead of being ruthlessly subjected to experiments of such a colossal character. In my remarks I, of course, include the abolition of the corps of Royal Marines as part of the large issue, for it is idle to pretend that the corps can be preserved after all its officers have vanished.
One further remark in conclusion. In all this controversy concerning naval training not one word has been alleged agi" :inst. the existing officers or engine-room artificers who are to be supplanted by new types. In- forming these new types- of officers the Navy is to be utterly- divorced from the educational and industrial life of the country. There are to be no more entries from the public, grammar,an- el technological schools. The magnificent body of engineers who are to be found in the workshops of the country will no longer find an adequate outlet for their energies in the Navy, for the highest positions as watchkeepers will be cut off from them. The best of them will, therefore, go entirely to the mercantile marine. They never cost the country a penny for their training, but the Admiralty prefer to supplant them by three thousand stokers, who enter at the age of twenty without any educational qualifications what- ever, and whose three years' training is calculated to cost the country 21,800,000. The direct entry of engineers as Engineer Sub-Lieutenants is also to cease in favour of officers whose training will cost at least 21,000 each before they are placed in responsible positions. The entry of officers into the Royal Naval Reserve is stopped as part of the same policy, for -the deck officers can handle ships but not engines, and the engineers cannot handle ships. The ' Worcester ' and Conway' have been told that their Cadets will in future be precluded from entering the Navy, be their seamanship qualifications what they may, unless they' can pass 'an engineering examination. We are invited by Lord Tweed- mouth and Mr. Robertson to watch and wait while the ship is burning. I prefer the courageous course of acting at once, before the fire is out of control.—I am, Sir,
CARLTON BELLAIRO.
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