Salt Lake Tribune | 1913-09-14 | Page 6 | Guns in the Navies

GUNS IN THE NAVIES, Tho fact that tho German aVy i5 to be armed with heavier guns ba3 for tbo most part oscaped the attention of tho American public; but no doubt tho British Admiralty is fully alive to tho proposition. The German navy heretofore has not followed the load of othor nations in enlarging its cannon. It has adhered to tho comparatively small calibers that wero in voguo in the world's navies twenty yearn or raoro ago. So that tho largest calibor guns now in tho German navy aro 11-inch. But other navios have been using 12-inch 12-inch aud 13-inch guiiB for a long timo. Tho American navy, which is usualiv pretty well up in this sort of progress, used in tho Spanish-American war 12-inch 12-inch and 13-inch guns very offoctivoly. It is stated that Japan also is arming arm-ing her battleships with 15-inch guns. Great. Britain for her superdread-noughts superdread-noughts has for some timo 'been using la-inch guns, with influence pushing for largor calibore. Tic latest Amori-can Amori-can ships are to carry 14-hich gung, and wo havo on some of our cnanf. do. fonses a small number of 16-inch guns. There has been in this country a good deal of pushing for tho uso of 16-inch guns on our largest battleships, and it is likely that beforo long we eha.ll havo the biggest fighting ship in the world, and that, it will bo armed with 16-inch guns. These huge guns aro of tremendous effectiveness, but, ns stated in a description de-scription of these in tho Springfield (Mass.) Republican, the calibor is not tho full index of tho power and do-utructivencss do-utructivencss of the 14 to 16-inch guns. The ordinary practico in making such guns Is to mako tho length of the gun 45 to 50 caliber; so that a 16-inch gun would bo from 04 to 66 foot long. A gun of that caliber and length is a foarfully destructive weapon. By reason rea-son of nicety in mounting and balancing, bal-ancing, oven tho heaviest guns aro easily eas-ily handled, aud aro made arms of precision pre-cision and accuracy of aim and as true to the target as tho best rifle, whilo It? K"ns' " irnrl that mneh ivB raP" of fire moi.dou.ly mo 1 fiIWi b'K guns ncaSll"lB ' of foe navy iM?'- ; tended and J ,tl39