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Show i JAPANESE ONLY NATION TO BUILD SUPER-DREADNAUGHT OF TYPE CONTEMPLATED BY AMERICANS American battleship designs, as exemplified in the lasi seven battleships battle-ships built and bulldinu, is tb- bi si in the world, according to Maurice Prendergast, the British UuVal e-Iert, e-Iert, in a ttatement circulated by k Mr A. n Dadmun, secrel try of the f ' Navy League. Mr. iKulmun Quotes , Mr. Prendergast from an article , written for the Navy, the organ of the British League. In part Mr R Prendergast says. With perhaps 3y 1 the exception of tho .Ia.nu- l-'uso, 1 1 110 dreadnaughts among the lle. t.s in 5U i actie service can compare with t9 these new American ships in tlu- matter of sire. The American ships w ill probably be the largest afloat for manv years after their c'omple- designs of American battleships has displayed a remarkable standard of excellent'.- It wus . karly re o-nized in the verj' firs! United States dreadnaughts that plain broadside fire was of molt- practical value than heavy end-on tire at odd angles an-gles Alter all navies had tried various va-rious methods of mounting bi un& the American center-line plan bud to be finally adopted, 'Perhaps the most interesting point it the armoring Of these ships. The methods of protecting warship by armor has savored too much of following traditional practice than attempting any fresh solution. The American designers have boldl) declare. de-clare. I for the thickest armor or none, ir armor cannol withstand the attack of heavy ordnance abandon aban-don it, they say. and devote the vveighl to some other purpose or for extending the ara ot really thick and useful protection "The onvi ntlonal six-Inch plate tor a six-Inch positor, Aye-Inch armor ar-mor for five-inch guns, etc., like the processional arrangements made bi Noah for tlie Ark, ihey consider futile. fu-tile. Su h armor merely ;isisti in the detonation of large, high explosive ex-plosive shells which would pass through ordinary plating without meetlpg enough resistance to burst. Km epi lor the protective decks no armor of less than fourteeu-inch thickin ss Is used. The water line is protected by a belt of fourteen-Inch fourteen-Inch thickness which extends for some distance beyond the end barbettes bar-bettes and is closed by cross bulkheads bulk-heads of equal section. Nearly th.-whole th.-whole of this belt is seventeen and a halt feet deep, nine feet ot its vertical ver-tical depth being above- the water line and eight and a halt' feel below the Name. But near the stern there is a jo and the belt extend from tin- water line only tiff this sjtma depth below' it as the rest of the belt, 'The four sreat gun positions nre composed of fourteeu-inch armor also. The faces of the gun shields arc eighteen inches thick, while the aides are nine to ten indies thi k with a five-inch roof The conning towci S sixteen inches thicK and the communication lube Is or the :-amc section. "One of the most pleasing features fea-tures la the way in which all tho uptakes from the l'oilers are gathered gath-ered within th'e big fourtcen-lnch cone that form--- the base of the Bingh funnel. This prevents the perforation of the uptakes and the following em ulation of the furnace gases between 'he decks. In the new .-hips additional weight has been devoted to protection protec-tion against submarine explosions by an extendi d system of lateral 'armored biU'khealds placed eight ret from the outer skin of the ship. These are formed 6 Beveral thick-nessi thick-nessi a of high-tensile steel and extend ex-tend along the ipaxaginc, bollr and engine room spaces. As the pro-it teetion of the flve-ineh sama by heavy armor would Involve an exorbitant ex-orbitant increase in displacement, no attempt whatever (s made to protect pro-tect these guns other than the slight protection afforded by the hull plating, plat-ing, The designers have. abjured the use of thin armor for the reasons reas-ons stated above. "These new American ships are developed from the Nevada class. Bojtb the Nevada and our Queen BUzabeth were designed about the same lime and numerous points of marked resemblance between them seem to raise the similarity abovo the field of vulgar coincidence. For neatness of design the American ships are facile prim i ps a striking strik-ing contrast to some dreadna uy his. I I MM whose minor details scorn to have been 'shoveled on just where they ;H will fit,' as a sort of afterthought. The difference amounts to the neat ;IH tier stowage of the boat- In Amerl- can Ships and the clumsy Jig-saw 'JH boat arrangements of the German H American II been reared in the stifling iitmos- IjH phere of secret aU'Slght and hon- es criticism in the i ae of the Delaware at the Newport confer- once) haa gone far in the DTodtio- ot some ol the finest warship" float. As a contrast In what Iln- M -. ring pain did the Gei man moun- :k alna D( "'' produce a rltSlcvldua il |