OCR Text |
Show PROPOSE SLOWER SHIPS WITH BETTER ARMOR FOR NAVY WASHINGTON. The revolution ary proposal of slower, rather than j faster, battleships and more big i guns to meet the challenge of rr.oo-ern rr.oo-ern naval warfare is before naval circles. The proposal was put forward b Lieut. Franklin G. Percival, I S X. retired, and published m the United States Naval Institute Proceedings, an unofficial but highly rated journal jour-nal dealing with naval problems Under the title "Future Naval War," Percivai contends that in days of airplane development it is nopelcss to try to build ships that can compete fur speed against the plane. Recent drcadnaught design has centered about ships of 27 and 33 knots. While not urging alteration ol these speeds which, he contends, can still be used at either end ol a battle line, Percival argues that the slower ship still may be the answer an-swer to naval design problems. In any event, he says, the fleet will still be tied to the speed of the slower units, capable of only 21 knots. On the other hand, he asserts, the 27 knot main line would call for cruisers of 36 to 40 knots and destroyers de-stroyers of 45 to 50 knots. These faster speeds also would require much more fuel than now carried. "It is fundamentally unsound," the article says, "to waste tonnage in a futile attempt to compete with the airplane in speed. The logical course is to exploit the one great weakness of all aircraft vulnerability. vulnerabil-ity. To do this designs of warships must emphasize qualities incompatible incompat-ible with extreme speed." In behalf of the slower ship, Percival Per-cival cites the saving in engine space and engineering crews. |