DESTROYER TENDER.

[Based on characteristics of General Board (Construction and Repair No. 15272-A.2).]

[Based on General Board characteristics (Construction and Repair No. 15272-A.2).]

[Based on characteristics received unofficially from aid for material dated Oct. 2, 1912.]

[Based on characteristics same as for 1913 program. If these are changed as Bureau of Construction and Repair has recommended, amount should be increased to $650,000 for increase of Navy, construction and maintenance, 8-hour day.j

[Based on characteristics of General Board (Construction and Repair No. 15272-A.2).]

[Based on characteristics received unofficially from aid for material dated Oct. 1, 1912.]

SEAGOING TUG.

[Based on General Board characteristics (Construction and Repair, No. 15272-A. 2).]

Mr. ROBERTS. I would like to ask, Mr. Secretary, whether or not the private yards on the Atlantic coast have all gone on the eighthour basis?

Secretary MEYER. Wherever they are doing Government work. The entire plants of the New York Shipbuilding Co. and of the Fore River Shipbuilding Co. have been placed on the eight-hour basis.

Mr. ROBERTS. I understood that if they were going on the eighthour basis for Government work that they would have to go on the same basis for all work.

Secretary MEYER. I have not noticed that; I imagine they will eventually.

Mr. HOBSON. I think the resolution requires them to be completely eight-hour yards to do any Government work.

Secretary MEYER. I did not understand that.

Mr. TRIBBLE. Mr. Secretary, in addition to the information requested by the chairman, I will ask you to please furnish a statement showing approximately what it would cost to man, equip, and furnish one of the battleships and keep it afloat annually? Secretary MEYER. Approximately $850,000.

Mr. BATHRICK. You have stated that it was necessary to build battleships. What are your reasons; why do you believe it necessary? Secretary MEYER. I believe it to be necessary in order to have a fleet that will meet the possible requirements of emergencies that might arise. Otherwise, if you are not going to have a fleet that will meet emergencies that may arise, a fleet made up of vessels of a character which other navies which may come in contact with us are building, it would be better to have no Navy and no fleet; better than to have a lot of vessels which would be crushed like a lot of pasteboard boxes.

Mr. BATHRICK. I rather expected to get some reason other than "may" or "might." I thought, perhaps, that you might have some specific special reason.

Secretary MEYER. I do not want to for this reason: The other day I talked rather freely about the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific, and it was all in the papers the next day. You have asked a question which it is perfectly proper to ask, and I will sit down and discuss it

with you some time, but I do not want to embarrass foreign relations by making statements which might be misunderstood and create offense where none is meant to be given.

Mr. GREGG. How many battleships have we of the class that is now considered practically obsolete that carry 13-inch guns-is it not six? Secretary MEYER. There were three original ones that carried the 13-inch guns.

Mr. GREGG. I would like to ask whether the department is making any effort to develop a torpedo shell that would make the 13-inch guns useful and serviceable?

Secretary MEYER. You mean the old 13-inch guns?

Mr. GREGG. On the ships that carry 13-inch guns, whether any effort is being made to develop a torpedo shell that will make those guns practically as effective as the 14-inch guns?

Secretary MEYER. I do not think so. Our tendency is toward larger guns.

Mr. GREGG. Is any effort being made to develop a shell?

Secretary MEYER. I do not think so, for 13-inch guns.

Mr. GREGG. Is any effort being made to prevent the obsolescence by the development of a torpedo shell?

Secretary MEYER. To be used on those ships?

Mr. GREGG. Yes, sir; any effort being made in the department to develop a shell that would prevent the obsolescence of these ships carrying 13-inch guns or the old 12-inch guns?

Secretary MEYER. I do not think so, for those particular ships.

Mr. GREGG. No effort is being made along that line in the denartment?

Secretary MEYER. Expert questions like that I would like to have referred to the Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance.

On page 22 of my annual report I say:

While only three battleships are included in the estimates for this year, the department feels that the deficiencies of the fleet in other types of ships should be carried out in accordance with the recommendations of the general board. This board has furnished annually since 1900 a consistent and continuing pro

gram.

Four

The general board, in pursuance of consistent recommendations since 1900, recommends that provision be made for an increase of the Navy at the coming session of Congress by the addition of the following new construction: battleships, two battle cruisers, 16 destroyers, one destroyer tender, two transports, one ammunition ship, six submarines, one submarine tender, one supply ship, two gunboats, two sea-going tugs, one dry dock, and one submarine testing dock.

The CHAIRMAN. Just at that point I would like to have you put in a statement of what that program would cost if it were carried out in toto.

Secretary MEYER. If the program of the General Board were carried out in toto it would cost about $61,000,000 for the first year. My program calls for less money.

Mr. GREGG. They ask for four battleships and 16 destroyers. If the 16 destroyers are necessary for the four new ships asked for, what deficiency have we now?

Secretary MEYER. We would not want destroyers for the vessels that are in the second line.

Mr. GREGG. But in the first line?

Secretary MEYER. We consider that we have 20 in the first line, and that should be 80 destroyers.

Mr. GREGG. What have we?

Secretary MEYER. We had 40 at the mobilization.

Mr. HOBSON. Some of them are pretty old?

Secretary MEYER. Yes, sir; that is, destroyers and torpedo boats. Mr. GREGG. They are recommending destroyers to supply the battleships, but what is the program as to supplying the past deficiency? Secretary MEYER. They are not laying that out.

Mr. GREGG. But it has to be homogeneous in the past as well as in the future.

Secretary MEYER. You can not change the past, but you can take care of the future.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Secretary, I would like to have you put into the hearings your own recommendations as to the building program from a practical standpoint, not the ethical one as put down by the General Board. What do you recommend in addition to the battleship program, and please state the order of preference?

Secretary MEYER. I recommend 3 battleships, 12 destroyers with their tenders, 2 transports, 1 ammunition ship, 5 submarines, with their tender, 2 gunboats and 1 supply vessel, at a total cost of approximately $36,000.000 for the first year.

Mr. GREGG. Twelve destroyers?

Secretary MEYER. Yes, sir.

Mr. Foss. Is that the order of preference?
Secretary MEYER. Yes, sir.

If I may, there are one or two matters which I would like to call to your attention.

The reservation of coal and oil lands I spoke of.

As to the director of navy yards, he assists in coordinating the work; and if they are doing work in certain yards cheaper, he notifies the other yards. One of the chief objects of a director of navy yards is to have a central office where the commandants can get direct information as to the general results.

Pearl Harbor I touched on the other day.

As to the Panama Canal Commission, through my efforts I got Col. Goethals to recommend to the congressional committee that went down there, the building of a couple of colliers on naval lines which can be used in time of peace and the Navy can use in time of war. We gave him also figures which I personally reported to the committee a year ago, showing that if they built the colliers on naval lines the commission could transport its coal and go back instantly with water ballast, and in that way they could transport their coal cheaper than any commercial organization could transport it.

Mr. Foss. If they did not have any return cargo?

Secretary MEYER. If they go back with water there is no delay in collecting the cargo or unloading it, and they could make one more trip a year, and I demonstrated by actual figures that it would be an economy. They would have eventually 20 colliers.

The CHAIRMAN. Last year when a similar matter was up I went to see Mr. Adamson, chairman of that committee, and talked along the same lines and asked him to take up the matter of constructing the colliers on the lines suggested, so that they could be used for naval