AMERICA’S HUGE NAVY

Greymouth Evening Star, 2 April 1918, Page 8

AMERICA’S HUGE NAVY

BIGGEST DESTROYER FLEET IN > THE WORLD. The naval programme approved by when completed,.and it is making rapid pvogresw, will result in making the . United States Navy almost Hie fnoSt efficient and powerful hi the wbrld. Within eight months the United States will have the greatest fleet 'of torpedo boat destroyers/ in the world. These ships are now being rushed for launching in Government and private yards on both coasts. 'By next .June every, one of these vessels will be in the water ready to combat the submarine menace. The battleship programme approved li v the last Congress, under the four-year plan of construction, is being l carried out, and great Dreadnoughts are being built as rapidly as possible. By early spring- three, new naval training stations will be completed. These stations will train at one, time. 15,000 navy 'recruits. fSeveral thousand civilian seamen and officers of the fleet reserve are now being trained to take commissions in the United States Navy. AIL warrant officers in the navy can now take examinations for commissions. There is a. shortage of officers amounting to about- 3000. but these will soon be secured from the warrant officers who win commissions, and from the/best seamen in the licet reserve. CM—■■ll WHIT fiBMWWWWWMrowa