THE MAN BEHIND THE GUN.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXI, Issue XV, 8 October 1898, Page 457

THE MAN BEHIND THE GUN.

ONE THING NEEDFUL IN A SEA FIGHT. The naval battle of Santiago has left behind it one great lesson. This lesson (says the ‘Spectator’) is that in naval war what really matters is not the armour plating, the build of the ship,

or even the power of the engines, but the man behind the gun. When Captain Mahan was entertained in England at a naval dinner, the speech of the evening was admitted by all to have been made by the American Admiral. He reminded his hearers that strategy, and armour, and new types of gun, and scientific dodges, and all the rest were very good things, but in the last resort what really mattered was the man behind the gun. That was true in the

old wars, and has been proved true again, both at Manila and at Santiago.

Straight shooting is after all, what wins the battle. Of course, you had better have a gun that will fire, and fire a powerful shot at a longish range, but even if you have got it, it is perfectly useless if the men behind it are too excited or have had too little practice to be able to fire it straight, and so to hit with it. The most deadly

patent shell, fired from the newest and most expensive and most scientific of guns, is no better than an old round shot fired from a gun of Nelson’s day if it drops in the water and does not strike the enemy’s hull or deck. In other words, superiority of gun fire is now, as in the days of old, the chief thing to look for. No doubt you should, as we have said, give your men as good a gun to fire with as possible, but teach their officers and them to rely, not upon the

ship’s armour, or the range, of her guns, or the weight of the metal discharged, or the speed of the engines, but upon the power, if need be, to make the enemy’s hull look like a porous plaster. Look at the heroic fight made by the little Gloucester by the way, the people of the old city should send a greeting and a silk flag to the little ship that has done their name such credit. What gave the Gloucester her victory, and also allowed her to escape, was her gun fire. The ‘destroyers’ she disabled, let alone the Spanish cruisers, could have sunk her easily could they have hit her, but they failed to do so, partly because of their own essential bad marksmanship, and partly also because a man who is peppering you from a revolver is always hard to hit.

Being shot at with great accuracy is apt to destroy one’s aim. That our own sailors are very good marksmen already we do not doubt, nor do we doubt that their practice would be better, rather than worse, in an actual engagement. Still, we hope that, the Santiago fight will make the Admiralty give still more encouragement to the practice of gun fire. Captains should be made to feel that one of the chief things expected from them is a record of successful shooting, while the really able gunners should be marked out for special promotion and special privileges. Good tiring should, in fact, be treated as an essential.