ver, that the strategist and the
technician should work independently of each other. Such a procedure
would result in the strategist demanding things the technician could
not supply, and in the technician supplying things the strategist
did not want, under a mistaken impression as to what the strategist
wanted. The fullest and most intimate understanding and co-operation
must exist between the strategist and the technician, as it must
equally between the architect and the builder of a house.

From an appreciation of such facts as these, every great Navy
Department, except that of the United States, has developed a General
Staff, which studies what should be done to prepare for passing
from a state of peace to a state of war; which informs the minister
at the head of the department what things should be done, and is
given power to provide that the various bureaus and offices shall
be able to do them when war breaks. This is the scheme which all
the navy departments, except the American, have devised, to meet
the sudden and violent shock of the outbreak of a modern war. _No
other means has yet been devised_, and no other means is even
forecasted.

The means is extremely simple in principle, but complex beyond
the reach of an ordinary imagination in detail. It consists simply
in writing down a digest of all the various things that are to be
done, dividing the task of doing them among the various bureaus
and offices that are authorized by law to do them, and then seeing
that the bureaus shall be able to do them in the time allowed.

The best way of ascertaining if the bureaus are able to do them is
to mobilize--to put into commission and send out to sea all the craft
that will be needed, fully equipped with a trained personnel and with
a well-conditioned material; and then direct the commander-in-chief
to solve a definite strategic problem--say to defend the coast
against a hypothetical enemy fleet--the solution including tactical
games by day and night.

Before attempting the solution of a strategic problem by an entire
naval force, however, it is usual to hold mobilization exercises
of a character less complete, in the same way that any course of
training begins with drills that are easy and progresses to drills
that are difficult. The simplest of all the preparative drills--if
drills they correctly can be called--is the periodical reporting,
once a month, or once a quarter, by each bureau and office, of its
state o