obtained, as between the Japanese boats and their objective, there was none of that counter-attack which may be depended on to neutralise the operations of torpedo craft in the majority of instances. At Round Island, where torpedo craft figured both sides, the results secured were negative. In the general night attack on the Port Arthur fleet in the previous sortie, no ships were torpedoed though attacks were pressed home all night. Only at Tsushima were hits secured, and here apparently only after several attacks upon demoralised and damaged vessels.[1] Certainly the operations cannot be said to substantiate most of what the advocates of the torpedo claimed for it ere the war broke out.
Of gunnery, as of torpedo, it must be said that the war taught nothing new. Every lesson corresponded with the result of experiment or the experiences of former wars. Ships, indeed, sank more easily under gun fire at Tsushima than had been expected, but it was subsequently shown that the conditions were artificial. The Russian battleships—none of them triumphs of the ship builder's art—were overloaded and unduly submerged. Consequently the thin upper belts were in actual result their water-line belts, so that to all intents and purposes the Borodinos were no
- ↑ The statement of Admiral Nebogatoff (Fighting Ships, 1906) still further discounts the torpedo, for according to this account only ships that burned searchlights got torpedoed. All Nebogatoff's own ships — though hampered by 'quick firers' that fired one round a minute and unprotected by light craft—survived the night attack.
