French Navy - 1900s
The declaration of M. Lockroy, former minister of marine, that the French navy was merely a costly toy, and useless for lack of fortified ports and coaling stations, led to the adoption in 1900 of a new program, of which the chief features were the building of heavy battle-ships, swift armored cruisers with a large radius of action, fleets of sea-going torpedo boats, and the fortification of various points in Algeria, Tunis, Senegal, and Indo-China; all this to be completed before 1907 at an outlay of 762,000,000 francs. When these plans were executed France's fleet would consist of 28 first-class battle-ships, 24 protected cruisers, 52 destroyers, 263 torpedo boats, and 38 submarine boats.
The new battle-ships were to be of 14,865 tons, 18 knots, and have a radius of 4000 miles; the cruisers, 12,600 tons, 22 knots, and a radius of over 12,000 miles. The ports to be fortified are among others. Bizerta, in Tunis; Dakar, in Senegal, and Saigon, in Farther India. And to bind fleet and stations closely together a system of submarine cables was projected from Oran, in Algeria, by way of Teneriffe to St. Louis, in Senegal ; from Hue, in Annam, to the neighborhood of Hong Kong; from Madagascar to Réunion; from the Gulf of Benin to French Congo.
The actual state of the French fleet in 1900, as organized in the marine districts of Cherbourg, Brest, Lorient, Rochefort, Toulon, Algeria, and Cochin-China was the following: Of armored battle-ships, there were 34, of which 15 are coast guards and 19 sea-going machines. Of these 19, 8 range from 11,268 to 12,200 tons, had a speed of 17 knots, and were provided with 4 large turret pieces;, 2 12 and 2 11-inch guns, or 4 12-inch guns. One, the Brennus, carried 3 13-inch guns. In the course of construction were the Suffcrn, 12,728 tons; the Jena, 12,052 tons, and the Henri II, of 8950 tons, all of 18 knots speed and armed with 4 turrcted 12-inch guns and batteries of 7-5-inch quick-fire guns. The other 10 sea-going battle-ships had 110 protected guns and fell below 16 knots speeds.
Of cruisers there were 6 armored vessels, ranging from 5000 to 6000 tons, from 18 to 20 knots in speed, provided with 2 7.7-inch guns and batteries of 6.5-inch and 5.5-inch guns. In building there were the Jeanne d'Arc, of 11,270 tons; 2 armored cruisers, of 14.138 tons and 23 knots; 8 armored cruisers, of 8000 to 9000 tons and 21 knots, and 3 of 7500 tons.
In 1900 there were to be started 2 cruisers, of 12,416 tons and 21 knots. Of 35 unprotected cruisers, 3 were of the first class, having a speed of 23 knots; 16 of the first, second, and third classes, with a speed of 18 to 20 knots, and 16 of the third class, running from 19 to 20 knots. Last came 20 torpedo-boat destroyers and 222 torpedo and submarine boats. The torpedo-boat fleet was a favorite with the French, who depend on it to protect their coasts, and see in it a possible means of effecting the long-delayed invasion of England.
Nothing could be accomplished without a diplomacy, an army, and, to begin with, a navy of the first rank; and, in order to use these instruments properly, a great deal of the determination, unity, and self-sacrifice which caused the success of the Japanese in 1905 was necessary. Such a combination, the critics of the Republic insisted, was impossible in a Democracy, but was almost easy under a Monarch. Had not the German Emperor created in a few years a navy second only to one in the world? It was certain that the Republican Parliaments, unsupported by the public spirit and poorly guided by merely nominal Governments, were unequal to the task set for them. Exclusively attentive to their divisions - to what Jules Ferry contemptuously called their pot au feu - they let well-meaning but incompetent Ministers send the French Navy to rack and ruin. So while they accepted a Colonial policy leading evidently to a Colonial Empire, they suffered the only instrument likely to make a Colonial Empire of any use, to be broken in their own hands.
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