armour to batteries when foreign officers were visiting on board. This was actually done on board the Rossia when she was a comparatively new ship. No civilian Russian ever took interest in the Navy—to have done so even in a general way would almost have risked his liberty. The Navy was a secret machine; and the war with Japan very clearly indicated that secrecy had been a splendid cloak for incompetence.
Other instances could be cited, but these suffice. The trend of official ideas everywhere is to 'secrecy,' and the advocates of this particular panacea invariably cast their eyes upon the Press as the chief obstacle between them and their desires.
At frequently recurring intervals, notably in such cases as that of a paper[1] by Lord Ellenborough at the Royal United Service Institution, on the possibility of our fleets and harbours being surprised, and the subsequent discussion on it, very great prominence is given to the subject of the Navy and the Press. At the lecture in question speaker after speaker devoted his attention to the probability of the enemy being assisted unintentionally by learning in newspapers of projected movements. This opinion, sometimes veiled, was in other cases openly enunciated, and a wealth of compliment passed upon the Japanese press laws. Some law to muzzle the British press was advocated, as it has been advocated elsewhere.
The case for it may be briefly put as follows.
- ↑ Journal of the Royal United Service Institution, July 1905.
