Page:Heresies of Sea Power (1906).djvu/269

 considered, the bloodless victory is possibly the more economical and more scientific exercise of power.

Supposing Nelson to have joined his fleet heralded by all the usual signs of a new admiral's arrival, and supposing this to have detained the French in harbour; there would have been no Trafalgar. There would, however, have been forced and fatal inactivity on the part of the Franco-Spanish fleet at no cost of British ships and lives. An exercise of secrecy produced Trafalgar, it gave us dramatic results at a certain cost. To estimate exactly after the lapse of a hundred years whether this was a best possible is a task beyond human power, because completely accurate data are not available as to whether an indefinite blockade could have been maintained. In a general way we can surmise, but beyond surmise we can hardly go. We cannot say exactly how far the question of maintaining the blockade entered into Nelson's calculations; and so here the matter must be left, since it is only in flights of imagination that we can conceive of the ideal war in which every man is so perfect that the enemy is brought to his knees without a single battle.

Supposing secrecy, or rather, strivings after it, to be abolished, it in no way follows that ideal war will be produced. Indeed, paradoxical as it may seem, real secrecy is probably only to be found in the abolition of secrecy. For instance, it is relatively easy to conceal any particular detail when there is a general show of