Page:Victory at Sea - William Sowden Sims and Burton J. Hendrick.djvu/270

252 demonstrated this fact and the more energetically we prosecuted every form of opposition, the earlier would the enemy's general moral break down and victory be assured. In war, where human lives as well as national interests are at stake, no thought whatever can be given to expense. It is impossible to place a value on human life. Therefore, on November 2, 1917, the so-called "Northern Barrage" project was officially adopted by both the American and the British Governments. When I say that the proposed minefield was as long as the distance from Washington to New York, some idea of its magnitude may be obtained. Nothing like it had ever been attempted before. The combined operations involved a mass of detail which the lay mind can hardly comprehend. The cost—$40,000,000—is perhaps not an astonishing figure in the statistics of this war, but it gives some conception of the size of the undertaking. During the two years preceding the war Captain Reginald R. Belknap commanded the mine-laying squadron of the Atlantic fleet. Although his force was small, consisting principally of two antiquated warships, the Baltimore and the San Francisco, Captain Belknap had performed his duties conscientiously and ably, and his little squadron therefore gave us an excellent foundation on which to build. Before the European War the business of mine-laying had been unpopular in the American navy as well as in the British ; such an occupation, as Sir Eric Geddes once said, had been regarded as something like that of "rat catching"; as hostilities went on, however, and the mine developed great value as an anti-submarine weapon, this branch of the service began to receive more respectful attention. Captain Belknap's work not only provided the nucleus out of which the great American mine force was developed, but he was chiefly responsible for organizing this force. The "active front" of our mine-laying squadron was found in the North Sea; but the sources of supply lay in a dozen shipyards and several hundred manufacturing plants in the United States.