Hanson W. Baldwin, most temperate of military commentators and an Annapolis graduate himself, let go a full salvo at the Navy. It hit where it hurt: smack on the Navy's big E (for efficiency).
Baldwin's serious charge: the Bureau of Ordnance is clogged by inertia and inefficiency, specifically in the development of naval mines and torpedoes; the Navy itself countenances inefficiency in high ranks, has done nothing to rid its command of deadwood. His invidious comparison: the Army has.
Beyond mines and torpedoes, wrote Baldwin in the New York Times this week, naval shells are not all they might be. And...