was a particular problem. Guns could be replaced by better ones, but it was entirely impractical to re-engine (and re-boiler) a ship in order to maintain her speed relative to more modern ships. The speed issue particularly affected cruisers.
Battleships did not grow very much over the decade following the Naval Defence Act, but cruisers did. Once battleships also began to grow the Royal Navy felt increasing financial pressure. Until 1909 there was, moreover, no corresponding change in British finances to relax that pressure. Admiral Sir John (‘Jacky’) Fisher was appointed First Sea Lord in 1904 specifically to solve the problem. In the Mediterranean he had shown that he could prevail over the French and the Russians with limited forces, relying on fast striking forces directed by intelligence rather than on the blocking concepts of the past. In the Admiralty Fisher sought to cut costs by ending the focal area cruiser strategy, substituting a limited number of large fast cruisers working with smaller ones. Fisher also sought deep cuts in the smaller deployed ships which were used mainly to police the Empire and to deal with peacetime threats to shipping, such as pirates. He was certainly aware that these roles mattered, but he also probably felt that they should have been paid for out of the Foreign Office budget.
Fisher’s savings on cruisers made capital ships the single largest item in the British naval budget. They followed the same trajectory as the cruisers. Successive classes grew larger and much more expensive, so that by 1913 the Royal Navy again faced crisis, despite changes in its financing. The attempts to resolve this problem are beyond the scope of this book.
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