CHAPTER II

THE UNITED STATES NAVY 1917-1921

            Between 1917 and 1921 naval aviation went from an experimental technology to an important component of the United States Navy.  The United States’ entry into World War I provided the impetus for increased interest in aviation and allowed the Navy to secure from Congress additional funding for the new technology.  Wartime experience revealed some of the tremendous potential in aviation but also exposed many of the glaring weaknesses within the Navy’s bureaucracy and the American aircraft industry.

            At war’s end, the Navy conducted an internal review to assess the administration and performance of its aviation units and to determine the best way to integrate aviation into its operations.  The limited role of naval aviation in the war, mainly in antisubmarine warfare, precluded comprehensive conclusions and forced the Navy to return to an ongoing program of experimentation.  This experimentation focused both on adapting aviation for use with the fleet and on a shift from flying boats to wheeled planes for use on aircraft carriers and other vessels.

Organizationally, three internal and one external choice faced the Navy.  Internally, the Navy could attempt to modify the existing system of divided control, create the authorized Navy Flying Corps, or establish a separate aviation bureau.  Externally, agitation was growing for an independent air force, an idea the Navy found completely unacceptable.  Of the internal alternatives, the existing system had proved incapable of handling wartime pressure, and senior officers in the Navy still rejected the Navy Flying Corps;  so the service slowly turned to the idea of an independent bureau.

            When the United States entered World War I on 6 April 1917 it is hard to imagine the Navy any more unprepared in its development of aviation.  The service, including the Marine Corps, possessed a mere fifty-four planes, all of them obsolete or suitable only for training.  Forty-eight officers and two hundred thirty-nine enlisted men made up the aviation section, with only a single base, Pensacola, supporting aviation.  Authority for aviation remained divided among five bureaus, with no single person or entity in overall control.[1]

            Two essential tasks faced the Navy in regards to aviation, and occupied much of the its attention for the first few months of World War I.  First, the Navy had to decide how aircraft were to be used during the war.  This included identifying clearly the missions to be performed, calculating the type and number of planes required for the mission, and determining the best way to deploy those aircraft to obtain the objectives.  Once these decisions were made, the Navy faced the daunting task of procuring planes of suitable quality in sufficient quantity to meet its needs.  The American aircraft industry had expanded considerably since 1914, but still remained far too small to meet the increased demands of both the Army and the Navy, to say nothing of allied governments which still wanted to purchase practically any aircraft that were available.

            The Navy based its prewar doctrine on the Mahanian principle of the decisive battle, as did the Royal Navy, in which the Navy would seek out and destroy the enemy’s main battle fleet in order to secure command of the sea.  Conditions in World War I, however, did not permit such a strategy.  Following the indecisive Battle of Jutland, in May 1916, the German High Seas Fleet and the Royal Navy remained vigilant across the North Sea, but did not engage each other.  German submarines now presented the main threat to command of the sea and hunting them down was a task better suited to small ships and airplanes rather than the Navy’s mighty battleships.[2]

            French and British naval officers arrived at Hampton Roads, Virginia, on 10 April 1917 to meet with American officials.  Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels lead the American delegation with Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Chief of Naval Operations William S. Benson, and members of the Navy’s General Board also present.  The British made three requests.  First, they wanted the United States to establish a South Atlantic Squadron and assume responsibility for protecting that area from enemy commerce raiders.  Second, the Royal Navy wanted the United States to increase its presence in the Pacific.  Both of these moves were intended to free up British ships for use with the Home Fleet.  Finally, the British asked the Navy to dispatch destroyers to Europe to patrol the western approaches to Ireland and operate with the Royal Navy.[3]

            Benson and the Navy were unwilling to meet most of these requests.  Senior naval officers were secretly concerned about a British defeat exposing the United States’ coast or the Caribbean to the German fleet and wanted to keep a strong force to protect those areas.  To this extent they insisted on maintaining not only the battle fleet but also keeping two destroyers per battleship with the fleet to protect it from the submarine menace.  After the war, Rear Admiral William S. Sims alleged another reason for the Navy’s reluctance.  According to him, when he was dispatched to Europe to take command of American naval forces there, CNO Benson told him “Don’t let the British pull the wool over your eyes.  It is none of our business pulling their chestnuts out of the fire.  We would as soon fight the British as the Germans.”[4]

            Benson vigorously denied the comment but for whatever reason the Navy refrained from making an immediate, major commitment of the sort sought by the British.  Instead the Navy dispatched six destroyers and other small craft for anti-submarine operations and to raise morale.  The Navy reluctantly stopped construction on battleships and instead focused on the production of destroyers and other antisubmarine weapons.  Daniels wrote in his diary “O for more destroyers!  I wish we could trade the money in dreadnaughts [sic] for destroyers already built.”  The destroyers would take time to build and equip, a cheaper and faster solution was the airplane.[5]

            With the primary role of naval aviation, anti-submarine warfare, thus determined for the immediate future, the Navy turned to the questions of types and deployment.  During the war Great Britain developed several aviation vessels capable of carrying and launching a variety of aircraft from either their decks or from the ocean.  The United States Navy possessed a small number of experimental aviation vessels, notably the North Carolina, as well, although the U.S. vessels had not been as extensively modified.  Sims forwarded a request by the British for four seaplane carriers and four seaplane tenders to operate with their fleet but two factors weighed heavily against this development[6]

First, construction of these vessels would take time, perhaps several years, and the Navy did not have sufficient experience to design or operate them without further testing.  Second, the most advanced American designs available were the large Curtiss flying boats, which were too large for deployment on ships.  While the Curtiss boats had fallen out of favor with American officers shortly before the war because of ongoing technical problems with the hull design and engines, the boats were still more advanced than any other plane in the American inventory.  According to Naval Constructor G. C. Westervelt:  “Everything in aircraft development line has had more abroad that it has had here.  In the one direction of the flying boat and its material we are abreast regarding aircraft.  Except in that one type they are very much ahead of us.”[7]  Thus, the Navy decided to focus on developing flying boats for anti-submarine operations and to deploy them from shore stations rather than ships at sea.[8]

With these conclusions arrived at, the Navy turned to the question of specific aircraft types and the numbers needed to meet the American commitment to the war.  Westervelt and Lieutenant W. G. Child presented the first estimates for the American commitment to the General Board and the Secretary of the Navy in March 1917.  Their report called for establishing bases in Great Britain, France, and the Caribbean, in addition to expanding the number of bases in the United States.  To outfit these stations, the report estimated that the Navy needed 334 seaplanes.  Based on European experiences, the report expected each plane to only last ninety days and hence the Navy would also need 1,356 replacement aircraft per year to maintain strength.  This number did not include training planes and with those included, Westervelt estimated the Navy needed to procure from 2,000 to 2,500 planes per year.[9]

            The Navy found Congress suddenly willing to provide funds for the purchase of airplanes.  The increase in aviation funding which occurred in just a few years was also staggering.  The first wartime appropriation for naval aviation exceeded all previous appropriations combined.  In many ways, Congress was attempting to overcome its former apathy by providing exceptional amounts of money.  For a complete listing of wartime Congressional appropriations rounded to the nearest dollar, see Table 1 below.

Table 1

Navy and Naval Aviation Appropriations, World War I[10]

            With the increase in funding for aviation, the Navy decided that Lieutenant Towers needed to be replaced by a higher ranking officer to give more status to the position of Officer in Charge of Aviation.  Consequently, in May 1917, the Navy assigned Captain Noble Irwin to replace Towers in the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations.  Irwin had no prior aviation experience and Towers remained as his assistant, with Irwin often deferring to Towers on aviation matters.  Towers also assumed additional duties in the Bureau of Navigation as Supervisor of the Naval Reserve Flying Corps.  Authorized under the Naval Act of 1916, the NFRC provided invaluable pilots for the Navy throughout the war.[11]

            Unprepared for this sudden change in tempo, the various bureaus assigned cognizance over aviation scrambled to expand, or create, their aviation sections.  Beginning in 1913, each bureau had received funding for aviation according to its assigned cognizance.  Due to the low level of funding, however, the bureaus had usually deferred to the head of aviation to oversee the expenditure of these funds.  With the increases in funding beginning in 1915, the Secretary of the Navy moved to hold the bureaus accountable for aviation expenditures.  Most notably, this decision forced the bureaus to assign inspectors to the aircraft factories and to take an active role in procurement.[12]

            The Bureau of Construction and Repair assigned Lieutenant Commander Jerome Hunsaker to head an expanded aviation section concerned not only with overseeing procurement but also maintenance of the growing number of planes.  Lieutenant Commander A. K. Atkins headed up the aviation desk in the Bureau of Steam Engineering, a desk divided into four sections and by war’s end staffed by forty officers, sixty clerks, and more than one hundred inspectors.  The Bureau of Ordnance created an aviation desk, its first, under Commander A. C. Stott with three sections to oversee the testing and acquisition of guns, bombs, and other items.  The Bureau of Yards and Docks also created its first aviation section, under the command of Civil Engineer Kirby Smith, to handle the expansion of aviation bases in the United States and abroad.[13]

            Prior to this period, the small number of aircraft purchased by the Navy allowed for an extremely informal system of procurement.  Captain Mark Bristol, one of Irwin’s predecessors, had overseen all purchases.  He corresponded directly with the companies and assigned individual officers to inspect the planes before delivery.  This system worked well with the experimental nature of aircraft development before the war since most of the planes were redesigned during production or following early test flights.  Companies delivered planes below specifications and weeks or even months behind schedule, leading Bristol to rewrite many of the early contracts after the plane was finally delivered.[14]

            The new wartime system proved less than satisfactory in many regards.  The companies, used to the informal system which provided a great deal of latitude, found the more stringent system confusing and restrictive.  In particular, those companies which dealt with both the Army and the Navy expressed a preference for the Army system where aviation was controlled exclusively by the Signal Corps.  Whereas the Army assigned a single inspector to each plant, the Navy could assign up to three, one each from Steam Engineering, Construction and Repair, and Ordnance.  Each inspector oversaw a different part of the plane, but no single officer inspected the whole plane.[15]

            Outside decisions now affected the Navy’s war plans.  The Council of National Defense created the Aircraft Production Board in May of 1917 to coordinate aircraft construction in order to insure that the Army and Navy did not compete for scarce resources.  Initially only advisory in nature, the board  later gained more formal power from Congress and divided up the existing aircraft companies between the two services.  The Navy received:

a part of the Standard Aircraft plant at Elizabeth, New Jersey, and the full output from the following:  Aeromarine Plane and Motor Co., Keyport, New Jersey; Boeing Airplane Co., Seattle, Washington; Burgess Co., Marblehead, Massachusetts; Canadian Aeroplanes, Ltd., Toronto, Canada;  Curtiss Engineering Corp., Garden City, New York; Gallaudet Aircraft Corp., East Greenwich, Rhode Island; L.W.F. Engineering Corp., College Point, New York;  Victor Talking Machine Co., Camden, New Jersey.

Despite the large number of companies assigned to the Navy, many of them did not have experience in producing naval aircraft.[16]

            The Navy made immediate demands of these companies, settling on several Curtiss designs and placing orders for them with all of the factories.  The Curtiss N-9 served as the Navy’s primary trainer, the first ones being ordered in 1916, with 560 built during the war.  The Curtiss HS series constituted the bulk of the Navy’s wartime acquisitions.  This single engine patrol plane was produced by almost of all of the Navy’s suppliers and more than one thousand entered service.  Curtiss also designed the largest Navy flying boat, the twin-engine H-12/H-16, which was exported to England as the America.  This plane was produced not only by the Curtiss factory, but also by the Navy’s newly built Naval Aircraft Factory(NAF) in Philadelphia.  Between the two factories, they built more than three hundred of the large flying boats.[17]

            The Navy constructed the NAF in part to meet the most glaring problem facing aviation at the beginning of the war, the nation’s lack of aircraft production capacity.  In 1914, the United States aircraft industry ranked last among the major powers with a mere one hundred eighty-six permanent employees.  The industry had expanded drastically during the war, reaching ten thousand employees by 1917, but was still far from large enough to support wartime demands.  With only twelve factories producing planes in 1917, more factories were needed before work could begin on the Navy’s contracts.  The industry completed this expansion in surprisingly little time, going from 740,000 square feet of factory space in July, 1917 to 5.3 million square feet by December.[18]

            While building the factories was a simple matter of applying the necessary resources and capital, training the workers and beginning full production took considerably more time.  Towers reported as late as February 1918 that “for the next eight months or a year the limiting factor will be the number of aircraft....”[19]  He further noted, “We will not catch up to the requirements of our stations abroad until about August.”[20]  His report proved pessimistic, however, and he was back before the General Board in July 1918 to report that production of seaplanes had reached more than 60 per week.  He now informed the Board that the industry had expanded so quickly that it would soon lack enough work to keep the factories in operation.  He obtained permission from the Board to begin placing planned contracts for fiscal year 1919.  As he explained, “The Bureau of C. & R. would be very glad to learn they could order more seaplanes, because they are in the embarrassing position of having several companies build up tremendous production facilities and then telling them to slow down.”[21]

            The significantly expanded capacity achieved by the industry did not alleviate the all Navy’s problems.  Compared to European designs, most American planes were still inferior.  When the Navy found it needed land planes for use in Europe, fighter escorts for the flying boats and light bombers for attacking German submarine bases, it turned to European designs, some produced in Europe and some manufactured here.  The planes manufactured in the United States were purchased with the assistance of the Army.  Early in the war the two services had reached an agreement that the Navy would only directly purchase seaplanes in order to avoid competition.  The agreement caused some complications for the Navy when the Army proved slow in releasing land planes for Navy use.  Captain Henry C. Mustin expressed his frustration with the system when he suggested, “Whatever that agreement is, we can get around it by calling all our machines seaplanes because they fly over the sea.”[22]

             In addition to design problems, the planes delivered to the Navy suffered from quality control problems.  The rapid expansion of both the aviation industry and the Navy’s bureaucracy led to the delivery of numerous planes that were unfit to fly.  In discussing operations using a British-designed light bomber, the de Havilland DH-4, Commander H. C. Dinger reported to the General Board that:  “All of the first DH planes from the U.S. were defective.  I think a hundred that were delivered to us were sent to the factory to be changed.”[23]  He went on to report that up to forty pounds of sand and other foreign matter had been found in the engines of planes delivered “ready to fly.”

According to Major B. L. Smith, USMC, the quality control problem resulted from the Navy’s divided system of cognizance.  He noted, “We have an inspection system, but each bureau has it’s [sic] own here.  C. & R. has its inspectors and Steam Engineering has its inspectors, but there is no one head.”[24]  He went on to report numerous difficulties with planes resulting from the separate inspections, noting in particular that on a number of occasions the engine had not been correctly attached to the body of the plane.  This particular problem evaded the Navy inspection system because, as Smith pointed out, the Bureau of Construction and Repair inspected the body of the plane while the Bureau of Steam Engineering inspected the engine but no inspector inspected the entire plane once it was fully assembled.  This problem also occurred with aircraft instruments, where again they were inspected before installation but not afterwards.[25]

            These problems continued throughout the war but did not stop naval aviation from contributing to Allied victory.  As part of the aviation effort, the Navy had deployed 1,174 officers and 18,398 enlisted men overseas.  Navy pilots flew more than 22,000 missions for a total of nearly 792,000 miles.  Missions included standard antisubmarine patrols as well as extensive bombing raids on German submarine bases along the coast.  These raids were scheduled to increase dramatically had the war continued.  Admiral William S. Sims, Commander in Chief of U.S. Naval Forces in Europe, said of naval aviation “The armistice was signed before our aviation works had got completely into working order.  Yet its accomplishments were highly creditable;  and had the war last a little longer they would have reached great proportions.”[26]  He added, “There can be no doubt but that this great force was a factor in persuading the enemy to acknowledge defeat when he did.”[27]  For a change Sims and Benson were in agreement as the CNO also commended the role naval aviation played in the United States’ war effort.[28]

            At the conclusion of the war, the General Board turned its attention from immediate concerns to development of a long term policy to insure that the problems encountered during World War I would not be repeated.  Admiral Albert G. Winterhalter, senior member of the Board during the war, summarized the Navy’s view of aviation’s past and future when he said:  “It has outgrown our former conceptions, if we look forward to 1925 we ought to have a fleet in the air for all purposes.”[29] Three periods attracted the Board’s attention:  first, the immediate post-war period through July 1919, second, the 1919-1920 fiscal year, and third, the period 1919-1925.

            To establish future policy, the Board conducted thirty-six hearings from 5 March and 23 May 1919.  In these hearings, the Board surveyed the opinions of the leading aviation experts within the Navy, such as Towers, Mustin, and Naval Constructor Jerome C. Hunsaker.  The Board also considered the opinions of other aviation experts from the United States Army and the Royal Air Force, most notably United State Army Brigadier General William Mitchell.  The General Board concluded this process by issuing a report in June 1919 with twenty recommendations for the future of naval aviation in the United States.[30]

            During the hearings, the General Board learned that the Secretary of the Navy and Congress had reduced appropriations for naval aviation.  In addition to reclaiming $97,000,000 from aviation in the Second (25 February 1919) Deficiency Act, the 1920 fiscal year appropriation was only $25,000,000.  Still considerable compared to prewar appropriations, this figure pales in comparison to the 1919 fiscal year sum of $220,000,000.  Not unexpected, this reduction in funding proved less than devastating for two reasons.  First, the Navy already planned to place more than one thousand aircraft into storage as surplus, meaning that for a number of years aircraft availability would not be a concern.  As Board member Badger pointed out:  “We have plenty of everything.”  Second, the Navy’s aircraft needs were reduced when Congress limited the Navy to only six aviation bases in the continental United States, five on the Atlantic Coast, one on the Pacific, and none overseas.[31]

            The new limited commitment and the unique nature of the naval aviation’s World War I operations convinced the General Board that experimentation rather than expansion should be the Navy’s focus.  Commander Kenneth Whiting made such a recommendation to the Board, stating:  “Our work for the next two or three or five years will be development work.”[32]  Rather than the great flying boats which had dominated naval aviation during the war, the consensus among aviation experts suggested that wheeled, or land, aircraft equipped with air flotation bags were preferable for support of the fleet.  This conclusion mirrored the Navy’s thinking before the war when Bristol and others had rejected the Curtiss boats as unsuited for fleet operations because of the difficulties in deploying the large aircraft from ships.[33]

            The Board realized that developing standardized types was preferable to the hodgepodge development which had occurred before the war.  During the hearings, the Navy reached a consensus on three types needed for fleet duty:  a fighter plane, a combination scout and spotter plane, and a combination torpedo plane and bomber.  While debate continued over specifications for these planes and the ability to combine one or more roles in a single plane, these types became standard for the Navy.  For the first time in its history, the Navy had established a clear list of the planes it needed rather than simply purchasing available planes and adopting them for naval use.[34]

            Debate also continued on the best means to deploy those planes.  Without a carrier to experiment with--though authorized in 1919 the Navy’s first carrier, the Langley, would not become operational until 1922--much of the debate was purely speculative.  The Royal Navy was the most developed in carrier aviation and much of the Navy’s planning was based on observers reports of Royal Navy operations.  The debate concluded that the Navy would probably deploy five to eight carriers carrying twenty to thirty planes each.  These carriers would be used much as cruisers were, to scout for the fleet and for launching preliminary attacks on the enemy battle line prior to the main engagement.  The experts also suggested that additional planes should be carried on battleships and cruisers and that during battles they could be launched with catapults to perform their tasks and then land on the carriers.[35]

            Obtaining these aircraft for the fleet proved more difficult than reaching a consensus on their types.  The Navy’s wartime restriction to seaplanes and flying boats left not only the Navy but also its traditional suppliers inexperienced with land planes. The wartime standardization of aircraft engine design with the Liberty engine added an additional complication to the development of aircraft for the Navy.  While the Liberty engine proved successful during the war, it was unsuited for the Navy’s current needs.  Testimony early in the war revealed that air cooled engines, either rotary or radial, were preferred for ship borne aircraft due to their lighter weight.  But with the decision to adopt the Liberty engine during the war, experimentation with air cooled engines had ceased.  Now Lt. Commander S. M. Kraus informed the General Board that both Army and Navy suppliers were at least two years away from developing a modern radial engine.[36]

            Several junior officers proposed a radical solution to the Navy’s problems with developing new aircraft.  Under the current system, as Whiting pointed out to the Board, “Each bureau is obtaining an experimental stations [sic] and experiments are all going along separately.”[37]  Whiting and the other junior officers urged the creation of a single experimental station.  All of the bureaus with cognizance over aviation would consolidate their experiments at the base under the command of an aviation officer.  These junior officers designed this base to alleviate one of the ongoing problems with aviation developments in the Navy, changes by one bureau which unexpectedly effected the designs of the other bureaus.[38]

            As a corollary to the experimental base, these same officers proposed that the Navy construct the bulk, if not all, of its airplanes at the Naval Aircraft Factory.  They anticipated that most of the immediate testing would be conducted with surplus planes already in the inventory.  Therefore, the number of planes actually being purchased would remain minimal for the foreseeable future, reducing the incentive for private enterprise to contribute significant sums of money to developing new planes.  According to supporters of the plan, using the Naval Aircraft Factor as the sole manufacturer of planes for the Navy would allow the Navy to develop the specialized types of planes it needed without relying on private industry.[39]

            As part of the general push for reducing costs and increasing efficiency that occurred after the war, some members of Congress supported such a suggestion.  They regarded the Naval Aircraft Factory as a major government investment and accused the aviation industry of profiteering during the war.  Other Congressmen noted the devastating effect that the end of the war was having on aviation (discussed in detail in Chapter 3), and expressed real concern that further cuts might permanently cripple the industry.  Captain Avery Craven, then Director of Naval Aviation, expressed his concerns over the exclusive use of the Naval Aircraft Factory.  He felt that while the factory might be sufficient for peacetime use, the past war had made clear that rapid expansion would be necessary during wartime.  If the Navy failed to support the aviation industry during peacetime then it would not have the wartime production it needed.[40]

            The Navy faced a similar decision in regards to the production of submarines.  As with aircraft, the Navy was dissatisfied with the quality of submarines constructed by  private manufacturers and possessed its own production facilities.  Unlike aircraft, however, the Navy had considerably more experience with producing ships which could be directly applied to the construction of submarines.  Little of the Navy’s experience related to aircraft production and the number of aircraft needed vastly exceeded that of submarines.[41]

            Contradicting the sound testimony received by the General Board, many suggestions also appeared which in hindsight appear far-fetched.  Lt. Commander G. deC. Chevalier, later to become the first man to land on Langley, proposed a version of the disposable fighter.  Equipped with flotation devices for the pilot and engine, these aircraft would be designed to ditch in the ocean following combat.  The Board quickly determined such a system to be prohibitively expensive and rejected the idea outright.  Lt. Commander Towers shocked the Board in 1919 when he recommended against the development of the aircraft carrier, arguing that by 1925 aircraft would be developed that were capable of hovering, and hence landing on virtually any ship.  Finally, Commander A. K. Atkins reported that the Bureau of Steam Engineering, true to its name, was developing a steam engine for airplanes.  The body of the plane contained the boiler and in place of the engines would be two turbines, each generating four hundred horsepower.[42]

            The review process concluded with a report to the Secretary of the Navy outlining twenty recommendations to guide aviation policy through 1925.  Of principle interest to procurement, the report expanded the types of aircraft required for the service with particular attention to land planes for use with the fleet and the facilities necessary to accommodate them.  The Board also recommended increasing the number of aviation bases, specifically calling for more bases on the Pacific coast and in United States possessions overseas. The report recommended that the purchase of new aircraft be kept to a minimum, with the funds instead being invested in experimental and developmental projects.  The Navy’s surplus of aircraft, and its access to Army surpluses, makes this policy understandable, but it would severely affect the newly expanded aircraft industry.[43]

            In regard to cognizance, a serious problem during the war, the General Board recommended against the creation of a separate Corps for Aviation. The Board also failed to comment on the creation of a separate bureau for aviation.  By not proposing a change in the bureaucratic structure, the General Board implicitly accepted the system of divided cognizance.[44] 

            The Board’s acceptance of the divided system of cognizance reflected the Navy’s continued desire to standardize aircraft procurement along the lines used for naval vessels.  During testimony before the Board, and Congress, officers repeatedly compared the building of aircraft and ships and suggested that a similar system was desirable and necessary.  Naval Constructor George Westervelt had reported to the Board in 1917 that “so far as organization and use are concerned, that the organization and use of aircraft are going to approach constantly closer to the organization and use of naval vessels.”[45]  After the war, the five bureaus with aviation departments had a vested interest in maintaining this system.  Each had developed an aviation section and any modification of the system threatened the bureaus’ control over these sections and the appropriations they received.[46]

            Lieutenant G. M. Brush addressed these very issues in a 1919 memo to Director of Naval Aviation Noble Irwin, submitted via the Bureau of Steam Engineering.  Brush addressed the need for reorganizing aviation cognizance but rejected calls for the separate aviation corps authorized in 1916, arguing that a separate aviation corps would divide the Navy and only serve to encourage the development of an independent air force.  Instead he recommended the creation of a separate bureau for aviation to assume the duties currently shared among five bureaus.  He argued that such a bureau could act with greater efficiency and deliver better results.  He also noted that business would appreciate being able to deal with a single contact rather than the multiple ones under the current system.[47]

Most importantly, Brush addressed the major objections to the creation of such a bureau.  He argued:

Before taking up the organization of the bureau or its advantages, a criticism is already apparent of such a step.  The question is, why should there be instituted another bureau, or, why cannot Aviation be carried on under the present bureau system.  There are two points to be brought up in connection with this question.

First, Aircraft does not bear the same relation to a battleship as a destroyer or a submarine.  The theories are entirely different, the engineering and designs bear no relation, and the manufacture, materials, and inspection are all foreign to battleship practice, but destroyers and submarines are not.  If a steel plant were going go manufacture high grade watches, this type of work would not be molded in with their engineering, shop, and sales departments.  If they did, they would fail, for the two subjects bear no relation.  But, on the other hand, if they started to build boilers instead of watches, they would combine because there is a relation.

Second, such a question might be fostered by the bureaus, being stimulated by their ambitions to keep what they already have;  and there might be some feeling that the personnel of one bureau upon combining would be given more power than the personnel of another.  But both reasons would be purely selfish and not in the interest of the betterment of the service, and should, therefore, not be allowed to enter in upon the discussion.[48]

The Bureau of Steam Engineering forwarded the memo to the Director of Naval Aviation with an endorsement rejecting Brush’s proposal.  The Bureau of Steam Engineering noted that “most of the difficulties in connection with aviation have been due to the inexperienced personnel connected with this branch of the service, a very large portion of which has never had any previous Naval experience.”[49]

            The impetus for organizational change eventually came from outside the Navy, from General Billy Mitchell and others pushing for an independent air force.  The horrors of World War I trench warfare had convinced many people, both military experts and amateur observers, that the machine gun and poison gas rendered future land warfare unfeasible.  Many of these same people concluded that warfare’s future lay in the air.  For war at sea, considerable sentiment existed which suggested that within a few years airplanes and submarines would become so effective that battleships and perhaps all surface vessels would become obsolete.  Captain J. W. W. Ashworth, of the Royal Air Force, testified before the General Board in 1918 to that very idea, declaring that surface ships could not last when threatened from the air.[50]

            Senior leaders in both the Army and the Navy opposed the creation of an independent air force.  General Mitchell, who was later court-martialed for his rash allegations, established himself as the leading proponent of an independent air force.  Mitchell allied himself with other aviation enthusiasts, notably Congressman Fiorello LaGuardia(D-NY), and took their case to Congress and the American people.  Mitchell and his supporters insisted that aviation represented not only the future of warfare but also a cheaper means of protecting the United States.  Further, they charged that leaders of both services who opposed aviation, who they described as either “ground-minded” or “battleship admirals,”  did so for selfish reasons and to the detriment of the country.[51]

            Beginning in 1919, congressmen repeatedly introduced legislation to create an independent air service of various forms, often with the support of General Mitchell.  Some of the legislation would have created a separate military service, while others would have established an executive department to oversee military and civilian aviation in the country.  More dangerous to the Navy were attempts to legally restrict the extent and role of naval aviation.  In particular were proposed amendments limiting naval aviation to aircraft serving with the fleet and not allowing any shore establishments.  Under these restrictions all training, maintenance, and operations would have to occur at sea.[52]

            Successes such as the 1919 NC-4 transatlantic flight, failed to prevent these attempts and from 1919 to 1921 the Navy focused on establishing naval aviation as an integral part of the fleet to insure naval aviation remained under its control.  According to Captain Noble Irwin, “Just at the present the urgent thing is to go ahead with the development of the use of aircraft with the fleet proper, particularly now when the move is for a united air service, and we strengthen our hand every time we can show we are using it with the fleet.”[53]  The Navy, however, remained reluctant to change the basic structure of its procurement process, but Mitchell’s pressure slowly changed that view.[54]

            A leading figure in changing the Navy’s view of a bureau of aeronautics from within, Captain William A. Moffett, became the new Director of Naval Aviation in May 1919.  Moffett, who won a Congressional Medal of Honor while commanding a cruiser at Vera Cruz, had made his reputation during the war organizing and commanding the massive Great Lakes Naval Training Station.  Congressman Frederick C. Hicks(R-NY) who had already introduced legislation to create a new bureau collaborated with Moffett.[55] 

            Hicks had first introduced such legislation in 1920, but division within the Navy kept the House Naval Affairs committee divided and the bill’s place on the calendar kept it from coming to a vote before the full Congress.  The next year, sentiment with the Navy had solidified in support of the new bureau, perhaps because incoming President Warren G. Harding publicly declared his support of an independent air service.  Allied with Moffett and the new Secretary of the Navy, Edwin Denby, Hicks reintroduced the legislation in 1921. Hicks began hearings on the bill before the Subcommittee on Aeronautics of the House Naval Affairs Committee by declaring in simple terms the bill’s intention “to create in the Navy Department an executive bureau similar in character and in functions to bureaus already established, so that we may bring into one bureau the various activities of aviation now scattered throughout the Navy Department in the other bureaus.” The subcommittee then heard from Moffett, Denby, and Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Robert E. Coontz, all of whom supported the legislation.[56]

            Leading off the Navy’s testimony, Secretary Denby carefully differentiated between a Bureau of Aeronautics and an independent air force then focused attention on the increased efficiency from a bureau, noting that

At present the activities of the air are spread out through different bureaus.  We have one division, called the Division of Aviation, but it has not the activities of aviation centralized in it.  It is highly important in my opinion, that those activities shall be centralized under one chief, of the same rank as other bureau chiefs, and that this shall have power to administer the affairs of aviation as distinct from the other branches of the service.[57]

Denby also assured Congress that the creation of an additional bureau would “not increase the cost of administration of the Navy Department;  on the contrary, it will probably considerably diminish the cost of administration by centralizing [aviation] activities under one competent head.”[58]

            Subcommittee members questioned Denby about his authority, or that of the President, to create the bureau.  Denby assured them that creating the bureau required an act of Congress without which neither he nor the President had the authority.  Members also inquired about removing aviation from the Navy completely, a move the Secretary rejected emphatically.  Several subcommittee members also expressed their objections to removing aviation from the Navy, noting that Great Britain’s experience did not give them confidence in such a move.[59]

            CNO Coontz next testified before the subcommittee.  He clearly identified his position, declaring:  “I have thought over this subject now very strongly for a year and a half and I find that the certain and sure possibility of efficiency and economy lies in having a bureau of aviation in the Navy Department, with a proper head.”[60]  He reaffirmed the Navy’s conviction that a naval aviator had to be a naval officer first, a requirement which precluded the creation of an independent air force.  He also clarified the bureau’s position within the Navy, informing subcommittee members that repair work on planes would still be conducted by the Bureau of Construction and Repair.  Likewise, the Bureau of Yards and Docks would continue to oversee aviation bases, the Bureau of Navigation would control personnel decisions, etc., in order to prevent duplication of effort.[61]

            When Moffett appeared before the subcommittee, he informed its members that his support for the bill came from observing his predecessor Captain T. T. Craven.  According to Moffett, Craven “was acting practically or was trying to act as a chief of a bureau and was trying to perform the work of the chief of a bureau without having any executive authority whatever.”[62]  Moffett reiterated the idea that an aviation bureau would increase the Navy’s efficiency, “furnishing the aviation needs of the fleet at the earliest possible moment and at the earliest possible cost....”[63]  Moffett pointed out that simply having to travel between the offices of the various bureaus in order to discuss a new plane took considerable time.[64] 

            Chairman Hicks, perhaps better understanding Congress’ desires, then directed a series of questions at Moffett to illustrate the savings from an aviation bureau.  Moffett assured the committee that the number of civilians currently employed in aviation work would be reduced and that the number of officers and men would not increase.  He also suggested that an aviation bureau would make it easier for Congress to monitor aviation expenditures since they would no longer be divided among the various bureaus.  Hicks supported this idea, pointing out that a single appropriation would be easier to control.[65]

            In further testimony, Moffett responded to committee members’ concerns over the impact of an aviation bureau.  Most members appeared concerned that the bureau’s creation would increase the Navy’s payroll by making all bureau members eligible for flight pay.  Moffett assured the committee that this was not to be the case and addressed other financial questions.  He also told the committee that the new bureau would secure more authority than previously suggested by taking on more responsibility from the other bureaus.[66]

            The House Naval Affairs Committee approved the bill unanimously, as did the Senate Naval Affairs Committee.  For parliamentary reasons, Hicks and other supporters of the bill converted the bill to an amendment to the naval appropriations bill, H. R. 4803.  Congressional debate was surprisingly light, with the only concern coming over the qualifications of the Bureau’s head and fears of increased cost from a new bureau.  Senator Robert La Follette, Progressive from Wisconsin, introduced an amendment that would have required the new Bureau chief to be a qualified pilot.  This was modified to require the chief to qualify as either a pilot or aero-observer within one year of assuming the office.  The appropriations act, with the bureau amendment, passed both house of Congress by overwhelming margins on 12 July 1921 and was signed by President Warren Harding a day later.[67]

            On 10 August 1921 acting Secretary of the Navy Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., issued General Order 65 to officially establish the Bureau of Aeronautics in the Navy.  According to the General Order, “The duties of the Bureau of Aeronautics shall comprise all that relates to designing, building, fitting out, and repairing naval and Marine Corps aircraft....”[68]  The Bureau of Aeronautics assumed the duties of the Bureau of Construction in designing, constructing, and repairing aircraft except in those cases where the part used was also used on ships.  The General Order established the same relationship between Aeronautics and the Bureau of Engineering, formerly the Bureau of Steam Engineering.  The Bureaus of Navigation and Ordnance would still supply instruments and weapons but installation would be overseen by Aeronautics.  The order concluded: 

The necessary steps shall be taken promptly by the various bureaus and offices of the Navy Department and Marine Corps affected by the terms of this order to turn over to the Bureau of Aeronautics, after consultation with the chief of that bureau, the officer, civilian, technical, clerical, and messenger personnel, together with the necessary records, equipment, and facilities now assigned for aeronautics work under their cognizance.[69]

            With the establishment of the Bureau of Aeronautics the Navy concluded its bureaucratic reorganization to accommodate aviation.  In this reorganization the Navy followed the pattern of most large organizations when adopting new technology.  The Navy first attempted to adapt the new technology to its existing bureaucratic system.  It wanted to procure planes the same way it procured ships.  Despite the failure of this system during World War I, the Navy attempted to make minimal changes in the system.  Only when outside pressure threatened the Navy’s continued control over aviation was the service willing to consider a bureaucratic change.  This change, the creation of the Bureau of Aeronautics, represented the least radical of the alternatives available to the Navy.[70] 

            Outside interests continued to pressure the Navy in regards to aviation.  The principle question became the Navy’s continued control over aviation rather than the Navy’s internal structure.  Whether the U.S. would follow the lead of Great Britain and establish an independent air force would be beyond the Navy’s direct control.  The creation of such service required an act of Congress and thus the arena for debate changed from the General Board hearings to Congress and public opinion.  During that debate the Navy would largely speak with a single voice in support of naval aviation under the Bureau of Aeronautics and in opposition to formation of an independent air force.