NAVY

 Of the thirteen American frigates built during the Revolution, seven were captured and taken into the Royal Navy, and another four were destroyed to prevent their falling into enemy hands….

…Robert Morris said there was no use keeping a navy afloat if the American people were unwilling to bear the financial burden. “Until Revenues for the Purpose can be obtained it is but vain to talk of Navy or Army or anything else….Every good American must wish to see the United States possessed of a powerful fleet, but perhaps the best way to obtain one is to make no Effort for the Purpose till the People are taught by their Feelings to call for and require it. They will now give money for Nothing.”

Ian W. Toll, Six Frigates: The Epic History of the Founding of the U.S. Navy (18-19). W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.

=================

ON JUNE 6, 1944, AS ALLIED TROOPS STORMED THE BEACHES OF northern France, President Roosevelt offered a simple prayer over the radio: “Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our Nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity. . . . With Thy blessing, we shall prevail over the unholy force of our enemy.”

The president knew, but could not yet disclose, that another great amphibious flotilla was underway in the Pacific. If not for the invasion of northern France (OVERLORD), the Pacific operation (FORAGER) would have surpassed all previous amphibious landings in scale and sophistication. That two such colossal assaults could be launched against fortified enemy shores, in the same month and at opposite ends of the Eurasian landmass, was a supreme demonstration of American military-industrial hegemony. The force that sailed against the Marianas included more than 600 ships carrying more than 300,000 men. Admiral Marc Mitscher’s Task Force 58 now included fifteen (fleet) aircraft carriers divided into four task groups. Task Force 51, the Joint Expeditionary Force, carried 127,000 amphibious assault troops, including the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Marine Divisions and the army’s 27th Infantry Division. 

Records enumerated 40,000 discrete categories of supplies and munitions in the holds of the transports. These had been combat-loaded so that they could be removed and transferred to the beachhead quickly and in exactly the quantities requested by the troops ashore. For every one marine or soldier in the landing force, the transport fleet carried more than a ton of supplies and equipment. A single supply ship brought rations to feed 90,000 men for a month. Mitscher’s task force carried eight million gallons of aviation fuel, and would burn more than four million barrels of bunker oil during the operation. 

An F6F pilot, flying above Task Force 58 during the five-day passage from Eniwetok to Saipan, was impressed by the sight of the fleet as it turned into the wind to launch aircraft. Carriers, battleships, cruisers, and destroyers turned together and steadied on the same course. “The wakes from all of those ships were perfectly symmetrical with each other, like a perfect corps de ballet, but some of these ships weighed thirty-five thousand tons. I looked down on this power and wondered what kind of fools these Japanese were. They had made one of the greatest miscalculations of all time, and boy, were they going to pay a price.”

Ian W. Toll, The Conquering Tide: War in the Pacific Islands, 1942-1944 (Vol. 2) (The Pacific War Trilogy): War in the Pacific Islands, 1942–1944 (457-458). W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.