US Marine Corps - The Black Vault

70 Amphibians Came To Conquer
operating in the Atlantic, and the Control Force and the Fleet Base Force
operating in both oceans.
The Battle Fleet contained battleships, destroyers and aircraft squadrons,
while the Scouting Fleet had fewer and older battleships, a lesser number
of destroyers, but all the new light cruisers. The Control Force had the old
cruisers, some destroyers, part of the mine squadrons, and the submarines.
The Fleet Base Force had mine squadrons, a few destroyers and the logistic
support ships of the Train.
According to the Fleet’s Annual Report:
The amount of time allotted to the year’s work (of the Fleet) is approximately
as follows:
Tactical Exercises 10 weeks
Cruising . 10 weeks
Gunnery Exercises ..,..,.. 12 weeks
Upkeep and Overhaul,..,. 18 weeks
Holidays . 2 weeks
Possibly unforeseen calls will encroach upon the overhaul time. This is the
common tendency.2T
Much has been said in conference and in correspondence concerning the insta-
bility of officer personnel. . . . Such a condition is inevitable.’s
The 1924–1925 year was the second year of Visual Signaling Competition
and of Radio Competition between ships of the Fleet. These competitions
added to the previously long existing gunnery and engineering competitions,
and expanded cruising schedules meant that ship employment schedules,
in fact, were “very crowded.” This crowding led the Commander in Chief
(Admiral Robert E. Coontz) to recommend that interruptions to the training
of the Fleet “must be limited to national celebrations, and specifically to the
Fourth of July and Navy Day.”
Among the events logged by the Commander in Chief were:
a.
b.
c,
The Japanese Training Squadron of three cruisers, visited San
Francisco during the year.
Ten ships of the Fleet rendered assistance to the Army-Around-The-
World fliers.
A shift from Magdalena Bay on the Southwest Coast of Lower
California, Mexico to Lahaina Bay, in Maui, Hawaii, as a training
base for the Battle Fleet was made, on a trial basis.”
—
* CINCUS, Annual Report, 1924, para. 92
= Ibid., para. 51.
= Ibid., paras. 64, 65, 77, 79.