The original Jeune École concept retained a small battle fleet while using torpedo boats and rams to defend the coast and cruisers to attack commerce. More radical advocates removed the battle fleet and reduced the cruiser requirement as well. Their plan assumed an opponent would bring its most valuable ships into prepared torpedo waters and suffer decisive losses there. The doctrine's appeal as an affordable route to sea power therefore rested on favorable enemy behavior and left it vulnerable to countermeasures. Keeping a credible battle fleet could have given the opponent a reason to approach, whereas an increasingly obsolete fleet weakened that part of the strategy.
Chapter · 16:09-24:37
The Jeune École made torpedo boats a fleet strategy
French naval thinkers proposed torpedo-boat coastal defense and cruiser commerce warfare, but increasingly assumed the enemy would cooperate with the plan.