A presidential letter advised keeping the battleship fleet together until the Panama Canal was complete. Without the canal, passage through the Strait of Magellan imposed a voyage measured in months for ships of this era. The fleet's West Coast arrival also supported a domestic campaign for congressional authorization of four more battleships, joining strategic mobility to naval appropriations politics. This passage makes the canal a force-concentration tool rather than merely a shortcut for commercial shipping.
Notable Point · 14:40-16:56
The Panama Canal and an undivided battle fleet
Roosevelt warned against splitting battleships between oceans before the Panama Canal could provide rapid strategic concentration.