Salisbury's least-worst modernization choice

The act is presented as a choice among imperfect options, with foreign responses to British construction treated as inevitable. Salisbury understood that more British ships could stimulate more construction abroad. He nevertheless judged that international tension, slow French building times, and the need to accelerate modernization made further delay more dangerous. Expanding cruisers strengthened the Navy's ability to scout, watch enemies, protect commerce, and hunt or conduct surface raiding. Their constant demand resembles the repeated calls for more frigates in Napoleonic-war histories, showing why a strategy built around worldwide maritime tasks could never treat cruisers as secondary.