The torpedo's giant-killer promise

The torpedo enters the story as naval warfare's classic David-and-Goliath weapon: a small platform might put a damaging hole below a much larger ship's waterline. That promise appealed especially to states hoping that one new system could overturn an established naval and industrial advantage. Earlier claims for explosive shells had prompted armour and ironclad construction because opponents adapted instead of standing still. Torpedoes still had practical limits in range, accuracy, and platform survivability that grand claims often ignored. A government spending public money could not safely abandon proven forces for an untested alternative, however revolutionary it appeared. Procurement and tactics therefore required the same judgment: balance a plausible new capability against systems that already worked.