Why naval technology moved faster than army doctrine

The Dardanelles decision came within the first months of World War I, when armies were discovering that inherited doctrine fitted the new battlefield poorly. European study of the American Civil War gave disproportionate attention to observers from less instructive commands. Dismissive judgments about the Russian and Japanese armies separately encouraged neglect of the Russo-Japanese land war. Navies had less room to disregard changes because another fleet's new propulsion system, guns, or submarines directly affected competition at sea. Turbinia's public demonstration made turbine performance impossible to overlook. The Baltic proposal would depend on forces and weapons whose capabilities had changed substantially since earlier wars.