Animal Weapons by Douglas J. Emlen

Author:Douglas J. Emlen
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781429947398
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.

Submarines were the ultimate “sneaks” in naval warfare. Small and invisible, they could sink even the largest of battleships.

By 1914, it was clear even to the British that despite their grandeur, battleships were not going to prove decisive in battles. They’d been designed to fight other battleships, but such engagements almost never materialized and, as deterrents, they had become obsolete.44 Although battleships remained a part of naval fleets for many years afterward, their prestigious role as monarch of the seas was over, and the few that remained in service ended up supporting a newer and better weapon, the aircraft carrier.45

In the end, the fate of all weapons comes back to benefits and costs. Early in arms races the payoffs for big weapons may soar. But circumstances change. Costs climb and cheaters invade, gouging profits until big weapons reach a point that’s unsustainable: the rewards no longer justify the expense. From that point forward, they’re just a liability.

* * *

The sunset was beautiful, as it nearly always was on Barro Colorado Island. Colorful parrots squawked as they converged from all directions, piling into a communal roosting tree at the edge of the water. A keel-billed toucan crossed the clearing in front of us with a soft whoosh. It was February 1992. I’d completed my stint in the Panama forest and was preparing to return to normal life as a graduate student. All the beetles were measured; the ant farms disassembled; and thousands of plastic tubes sat boxed and secure in deep storage. My lab was clean and my bags nearly packed. For almost two years I’d lived and worked at the Smithsonian research station on BCI, hanging with a crowd of biologists all working diligently to understand the details of life. Now it was time to go home.

Several of us relaxed on a porch overlooking the canal, beads of precipitation dripping from our ice-cold bottles of beer. Big ships were a regular sight, as boats traversed from the Atlantic to the Pacific or vice versa. Most were boring box boats, cargo carriers stacked to the brim with metal crates. Every now and then a cruise ship would appear. But the most exciting by far were the warships. This evening an entire fleet of the U.S. Navy glided quietly by—destroyers, cruisers, and, best of all, a battleship—a slate-gray monstrosity, awe-inspiring with its gigantic guns, bristling with antennae, radar, and satellite dishes. U.S. battleships were the largest vessels able to fit into the canal, we were told. At almost nine hundred feet long and just over one hundred feet wide, Iowa-class battleships had only eleven inches to spare when they squeezed into the locks.

I’ll remember that night for the rest of my life, because I woke to a shattering explosion. In a flash of blinding light I was thrown six feet from my bed, hitting the wall and then crumpling to the floor. I sat there, shaken and aching in the sudden darkness, sure we were at war; my first thoughts were of the battleship.

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