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Oil on the Caribbean Shell Gas & Oil Tin Sign Buy at AllPosters.com Almost unnoticed, the conditions which underlie sea power are undergoing a revolution. The nineteenth century saw the abandonment of the wind-driven craft upon which the world had relied since the beginning of history in favor of vessels propelled by coal and steam. The twentieth century promises a change no less remarkable. Coal as fuel is rapidly yielding place to petroleum and gas-driven motors seem about to crowd out the steam engine. The change to oil as fuel for large ships is already in progress. Almost all large vessels whose routes carry them near oil fields are being fitted to use petroleum instead of coal. The change from the steam engine to the gas motor is coming more slowly. The crude-petroleum-consuming motor has only recently emerged from the experimental stage, but it seems highly probable that in a few years it will play an important part in both the merchant marines and navies of the world. The nation which controls the oil supply possesses one of the great factors upon which ocean-borne commerce will depend and about which naval policies will turn. Most fortunate of all is the nation which controls oil supplies which lie near the points where the world's great trade routes cross. In time of peace such resources will find a ready market, and in time of war they will prove possessions of greatest strategic importance. In 1915, the first two battleships of the dreadnought type, the Oklahoma and the Nevada, using oil exclusively for fuel, were added to the Navy. Fortyone of our destroyers built or building use oil fuel only. Storage facilities are being proportionately increased. Oiling stations are replacing coaling stations. In 1912 steps were taken for construction of fuel oil tanks at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii; Melville, R. I.; Norfolk, Virginia; Charleston, South Carolina; and Key West, Florida. Oil development in the Caribbean is still in its infancy. It began hardly 100 years ago, but there seems to be every reason to believe that there will develop close at hand a cheap, unexcelled fuel supply to serve the rapidly increasing commerce of the region. The importance of the control of oil as a factor in the international politics of the Caribbean can hardly be overemphasized. It may not only mean the dominance of the resources which determine the economic growth of the republics and colonies of the surrounding coasts, but it will have an important effect on the marine policies and therefore on the political influence of the countries competing for position in naval affairs. The control of oil resources is not an economic problem only, such as is presented by concessions granted for the building of lighting plants, street railways, mines, or even great railway trunk lines. Oil concessions like these, when granted to foreigners, are likely to raise questions of the extent to which the rights of foreign investors will be protected by force by their home countries. But it may be not only this vicarious and indirect interest which the foreign power will feel in defending its subjects' oil wells; every great nation, which feels that the control of oil measures its international mercantile and naval power, will be prompted to support its subjects in ways and degrees which may make our previous disputes over asphalt grants and railway concessions insignificant in comparison. Home