The General Board, whose main concern was the integrated operation of the United States battle fleet, pushed for the design to provide more scouting capabilities for fleet operations. But the high cost of the design—$1,900,000 for hull and machinery vs. $790,000 for the ships—and the lack of operating experience with the —the first of the "thousand tonners" (destroyers exceeding displacement) which were just beginning to be launched—caused C&R to resist the much larger design. The Chief Constructor of the Navy, the head of C&R, pointed out that the British had not repeated the "Swift" design in the five years since her introduction, and noted that "a destroyer that gets too large loses many of the desirable features of the type".