NEW DANGERS TO BE FACED

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 148, 18 March 1939, Page 11

NEW DANGERS TO BE FACED

Commons Debate On Navy Estimates

PACT WITH GERMANY - HELD WORTHLESS (British Official Wireless.) (Received March, 17 6.30 p.m.) RUGBY, March 16. Speaking for the Opposition in the debate following the introduction of the Navy Estimates in the House of Commons today, Mr. A. V. Alexander (Labour) expressed qualified satisfaction with the progress revealed in Mr. Shakespeare s speech. The Admiralty, he said, had taken measures for the development of the country’s naval power which would have been excellent in ordinary circumstances, but his criticism was that the National Government’s foreign policy had led Britain into a position in which the Navy had to face a series of strategical fa<;ts and strategical dangers, which it ought never have had to face and which might mean that, even with the enormous expenditure which the House was being asked to approve, its strength might not be sufficient to give the country the naval security so vital to it.

Mr. Winston Churchill (Conservative), referring to the decision to scrap one of the Royal Sovereign class in 1942 and another in 1943, said that Germany would soon have five cruisers definitely superior to anything, except battle-cruisers. These would be “super-Emdens, and in the event of war they would be capable of inflicting heavy losses on our trade. No cruiser dared come within range of the Royal Sovereign ships, which were ideal vessels for bringing in convoys from Australia, the Cape, and South America. Worthless Agreement.

Mr. A. Duff Cooper (Conservative), answering Mr. Churchill, said that there must be a limit, even to the lives of battleships. If we retained the Royal Sovereigns, Germany would have the right to begin battleship construction in 1942. Either a great disaster might happen before then or we might enter a happier period.

Continuing, Mr. Duff Cooper said he doubted the advantage of tile AngloGerman naval agreement “now that a thrice-perjured traitor and breaker of oaths is at the head of the German State. I consider that any agreement he signs is not worth the paper on which it is written. No member of the House can hold a different opinion.

“Our naval margin is small, speciallv as we no longer have the friendship of Japan. A fate even more awful than that which befell Czechoslovakia will befall Britain if we lose our naval superiority even fop the shortest period.” Lieutenant-Commander FJetcher (Labour) stressed the difficulty of covering two hemispheres with 21 capital ships. “British interests in the Far East,” be said, “have gone up in smoko because pressure at Home forbade us to send out ships. If we had to fight in two hemispheres it would be necessary to let events rip in the Far East. That will mean good-bye to the Dutch East Indies." He asked what prospect there was of the United Kingdom’s stationing a fleet at Singapore in an emergency sufficient to safeguard British interests in the eastern hemisphere. The Civil Lord of the Admiralty, Colonel J. J. Llewellyn, replying to tlie debate for the Government, said it was still true, as Sir Samuel Hoare had said two years ago, that we were building a Heel which it was hoped would, in conjunction witli the navies of the Dominions, be sufficient to protect British interests in both hemispheres.