NAVAL DEFENCE

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 32, 6 August 1936, Page 11

NAVAL DEFENCE

NO MOVE IN CANADA

SUBJECT POLITICALLY DEAD

(From "The Post's" Representative.)

. , t * . VANCOUVER, July 15. Canada, aione. among the .British countries, took no action in regard to naval defence during the 1936 session of Parliament; The subject was not even debated, although cabled dispatches told.of increased appropriations for naval defence being made in the Motherland,' Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. It was believed that'" Mr.- ■Bennett,. : the Conservative Leader, would initiate'" a discussion, aimed at Canada taking a greater share in Empire defence, but neither he nor the' Prime Minister,' Mr. Mackenzie King, took any action that would instruct the people oh the growing seriousness of the problem. S The defence of Canada was referred to in Congress at Washington, during the debate on the. largest peace-time armament votes in the history of the United States. A New York representative said that the size of the vote insured Canada, against' attack by a foreign Power. A member .of the House of .Copimons at Ottawa asked the Prime Minister whether his attention had been drawn to the suggestion that Canada was openly depending on the United States for defence. :., The Prime Minister avoided discussion of the question; no further reference to the implied insult was made during the sitting of Parliament. In the, past ten years.there has been, little reference in. Parliament to Empire, defence.. Successive Govern-: ments avoid reopening the question, .although the relative cost of defence in the United Kingdom and other parts of the Empire shows how smalt is Canada's contribution. At present the naval unit in Canadian waters comprises two' destroyers tin the Atlantic coast and two on the , Pacific coast. Their base is the West Indies, headquarters of the naval defences of British possessions in the northern half of the Western Hemisphere. THE MONROE DOCTRINE. As far. back as 1909, four'1 years after the establishment , of the Australian Navy, Canada offered to create a naval force to operate in the-Atlantic and the Pacific, and reaffirmed its obligations in connection with the dockyards of Halifax and Equimalt. In tW following year an Act was passed, providing for a building programme. The principle was laid down that the fleet should be under the absolute control of the Dominion, but. at the. disposal of the Crown in an emergency.' The opinion was then expressed that Can-r ada was doing too little, that-it .was setting up a claim to remain neutral when Great Britain was at war, that steps were* being taken to involve Canada in foreign wars, in which it had no interest. Sir Wilfrid Laurier clearly stated the position: whether . Canada liked it or not, Canada was necessarily in a state of war when Great Britain was at war. But he was careful to state that Canada did not surrender the right to decide whether it would take part in war. ' When Laurier was defeated/in 1911, his successor, Mr. (now Sir Robert) Borden, visited England, and undertook to vote funds for a building programme of the first strength, to be placed at the' disposal of the Admiralty, but capable of being transferred, to the Dominion if it were decided to create a Canadian Navy. The Senate at Ottawa rejected the proposals on a strict party vote.' Throughout 'the Great War, and subsequently, especially during the discussions that led to the passing of the Statute of. Westminster, 1926, the British Government was careful not to use any influence that-would seek'to change public; opinion in Canada in regard to naval de-fence,-which is generally attributed to a sense of national consciousness, the growth of the youth movement, and, as a Liberal M.P. openly stated in the House of Commons recently, the knowledge that, to all practical purposes, Canada is protected from attack by the Monroe Doctrine and the might of the American Navy. There does not seem now, as hitherto, any likelihood that the question of increasing the naval defences of Canada ■ will be brought into the arena of public discussion;.