NEW NAVAL RACE?

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 49, 13 March 1937, Page 9

NEW NAVAL RACE?

(British Official Wirelens.l

First Lord is Not Pessimistic SOME LIMITATI0N

r ivtJGBY, March 11. Gontinuing his speech in the House of Gommons on the Naval Estimates tthe First Lord of the Admiralty (Sir eamuol Hoare) said that five new Ibattleships would be laid down during 1937, because, aa 12 of the existing 15 •were over 20 years old, they would i othetwise be in a position of serious weakness in face of naval Fowers which jhad been building new battleships for some years. The new battleships would displace about 35,000 tons and would have 14-ineh guns, and were designed for a higher speed than any existing British battleship. As to cruisers, the seven new vessels | to* be laid down this year would bring the under-age cruisers up to 53 and the ;over-age to 23. The over-age cruisers •would not be scrapped but armed with •anti-aircraft guns for escort work in the Narrow Seas. Sir Samuel Hoare 's concluding words .were devoted to the future of naval armaments. Was the world entering upon- a new r&oe in which sooner or later it would die either of exhausfcion or by self-destruction in a final catastrophe? He refused to accept a view iso fatalistie, recalling that one field in which so far it had been fOilnd possible ito reach an agreement on limltation Was the naval. There was the "Wfeshington Treaty, though it had not been renewed, the 1930 Treaty, the AngloGerman Naval Agreement, the PfOtocol on submarine warfare, and l&stly there .was every hope that the London Treaty .t>f 1936 would be accepted by a sufficient number of Fowers for Britain to ratify it. The position was that negotiations were going on with a number of other Powers with a view to bringing them Within the system of the treaty. The main effort of the British Government had been directed. to the conclusion of bilateral agreements with Germany and Soviet Russia, but sMilar negotiations had been proceeding satisfactorily with Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Poland and Turkey. As to Italy, he Waa glad to say that the Italian Government was Teady to make a valuable contribution by its. readiness to acccpt a maximum gun calibre of 14 inches for capital ships, provided the other principal naval Powers did likewiSe. He hoped, f6Cowing the Anglo-Italian Declaration relating to the Mediterranean, that Italy would accede before long to the whole Treaty. He urged the House not to underestimate the value of the 1936 Treaty, which he believed mighfc be great. It was regrettable that it embo^ied no direct quantitative limitation, but if the Treaty beeame general they might nevertheless obviate a naval in.ee. which could be qualitative as much as quantitative, and past esperience showed that the first was the more dangerous. Competition in types was more expensive and more- detrimeutal to friendly relations between nations than competition in numbers. The 1936 Treaty gave them the chance to avoid a race of new types and sizes, and he was not unhopeful of the future.