GUNS AT GIBRALTAR

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 157, 21 July 1937, Page 5

GUNS AT GIBRALTAR

Telegraph— Press Assn.-

Not a Menace to Britain in Mediterranean FOREIGN ARMS INFERIOR

(By

-Copyright. )

(Reeeived 21, 8.45 a.m.) LONDON, July 20. Both Mr Winston Churchill (Con.) and Mr David Lloyd George spoke strongly in a debate in the House of Commons concerning the batteries Of tiigh-calibre guns, ailegedly supplied by Germany and mounted between Algeciras and Tarifa and at Canroque, near Gibraltar.

Mr Churchill said it was absurd to suppose that General Franco, leader of the Spanish rebel forces, could bave provided them from his meagfe resources. Were they the price he had to pay for help from this or that PowerP he asked. Mr Lloyd George descrxbed the batteries opposite Gibraltar as the most startiiiig ahd most sehsatiohal xevelation of what was in the minds of Signor Mussolini and Herr Hitler. With a hostile, Weil-armed Spain, the Mediterranean would be closed, he deciai'ed. Viscotlnt Cran bdrne, Onder-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, in a reply, ekpressed the hopa that the House would not see in every precaution takeh by General Franco a menace to Britain. It appeared probable that as Algeciras was bombarded e&rly in the civil war by SpaHish Gbvernment ships, that these guns were mounted as a defence against future bombardtoents. As for the suggestion that the guns dominated Gibraltar, ' Visbount Ci'an borne said that, whatever their purpose, the British Government had taken notice of all weapons installed in the neighbourhood, and though it was not in the public interest to give details, he could say that the only guns commanding the fortress were- inferior to the British guns that could be trained on them. Therefore they constituted no menaGe at present. Mr Lloyd George and Major O. R. Attlee, leader Of the OppOBition, pressed fOr details of the guns asking if they dohiinated the paSsage of ships. Viscount Granborne.' Yes, eertainly. These guns do fire across the Straits, but in the view of experts they do not constitute a military or naval- menace with which we cannOt dfeal.