Hokitika Guardian & Evening Star FRIDAY, FEB. 4th, 1921. CURTAILING ARMAMENTS.

Hokitika Guardian, 4 February 1921, Page 2

Hokitika Guardian & Evening Star FRIDAY, FEB. 4th, 1921. CURTAILING ARMAMENTS.

Tin: prospects of a naval holiday by mutual agreement between the United States, Britain, and Japan, are by no means so blight as when the project was lirst. mooted. The chief difficulty in the way is. clearly, the fact that America lias not ratified the Peace Treaty and has not joined the League of Nations. While a member of the Opposition Party in Japan has submitted a resolution within the party advocating the restriction of armaments the newspaper “Jiji Shimpo” states that it is believed that a majority of flu; party is opposed to the idea regarding it as idealistic aml impracticable. “The exisitng international situa tion,” the newspaper adds, ‘‘renders an assurance of permanent peace difficult. The failure of the United States to" join the League makes this quite evident Japan has grave responsibilities in the Far J'hist, and must complete and amplify her naval defence.” Moreover Mr Josephus Daniels, Democratic Secretary to the United States Navy, lias again stated emphatically bis opinion, that, failing America’s entry into the League, or into some similar organisation, the eon stnietion of the • American Navy must be speeded-up; and this view finds support in nil article contributed by the Republican President-elect to the “Naval Journal.” “It is the Navy,” de- ■ dares Mr Harding, ‘that guarantees us against invasion. We do not want the navy foi conquest. We would like to reduce our armaments, but so long as there is need for American national defence ,we must maintain our navy, not only in material strength, but in the moral and capacity of its officers.” ExSenator Harding would have nothing to do with the League of Nations, which would have proved a far cheaper and far surer guarantee against invasion than the American Navy can ever fie; and the difficulty in which the i United States now finds itself is the natural result of the intransigeant folly ' of himself and his fellow-Senators. Senator Borah, another Republican, speaking in the Senate last week, stated that the United States must either seek an international agreement aiming at dis- 1 armament, or construct a navy able to defend the country against any possible group of enemies; and it is very significant. that the cost ((540 million dollars—£128,000,000) of the completion of the capital ships in the present American naval programme is “prohibitive.” He added that he believed that the masses of the people of the United States, Britain, and Japan are in favour of abandoning competitive naval building. If this he true, and we fully believed that it is true, then the mass of the people Tn the United States will, surely, before long compel the Presi-dent-elect and his Senators to ratify the Pence Treaty and join the League. No greater heed need he given to the Paris cablegram which states that “The reduction of the American naval programme is considered unlikely in view of the unemployment in that country.” Manifestly, tl" "’oitey voted for naval < (instruction would, if d«;voted to peaceful purpose's, employ at least as much labour as it would if expended on battleships.* Indeed, it would obviously ho far cheaper and better to spend the money in unemployment subsidies than I bv building battleships, to commit the United States, and the nations generally, to a mad race of armaments.