BRITAIN'S PERIL

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 3, Issue 661, 13 October 1933, Page 3

BRITAIN'S PERIL

CRUISER SHORTAGE MORE SHIPS REQUIRED . TO PROTECT SEA " LANES. FALSE ECONOMY. The laying-down at Devonport Dockyard of the lceel-plate of the new j cruiser Apollo, a belated legacy of j the 1932 programme, once more • brings to the fore the disgraceful and | dangerous manner in which the cruis- , er requirements of ths Navy have ! been neglected and the way in which! the' building of the few ships approved for rcplacement of obsolete units has been deferred from year to year, says the naval correspondent of the London Morning Post. The First Lord of the Admiralty, Sir Bolton Eyres-MJonsell, is expected to confront the Cabinet with a further naval building proigramme early in' November. This .will not be a moment too soon. There are at present 53 cruisers on the active list of the Royal Navy, including the naval forces of the Dominions. This cruiser strength int cludes two ships built before the war and one completed :in 1914. Altogether no fewer than 23 of the 53' are out of date, so that the cruiser strength. of the entire British Empire is virtually composed of only 30 ships. That the extreme gravity of the ! situation is apparent to som«, tft ' least, of those in hiigh places has been .' evidenced by the speech of the First' Lord of the Admiralty at Barrow-iii^' Furness, and also by Lord JellieoeV speech at Portsmouth when he perZ formed the opening ceremony of NavZ: Week.

1 Lord J/eillicoe's Warning. Lord Jellicoe issued his warning fri* • no uncertain words, pointing out that during the war we did not have sufficient cruistrs and destroj'ers to meet all requirements. We then had over i 100 cruisers and 350 destroyers, , whereas we now have about 50 cruis- ' ers and 150 destroyers. Overseas trade is the life-blood of the British lEmpire. The arteries through which( this trade runs cover i over 80,000 miles of ocran trade j routes. How can we protect them with 1 our present cruiser strength ? ! To begin with, out of our strength of 53 cruisers, 18 at least would be requircd in war to operate with the battle fleet, since it is unthinkable from a strategical and taetical point of view that any battle fleet could even attempt to operate without at least thrce attached cruiser squadrons. Two more cruisers would be required to work with the fleet destroyer flotillas. Therefore, out of our strength of 53 cruisers, there would be only 33 left for the protection of ■trade. Thus each cruiser would have to protect nearly 2500 miles of trade routes — aii impossibility if unlocated raiders were anywhere on the high seas. Moreover, on any day there are over 2000 sh'ps of over .2500 tons displacement carrying our trade upon the seas. Therefore, every cruiser would have to be responsible for at least 70 ships.

The above takes no account of cruisers having to be in dock for periodie refits or through. dainage damage sustained, in action. It also leaves all our colonies and Dominions utterly uriprotected from raids or invasion.. There is anoth'er point to be considered. At present we are ibound by the London Na.yy- Treaty, although our naval tonnage is still 300,000 tons below. that allowed to us . .by that agreements The London Naval Treaty falls due for revision in 1936 — -about the time when ships laid down now would be ready to take their places on the active list. The opinion is held in ma w quarters that the London agreement will not he renewed, and will be allowed to lapse. Certainly there are ind'ica,£ions that this will be the case. The IJnited States have just appropriated ,£47,000,000 to he spread over three .years, for the construction of 32 ships ,;for her navy. Japan has instituted -ta new building programme for 33 ■3-ships costing £31,000,000 France, u#ecording to the latest returns, has on c|he stocks of 45 warships, while Italy ,-has 37 men-lof-war building. ;L Great Britain has, on the other .'hand, three cruisers of the 1930 pro•gramme nearing completion. Also ■ibuild'ing are 19 ships of the 1931 programme and 19 of the 1932 program'ime, a total of 41 ships. Not one of .these vessels can be regarded as n^w construction to augment our present puny strength, since every one of them is earmarked to replace some long wotn-out unit which will immediately be scrapped. The 1933 programme, comprising cruisers, one flotilla leadei*, and eight destroyers, three submarines, and five sloops, has not yet been started and will not be started until next year.

Cheap Insurance R'egarding the cost to the nation, Sir Bolton Eyres Monsell put very clearly when he likencd the Navy to the insurance policy of the Empire. In 1925 the valu'e of ou roverseas trade was £2,000,000,000, while the cost of the Navy was £50,000,000. This works out as an insurance ' premium of 2i per cent., a very low figure when one considers the risks that are covered. It is worth noting in this connection that the cost of the .Navy is not a disbursement on the part of the eountry. A very ' considerable portion of the funds appropriated under Navy Estimates remains in this eountry and serves to encourage trad. . Moreover, unemployment is alleviated. That America sees this point of view is shown by the faet that her present naval building proposals were put forward, not to inerease the strength of the Navy, but to deal with the uneiPployment problem. The Navy certainly is our insurance, not only-of iife, but of our daily bread and all the little "extras ' which make life worth living. Any business eoncern in the realm of insurance would demand a very high' premium for the risks we run through idealistic politicians' "gesturing" away even the small remnants of security which we still possess. The other two cruisers of this programme are being built by contract, the Galatea, by Scott's Shipbuilding Company, Ltd. Greenock, and the Phaeton, by Sv/an_ Hunter and Wigham Richardson, Ltd., pf Wallsend. The contract for the machinery of the Apollo has been placed with Messrs. Beardmore, of Dalmuir.