FUTURE BRITISH NAVY

Taihape Daily Times, 15 February 1919, Page 5

FUTURE BRITISH NAVY

EMPIRE YORCE PROPOSED.

LONDON, January 29

Admiral Sir David Beatty, when receiving the freedom of Edinburgh on Saturday, announced L hat *he Grand Fleet was being dispersed. Mr. Archibald Hurd, naval expert of the Daily Telegraph, discussing the effects of this great transformation, says that a considerable proportion of the ships must be placed forthwith on a peace footing, under the nucleus crews system. With the removal of the target in northern waters, Ip. considerable \forc-e must be retained in the Channel, and an adequate squadron in the Mediterranean, but the navy must in a large measure . employed on the outer seas.

The flag must again be shown in Canada, the Pacific, China, and the Indian Ocean, and the Persian Gulf.

Whatever the Admiralty's plana,, they must fit in with the ideas of the Dominions, Avhich will certainly desire to bear a larger share in the naval defence of the Empire, as their request for Jcllicoe's advice seems to indicate.

The opportunity now offers of creating something in the nature of an Empire force—an Imperial squadron of Quee?i Elizabeths, or some such ships, for ocean-going work, each section of the Empire making an appropriate contribution of vesels, officers and men, and leaving to the Dominions the provision of localised mobile defence forces.

The most experienced statesmen of the Dominions ladmit that the problem is not insoluble, but "th? matter will need the more careful handling if the opportunity now offered is not to be lost.