FLEETS IN PACIFIC.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 56, Issue 123, 6 March 1936, Page 6

FLEETS IN PACIFIC.

AN AMERICAN SUGGESTION. “REMINDER” TO JAPAN. (United Press Association—Copyright.) LONDON, March 5. The correspondent of the Sun-Herald Service understands there is a distinct possibility of units of the British Fleet being stationed in Australia and New Zealand as part of the policy of increasing the Empire’s nayal forces in Australia and New Zealand, because the Commonwealth lias its own navy of three cruisers, five destroyers, a sloop, and an aircraft-carrier, and New Zealand ha 3 two cruisers and a sloop. Most of the British ships would probably be distributed on the China station, at Singapore and Ceylon. The proposal may be said to be still in the discussion stage, after conversations which Mr Norman Davis (United States delegate to the Nayal Conference) initiated with the British delegates, after which the Dominions’ representatives were consulted. According to the “Sun-Herald’s” informant, the Americans desire a gentlemen’s agreement on naval parity between Britain and the United States. The Americans suggested that the British and United States fleets in the Pacific should be strengthened as a “collective security” reminder to Japan. . Mr Davis is reported to have intimated the willingness of the United States to transfer more ships to the Pacific if Britain would do likewise.