THE OVERSEA DOMINIONS.

Auckland Star, Volume XL, Issue 160, 7 July 1909, Page 5

THE OVERSEA DOMINIONS.

GREAT OBJECT OF DEFENCE. THE HIGH ROAD OF THE SEAS. SPEECH BY MR. McKENNA. (Received 12.25 p.m.) SYDNEY, this day. The second day's proceedings of the Press Conference (writes the "Daily Telegraph's Special Correspondent) was presided over by Mr R. McKenna (First Lord' of the Admiralty), who, in hisopening remark, said: "It is only from a defensive point of view that we ever consider ourselves in relation to other nations. Our great object in the maintenance of the navy is to keep open the high road of the seas. So long as we can keep that high road open our difficulties of mutual defence, and a mutual assistance in common defence are not so great as those which years ago confronted the Government of any great European country which had the problem of local transport to encounter. Our remotest dominion is nearer the British shores to-day than the North of France was to the South of France a century ago. In dealing with local differences for the defence schemes of the various dominions, we recognise that, in the development of the naval idea in every dominion, it is essential that the mainspring should come from the dominion itself. We cannot force our strategical ideas upon you. We will assist in every way in our power, and whatever be the method by which we are asked to assist, we are sure that in the long run. out of this process of self-de-velopment, every dominion will come ultimately to the same conclusion—that the naval problem of defence is one and the same the whole world over, and that the maintenance of supremacy at sea means the maintenance of supremacy in all seas alike."'