FUTURE CAPITAL SHIPS.

Auckland Star, Volume LVI, Issue 190, 13 August 1925, Page 10

FUTURE CAPITAL SHIPS.

RASH AND SPECULATIVE. THE NELSON AND THE RODNEY. Will the Nelson and Rodney, whirl) are shortly to take the water on the Tyne and the Mersey, prove to be the last battleships of large displacement tc be built for any Power? "It is rash to speculate on such a matter," says the "Army and Navy Gnzette," "but the indications at present certainly point in this direction. It is well to recall the circumstances under which these vessels were put in hand. The Washington Conference of 1921-2 proposed a complete ten-year naval holiday from battleship construction, but Japan stood out for the completion of her new battleship Mutsu, which gave her two post-Jutland ships of the latest design. America then insisted on completing two more, the Colorado and West Virginia, and, to maintain the status quo. Great Britain, which had stopped work on four new battleships at the start of the Conference, was authorised to build two others. Now. although the Washington Treaty is to last until the end of 193(1, or for another eleven and a-half years, the Powers are not bound by it to suspend battleship construction for so long. France and Italy have the right to resume such construction in 1927, and to lay down in that year ships which will come into service in 1930-1 to replace the Jean Bart and Dante Alighieri respectively. Much will doubtless depend upon whether they exercise this right. "Three years ago, the right to build a new battleship was offered to the French Government by. the loss of their ship, the France. They took no advantage of the clause in the Treaty which permits of the replacement of capital ships or aircraft-carriers accidentally destroyed, and tho precedent may commend itself in 1927. After all, each Power is only authorised to lay down one ship in that year, and the use of such an isolated unit would raise some awkward problems. Much better, it would seem, would be the construction instead of, say, three 10,000-ton cruisers, or six flotilla I leaders similar to the fine trio of Italian ships now visiting the Baltic. Supposing France and Italy take this view, their, action will not be without its influence on the other signatory Powers, Britain, America, and Japan, as to the decisions they will make in 1931, when they are allowed to resume battleship construction. Another Conference before that date might well confirm and consolidate what would by then have become the genera] tendency. "It is only a question of agreement between the Powers before what we now call the cruiser becomes the capital ship of the future. As Admiral Sir William Henderson has often argued, a 10.000----ton cruiser could perform all the functions of a battleship, provided that the nations had agreed that vessels of larger tonnage should not -*; built. From the standpoints of personnel and operations, there can bo no question that two or three cruisers would be preferable to one battleship. As regards the strategic aepect, too, Admiral Henderson has pointed out that Fleets should be constituted to fit the probable theatres in which they may have to act. This points to the elimination of the big ship, and the use of smaller, simpler, and more mobile '-essels. The naval lesson of the war, lie affirms, is that the construction and organisation of the Fleets was such that they could only be ueed to advantage in narrow waters. But the next move is with the politicians if a return to smaller dimensions is to be brought about, for the Powers must agree collectively before any one oi them dare take the risk which failure to include the largest and most powerful vessels in their battle squadrons would involve."