NAVAL DEFENCE.

Press, Volume LXII, Issue 18677, 28 April 1926, Page 8

NAVAL DEFENCE.

? ——— J>u. COULD DO MORE. NAVY LEAGUE VIEW. i The necessity lor naval defence of the •liiiupu'u was lu'fccu uy mi J. J. Douguii at just nigut. b meeting ot the uantoroury uruu'cu ox the wAvy l<eague, wiien no appeaieii ior iielp uom the uusmeuu men ot tile tiny. no saiu that uie people oi the lMupno were too much lnciuieu to apathy on iius matter. "io-aay, the,-British iNavy is at as low an eob as it ever toaj> ueen," said Mr Oougali, ''and there ts one Navy which, xrom a material jwnclpoint at any rate, is superior to our xNavy. This, of course, results, in a large measure; trom the enormous cost to Great Britain of the Great War. The effort Britain has made to throw oif her debts | is herculean, and I am sure that no other- country in the world could have done it"

New Zealand, he said, was doing a small share in the maintenance of the Navy, but she was not doing as much as she might. The Dominion was wealthier, per capita, than England, and yet she was not paying as much per head as was Great Britain. Lord Jellicoe, in a scheme for nkval maintenance, had suggested £850,000 as New Zealand's quota, whereas at the present it was merely £500,000. Popular Misapprehension. There was a good deal of misapprehension, said the speaker, on the necessity for naval defence, and a great deal of this arose from a misconception of the Washington Agreement, the League of Nations, and the Locarno Pact. The Washington Agreement merely reduced the number of battleships in a navy, and the other Powers had concentrated on light fast cruisers and destroyers. Both the U.S.A. and Japan had built a number of these vessels faster than anything Britain hadin her Navy, and the other day Japan had revealed the fact that she had secretly built four cruisers, of original design, which wqre very fast indeed. This was a significant fact. The speaker did not regard Japan as a potential enemy. She had little to gain, and a great deal to lose in a war with Great Britain. Since 1918 the following numbers of vessels had been built by the leading Naval Powers:— Battleships Great Britain 3, U.S.A. 5, Japan 2; cruisers: Great Britain 8, U.S.A. 10, Japan 17; destroyers: Great Britain 29 U.S.A.' 145, Japan 45; submarines: Great Britain 21, U.S.A. 53, Japan 49. "It is just as necessary to-day to be vigilant and watchful," concluded Mr Don gall, "and there is an absolute necessity for naval defence. If we fail we pass out of existence."