DEFENCE OF N.Z. TRADE

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25734, 21 February 1949, Page 6

DEFENCE OF N.Z. TRADE

NAVAL POLICY OF GOVERNMENT BOND WITH MERCHANT SERVICE (P.A.) WELLINGTON. February 20. The policy of the New Zealand Government, so far as the Royal New Zealand Navy was concerned, was to concentrate on the defence of trade, said the First Member of the New Zealand NavAl Board (Commodore G. W. G. gimpson) at the annual dinner of the New Zealand Company of Master Mariners on board the Dominion Monarch at Wellington. Commodore Simpson said the Royal New Zealand Navy was small. There were two cruisers on loan, one kept in commission and the second in reserve; but kept refitted. There were also six frigates, four of which were already here and two more to arrive soon. Frigates were very effective in antisubmarine operations. Royal Naval research on anti-submarine measures was being very actively pursued, he added. Manpower was most important and the Navy had no great difficulty in getting recruits. The Royal Navy and Merchant Navy were no longer even sister services. They were twin services. The Merchant Navy was responsible for the Empire’s lifeline of trade and the Royal and Commonwealth Navies were its insurance. While officers of the Royal Navy were not able to master a bill of lading or to say at what temperature perishable cargo should be carried. officers of the Merchant Navy could carry out most duties in a naval ship, so that in time of stress the Royal Navy could -rely with confidence on the Merchant Navy to come to its assistance. This was a result of understanding promoted by the 191441918 war and sesfled in the years between 1939 and 1945. * In the recent war the first U-boat attack had come with the sinking of the Athenia on the day hostilities had been announced and had eqded with a sinking the day before the announcement of the armistice.

Of shipping sunk during the war, 80 per cent, naa been sunk in the Atlantic. Of 729 German submarines sunk in the war, the navies of Britain and the Commonwealth had sunk 579 and also 69 of the 85 Italian submarines and 10 of the 110 Japanese. British and Commonwealth navies, substantially aided by the Royal Air Force, had accounted for 71 per cent, of the total number of enemy submarines sunk. The New Zealand Shipping Company superintendent (Captain F. Tether) said that war had broken down all barriers between the Royal Navy and Merchant Navy. After their close association in convoys and beach landings they were now one. “Should the ball go up again, the Navy would have the merchant service on its doorstep at once asking ‘What are our orders’,” he said. He referred to sea cadets and the sea scouts as sources of men for the sea in wartime. If peace continued, most of them would never wear uniform again after they left these organisations; but, if war came, they would join the Navy. It was through such organisations that the Empire’s spirit of the sea was maintained.