NAVAL POLICY

Evening Post, Volume XCIX, Issue 120, 21 May 1920, Page 7

NAVAL POLICY

BEATTY'S PLAIN SPEAKINGS

Whom our own correspondent.)

LONDON, 25th Maroh. At, the 137 th anniversary festival banquet of the Highland Society (Prince Arthur of. Connaught in the chair), Lord Beatty. remarked that it was from Scotland that the Navy sailed. O n its adventures; it was,to Scotland that it returned with its disappointments; and it was to Scotland, and more especially to the Firth of. Forth, thet it returned) in Iho hour of its triumphs. It. was to the 1' irth of Forth that the battle cruisers returned after t-ha# battle round which controversy was raging, and would continue to rage for the. next 200 years. "As to the future, there is little to bo said Wo arc called the Silent Service. Last week ;vo broke the silence. We took the Empire into our confidence, and in the statement ot policy which accompanied' the Naval Jistimatos the British Empire «nd tho world at large" were told of the problems that wo am thinking about." Many'of them,. no doubt, are controversial. I hope that it will produce criticism. We are not afraid of criluiism. I would ask that tne criticism shall be fair; that, it shall- bo constructive, and no: destructive. Wo are trying to meet the problems in a spirit ol advancement ■ coupled with economy. But "the" economical side, which is me?t

important* and which we have not lost sight of, is one which.requires a'note of warning. You cannot have a really valuable thing without paying for ii. Wo came into bein£ by the sea, wo exist by the sea. and Hie clay that we. forget it, and fo-rsoi sea power and all that it means, the- British Empire will crumble *• the ground."' (Cheers.)