BIG NAVIES

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 86, 12 April 1927, Page 17

BIG NAVIES

UNITED STATES BLAMED

LETTER TO "THE TIMES"

REMEDY IN HANDS OP AMERICA

"Who is the mysterious "Mr. X" who in "The Times," under the cover of anonymity, learnedly and apparently authoritatively discussed President Coolidge's- proposals for the limitation "of naval armaments, contrasting the alleged ill-founded claim of the United States with "British need" of sea power? asks the London correspondent of the "Chriatian Science Monitor," an American publication. The writer, disapproving competition in warship building/ blames, America's big navy for it, declaring "the weary nations would gladly have abandoned spending their money on:,unproduef -nsses of steel.if the United States had led the way by diminishing its fleet. "President Coolidge deplores, " ho writes,,"as any man of . sensibility must deplore,- the growth of armaments, -which*, he ' regards, rightly or wrongly, to be, calculated to lead to war. May I point out that the remedy lies very largely in the hands of himself and his countrymen, so far as sea armaments are concerned? No navy in the world has increased to the degree of that of the United States, yet wherein lies the national necessity for this great sea pdwer on her part? It is'admitted universally that the sole justification for armaments is security But while no nation is less in need of sea-fighting forces for security than the United States, she insists upon possessing a numerical equality with the British Empire, whose security depends wholly without reservation upon the sea. BRITISH NEED OF A NAVY! "Three hundred years ago Baleigh explained in three sentences the need of a navy foi; Great Britain, and what he said of Great-Britain in that day is equally true of Great Britain to-day. There are,' he wrote, 'two ways by which England can be afflicted. One by invasion. .". The other by impeachment of our trades. . . Invaded or impeached we cannot be but by sea.' "Invasion and impeachment are indeed theonjy ways by which any Power—not England ' ajonc—can be afflicted. The.United States is in danger from neither by sea. The invasion of a country- separated by 3000 miles ot salt water from its nearest military Power capable of injuring her; inhabited by 100,000,000 people, whose aptitude, for war and'capacity for raisin" armies, was'illustrated in 1861 and 191 1?, and whose 'conquest'owing.to her vast' territory would; be-impossible, even if 1 armies could be • carried there, which armies, to be carried across, would' need more tonnage than the whole mercantile marine of the- world to transport and maintain—such a country is in no.need of seapower-to defend her against invasion. Twenty thousand Boer farmers were capable of* resisting the armies of Great Britain for two years, and at one moment not without prospects of success. What must be the ;aize of an;army Power must send across the Atlantic to overcome more millions of^Americans than there were thousands of Bocra? NO BLOCKADE POSSIBLE. "Not the loss/immuno is she from impeachment of her trade. No nation^ not oven the most powerful maritime nation, could blockade her and stop the &o\v. of her commerce; for to maintain a fleet cap. able of such action in the Western Atlantic- is unpracticable. Why have we built Singapore! Becauso of the fact that without a' baseV a. fleet cannot operate." There is no base, nor any intention on the part of any Power to make one, in the Western Atlantic. , :, "The American trade,is largely car-, ned in neutral 'bottoms and' is secure in war. Spine—at no benefit to the American people-—is- carried more expensively in her own bottoms. Her shipping trade does riot earn revenues to balance her budgeVas does th(it of the British mercantile marine, with its freight of £148,000,000 to help pay for her imports. Nationally, the American mercantile marine employed in tho overseas trade is of no financial importance whatever to her people. "Thus in no way is Iho depondent for her security (upon the sea. Compare this witlt. 'Great Britain, withwhom she claims tho necessity of an oquality of naval strength. The British Isles lie within a few miles of powerful military States; their population is martial indeed, but not numerous; and though capable in timo of producing armies, their area is so small that if invading forces were landed, the country would bo overrun boforo' sho had time to raise, organise/ and equip them. '. .■■'.'... DANGER OF; INVASION. , " England -is exposed to that danger of invasion, and is capable of resisting it-.iby sea only. As to the impeachment of her trade, Great Britain ■ ia., dependent on overseas for food and ■ the. raw materials of Sher industry, on the use '■- of the I sea to carry back goods and earn freights with w<iieh she pays for her daily' bread. Yet with these differences this great self-supporting continental nation avers that it must, for its security, possess a navy as large as that of thiß group of island Statesl '/■ "If when the-war was ended, Britain had not found itself faced with a great, growing navy on the other ■ side of the Atlantic, that competition which we and others regret no less than Mr. Coolidge—we might say more than he, for we can less afford tho burden— would never have begun. The weary nations would gladly havo abandoned spending their money on unproductive masses of steel and enlarging their harbours and docks to receive them. Today, would the United States but agree to consider the strength of navies in terms of their relation to the only thing to which they should be related, security, competition would automatically cease and the burden to commerce and-"the. danger to peace, which the President wishes to remove, would disappear." . - ': "