WARM APPROVAL

Evening Post, Volume CXXVII, Issue 40, 17 February 1939, Page 9

WARM APPROVAL

LONDON PRESS

DEFENCE EXPENDITURE

, "FROM DANGER TO

SECURITY"

(Indeoendent Cable Service.)

LONDON, February 16. All sections of the Press warmly approve of the defence programme announced yesterday.

The "Daily Telegraph" says that the cost is staggering, but that the country is rerfdy to bear whatever burden will assure national security. All it asks is to receive value for its money and to receive it quickly. The "News Chronicle." says:—"lt will show the dictators that their apparently pacific speeches have not pulled the wool over our eyes."

The "Daily Express" says:—''The new programme will make us so strong that no enemy will dare to attack us."

The "Daily Mail" says:—"The barometer tells us that we are becoming stronger daily as the needle of expenditure moves steadily from danger to security." The "Daily Express" says that the two new battleships in the 1939 programme will be of 40,000 tons, mounting 16-inch guns. Four large cruisers and one aircraft-carrier will make a total of 43 ships for. the 1939 programme. ~ The new battleships bring the total of capital ships now under construction to nine.

The "Financial News" says that with drastic economies and drastic taxation, it might be possible to keep the defence borrowing between £265,000,000 and £295,000,000 in the coming year.