LACK OF CAPITAL SHIP

Evening Post, Volume CXXVII, Issue 61, 14 March 1939, Page 8

LACK OF CAPITAL SHIP

Memories of the great part played by the capital ship Australia in the Great War are still green, and many people have'thought that it would be comforting if crisis were to find a modern capital ship to head and round off the Australian Squadron. Something of this thought seems to lurk between the lines of the statement concerning the Repulse, and of the suggestion that this capital ship will carry the King and Queen to North America in the middle of this year; also that it "would cause no surprise" if the Repulse later carried the Duke and Duchess of Kent to Australia, to inaugurate the Duke's Governor-Generalship. The writer's capacity for surprise would not be

over-strained if the Repulse's voyage to Australia were to be "moral and strategical" over and above the eclat that attaches fo carrying Royal passengers. Moreover, "it is even suggested that if a battleship were used for this purpose it might be detained in Australian waters for several months." Remembering the Australia, Australians might be loath to let the Repulse go away again. That would lead, -no doubt, to two problems —strategic and financial. Could the- British Navy permanently detach a capital ship, and "would the Australians pay for her? Would New Zealand be expected to enter further into the naval financial commitment? The, tripartite defence conference (United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand) to be held in New Zealand obviously must consider naval problems, but whether the Repulse or any other capital ship will figure in them is another matter. The message referred to may prove to be more speculative than authoritative.