DEFENCE OF THE EMPIRE

Greymouth Evening Star, 20 May 1938, Page 3

DEFENCE OF THE EMPIRE

STEPS TAKEN lIV IIIiITAIN. Defence. Rearmament. Defence. Rearmament. The words are on everyone s lips lays C. A. Lyon, in an English paper. The r< alily they represent has been the nation's ventral thought in the last, weeks. Ami yet how much does the nation as a whole know of this reality? llow many soldiers, aeroplanes, guns, ships we have. How good they ai<. llow strong' a force they represent. Arc they up to date or not? Rirst, the Army. Britain has an Army of 170,000 men. There are 113.imo of them in the hararcks spread up ami down Britain. The rest are in garrisons overseas. There are mi.OOO more in. India.

'l'horo are 160,000 soldiers in Iho Territorial Army. There are 130,000 more, fully trained soldiers in the rc:a rvc. The 113.000 I roops' of the Regular Army in Britain are divided up into six divisions. Five ordinary and one mobile.

These six divisions look: puny beside Germany's thirty-nine announced divisions, which are, moreover, undoubtedly being built up to fifty. Or even against Erance's thirty divisions. But the new doctrine of war is that men do not matter in comparison with machines.

The British Army resembles' a factory which is installing new machinery at top speed. Every battalion is being made into a machine-minded one. 'rhe machine they are being given to use is a very efficient one. the famous Czech Bren gun. Tho Bren gun is so light, that it can be. carried, and even used, by one man—and yet it is a machine-gun. It lis capable of more rapid, sustained, amt accurate fire than any other gun lof the kind.

'Phe number of Bren guns with, which the infantry are being equipped, is from 6000 to 7Oou. I The mechanised cavalry may bo equipped with the Bren gun. Their i allotment would bring Britain’s] strength in this vital arm to a grand; total of 10,000 guns. Now for the artillery. Until recent-

ly most important classes of guns were of two kinds—lB-pouhder field guns and howitzers. All this is now being wiped: out. A great part of the field guns in the British Army aiie now being converted

to 25-pounder combined field gun how itzers.

The new kind of gun combines the long range- of the field gun with the high trajectory and. plunging fire effect. of the howitzer. hi all, the British Army, including iho Territorial Army. has nearly 2000 guns.

TANK BATTALIONS. The re are eight tank battalions. Each has approximately sixty tanks —nearly 500 in all. Eighteen of Britain's twenty-two cavalry regiments have been mechanised. These 1 regiments are being equipped' with tanks and mechanised vehicles. If all the cavalry is equipped with tanks it. will bring the total number possessed by the British Army up to 1500. The mechanised vehicles will run into thousands.

Two-thirds of the tanks are modern light tanks 1 carrying two to three men. They carry one heavy machine gun. and armour-piercing gun, coaxially mounted, and travel at thirty miles an hour over roads or smooth ground. They cost ll'om £3600 to £5OOO to build. Now the' Air Force. In a little more than (wo years it hasi seen an unprecedented expansion. The personnel, in 1935 was 31.000. Now it is 70.000. i In 1935 Britain had' 880 first-line machines. She now has 1500. and before long will have 1750. Including the Fleet air arm and 'planes abroad, Britain has 2000. France has 1250 to 2200 and is aiming at 3000. I Tho R.A.F. in Britain consists ot 1159 squadrons. There are thirty lighter squadrons, cighty-threft bomber squadrons, fifteen “army co-operation" squadrons (which do reconnaissance work with the Army), seventeen reconnaissance squadrons, four torpedo bombing squadrons. The Fleet air arm consists of a further twenty squadrons. Turn, now to Britain’s defences against air raids. The defences stretch in a long north-south line from Hop to bottom of Britain. They are | manned by 48,000 Territorials.. I The defence ot a great city is. by I anti-aircraft batteries, and their equipIntent is eight, guns each —608 guns 1 pointing to the sky.

Between the cities the defences are in the hands of the fighter planes. In front of and between the great towns is a chain of searchlights hundreds of miles long. No section of the sky above the line of defence can escape their probing beams. There art 108 searchlight eoinpan-

ies. Each company has twenty-four searchlights—2sl)2 giant, pencils of light in the sky. Each company covers an area of 100 square miles. The Navy is relatively stronger than it was before the war. It is being strengthened' further still. Fortysi.'VGii new ships will be launched in IH.'tS —one aircraft carrier, three cruisers, thirty-two destroyers, eleven submarines. Thesu are only an instalment of what is to come. Other ships tire building. They include five battleships, four aircraft carriers, fourteen cruisers, eight destroyers, seventeen submarines. Nearly 350.000 are engaged in this occupation of arms, bearing. The cost of it all is .C 332,927,000 a year, or ,C29/10/. for every family in the country.