DISARMAMENT OVERTURES

Hawera Star, Volume LI, 28 May 1932, Page 5

DISARMAMENT OVERTURES

ATTITUDE TOWARDS NAVIES COMMITTEE VIEWS DIVIDED OFFENSIVE AIRCRAFT. DEFINITION STILL SOUGHT. British Official Wireless.) Received 10.30 a.m. to-day. RUGBY, May 27.. The naval commission of the Disarmament Conference at Geneva to-day approved the report of the expert committee which has been considering whether naval armaments are the most specifically offensive, the most effacious in national defence or the most threatening to civilization. The report is inconclusive and merely records a divergence of views of the different naval jiowers on the question of capital ships, aircraft carriers and submarines. The date of a meeting of the general committee at which the report will be discussed has not yet been fixed. Reports from Geneva suggest that further conversations between the heads of Governments or the. principal European powers concerned and the United States delegate, Mr.. Hugh Gibson, will procede the meeting with a view to reaching an agreement. Reports state it may be found convenient to hold such meetings between the heads of the various states immediately before the opening of the Lausanne conference. A further session was held at Geneva to-dav but so far no agreement has been reached as to the definition of offensive aircraft. The Belgian gate suggested that aeroplanes capable .of bombing should' be regarded as offensive and that aeroplanes weighing 1500 miligrammes or with an engine horsepower of 550 or over should come into the same category.