A BLUEJACKET'S VIEWS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXV, Issue 16550, 14 May 1914, Page 7

A BLUEJACKET'S VIEWS.

LOCAL FLEET USELESS:.. [From Onit Correspondent.] • INVERCARGILL, May 13. Ten years in the British Navy should

be sufficient to qualify oven a blue-

jacket to give expression to TJews on matters concerning the nation's /defence, views that are worth at any rate listening to. On the southern express recently a "News", reporter had a chat with a seaman, who gave every indication of being a careful observer. He had spent a decade, aa man-o'-wars-man in southern seaa. Until a month or two ago he had been a member of the crew ; of H.H.S. Psyche, a cruiser belonging to. what some call "the New Zealand Navy."

" What do you think of the Government's move in discontinuing the contribution to the Imperial Navy?" asked the reporter. " From a financial point of view," replied the man-o'-war's-man. "I a'm not in a position to speak, but from the standpoint of utility, that is, real defence, I think—and I am voicing the opinions of my fellow-seamen^— that a mistake has been made. In the first place, your ships are obsolete, in the second place the ships are so few that they could not give ; adequate protection to the North Island alone, even supposing they were up to sec-ond-class standard. If a foreign. country had designs on New Zealand, the defence authorities in that country would only send out the very best ships they possessed. Picture, then, your navy in the throes of an encounter. The bottom of the ocean would claim your vessels in a very short time. The victors could then anchor in Bluff Harbour, take a gun to the top of Bluff Hill, and reduce Invercargill to ruins. Your Territorials would be useless to repel an attack from the sea. The enemy could than visit Dunedin and storm the city; "*n short, New Zealand would be captured

in a very short time. Your Government may have confidence in your navy, but I have none."