GERMAN SUPERIORITY.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIX, Issue 164, 13 June 1939, Page 9

GERMAN SUPERIORITY.

CRUtSER ARMAMENT. NOT A CHANCE FOR BRITISH. LONDON, June 3. “Britain’s trade-protection cruisers would be liable to he blown out ol tlie water by the new German 10,000lon armoured cruisers,’’ says Mr Hector Bywater, naval correspondent of the Daily Telegraph. He urges that Britain needs to lay down a series of heavily-armoured cruisers, mounting eight-inch guns. “Germany,” he continues, ‘has commissioned her first 10,000-ton cruisers of which four are being built, and a further five will probably he included in the 19-12-43 programme. “These will all he nominally equal to Britain’s 13 ‘County’ class cruisers, hut will actually he more heavily armed and armoured. “Furthermore, the 25 British cruisers at present being constructed are to lie armed only with six-inch guns and would not have a sporting chance against eight-inch guns, for which they would only provide target practice. “Britain is fettered by tlie London Treaty, which forbids her construction of cught-inch-gun cruisers before 19-12, hut it is understood that her co-signatories, America and France, would not object to her revision of the undertaking.”