The New Zealand Times. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 1, 1914. OUR NAVAL POLICY

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIX, Issue 8852, 1 October 1914, Page 4

The New Zealand Times. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 1, 1914. OUR NAVAL POLICY

The evening jouraaal is apparently very sensitive to our suggestion'that it has employed craft in the endeavour ■ to represent the recant services of the Australian fleet as a justification ot Mr Allen’s unpopular scheme that Now Zealand should embark upon the construction of a separate navy. Bearing in mind the tone of our contemporary’s articles, and the evident purpose underlying them, we do not know that we could have used a milder term than craft to illustrate our meaning. There is craft in every line of the two more recent articles that our contempory has published in extenuation of its political methods. There is more. There is a reprehensible intention to misrepresent the sacrifice that New Zealand has made in the cause of effective naval defence which is, anything but patriotic. What other interpretation can be placed upon its reiterated assertion that New Zealand is attempting to profit by the naval en-, terprise of Australia without offering to bear any part of the burden? Let us quote the exact words of the evening journal. After referring to the security furnished to our commerce in these seas by the Australian fleet, it proceeds to say: :

The security would be more thorough and would have a wider range if - New Zealand had been making its own..contribution to the naval - defence of Australasia instead of being content to reap the benefit of Australian enterprise without sharing the burden.

Is this a fair statement of the case? Is it in any sense just to New Zealand? Seeing that we have spent between one and two millions sterling upon a formidable battleship, which is now in the fighting line in the North Sea, and that irrespective of this we paid our £IOO,OOO annual naval subsidy to the Admiralty until it was diverted by the Hon. James Allen, how can the reproach possibly be levelled against New Zealand that she has evaded any part of her naval burden? In proportion to our population, which is scarcely more than a million, we have been nobly bearing our lair share of this burden. If we are not receiving protection in proportion to our sacrifice, it is for the Hon. James Allen to explain the reason why, because he was the envoy to London when the 1909 agreement, which would have given us protection practically equal to that afforded by the whole Australian fleet, was departed from.

Hie craft of the evening journal is more openly displayed in the statement that “ the most complete mastery of the North Sea by the British JNavy would still have left our troopships open to interception by the Scharahorst or the Gneisenau if Australia’s much-derided navy had not been available for their protection.”' This assertion is so obviously opposed to the actual facts that it is not calculated to impress any but the most thoughtless reader. The purpose of the writer is disclosed by the innuendo that if there had been no Australian navy these seas would have been wholly unprotected. Now, the evening journal knows perfectly well that this is not a, fair nor an honest statement of the case. There was a strong South Pacific squadron - long before the Australian navy was ever thought of. If there was no Australian navy, our waters would in all probability bo far better protected at the present moment than they are by the Australia, Melbourne, and Sydney. Twelve years ago, before Australia ventured upon her separate naval system, there were nine cruisers stationed on the South Pacific station. These were the Powerful, Cambrian, Challenger, Encounter, Pegasus, Pioneer, Prometheus, Psyche, Pyramus. So far as Australia was concerned, she enjoyed this considerable measure of protection for an annual subsidy of £200,000, which was a more bagatelle compared with the millions she is spending now upon the cost of a separate naval establishment and the upkeep of her several vessels. Of course, wo are likely to be told that though the existing Australian fleet is fewer in numbers than the squadron formerly maintained by the Admiralty in these waters—only one to three the vessels are more modern, but an argument of this kind pre-supposes that tli© South Pacific squadron would not have been kept abreast of modern

requirements. This is palpable nonsense. We might just as well attempt to arguo that the Admiralty would ho content to allow the British Navy to become inferior to the navies of Continental nations. So long as the responsibility of control is left in the hands of the Admiralty, so long will the margin of safety bo maintained in full measure.

What we complained of chiefly on the part of the writer in the evening journal was the attempt to represent the term “tin-pot” which has been applied to the Australian Navy, as a substitute for the South Pacific squadron, as having been used to describe the ships of the Australian fleet. On the face of it, this is unfair to the opponents of the Allen separate navy scheme. They have never at any time spoken or written of the Australia, the Melbourne or the Sydney as “tin-pots.” On the contrary, they have admired and applauded the ships, and marvelled at the courage of Australia in facing this enormous responsibility. This much was fully proved by tho quotation from cur own columns, which challenged Mr Allen’s claim that the Australian scheme represented a margin of safety, and which characterised our programme as of tin-pots which, against first-class modern battleships, provided anything but a margin of safety. Of course, the “Evening Post” writer, intent upon bolstering up Mr Allen’s preposterous scheme and willing to strengthen a weak cause by appealing to a sense of colonial in contradistinction to Imperial patriotism will probably decline to recognise tho distinction. However, it should be easily apparent. Australia has not built a Navy. Sho has provided the nucleus of one, and however effective the three ships may bo, they afford no margin of safety nor do they compensate the South Pacific for the withdrawal of tho British squadron which was forced upon tho Admiralty by tho Commonwealth’s independent policy. The “Post,”' in its campaign of exalting the Australian policy and depreciating our, own for the better justification of Mr Allen, says:— “Australia’s battle-cruiser has added to the naval strength of the Empire; New Zealand's has simply reduced the British Navy Estimates by the cost of the vessel.” This is tho veriest humbug. If Australia’s battleships have added to the naval strength of the Empire, has not New Zealand added to it also, seeing that our battleship is in tho fighting lino in the North Sea? If Australia is entitled to credit for her enterprise. New Zealand is entitled to even greater credit, because she has given her battleship freely and absolutely so that it might be employed whore it is of the greatest service to the Empire. Australia has lent her ships merely for the period of the war. The evening journal challenges our opinion that the Hon. James Allen’s policy is in the direction of cutting the painter binding us to the Mother Country. It affects to deplore that language can be so grossly misused. “ Have the Australians cut the painter?” it asks, and then it proceeds to answer the question in its own way by offering as proof to the contrary that the Australian fleet cooperated with our expeditionary force at Samoa. This is all very well. But 1 the evening journal knows that we have not misused language. It knows quit© as well as we do that when war was declared the Australian fleet did not pass over to the control of tbe Admiralty until the Commonwealth Cabinet had decided that it should bo offered. What would have happened if the Australian Government had not sympathised with the war and been prepared to co-operate? Is it consistent with our conception of Imperialism that a colonial Government should maintain the right to remain neutral when Great Britain is at war? However, the mere fact that Australia holds that prerogative is the best argument why we should not bo persuaded by tbo sophistries of Mr Allen and his most unswerving supporter tbe '‘Post” to pursue a similar policy. This was tbe line adopted by' Sir Wilfrid Banner some years ago, when he maintained the right of Canada to preserve neutrality if she chose to do so in tho event of Great Britain being engaged in war, and it was so distasteful to the patriotism of the sister Dominion that it proved to be Sir Wilfrid Laurier’s political undoing. It will eventually contribute materially to the political undoing of the Hon. James Allen if he persists in the policy of a separate navy for New Zealand.