JELLICOE PRAISES GREAT FRANKNESS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18188, 22 June 1927, Page 9

JELLICOE PRAISES GREAT FRANKNESS.

URGES ALL DELEGATES TO PUT CARDS ON TABLE. By Telegraph.—-Press Assn.—Copyright. Aus. and N.Z. Cable Association. (Received June 22, 11.30 a.m.) GENEVA, June 21. Earl Jellicoe, interviewed, offered the following comments.on the British proposals, which, he said, were not only his personal opinions, but also those of the whole British delegation. “ The essence of the British proposals is extreme frankness,” he said. “ I cannot conceive a better method of arriving at a good result than each nation saj-ing definitely what it wants and why it wants it——if all the delegates place all their cards on the table and show each other the exact position of their naval defence. We must be prepared to defend our demands for various numbers and types of vessels. The whole world knows that for Britain a Navy is a matter of defence of trade routes, without which Britain could not exist and the dominions an 4 colonies could not market their products. Britain in this respect is in a different position from other countries. Japan is nearest to our position, in her dependence on imports. We can and are willing to show the world what we need to defend sea routes. “ We believe, if others do the same, according to their own requirements, that it should eventually provide a basis for agreement. “ It seems obvious to me that when we come to the details our first effort should be to reduce the size of ships in the different classes. We propose to reduce battleships bv 5000 tons, and cruisers, except those of 10.000 tons built under the Washington Treaty, to 7500 tons. Anybod-”’ who recollects pre-war competitive shipbuilding must be convinced that the British proposals contain the germ of an agreement. The system of reducing the size of warships was recognised at Washington. It seems most logical to us to pursue the method and to try to reduce other classes as well as battleships. For instance, most nations claim that the submarine is a defensive weapon. As such it should be considerably reduced in size. Nobodv can possibly call a submarine of 1200 or 2000 tons a defensive weapon. For coastal defence submarines do not need to be anything approaching .these sizes.” Earl Jellicoe endorsed entirely the British naval experts’ examination of the British proposals as compared with the American and Japanese proposals.