JAPANESE NAVY.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXI, Issue 19032, 9 June 1924, Page 10

JAPANESE NAVY.

EXTENSIVE BUILDING POLICY. 57 NEW WAB VESSELS. SPIRIT OF WASHINGTON TREATY. (From Post’s Correspondent.) LONDON, March 24. While much has been said regarding the feelings of the Japanese if we should continue the development of the Singapore Base, little or nothing seems to have been mentioned here regarding Japan’s naval activities until an artide appeared in the Observer recently. The information given is no doubt available for all who have the energy to seek for it, but it must have come as a surprise to many people to find how wide awake and active the Japanese have been since 1900, and that in spite of the Washington Conference. Battleships, says the writer in The Observer, were not the only men-of-war which Japan was building on a lavish scale in 1921. She had, besides, an imposing programme of 4 •auxiliary” construction under way, including cruiser*, destroyers, and submarines. The dimes-I sfons of this programme had been framed with due regard to the size of the future battle- fleet; that is to say, the number of cruisers, destroyers, and so on, was porportionate to the re-1 quire meats of the “eight-eight” fleet,; which would have eventually have ?on- i sistc-d of eight battleships and eight i When, therefore, the! eight-eight” scheme was dropped, it j was assumed that a corresponding reduction would be made in the “auxiliary” programme. This anticipation has not been fulfilled. A certain number of small men-of-war were cancelled in the spring of 1922, involving a total reduction of 13,935 tons, but at the same time, all the remaining vessels were redesigned on a basis of increased displacement and fighting power. In no other country has there been so great a volume of naval ship-building since the Washington Conference as in Japan, the following table shows the lightcruisers, which have been laid down sisce January, 1922:—Sendai (5570 tons), begun February, 1922; Jintsuu (5570 tons), begun August, 1922; Yubari (3100 tons), begun June, 1922; Kinugasa, Kako, Aobo, Furutaka (7500 tons), begun April, 1923-January, 1924; Myoko (10,000 tons), begun January, 1924.

57 NEW VESSELS OF WAR. Preparations are in train for starting work on the Nachi, a 10,000-ton cruiser, it Yokosuka, some time before next June, and two more 10,000-ton cruisers have been authorised for building in the fiscal year 1925-26. Within the same period, during which neither Great Britain nor the United States has laid down a single light-cruiser, Japan has begun or ordered 24 de stroyers, averaging 1375 tons, and 22 submarines, with an average displacement of 1173 tons. In sum, therefore, Japanese naval construction since tne Washington Conference embraces 11 light cruisers, 24 destroyers, and 22 submarines—s 7 vessels of war, with a total displacement of 145,406 tons. Within the same period. Great Britain has laid down one cruiser mine-layer, and the United States three submarines. In view of these comparative statistics of post-Conference warship construction, Japan’s insistence on the necessity of observing the spirit of the Washington Treaty, as well as its letter, seems rather forced. Japan, of course, is free to lay down as many

“auxiliary” ships a she pleases, there being no Treaty limit to the number of vessels which may be constructed by any signatory Power, but an analysis of Japan’s current building programme helps to explain why Australia and New Zealand attach so much importance to the completion of the Singapore project. Without carrying into the very complicated discussion as to the respective merits of great ships and mosquito craft, it may be stated as an axiom that the restriction of battleships under the Washing tou Treaty has tended to exalt the re--1 lative value, both tactical and strateI gic, of smaller naval vessels. The light ; cruiser, the destroyer, and the submarine have, in effect, been promoted several stages up in the hierarchy of naval power.

FEVERISH HASTE. Now that dreadnought development is arrested by the Treaty, naval architects are striving to endow each type of smaller craft with the Utmost degree of fighting power. As regards cruisers, the Treaty fixed 10,000 tons as the greatest displaccmeit and Sin. guns as_ the heaviest aramament permissible in ships of this category. Japan, ou her own admission, was tne first country to redesign her projected cruisers in ac cordance with this standard of tonnage and artillery. To her, also, belongs the distinction of having laid down the first 10,000-ton “Washington” cruissr. Her post-Conference activity in submarine construction is revealed by the Admiraltry return issued last week, which shows her to have thirty-three undersea boats building and projected, as against seven for Great Britain and eleven for the United States. Owing to the reticence of the Japanese authorities on this point, it is difficult to obtain precise information as to the number of boats laid down since the Washington Conference, but the frequent reports in the Japanese Press of the launch or trial trips of new submarines suggest that the vessels are being built with a haste which might almost be termed feverish.

SUBMARINE BUILT IN SIX MONTHS. From a comparison of dates it is evident that submarines are now launched within six to eight months from the laying of the keel, an achievement which comes near the best performance of German yards in the latter phase of the war when their resources were concentrated on the rapid production of U-boats. As an example may be cittd the Japanese submarine No. 62, approximately in size to the British 44 L” class, which was laid down in November, 1921, and launched in April, 1922. According to the Admiralty return, Japan has now forty-four submarines built, with thirty-three building and projected—a total of seventyseven boats most of which are oceangoing design. Considering that the to*;al number of British submarines, built and building, is only sixty-eight, the Japanese suggesting that this country, in proposing to construct a new dock at Singapore, was infringing the spirit of the Washington Treaty sounds rather grotesque.