Wairarapa Daily Times [Established Over 50 Years.] FRIDAY, JANUARY 6, 1928 AMERICAN NAVAL POLICY.

Wairarapa Daily Times, 6 January 1928, Page 4

Wairarapa Daily Times [Established Over 50 Years.] FRIDAY, JANUARY 6, 1928 AMERICAN NAVAL POLICY.

The many admirable qualities possessed by Mr Coolidge do not appear to include a sense of the incongruous; otherwise, in view of what happened at Geneva last July, he might have couched his Presidential message in rather different terms. In justifying extensive additions to the American navy, he advanced precisely the same arguments as Britain advanced—and with even stronger reason —in support of her attitude at Geneva. Yet the British contentions which have now been taken over bodily by Mr Coolidge failed to impress the American delegates at the conference. The President alludes to America’s outlying territories, to her foreign commerce, and . to ocean lines of trade “unsurpassed by any other country’.” The latter claim, by the way, is not borne out by the records; the British figure's are greatly in excess of the American. The President also instances her coastal cities, 'which arc exposed to attack, and to America’s duty of defending the Panama Canal. His logic is unanswerable. But, after all, similar conditions apply to the British Empire with far greater force. At Geneva* Mr Bridgeman in effect invited the American representatives to look at the atlas, the trade statistics, and Lloyd’s Register. These would have spoken for themselves. The atlas would have shown an empire not only vast in area but scattered and separated by immense distances. The whole of it relies upon the British navy for defence. Isolated outposts, such as the Falkland Islands and St. Helena, are just as entitled to protection as more important parts of the Empire. The statistics would have shown that Britain depends, for existence upon imports. The bulk of her foodstuffs and raw materials come from oversea, and were communications to be interrupted Britain would soon starve. Lloyd’s -Register would have shown that the Empire has upwards of 21,000,000 tons of merchant shipping to be protected, while, to complete the parallel, Britain has rich coastal cities liable to attack, and Britain is charged with an international duty of defending the Suez Canal. The crux of the matter is that America is a continent; and sea-power, though valuable as an insurance, is not absolutely indispensible to her. She is self contained. She could, if the worst came to the worst, survive the loss of her oversea territory, the destruction of her mercantile marine, and the

severance of her trade routes, calamitous though such a development would be. But to Britain it would spell irremediable disaster. Britain must maintain a naval establishment that is adequate to keep the sea routes open, and deal with marauders.