Show Is world naval race soon to begin W MIN ev 4 A 41 A J re YN 14 4 0 0 qa A az ivaz important cogs in the worlds world a two grea greatest test navies left launching the phelps the newest addition to 0 o the united states fleet right Brit britain alris s newest most powerful battleship the rodney upper inset sir bolton eyres monsell first lord of the british ad admiralty lower inset adm ral will am H standley chief of united states naval operations by WILLIAM C UTLEY ITH the whole w world orld fearful W WITH that the east african incident may provoke the ent re ru o 0 continent into another terrible war and that such a war tf if it comes will eventually spread to the far corners of the earth there Is I 1 11 t tie room for hope that any definite agreements of importance will be reached during the naval conference which opens in london december 2 certainly no reductions in naval armaments of the powers will find fa vor neither will things remain ex acely as they are rather the chief hope of the meeting will be to put some sort of limitations upon the na val building which Is certain to be gin with the expiration of the present london treaty at the end of 1938 1936 if the delegates can succeed in prevent ing a tree free for all naval race which alti might lead to disaster the con ference ferenee will not have been in vain the december conference Is in reality a preliminary to conferences in may or arjune 4 june of next year delegates will now attempt to clarify the de sires and intentions of the several major powers in the spring they w 11 return to london to see what actual technical agreements can be arrived at using the revelations of the de cember meeting as a foundation it has been generally predicted that the outcome of these meetings will be additions totaling 1000 tons to the navies of the great powers AN whether hether each power will be able to build her desired share of the additions without serious protest from the otters oti ers re mains to be een would ban battleship great britain it Is safe to predict a ill renew her efforts to sell the other powers on the idea of abolishing ta tie e battleship in all navies she ha has s in that she woul I 1 I 1 ke to aug ment her present naval tonnage by the addition of 20 new cruisers it if the battleship must remain at the insist ence of other nations brita n will gainly start construction of at least one to replace those capital ships in his maje majesty s fleet which are rapid ly becoming obsolete the united states will without much argument seek to uphold the present policy of naval parity with great britain as granted by the wash ington naval treaty of Y M 2 she will however differ with britain on the tapes of snips to be built since the battleship hip or capital ship Is a real necessity to an efficient ame american r lean navy japan haeng already broken the reins of the 5 5 1 ratio will reiterate more forcibly her demands for parity with brita brim n and america such parity will be in all likelihood leal ical for cipan Is little lil ely to be in a position to do enough building to reach that level it the two english speaking nations are going to make sizeable additions to their naval strengths germany has won an agreement with great britain which will allow her to build a fleet equal to 30 per cent of the british strength france will at least insist upon matching ship for ship w th germany what italy will do Is highly problematical at the time although it may be said she will keep right on increasing the size of her navy to what extent is the problem submarines would be abolished if brita n pad her way and it Is a safe bet bet tl it it bull will mike the au an suggestion to outlaw them in the preliminary conference with ab sol no h pe of success at leist that will clarify the situation with rith respect to underwater craft in the sub sequent d lons limiting battleship tonnage there Is also no doubt that america will be successful in upholding the international legality of the capital ship the question will resolve itself into an effort to limit the tonnage of these vessels rather than to abolish them altogether the united states was successful in defeating the brit ish pro proposal to limit capital ships to 25 tons at tie tt e london conference of 1040 1930 the generally accepted theory is that battleships have 0 their usefulness after arter they have become more than twenty years of age there have been no battleships completed during the last ten beirs and by far the greater part of the world worlds s battle sh ps have already pissed the twenty beir mark by agreement the united states and great lr tain may not lay down an other battleship until it tabes takes three or four yeara years to build one of the giant floating fortresses by the year 1941 there 0 a o lid ild be only two british battleships battleship less than twenty years old the rolney and the nelson the united states will hae bae the colorado and the west clr 1111 still of ireful age japan will have none and france will have none italy Is build lag ing two 35 ton battleships now and they alone in 11 II duces navy will be less than twenty years old from this it will be seen that if the naval conferences do not succeed in abolishing the battleship father time will unless the powers begin build ln ing new ones soon battleships cost about apiece so it Is bar harl I 1 ly reasonable rei that new ones will be how leading navies compare warships of useful age being built or appropriated for cap tal A jcraft heavy light sub S 8 ps carr en ers cru ser sers cru sers destroyers mar nes ne great brita n is 15 7 is 18 32 83 88 46 the un ted states 12 6 18 19 61 59 japan 8 6 12 23 83 62 france 7 1 7 12 74 83 italy 5 S 7 15 65 54 total tonnage G eat brita n 1 the un ted states 1022 1 japan france italy constructed with anything like reck reek less abandon tons our limit no ship larger than 35 OW tons can clear the locks in the I 1 anama canal so it Is safe to predict that the unit ed states will not plan any new battleships of more than that limit nor Is it probable that uncle sam will ever agree to the limit of 27 tons which it Is reported great britain will propose britain feels that it would be more to her advantage to d bute her ton nage limit in a larger number of small er sh ps with her widely scattered colonies covering the earth ton you know the sun never sets on the british flag she has ample fuel sta eions to feed her ships on long cruises america has no comparable system of supply depots and therefore finds it essential to have ships with larger fuel capacity which can go a long long way from home without having to worry about refueling growing more and more every day in great britain Is the feeling that anglo american battleship agreements are not worth bothering about any way because it seems unthinkable that the two fleets should ever be directed against each other let america go right ahead and build ships on any size she likes say the sponsors of this plan and let britain build what ever size she deems advisable however Is it really certain that these two great navies would never be used against each other here Is a case in point the lea league 0 ue of nations Is even now trying to take some of mussolini s steam out of him by the application of sanctions until he decides it Is time to halt his big invasion of ethiopia it Is not beyond the realm of possibility that these sanctions will have to be enforced through the use of a naval blockade prime Nl minister inister baldwin has openly reminded his country of such a possibility he ile has also said that great britain would have no DO part of any such blockade without know ing exactly how the united states stands with respect to it the league itself has been apprehensive on that point an 1 has asked the united state states to define its position without hiving obtained a clear answer as this Is beng being written how navies might meet it if member nations of the league refuse to sell goods to italy will the united states increase its italian exports suppose ships carrying our goods are refused entry into italy by the blockade would our fleet step in and attempt to bleik the blockade in such a case our navy davy might well be operating rating against britain n meanwhile there Is quite a movement afoot here at home to clear up our own naval policy the growth of our navy has been spasmodic and with out a clearly defined objective for many years the start of the world war caught our navy quite unprepared we were forced to build a fleet of very great size r z e in a big hurry naturally the cost was wag much more than it should have been in the early years fol lowing the war the navy was allowed to decline to a great extent this was only following the traditions created by our government in ln the years immediately following other wars our spasmodic building the washing on treaty was signed in 1922 in the eight years after that we laid down only 21 meno men o war and these were the result of periodic bursts of enthusiastic building rather than of a carefully scheduled plan during that same period much of our war time fleet became obsolete but we did not mal e replacements we were rapidly falling well back into third place in naval strength for during the years between 1922 and 1930 great britain built 88 86 ships and japan built the policy of anglo american parity was extended in 1 aa at london but for us the parity was purely the theoretta theor orett etl cal eat for we did not actually build up x a to it at all now since the advent of the koose roose velt administration the vinson tra mell met bill has definitely approved naval construction up to the parity principle authorizing the building of planes and ships to make parity a tact fact the standley PI 1 besides this the alert jd d able ad miral william H standley i ef chief of naval operations of the united states has outlined and actually begun to put into practice a plan which gives the nation a more definite n naf 11 r policy than it has ever had t e the standley plan Is only the eg inning for or to be successful it mus must have the continued support of congress for many years to come the plan Is simple enough it in bolves a consistent orderly and clear ly scheduled program of annual re placements of all obsolete ships it will promote what the admiral calls a business man s navy the plan would be projected into the future and would allow for the com completion of twelve or thirteen ships empry year to take the places of the same number which will each year beame beci me over age the cost would be a reg regular u lar item in the annual naval appropriation bill the N inson tramell bill would give us parity with britain by 1842 the stand ley plan would prevent our navy from falling behind again after this burst of construction 0 western newspaper union |