Orders of the Day — London Naval Treaty Bill.

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at on 20 July 1937.

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Photo of Mr Reginald Fletcher Mr Reginald Fletcher , Nuneaton

It was an extremely touching sight to watch the hon. Member for East Fulham (Mr. Astor), who has just sat down, speaking under a fond parental eye. Surely, it was what is known as the Oedipus complex which led him to request that that gaze should be directed upon him from the rear. I will leave it to my hon. Friend the Member for North Camberwell (Mr. Ammon) to deal with the extremely inaccurate remarks of the hon. Member about the events at Invergordon, but I thought he spoke very airily indeed about the liquidation of the present situation in Spain, which was to be followed by Italy doing everything that is sweet and proper. May I remind him that we have already, quite recently, signed a Treaty with Italy, under which Italy undertakes to preserve the status quo in the Mediterranean, and that if Italy would honour that Treaty in good faith, then indeed the situation in Spain would be liquidated very easily and very quickly?

If the First Lord of the Admiralty will allow me to say so, I think he opened this Debate very fairly indeed, making no extravagant claims whatsoever for these Treaties, but speaking very moderately indeed about their value. In fact, the only enthusiasm that I thought he showed in the course of his remarks was when he referred to the admirable work done by Sir R. Craigie in connection with these Treaties, remarks which I am certain will be endorsed by anyone who knows anything about the work which has been done. All that I can say is that I hope that in the future the First Lord will find happier opportunities for the display of his talents than these particular Treaties are able to afford him. There is one question that I would like to ask him. Do we know everything about these Treaties? It is only quite recently that we found out that the Anglo-German Treaty, signed in 1935, had a secret agreement attached to it. Are there any secret agreements attached to these Treaties which have not been mentioned to-day?

Obviously, the Powers which have not signed these treaties dictate the situation, so that the treaties are of very doubtful value indeed. Naval treaties which leave Italy and Japan outside are of very little use, but it may fairly be said that nothing else was open to us. There was nothing more that we could get, and at any rate, if these treaties do not do much good, they do not do very much harm, unless possibly they engender a completely false sense of security and of limitation of armaments. There are so many escape Clauses to these treaties that they are hardly worth anything at all. Any country which is a signatory can escape from any of their provisions at will, and practically without formality, thanks to these escape Clauses, and, as a matter of fact, Japan, which is not a signatory, has it in her power to give any country which is a signatory the opportunity of escaping from the provisions of the treaties through these escape Clauses.

Is Germany entitled to divide her 35 per cent of light craft between the three categories of "A" and "B" cruisers and destroyers in each category, or is she entitled to 35 per cent. of our total tonnage in light craft? Is the 35 per cent. to which she is entitled to be divided beween each of those three categories, or is she, for instance, entitled to have more than the five "A"-class cruisers to which our 15 "A"-class cruisers would entitle her under the 35 per cent. clause, if she chooses to have more "A"-class cruisers by diminishing her tonnage in either of the other two categories? Then again, on exactly what basis is the tonnage of our Fleet calculated for the purposes of assessing the 35 per cent. to which Germany is entitled? The Treaty speaks of 35 per cent. as defined by treaty, but defence vessels and torpedo boats are not defined by treaty and, therefore, I think it is of importance to know exactly upon what basis our tonnage is calculated in order to arrive at the 35 per cent. to which Germany is entitled. Further, on what basis is the ratio between over-age and under-age tonnage calculated? The German Navy being of rather modern construction, it seems to me that Germany must be short of what we call over-age tonnage, and, therefore, how is that ratio calculated? Those are two or three specific points which I think it would assist the House to have cleared up.

To turn to more general considerations, a certain amount of stress has been laid upon the provision for exchange of information. I feel that it is a very pious hope that any benefit will be derived from this exchange of information. We know quite well that the Intelligence services of all naval countries have long ago found out that it is quite impossible to keep the main facts about naval construction secret. It simply cannot be done. You can keep secret certain details of naval construction, but the fact that you are building certain ships of a certain tonnage and with certain armament is, in a very short time, common property all over the world. What we are doing by this provision about exchange of information is to recognise the fact that you cannot keep those secrets. We are, therefore, agreeing to the exchange of information which the countries concerned would get hold of anyhow.

When it comes to exchanging information about details which it is possible to keep secret, I do not believe that any country concerned, our own included, will be bound by this provision. Will the information about our naval construction which is to be given to other Powers be given to them before it is given to this House, or will it be in excess of the information given to this House? I have an idea that we shall arrive at the farcical situation that under these treaties we shall be giving to other Powers information which is withheld from Members of the House. I notice that Russia not only need give no information about her Far Eastern construction, but, if she chooses to say that she feels threatened by Japan, she can cut out all the processes of consultation and delay which attach to the escape clauses. She is to be the sole judge. She need not explain her reasons for feeling threatened; she merely has to say that she believes Japan is exceeding the London Treaty limits, and then she can go ahead without consultation with the other signatory Powers.

I would like to turn to what I think is the main feature of this Debate, that is, the "A"-class cruisers, the 10,000-ton 8-inch gun cruisers. We have 15 of them and we have bound ourselves to build no more until 1942. The Anglo-German Agreement in 1935 entitled Germany to build five of these large "A"-class cruisers, of which three are already laid down. Under this Treaty Russia may build up to seven such cruisers, but, in accordance with the timorous and genteel decency which prevails in the phraseology of these treaties, she hopes not to do so. The real fact, stripped of all pretence and all these worthless and fictitious provisos, is that any country may build "A"-class cruisers if she feels threatened. Therefore, to use a phrase employed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Hillsborough (Mr. Alexander), the race is on from this moment in these "A"-class cruisers. The escape clauses permit it. Germany may build "A"-class cruisers if Russia builds "B"-class cruisers which outclass German "B"-class cruisers. That is an excuse to Germany to build these "A"-class cruisers.

Germany and Italy may build crusers above the limits of the London Treaty. Germany and Russia will certainly build them, and the result is there may be five German 10,000-ton cruisers against which we have no comparable ships to set. The First Lord knows that it is not merely a question of building three more of these five "A"-class cruisers which are pro- vided for by the Anglo-German Naval Treaty. Germany has reserved her right to increase beyond these five. The situation is simply that at the present moment our 15 "A"-class cruisers are already outclassed by "A"-class cruisers of other navies, and we have bound ourselves to build no more of them until 1942 although other countries can invoke and profit by every conceivable form of escape clause in order to go on building that class of ship. I hope that the result of this will not be a repetition of the melancholy story we learned at Coronel when the "Good Hope" and "Monmouth" found themselves out-gunned and outclassed by the "Scharnhorst" and the "Gneisenau."

We ought to get the position clear about the 16-inch guns. As I understand it, Japan has reserved her right to instal 16-inch guns, but has not so far categorically announced that she is mounting them in any of her new construction. On the other hand, I understand that we have a categorical declaration by America that she is proposing to instal guns of that calibre in her new construction. If that is the position, it would be a good thing if it could be confirmed so that the House would know what the position is with regard to 16-inch guns. The moment one country puts 16-inch guns into a ship, other major naval Powers will inevitably follow the example. Here again, just as the race is on in the "A"-class cruisers, so the race is on in the 16-inch gun capital ship. I do not know whether we shall get any declaration. We have had a statement by the former First Lord of the Admiralty in answer to a question by myself that even if America or Japan announced an intention to instal 16-inch guns, the design of our new capital ships which are now laid down would not be altered and that we would stick to the 14-inch guns. Does the First Lord repeat that undertaking in regard to the three further capital ships which are to be laid down? I do not believe that he can.

The general conclusions I am led to are that these treaties give no real limitation whatever. It is all quite illusory, and there is no prospect of any real limitation to be found within the contents of the treaties. This country in regard to its future naval construction has to be guided by its own interests and by nothing else, because there is no real naval limitation in existence. If that be so, let me remind the First Lord that this country has very little to gain, curiously enough, from leading the van in new naval construction. What was said this afternoon about the construction of the "Dreadnought" is true. By building that ship we wiped out the great superiority that we had and we put other naval Powers on an equal footing with ourselves. We gave them an equal start with ourselves in that particular form of "Dreadnought" construction. If the 16-inch gun 35,000-ton battleships are to be built, do not let us feel necessarily that our security is built up in that direction. Do not let us necessarily say that we are going to lead the way in that particular class of ship. Let us concentrate instead upon finding the counter to ships of that enormous size and gun power. Do not let us sit down and say that that is the last word in capital ship strategy or technique or naval construction. The more we see other countries going in for these mammoth ships and guns, the more the brains of our staff and our constructors should be devoted to finding the counter to them. Of all forms of armament competition, big gun and big ship competition is the most futile and wasteful. These treaties do nothing to secure limitations of big ship building. They illustrate and underline the failure of the Government to bring about an international situation in which limitation is possible. The race is on in naval competition and construction, and expenditure is bound to increase, with a corresponding reduction in the standard of living. By their failure to support efforts for disarmament and efforts for limitation, the Government have brought about a situation which this country will yet bitterly rue.