The United States After Thirty Years

VI.—The Naval Misunderstandings rE nearest approach to hostility or annoyance which I observed in Americans was when they were talking to me about the Geneva Naval Conference. In Washington especially- the breakdown of the Con- ference had caused surprise and some bitterness; was not backward whenever I had the opportunity of presenting the British case, and the conclusion I came to after several disputes, vigorous though never really unfriendly, was that there had been much more mis- understanding on the Naval question than on any other.

I had gone to America anxious to inform my friends there of the very positive merits of the British ease— merits which are very clear to me—but I found that, though there was indeed great need for informing them, I myself was in need of information about the American objections. I think that the arguments of the Geneva Conference were more inadequately summarized for the use of those people in both countries who wanted to judge from the facts than those of any Conference in recent times. It was a painful discovery for me that intelligent Americans seriously believed that Britain had tried at Geneva to refuse naval equality, or parity as the Americans say. I explained that ever since parity was accepted by Britain at the Washington Conference it had been assumed as a matter of course, and that nobody had ever dreamed of going back upon it. " What were your people trying to do at Geneva, then ? " I was asked. I had to explain that though parity, as such was never in question, we had objected to a particular interpretation or application of parity.

THE BRITISH CASE.

The crux at Geneva was, of course, the dispute about cruisers. The United States proposed a total permitted tonnage for the whole class for both countries. Our delegates naturally pointed out that to patrol the vast and intricate trade-routes of the Empire it would be necessary for Britain to expend the permitted tonnage on building a great many comparatively small vessels, otherwise the total tonnage would not " go round." The United States would quite naturally expend her tonnage upon building the largest sanctioned type of cruiser—the 10,000-ton ship—which is believed in by her experts and which is suitable to her needs because, not having many. naval bases, she requires cruisers that can keep the sea for long periods. The result would be that for fighting - purposes the American cruisers would be greatly superior to the British cruisers. " Our delegates," I went on to say, " never thought of question- ing your right to build as many cruisers as you please. What they did object to was putting their signatures to a document which in the name of parity would not produce anything resembling parity." The usual answer to this was : " Well, that is all new to us. We never heard it put that way before." Thus encouraged, I would go on to emphasize the honesty, the pacific character, and the economical advantages of the British scheme at Geneva. The proposed lengthening of the lives of ships was aimed at a vast reduction of expendi- ture. The proposed reduction of the size of all ships, from battleships to submarines, and the proposed" reduction of gun-power were a real contribution to an unaggressive conception of the modern duties of navies. " I see," I added, " that you have been disappointed by the breakdown, but your disappointment cannot possibly have been greater than ours."

AMERICAN NAVAL NEEDS.

It was at Washington, where they know, that I learned far more than anywhere else about the 'American point of view. I was there told that although British naval needs were admittedly different from American nteds 'they were not nearly so different as had -been- represtited. Those Americans who want a larger Navy speak of their country to-day as being dependent to a degree which was not foreseen, even a generation ago, on foreign trade, and on the investment abroad of American money. " We are a great mid-oceanic trading country," one said to me, " dependent upon open sea routes for our manga- nese, our tin, our rubber, and indeed for most tropical products. It is absurd to talk as though Britain was peculiar in this respect. We only want cruisers appro- priate to our risks,` and no one has denied that large cruisers are the right type for us. We cannot put into a naval base here, there, and everywhere, to refuel, as you can. Your people at Geneva asked us to sere their point of view, but they absolutely refused to see ours." " Our point of view," I protested, " was a very sound one The purpose of the Conference was naval reduction. Everybody knows that the maximum allowed in compe- tition becomes the minimum. Your 10,000-ton cruisers with eight-inch guns, unless they were strictly limited in number as we proposed, would have tended to become the standard size for all nations."

THE RODNEY AND THE NELSON.

The next point of importance which I encountered was the harping on the advantage which Britain haS in the possession of the super-Dreadnoughts, Rodney' and Nelson'-55,000-ton ships with 16-inch guns, not td mention the battle-cruiser ' Hood ' of 41,000 tons. Wherever I went I was haunted by the Nelson and the Rodney.' In every conversation these names soon turned up. The general feeling was that the British delegates at the Washington Conference had " put it over " the American members. It was not suggested— for of course it could not be—that Britain had not a perfect right to commission the Rodney ' and the Nelson.' But somehow or other the Americans thought that they had been overcome by a superior diplomacy, which had brought it about that Britain would have a superiority in battleships for a long time while parity was in process of being secured. Moreover, Britain, the Americans said, had seemed to be in a great hurry to get on with her fourteen 10,000-ton cruisers immediately after the Washington Conference. Certainly she had a legal right _ to do it, but was this rush exactly in the spirit of the Conference ? Therefore, when . it came to the recent British proposal of a further - reduction in the size of liattleships-the .American answer was "That's all very well. But for an indefinite period,-that is to say till -the lives of the present British. battleships are ended-,--the British Fleet would have a. considerable superiority. You would still have your Rodney' and your -` Nelson,' and we shOuld have nothing - to match them. Of course,- if you had proposed to scrap these ships we might have said Now you're talking.' But no scrapping -was proposed. On- the contrary you have actually suggested a longer- life for every ship. Our grievance about your liattleship proposal is just as great as your grievance about our cruiser proposal, but you seem unable to see it.'? • A similar suspicion was excited by the British proposals to reduce the guns in cruisers to six inches. The British seaman with his long service can man-handle a six-inch gun, but the American, with his shorter service, relies more upon mechanism, and feels that a reduction to six inches would give Britain a distinct advantage. And if I was haunted by the Rodney ' and the Nelson I was almost equally haunted by the names of some of those British liners which Americans think would spring into life in hundreds in the event of war as highly efficient eruiisers. ".You have nearly 900,000 tons of these fast merchant vessels," said one expert to me, " and we have lessr.than 200,000 tons."

I have said enough about the rival points of view, but I never felt so drearily what a gulf of ignorance about one another separates the two countries. It would be incon- ceivable that in a matter of comparable importance there would be so much ignorance of the rival points of view in any two European nations. We say that science has eliminated distance, but I fear that it has not.

FREEDOM OF THE SEAS.

At the back of all this contention about tonnages and gun-power is the traditional American feeling about the Freedom of the Seas. Numerous as the misunderstandings are about the subjects I have mentioned, I believe that the misunderstandings about the Freedom of the Seas are even more numerous. The very phrase is naturally disagreeable to Englishmen. They remember how Germany used -it before the War, with an ingenuous face, in order to try to induce us voluntarily to give up the only means—naval belligerent rights—by which we could defeat her in a war. The extreme interpretation of the phrase means to many Americans complete recognition of the rights of neutrals in war as well as in peace. The rights of capture and search would disappear ; contra- band would be a forgotten word ; blockade would be impossible. I. venture to say, however, that officials, experts, and, well-informed people generally in America are no more anxious to insist upon that interpretation than we are. After all the League of Nations conteiu- plates pressure upon an aggressive Power which could be carried out in many cases only by blockade.

Still, the feeling is strong in the United States that Americans have too long had to put up with the incon- venience and humiliation of running the gauntlet of the British Fleet when Britain was at war. As one American seaman kept saying to me, with a kind of friendly yet jocular truculence, " We're not going into Plymouth any more ! We're not going into Kirkwall any more ! " Concern for American national prestige of course counts for much in this matter. I made a point of arguing that no naval Power could really get on without a blockade if it seriously had to use its Navy. The American history books, as I reminded my friends, said a great deal about British interference with American merchant rights in 1812—a matter upon which British history books say relatively little—but during the American Civil War the boot was on the other leg. Then the Federals tried to prevent Britain exercising neutral rights. Was it not true that every naval Power tried to assert the rights of search and capture if it felt strong enough ? Did not the Federals even invent the doctrine of Continuous Voyage for the purpose ?

A NEW APPROACH.

On the whole I did not find much resistance to these arguments. Most Americans recognize that the Monroe Doctrine places vast responsibilities on the United States as the keeper of the peace in her own hemisphere, and that she might make herself helpless by repudiating the right of blockade. The true line of approach to a naval agreement, I am convinced, is negotiation to determine the dual application of Anglo-American naval power. We ought to be sister guardians of the seas. Discussions about parity provide little hope, for all the time we are speaking in different terms. The result of the Geneva Conference is that the United States, if she accomplishes her present programme, will have twenty-one 10,000-ton cruisers to our' ur fourteen !

Let us then try the new way, which is based on the simple fact that we have reached a stage in the interlocking of the world's interests where any nation which insists on full neutral rights in time of war will be feeding an aggressor with munitions, playing a very selfish part, and doing an injury to the civilized world.

J. B. ATKINS.