News of the Week
THE unhappy sequel to the failure of the Three Power Naval Conference at Geneva is the launching of a Big Navy programme in the United States, to be com- pleted in the extraordinarily short period of five years. This step has been taken in spite of the signal—intended as a repudiation of naval competition—which was made by Great Britain when she postponed the laying down of two of the three cruisers due this year. Some persons assume that this particular Big Navy programme has the consent of President Coolidge. So far from joining in that assumption we do not believe for a moment that Mr. Coolidge has consented to it. We go further and express the belief that he will not consent. If he did' he would have to take back the words which he used in his recent Message to Congress. He then wrote disparagingly of naval competition as being a European vice—a vice from which Arriericans were free. He also said that the failure at Geneva could. not have any influence upon the American decision.
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