Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-05-18
BY FRANK H. sIMoNDS.

TN ALL the many articles havl
written about the Naval Conference
and treaty of London, have con
i fined the discussion to the Amer
lean standpoint. Did the treaty
promise tonnage reduction, construction
limitation, Anglo-American parity
These are the questions about which
American discussion has pretty gen.
orally revolved.
Turning to the European point o.
view-and primarily to the opinion o.
continental states-it becomes clear al
once that the basis of estimate is some
what different. Here the meaning o.
the London pact Is set forth in some
what more materialiStic terms. In fact
the whole episode seems not an adven-
ture in idealism but shining example
of real politik.
Great Britain, to the European mind
has made great and historic renuncia-
ton. In admitting parity on the part
of the American fleet she has, such Is
the continental Judgment, initiated the
Roman example, which brought back
the frontiers of the empire to the Rhine
and the Danube, abandoning outlying
provinces, when the first clear evidences
Of internal slackening were discovered.
Result Believed Sure.
These continental critics are little IN
terested in the questions which trouble
American naval experts, above all IN the
debate as to whether absolute and ulti-
mate parity has been attained. Fol-
them the British have agreed to so close
an approach to equality that the result
Is unmistakable. Once for all Britain
has abandoned to the United States alb
solute control of the waters of the At
lantic and Pacific Oceans, within what
may be described as the American
sphere. AS Rome retired from Dacia,
Britain has withdrawn from both Amer
icas. Her legions, which are her ships,
can no longer undertake to defend her
old positions.
For the traditional British domination
stituted a division. AS the empire of
Charlemagne was divided between the
three sons of Louis by the treaty OF
Verdun, the British Empire of the seas
has been split between the United
States, Japan and Britain. North OF
Singapore, west of Hawaii, south OF the
Aleutian Islands, Japan has now estab-
lished a naval domination which IS be-
yond challenge. The open door IN China
perhaps still persists, but the key to
the door, and the power to slam it shut,
rest with the Japanese fleet.
The area of British supremacy Is
stlIl marked by the life line OF empire
which stretches from the Solent, by
way of Gibraltar, Malta, Suez, Alden
and Singapore, to Sydney. Retiring
from Eastern Asia and the Americas,
Britain still clings to traditional domt-
nance in European waters and along
and South Africa. Against France,
italy, Germany, Britain still maintains
her traditional position, but against
America and Japan she no longer
holds out.
RetrogressioD In Power.
Thus the treaty of London means q
distinct, very far reaching retrogresSion
in British power and prestige. Thus
the treaty of London, like the treaty
of Verdun IL centuries earlier, Is &C
cepted as q sign of disintegration. In
Paris, in Rome, even in Berlin, one
talks of the decline if not the fall Of
the empire which has bulked largest in
the European mind since that OF Rome.
The continent, speaking generally,
never believed Britain would yield with
out a struggle. It never imagined that
the shock between England and the
United States was more avoidable than
that between Britain and Germany in
the present century or between France
and Britain In the last. Moreover, In
certain sense, the European mind still
refuses to credit the appearance as a
reality.
The continent believes that while
Britain has, beyond recall, abandoned
the domination of the seas, British
policy Is engaged not wholly unsuccess-
fully in substituting a policy of Anglo
American hegemony for that exclu-
sively British. 1t looks forward not
without anxiety to later negotiations
which may result in the adoption Of
identical policies by the nations which
are henceforth to have equal fleets.
Nor is this possibility wholly absent
from the Japanese mind. The very insist
ence upon the 70 per cent in place Of
the so per cent ratio has been ex-
planned in certain continental journals
as having its origin in an apprehension
that, in the day of crisis, japan might
And herself confronted by the combined