London, Aug. 6.
Speaking at, Haslemere to-day, Mr. Winston Churchill, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, declared that the fundamental cause of the} breakdown of the Geneva Naval Limitation Conference lay in the different views as to what con stituted naval equality. Britain, he said, favoured a broad principle of naval equality, with consideration of /special needs, but the United States insisted on equal tonnage expressed jin, mathematical parity.
The scattered British Empire, Mr. Churchill declared, was unable to} bind itself to the principle of machi magical parity, and if the special] needs of the Empire had not been recognized at the Washington Con ference that conference too would have failed as Geneva had done, The speaker' emphasized that Britain would not be offended if America built the cruisers she desired. conclusion the Chancellor ex-[pressixi the hope that the purposes Jot the Geneva Conferegce would be achieved in the next few years, not Jon paper but in practice—Rent A Misquotation London, Aug. 6.
Speaking at a country residence to-day in allusion to the Geneva, Conference, the Earl of Balfour sai that Mr. Hugh Gibson, the head the American delegation to the Conference, had inadvertently misquoted a statement he (Lord Balfour) had made at the Washington Conference, when Great Britain and the United States had agreed that vessels to battle-fleets imited in each ease to, 450,000 tons.
The Earl of Balfour complained that he had been repeatedly misquoted, That statement be made with regard to cruisers auxiliary to battle-fleets. It had been interpret= ed however as meaning that the. [whole force of cruisers required to, protect the British Empire, its Jcommeree and communications, might be met by 450,000 tons, Me read the text of his speech at the Washington Conference in ing out how he had agreed 8 a reasonable gi mount for ships auxil fects. He added that hhgd referred to the num peses for which other auxiliary, Ships were required for such an Empire us the British, and declared thit was the pivot on which the whole thing turned. It was really a melancholy reflection, he said, that Mr, Hugh Gibson,' the chief American delegate, should inadvertently have omitted words which nyodify the whole sense of the pats sage from which they ave extracted, Lord Balfour vividly contrasted Amperica's self-contained geograpbic~ al, position with Britain's situation with her close neighbours, her over-sas responsibilities and the. ies of food and ith an eloquent appel for a proper understanding between Armorica and Great Britain-—Reuter, New York, Aug. 8.
The New York "World," com: menting on the relations between [Great Britain and the United States, deplores the failure of the Geneva, Limitation Conference. It add:
fortunately it came at a time Jalmost unprecedented cordiality tween the two nations, which, in itself, is the most effective protect-against the Big Navyites.'"
"The maintenance of goodwill with Britain," the paper continues, "ig far more valuable than the con-Jelusion of any naval compact."
The paper expresses the opinion that the existing good-feeling is duc, above all, to the discovery. that Americn ' shares very definite grounds of interest with the British Commonwealth of Nations, which has replaced the old Empire.
"The United States," it continues, socially and poli more akin to these Dominions than to any other countries in the world: hence fa breach of peace is not merely unthinkable, but reciprocal goodwill
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.