Within two or three months eighteen new destroyers are scheduled io leave the shipyards. They will be the first installment in a programme Of 35 of this type craft due to be carried out before 1940. This programme was held up for a time owing to the tremendous strain suddenly thrown. on the British armaments industry by the simultaneous speed up in rearmament of all three fighting services. To equip the destroyers alone it was necessary to deliver nearly 300 new model 4.7-inch guns, including reservers. These guns have a high angle mounting never previously used in the British navy.
Additional destroyers probably will be laid down under the 1939 programme, since it is on these small, high speed craft that Great Britain would depend largely in war time for convoying vital food and raw materials along the Empire trade lifeline.—United Press.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.