The exact extent to which the President. will request enlargement of the Navy's air force remained uncertain to-day. It was believed, however, that he would ask that the air force be brought to 2,000 planes before 1940 instead of the present goal of the same number by 1942. Such action, it was estimated, would bring the Army and Navy combined air forces to about 4,500 modern planes.
Observers recalled that the annual report of the Secretary of Navy, Mr. Claude Swanson, pointed out that the United States was trailing other nations in the number of modern submarines and destroyers. The United States has only 39 modern destroyers as compared with Britain's 83 and Japan's 82. France has 61 modern destroyers and Italy 74. The United States also ranks fifth in the number of submarines, possessing 29 as compared with 40 for Britain, 48 for Japan, 75 for France and 71 for Italy.—United Press,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.