Building escorts and submarines across the Commonwealth

The Royal Navy already understood that anti-submarine escorts and submarines would be central to a global war, but planned against a later strategic deadline around 1942. The government's move away from the Ten Year Rule in 1932 had still left an unofficial five-year planning horizon. Bringing the crash program forward into January 1939 would not deliver every hull before September, but could put substantial reinforcements into service soon afterward. Placing orders in Britain, Australia, India, Canada, and South Africa would create both ships and the yards, turbine production, and workforce needed for later expansion. Cockatoo Island Dockyard was one Australian facility whose existing capacity could be supported and enlarged through this distributed program. More escorts could reduce early merchant losses, while more submarines would avoid stripping the Far East to reinforce the Mediterranean and could constrain German, Italian, and Japanese operations. Commonwealth industrial development would multiply fleet strength by adding production capacity as well as ships.