A substantial opposition argument from the 1934 naval estimates debate deserves more than dismissal as simple naivety. The speaker points to hundreds of millions spent on the navy and credits the Washington and London agreements with preventing still greater expenditure on capital ships. He concludes that renewed service estimates and propaganda would drive the powers from disarmament toward armed security and an arms race. This was a sincere, internally coherent attempt to preserve peace. Its timing, only five years before the Second World War, reveals the strategic danger of a policy that works only if other states make the same choice.
Chapter · 39:47-43:36
The 1934 naval estimates contained a serious case for disarmament
An opposition speech argued that naval treaties had saved vast sums and that renewed spending would push the great powers from disarmament toward an arms race.