The personified Royal Navy expects the Treasury to reduce defense spending as soon as no immediate enemy can be named. It therefore reads the treaty ratio as a floor that might prevent further reductions, not merely as a ceiling on new construction. The joke turns an international arms limit into an internal argument against unilateral economy. The same treaty number can mean protection to one navy and deprivation to another.
Notable Point · 6:08-6:36
The Royal Navy sees a floor against Treasury cuts
Britain's navy treats treaty limits as protection against deeper peacetime cuts rather than permission to build up to the ceiling.