The personified-navies idea returns for the London naval treaty system. After the Second London Naval Treaty, the British, French, and American characters ask why their governments keep signing limits while guns are pointed at them and bombs are already falling. Their complaint contrasts the diplomatic desire to preserve an appearance of peace with a naval assessment that the security environment is worsening. The comedy becomes darker as arms limitation moves from postwar retrenchment toward a rearmament crisis. The later skit provides a bridge from Washington to the increasingly fragile treaty system of the 1930s.
Notable Point · 12:18-13:20
The Second London Treaty and the illusion of peace
A later skit has Britain, France, and the United States question arms limits while military threats are already unmistakable.