Interwar warship tonnage declarations do not provide simple proof that one navy obeyed while another cheated. Individual designs contained variations and adjustments that complicate a clean compliant-or-noncompliant label. Calculations used by directors of naval construction show that formal limits still left room for interpretation and creative accounting. The Royal Navy is offered as an example of close attention to the treaty's letter rather than uncomplicated acceptance of its spirit.
Notable Point · 1:11:36-1:13:23
Treaty compliance and naval creative accounting
Nominal treaty compliance could conceal design allowances, accounting choices, and interpretations that followed the letter more closely than the spirit.