Decline of the dreadnought: Britain and the Washington Naval Conference, 1921-1922

• Main Author: Gamble, Raymond Carl
• Language: ENG
• Published: ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst 1993
• Subjects: European history
• Online Access: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations/AAI9316650

This dissertation examines Britain's decision to cede naval parity to the United States at the Washington Naval Conference of 1921-1922. The study recognizes that scholarly opinion emphasizes the role of economic weakness in Britain's decision to accept capital ship limitation. The most useful sources in this study are the Cabinet and Admiralty records at the Public Record Office, London. The accounts of the various subcommittees of the Committee of Imperial Defence and the Cabinet Finance Committee are essential. Three sets of records are particularly helpful for the Conference itself: the papers of the British Empire Delegation, the State Department's Conference on the Limitation of Armament, and Butler and Bury's Documents on British Foreign Policy. The papers of the members of the British government provide limited assistance. At the turn of the century, the Royal Navy, imbued with the Alfred Thayer Mahan's doctrines of sea power, enjoyed the nation's confidence. The Great War damaged the reputations of both the battleship and its most ardent supporters. At the Paris Peace Conference, the United States challenged the supremacy of British sea power. In the face of the continuing American naval construction, the British policy of supremacy with economy became untenable. The Jutland and submarine controversies of 1920 exacerbated the government's loss of faith in the battleship and led to an investigation into the future weapons of the Navy. The Imperial Conference of 1921 precluded the possibility of Dominion support for a naval building program or a decision to renew the Anglo-Japanese Alliance in the face of American opposition. The British Empire Delegation at the Washington Conference sought the maximum relief from naval expenditure consonant with traditional measures of national security. In the face of American proposals for Anglo-American equality and a ten-year holiday in naval construction, Britain salvaged superiority in cruisers and two new battleships. These results lead to the conclusion that the Cabinet no longer believed that the battleship remained the ultimate arbiter of naval disputes. The Cabinet therefore choose to disregard the advice of the Admiralty and accept the naval limitation agreement.