The Geneva Naval Conference was a conference held to discuss naval arms limitation, held in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1927. The aim of the conference was to extend the existing limits on naval construction which had been agreed in the

Washington Naval Treaty The Washington Naval Treaty, also known as the Five-Power Treaty, was a treaty signed during 1922 among the major Allies of World War I, which agreed to prevent an arms race by limiting naval construction. It was negotiated at the Washington N ...

. The Washington Treaty had limited the construction of

battleship A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of large caliber guns. It dominated naval warfare in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The term ''battleship'' came into use in the late 1880s to describe a type ...

s and

aircraft carrier An aircraft carrier is a warship that serves as a seagoing airbase, equipped with a full-length flight deck and facilities for Carrier-based aircraft, carrying, arming, deploying, and recovering aircraft. Typically, it is the capital ship of a ...

s, but had not limited the construction of

cruiser A cruiser is a type of warship. Modern cruisers are generally the largest ships in a fleet after aircraft carriers and amphibious assault ships, and can usually perform several roles. The term "cruiser", which has been in use for several hu ...

s, destroyers or submarines.

Background

In February 1927, President Calvin Coolidge issued a call to the Big Five Powers to meet in Geneva to confront the issue of naval rivalries, as a result of discussions about naval arms limitations at League of Nations disarmament meetings. Britain and Japan accepted the invitation, but France and Italy (the other nations which had signed the Washington Treaty) declined. The Washington Treaty had defined a ratio of 5:5:3:1.75:1.75 in the strength of capital ships (battleships and battlecruisers) between Britain, the United States, Japan, France, and Italy respectively. The USA sought to use the Geneva conference to extend this ratio to smaller craft, allowing both Britain and themselves cruisers with a total displacement of 300,000 tons, with the Japanese allowed 180,000 tons. At the same time, the USA wanted to avoid further restrictions on the size of individual ships.

Negotiations

Under the Washington Treaty, each nation was allowed to build cruisers of up to 10,000 tons displacement carrying 8-inch guns. In practice this had also become a minimum figure, with navies competing to design cruisers of exactly 10,000 tons displacement. The US's negotiating position, on which it was unwilling to compromise, was a plan to build 25 heavy cruisers of 10,000 tons displacement (250,000 tons total). Britain, by contrast, was prepared to accept parity with the US in its cruiser fleet, so long as the Royal Navy was able to maintain the very large cruiser force, if necessary of smaller and cheaper ships, which it felt was necessary to protect the long trade routes and imperial commitments of the

British Empire The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts esta ...

. Britain proposed the reduction of the 10,000-ton and 8-inch limit for newly constructed cruisers. The British estimated they needed 70 cruisers totalling 560,000 tons displacement (i.e. averaging 8,000 tons each), almost twice the total tonnage of the American proposal. The principal Japanese concern was to avoid a repetition of the 5:5:3 ratio. The Japanese naval staff felt that a fleet 70% the size of that of the US was the minimum required to win a war against the US. Since the 70% ratio had not been achieved with battleships, it was particularly important to retain it for cruisers. However, since the British and American delegations were unable to reach agreement, Japanese objections were not crucial to the failure of the summit. In the end, the participants at the conference failed to reach a binding agreement regarding the distribution of naval tonnage.

Impact

The question of limitations on cruiser tonnage was raised again at the London Naval Conference of 1930, resulting in the London Naval Treaty. The London Conference succeeded where Geneva failed, with the US being permitted a larger number of heavy cruisers than Britain, but Britain being permitted a larger number of light cruisers. Agreement was reached in part because the British and US delegations recognized a greater shared interest and the need to cut government expenditure as a result of the Wall Street Crash of 1929. These events focused minds on the need to reach an agreement.Marriott, p.13

Notes

References

* *Evans, David & Peattie, Mark. ''Kaigun: Strategy, Tactics and Technology in the Imperial Japanese Navy, 1887-1941''. Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 1997. *Kennedy, Paul. ''The Rise and Fall of British Naval Mastery''. Macmillan, London, 1983. *Marriott, Leo. ''Treaty Cruisers: The First International Warship Building Competition''. Pen & Sword, Barnsley, 2005. * Potter, E (Editor). ''Sea Power: A Naval History'', 2nd Ed. Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 1981. * Szudarek, Krystian Maciej. "The British government and the naval disarmament conference in Geneva (1927)." ''Studia Maritima'' 27.1 (2014): 87-151. {{Authority control Naval conferences Diplomatic conferences in Switzerland 20th-century diplomatic conferences 1927 in Switzerland 1927 conferences