500.A15A3/1852a: Telegram
The Acting Secretary of State to the Ambassador in the United Kingdom (Bingham)
448. 1. It is our understanding that Craigie is now negotiating with the Japanese for simultaneous recourse by the British and Japanese Governments to Article 21 of the London Naval Treaty, 1930. We understand the British, if this negotiation succeeds, will retain five “C” class cruisers; the Japanese will retain excess cruisers, destroyers and submarines.
2. From the point of view of maintaining the retention of excess tonnage within strictly legal limits it is desirable that the British Government succeed in this negotiation.
3. At the same time, in order to arrange for the disposition of the 15,000 odd tons of submarines which we have reserved the right to keep in the event that the Japanese retain excess tonnage in the submarine category, we are most anxious to ascertain the present status of the negotiation. We wish you therefore to canvass the situation and report by telegraph on the most recent developments.
4. For your strictly confidential information, the Navy Department is seriously embarrassed to know what action it should take with regard to the 15,000 odd tons it is under contract to scrap before December 31, 1936, but which it is withholding from the contractors in view of the probability that the Japanese will retain excess submarine tonnage.