If Britain Should Lose

TIME does not ordinarily write about hypothetical cases; it writes about events. But for the U. S. the biggest event of the last ten weeks has been the development of a hypothetical case which suddenly alters the whole outlook for U. S. national security. The article which follows is in no sense a prediction. It explores the immediate problem of U. S. Defense. What the U. S. people choose to do or not to do about the British Fleet is incomparably more important than any other decision they can make about National Defense in the summer of 1940.

From Oran's harbor, below the frowning heights of Algeria's Jebel Murjajo, Britain got her full answer. It came with fearful finality. The question that Britain had faced was: What if France should lose? From some of France's politicians--well-intentioned poltroons, strong-minded pro-Nazis and plain defeatists--already had come the civilian's answer: ignominious surrender.

Last fortnight, off the Mediterranean pirates' 15th-Century stronghold at Mers-el-Kebir, France's Navy added its own postscript. It was put down in the blood of a thousand French gobs, gay in their red pompons and striped shirts, who had frolicked with British seamen on shore leave below Oran's quake-shattered Kasbah. It was put down in the hulk of the Dunkerque, France's answer to Germany's pocket battleships, now beached and battered by British bombs on the Barbary coast. It was repeated in the draggle-tailed flight of the crippled Strasbourg to Toulon, in the smashed hulks of four other men-of-war, in the sullen disarmament of the French squadron under British guns in Alexandria's harbor. France's last line had crumbled.

Last week as defeat-fluid France was poured inexorably into a Nazi mold, the U. S., like Britain before it, faced a similarly pregnant question: What if Britain should lose?

One important part of the answer to this question is obvious. If the British Isles should now be overwhelmed, the inescapable fact is that there will be a new mistress of the seas. None of Britain's dominions has the financial or industrial resources to support the fleet that ruled the waves even if it is not destroyed or made captive.

Another inescapable fact is that if Britain ceases to be mistress of the seas, the new mistress is almost certain to be either 1) Germany and her allies or 2) the U. S. and its allies (if any). Recognition of this fact is implicit in the two-ocean navy program which the U. S. already has afoot.

For the greater part of its history the U. S. has lived under the umbrella of protection provided by the British Fleet. Until World War I the U. S. never attempted to claim naval parity and by that time was thoroughly satisfied with a century-old tacit understanding which made the two fleets not rivals but complements of each other.

Under that understanding Britain, with her world empire, kept the seas open and safe--all that U. S. commerce could ask. Actually conceived by Foreign Secretary George Canning, the Monroe Doctrine had been made a workable arrangement--for that Doctrine was in fact a deal. In 1823 Canning agreed with President Monroe that Europe should not attempt to extend her holdings in the Western Hemisphere. With the backing of Britain, it became practical for the U. S. to insure its own security by preventing any other power from expanding in the Western Hemisphere. To all intents Britain had abdicated to the U. S. as the dominant power in the Americas.

Germany has made no such abdication. If she should succeed to Britain's power a new navy will rule the seas--a navy which for practical purposes dates back only to 1898. Its creator was able, far-seeing Admiral von Tirpitz, famed for his bifurcated beard, whose active service extended to 1916. The brief German naval tradition is of daring, offensive, individual action, of surface and submarine raiders ranging far & wide through two world wars. It is of one great battle--Jutland--and of studious, hard-faced Vice Admiral Scheer directing the fleet against Jellicoe and Beatty from the bridge of the Friedrich der Grosse. It is of one afternoon in Scapa Flow when the entire German Navy went down, scuttled, to save it from surrender. It is of baton-toting grand Admiral Erich Raeder with a new Nazi Fleet, of pocket battleships and modern submarines, raiding and taking daring risks to cover German landings in Norway. The German naval tradition is all crammed into 42 years.

If the U. S. Navy becomes mistress of the seas, the new ruler will have a 165-year-old tradition to look back on. That tradition stems from dashing Scot John Paul Jones, father of the navy, skipper of Bon Homme Richard and many another fighting craft of the days of wooden ships and iron men. It is of seamy Farragut, who dammed the torpedoes at Mobile Bay and went ahead, of Schley and his sharpshooting bluejackets at Santiago, of urbane Dewey at Manila ("You may fire when you are ready, Gridley"). It is of scholarly, outspoken Bill Sims and the North Sea patrol, of spectacled, bluff Admiral James Otto Richardson, 1940's CINCUS, whose fleet lies in the Pacific while the Japanese Navy waits--and waits.

Just as the German Navy is a newcomer to the world, so is Nazi foreign policy. It is possible that if Britain should lose and Hitler became master of the seas, he would suddenly become a good boy and covet nothing that belongs to his neighbors. The sun may also fail to rise tomorrow morning. There is nothing to prove absolutely that it will or that Hitler won't. One can judge only by experience, and although Hitler's record of past performance is not so long as the sun's it is just as consistent. He has often said that his ambitions were satisfied and he has always proved that they were not. A change in Hitler is not impossible but any nation that counts on it, takes a reckless risk--a risk out of all proportion to the probable cost of insuring against it.

Liability. In Nazi ideology economics is an instrument of war. Against barter, against cheap and conscript labor from the conquered countries, against German economic sleight-of-hand, high-wage U. S. business is unarmed. With the Germans masters of Europe, U. S. European trade ($1,893,000,000 in 1938) will almost certainly dwindle or it will have to be conducted on Germany's disadvantageous barter terms. And if Britain loses, Germany will have 60% of the world's merchant fleet. She will control the docks of the world either directly, or by economic pressure. A shipment of American typewriters will have small chance of quick unloading and delivery in Capetown, if competing German typewriters can be got to the customer first.

The greatest danger to the U. S. if Germany becomes mistress of the seas is inherent in the U. S.'s greatest strategic liability: South America. Caught by World War II on the point of taking a major place in world trade, "the Continent of the 20th Century" is more a half-completed duplicate than a complement of the U. S. economy. Of all her major exports, agricultural and mineral, the U. S. takes only one: coffee. Yet of the coffee production of the Brazilian plantations, the U. S. can use only 57%. The rest, if coffee raisers are to thrive, must be sold in world trade, principally in Europe.

With a habitual huge carry-over of wheat (this year, 288,000,000 bu.) the U. S. needs no wheat from Argentina. It needs no corn or meat grown in the fat lands of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and eastern Bolivia. Of South American metals, only tin, manganese, bauxite, platinum and vanadium could be bought by the U. S. without competition with its own economy. The U. S. could use rubber from Brazil, but Brazil's present output of rubber is negligible and it takes at least seven years for a rubber plantation to become commercially workable. Thus, several years and many things must happen before South America can hope to find a sufficient market in the U. S. During those years, Chilean copper must compete in the markets of the world with U. S. copper, Argentine wheat with U. S. wheat, Latin American oil with U. S. oil. If Hitler commands Europe, South America must turn to him for markets. His propagandists are already pointing this out.

The only alternative to allowing South America to fall into a victorious Hitler's economic lap is to form a hemisphere cartel to even up the bargaining power between the Western Hemisphere and Europe, between the Americas and the totalitarian States. The U. S. would have to foot the bill for such a program, possibly by some sort of AAA. Whether South America will be willing to place her economic future in U. S. hands at the forthcoming Havana Conference is uncertain.

If South America wants to side with U. S. she may find herself unable to do so--to carry it through under some circumstances that may arise, would be economic suicide. Meanwhile where Nazi business goes, there goes Nazi politics. In South America, Nazi thought and Nazi organization already bubble above the political surface, in Uruguay, in Brazil, in Chile, Argentina, Paraguay, Bolivia. Prodded by its own businessmen, pressed by German traders and diplomatic experts, South America might well become an armed threat to the U. S., a base for launching an invasion of North America up the stepladder of the Caribbean islands with a drive to the flank to close the Panama Canal.

As trade "friend," victorious Germany could make U. S. business and politics dance to its fiddling. As military foe, well fed and fortified in South America, it might play a deadlier tune. For it was of this war that Adolf Hitler's military mentor, old General von Ludendorff wrote:

After the next victorious war we must strike the conquered foe so mercilessly that his spirit and the spirit of his children will be crushed for generations. No conquered foe must ever again dare to look a German in the face as an equal. He must recognize him as his overlord.

The Fleet. U. S. isolation has been a practical foreign policy largely because Britain was friendly. For this arrangement, the U. S. repaid her. At the back door of Asia the U. S. Fleet has long stood guard, setting up outposts in the Philippines and Hawaii to prevent seizure of the Orient by pushing, expansion-set Japan. Today, with Britain fighting with her back to the wall, Admiral Richardson can keep his battle fleet based at Honolulu, only because the U. S.'s outposts in the Atlantic are still under the protection of a British Fleet.

The collapse of Britain and the loss of her fleet would plunge the U. S. into a defensive crisis. The U. S. Battle Fleet would have to go streaking for the Panama Canal and the Atlantic. The Pacific, to all intents, would have to be abandoned to Japan. And in the Atlantic Admiral Richardson might conceivably have to pit his great force against an armada of British, French, German and Italian ships, outnumbering him in tonnage more than 2-to-1.

Against superior naval force can the U. S. successfully be defended? Last May the question was before the Senate Naval Affairs Committee as it considered a $100,000,000 expansion of the Navy. Wrote Isolationist Senator Walsh in the committee's report:

From all evidence available it appears that the United States can be defeated and conquered without military conquest of continental United States. Without a navy controlling the sea areas against an enemy, an effective blockade against our foreign commerce can be established and maintained at points thousands of miles from our coast, and well beyond aircraft range.

Our outlying possessions will be captured and used against us as advance bases. There will be nothing to prevent the establishment of bases, by force if necessary, in this hemisphere, from which, as well as from aircraft carriers, repeated bombing raids can be dispatched against our highly industrialized areas.

It is obvious that such a war will not be particularly expensive to a well-prepared enemy. . . . In fact, such a war might even prove quite lucrative provided the enemy managed to secure a sufficient portion of our destroyed commerce overseas. . . .

With the loss of our outlying possessions, our foreign commerce, and subject to continual raids upon our coastal areas, our ultimate defeat is inevitable. It will be only a question of time. . . .

Three Kinds of Evil. If Germany should win the Battle of Britain, what would become of the British Fleet? One extreme possibility is that it would withdraw, along with the British-controlled units of the French Fleet, to the Western Hemisphere, to carry on the war. The other extreme possibility is that it would go to Germany intact.

Probability, however, does not run to extremes. Before Britain could be beaten there is every likelihood that part, perhaps a substantial part of the British Fleet would be lost in the fighting around the British Isles. Even if the bulk of the British Home Fleet should be surrendered, units stationed in the Mediterranean, colonies and dominions, might well escape German hands. The practical hypotheses fall into three classes.

I. Enough of the British Fleet might escape capture so that it would still remain the major naval force in the Atlantic.

How much of the British Fleet would be enough to dominate the Atlantic cannot be precisely answered. That depends partly on the types of vessels which escaped and also on the losses of the Axis Fleet. In a general way, if less than a third of the British Fleet is lost to Nazi air attacks, torpedoes, mines and naval attack, the rest would be roughly equal in tonnage to the present U. S. Fleet. Whether it could protect the North American seaboard and still keep open the sea routes to Africa, while the U. S. Fleet stayed in the Pacific, is questionable. But based in the Western Hemisphere, it would still be the major power in the Atlantic with a superiority of around 2-to-1 over the Axis Fleet, if both operated at equal distances from their bases. With some difficulty it might be able to keep victorious Adolf Hitler bottled up in Europe, deny him the food and trade from the colonies and South America. But an Atlantic Fleet operating from the Western Hemisphere needs more bases than the one at Halifax. Only the U. S. has them.

Such a fleet would constitute considerable protection for the U. S. but the protection would have a price. In the nature of things this price would have to include:

1) The British Fleet would have to use U. S. bases from Portsmouth to Charleston, possibly on down to the Canal Zone.

2) The U. S. would have to pay for upkeep of the fleet, in the long run might even have to provide manpower for replacements of battle casualties.

3) The U. S. would have to come to terms with the Empire for the use of the fleet in a coordinated plan to control the seas. The U. S. has not lent its fleet for the defense of Britain, and Britain would be less than sensible if she lent her fleet for the defense of the U. S. without at least some guarantee that the U. S. would become the open ally of the Empire. The U. S. has not the force to undertake the defense not only of Canada and the British West Indies (which it must defend anyhow for its own self-interest) but of Australia and New Zealand, Hong Kong and Singapore, India and South Africa. The only satisfactory quid pro quo the U. S. could offer probably would involve going to war with Germany, for Britain would have no incentive to save her fleet unless the U. S. offered her hope of victory.

II. Enough of the British Fleet will be destroyed or will surrender to Germany so that the U. S., to remain secure in the Atlantic, must withdraw its fleet from the Pacific.

On this hypothesis there are many variations. A third of the British Fleet might be grabbed by Germany or surrendered. Or a third might make its way across the Atlantic. But in any degree of the hypothesis, next step for Germany and the U. S. would probably be the greatest naval race of all time. The U. S. Fleet would have to be brought into the Atlantic, for Japan does not present a threat of invasion from the West in any way comparable to Germany's threat from the East.

Already committed to a two-ocean navy, the U. S. has a start in such a naval race. But her yards are running at capacity. And Germany already has the shipbuilding yards of France, plus her own. If the Battle of Britain should give Adolf Hitler not only the British yards but the partly completed ships of Britain's Fleet-to-be (seven battleships, seven carriers, 23 cruisers, 32 destroyers, ten submarines, plus smaller ships and any others secretly laid down since last September)--the U. S. would be in a tight spot.

III. So much of the British Fleet will surrender to Germany that the Axis will become the major naval power in the Atlantic even with the entire U. S. Fleet in that ocean.

This is the most serious situation of all for the U. S. and it is not beyond the bounds of possibility. If Britain should be conquered in a swift invasion lasting only three or four weeks, its morale might collapse as completely as that of France. In that event Winston Churchill might find himself out, like Paul Reynaud in France, and Churchill's promise never to surrender the fleet might be forgotten as quickly as Reynaud's similar promises.

If Germany should get half the present British Fleet to add to the Axis Navy she would have the edge on the U. S. Fleet about 5-to-3; if she got two-thirds her superiority would be about 2-to-1. Even with the defensive advantages of the Caribbean islands and short lines of communication, the U. S. Fleet might have its hands full defending North America and the Panama Canal. It would have to worry about Germany seizing a foothold in Newfoundland or thereabouts, within bombing range of the industrial heart of the U. S. Outclassed in the Atlantic, the U.S. would be face to face with foreign conquest of the type outlined in Senator Walsh's look at the future. It could probably do little more against an invasion of South America than harass the invader's supply lines by raids and hit-&-run attacks. The defense of the U. S. would then devolve much more on U. S. land forces, which will be slow in reaching a state of preparedness.

Timing. Making the only safe assumption from the standpoint of U. S. defense--that Hitler intends to attack the Western Hemisphere--one major question is: when will he attack? Timing is vital, for not until two years at least have passed can the U. S. count on a formidable army and air force. Not until seven years, at least, will the two-ocean fleet which the U. S. has ordered, exist. Not for several years can the U. S. become industrially prepared by building adequate plants for the production of synthetic rubber and silk, by developing alternative sources (or stock piles) of tin, manganese and other essential metals.

All these factors may tend to hurry Hitler into making his attack soon. Other factors may tend to delay him. Germany has not eaten well for several years and for the sake of morale at home, Hitler may need to put off further conquests until his people have had a few good meals. He would also take some risk in attacking the West before he had disposed of Russia, an ally which already has misgivings about him. By devoting a few months to a campaign to cripple Russia and seize the Ukraine he might protect his back and insure his food supplies.

If the British Fleet surrenders intact, it would take at least a year to train German personnel to learn to operate it. But Hitler might be ready to attack the U. S. sooner if a beaten Britain -- as bitter against the U. S. as France now is against Britain-- should willingly turn Nazi and aid him with the British Fleet. But in any event he would need a period of preparation. The minimum for that period is probably a few months (perhaps next winter, which is summer in South America--if he chooses that route), the maximum is probably around five years (till he can complete as many as possible of the ships now under construction in British, French and German yards, but before the new U. S. Fleet can be completed). Between those two extremes apparently lies the period of greatest U. S. danger.

During this interval Hitler's obvious move is to protest his friendship for the U. S.; to seek loans from the U. S., arguing that he needs reconstruction help in order to live in peace in Europe; to invite the U. S. to enter into as much friendly trade as will supply him with strategic materials he needs; to prosecute trade and political penetration in South America in order to prepare for his ultimate attack--and perhaps to subsidize a few Nazi revolutions; even to promise to make a lasting peace with the U. S. on condition that the U.S. stop rearmament. In these and other ways, including propaganda for "international friendship" he may succeed in postponing U. S. preparations for defense and hastening the time when he is ready to attack.

U. S. Problem. Dangerous as Hitler is, the U. S. is no mean adversary for him, provided it takes the steps necessary to prepare for the expected challenge. On the asset side the U. S. is already a great, rich, well-fed, homogeneous nation compared to Hitler's Europe which is half-starved and polyglot, with its industrial resources disrupted and partially destroyed by war. The U. S. is likewise, as of the present moment, a far greater naval power. If Britain is beaten, the U.S. will also have one new strength: no longer will citizens have any feeling that steps taken for U. S. protection are intended to pull some other nation's chestnuts from the fire.

On the liability side, the U. S. has a weak army and air force. It is not firm in a will to fight as are the Nazis. The U. S. is also perilously weak in potential allies on whose resources and aid it can count.

If Hitler chooses to fight Russia before tackling the Western Hemisphere, the U. S. will gain a few months breathing spell, but at the probable expense of losing its best potential ally--the only one which could make him fight a war facing both ways. Japan's chief value to the U. S. would be negative, to keep her from aiding Germany. But Russia and Japan each have their own ambitions, and no deal made with either of them can be long relied on. At best the U. S. can hardly hope for more than to induce one of them to join it in a three-handed game, in which two of the players looking after their individual interest would try to prevent the third player, Germany, from gaining a commanding lead.

In short, if Britain is beaten, there is a prospect that the only genuine security which the U. S. can gain is to set up its own right as mistress of the seas. Any other policy would expose the U. S.'s weak Latin-American flank. But in this policy the U. S. faces a multitude of difficulties. The question is not only Can it be done? but Is the U. S. willing to do it?

If the U. S. takes the power, it will have to take the responsibility. It will have to show a willingness, not hitherto apparent, to deal in world problems firmly and sensibly. And in doing so, it must also, as Britain has done, accept the odium of being top dog in the world. In that event, the U. S. can no longer afford to have its external policies subject to the whims of internal politics. It must think in world terms and regardless of quarrels about what party should be in power at home, it must acquire the tradition of carrying on a strong, consistent foreign policy, a tradition whose failure has brought France to downfall and Britain to the brink of downfall. To become mistress of the seas would be an outright reversal of U. S. isolationism, but it is a policy on which the U. S. already is launched. It was launched last week when Congress definitely placed an order for a two-ocean navy.

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