FRANCE'S VIEW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 29, 3 February 1934, Page 9

FRANCE'S VIEW.

ARMS IN EUROPE.

Three Powers Agreed on Vital Necessity of Pact. GERMANY'S RIGHTS. (British Official Wireless.) (Received 2 p.m.) RUGBY, February 2. To the British and Italian disarmament proposals at present under consideration by the Governments of the world there has now been added a French memorandum on the subject, which was handed to the German Government on Monday and which has been published in all the four principal European countries

This puts forward the French ideas on disarmament, and it is notable that despite the difference expressed in many viewpoints, there is at least a common recognition of the paramount importance to the peace of the world of an agreement which will avoid tlns almost inevitable catastrophic consequences of an armaments race. Another underlying consideration is the economic and social consequences of vast and wasteful expenditure which might follow failure to reach an armaments convention. Military and Naval Aircraft. It is noted in London that particular attention is devoted in some quarters to the British proposals for air armaments. The British Government has repeatedly emphasised the importance of this aspect of tiie problem, and the new memorandum recognises that these may prove to be the most potent military weapons in the possession of mankind. Article 35 of the British draft convention for Geneva required that the Permanent Disarmament Commission should work out schemes for the total elimination or military and naval aircraft, dependent on the effective supervision of civil aircraft. Britain now proposes that if the commission has not decided on abolition at the end of two years, all countries will be entitled to possess military aircraft.

The memorandum remarks that in the British Government's view "it will be prejudicial to the prospects of an inquiry that any party not hitherto entitled to possess military aircraft should claim such possession pending the results of the inquiry. At the same time the British Government frankly recognises that Germany and other States' not at present entitled to own military aircraft could not be asked to postpone their claim for long."

The proposal puts a term to the discussion, which might have been much prolonged. The memorandum suggests that Germany in the meantime should bo entitled to possess anti-aircraft guns.