DEFENCES OF EUROPE

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27472, 5 October 1954, Page 13

DEFENCES OF EUROPE

London Pact Aims At Solid Front

• (N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) (Rec. 8 p.m.) , LONDON, October 4. • "j * ne este . rn nat ions yesterday united in a project atnwd at ending age-old European rivalries and marshalling their forces in a solid front against the threat of Communist aggression. I? « sho i°. k h ®P ds on a P act which for the first time since AVorld War II will permit Germans to put on the old grev uniform of the Wehrmacht and raise an army, air force, and navy for Western defence.

Still to be approved by France’s parliament, the agreement signed today was wrung out of six days of bitter negotiations. At one time they appeared in a deadlock through French fear of Germany’s potential military might, which had already prompted France’s rejection of the European Defence Community only a month before.

As the delegates set the seal on today’s victory for their long-blocked defence plans—plans which only a few weeks ago were apparently hopelessly bogged down—America’s Secretary of State, Mr Dulles, told them: “I believe this conference will go down in history as one of the greatest of all time.”