Evening Post. MONDAY, DECEMBER 31, 1923. A TROUBLED TIME

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 156, 31 December 1923, Page 6

Evening Post. MONDAY, DECEMBER 31, 1923. A TROUBLED TIME

"Tranquillity and stability are the chief needs at home and abroad," "said Mr. Bonar Law a few days after, with the shadow of death upon him, he had smashed the Coalition and undertaken the onerous responsibility of forming a Conservative, Government. Illhealth did not prevent him from giving his country a. good lead in the desired direction; but he died before the New Year had half run its course, and any advance made under his leadership has been lost under that of his successor. The outlook for .and stability, both at home and .abroad, must indeed be said to be even more unpromising than it was at the end of last year. Turkey and France were at that time the chief dangers to the peace of Europe. The trouble with Turkey was settled by the Lausanne Conference on terms which involved the surrender by the Allies of almost everything that they had won from her in the war, and hardly was the ink on the Treaty dry before Italy's quarrel with Greece came very near to shattering the Allied Entente and the League of. Nations, and plunging Europe into war again.

Closely, indeed, and with an al- N most irresistible suggestion of a malicious irony on the part of fate did great arid incongruous events follow 6n one another's heels in the three weeks which included the consummation of the long-drawn-put negotiations at Lausanne. August 13.—Publication of correspondence between tne Allies relating to reparations and the Ruhr indicating that the impasse was still as hopeless as ever.

August IS.—De Valera, arrested at Clare by the Irish Free State troops. August 23.—The Turkish National Assembly at Angora ratifies the' Lausanne Ireaty.

August 24—Evacuation- of Constantinople by the. British forces begins. August 27.—Irish Free State holds its second General Election. \

August 29:—Italian Note to-'Greece. August 31.—League of. Nations: 26th session of the Council -opens .at Geneva. . September I.—Bombardment and occupaUon of Corfu by ItaHan forces announced.

Great earthquake in Japan, destroyPZ. la f r,f f rts of Tokio, Yokohama, Hves 0 DS) ?nd many thollsahd"s oi

. September 3—Fo.urth Assembly of the League of Nations opens at Geneva.

History was being made at a feverish pace during those three crowded weeks, and very little of it conveyed any suggestion of " tranquillity and stability." The most hopeful of'the items were pWhaps those relating to Ireland. The capture of de Va-lera and the triumph of the Free State Government at trie General Election indicate that the v country which during the first year of its new constitution nad become, jf possible/a greater anxiety than ever is at l aston the way to a law and order which, being homegrown should also be permanent, me admission of the Free State to the League of Nations has since Put it ra a complete equality with trie other Dominions in regard to external affairs, and opened up what is to be hoped may be "a broadening an d sobering responsibility for.the patriots whose watchword once was " Ourselves Alone." But the centre of the world's unrest during 'tho past year has

been the-policy-.of France. Mr. Bonar Law celebrated the opening of the year by the publication' of some far-reaching proposals with •regard to German reparations, but they were fai> too generous to Germany to ifind any favour in France. As Britain refused to join in the. French < proposal to occupy the Euhr in order to compel Germany to pay her debts,, France entered with Belgium on 11th January. By 24th September the French policy had -so far succeeded as to compel the German to abandon its policy of passive resistance in the occupied regions unconditionally. It has since wrung from Germany an official- admission that she lost the war. jßut the triumphs of a year of French occupation go no further than 'this, and there is nothing to shake, and much to confirm, the belief of three successive^ British ' Governments that peace .and prosperity "are riot to be won on these lines.

The strange thing, writes Professor Gilbert Murray in the "Weekly Westminster,", is that this policy meets with no .effective opposition." .All the neutrals loathe it, so do France's former Allies; even among her satellites, the Poles and Rumanians, one -hears- outbursts of complaint and fear. But the only Power strong enough to order [ ? offer] resist-' ance is Great Britain, and she does not care enough to take risks. -

The probability of Britain's taking a strong stand against a policy which she believes to be prolonging the stagnation of her trade and the misery and the waste: represented by her million and a quarter of tin--j employed^ arid to be threatening! Europe .with chaos, has unfortunately been diminished by the ill-; judged appeal of the Baldwin Government to the electors and its deplorable result. Protection and preference have been "snowed under "• by the electors, but that is; at the best but " a negative triumph. The Government is bound to "be turned out when the new Parliament, meets, but neither of the Free Trade parties can carry on alone, 'and "a-coalition seems to be out of the question.. Until some as yet unforeseen readjustment is" effected Britain, which is as obviously the mainstay of the world's peace as she formerly was_of the world's waivis threatened' with a period of political weakness which will increase the insecurity of the Empire- and the world. It is certainly a time for both Britain and the Empire to pull themselves together, and, instead of wasting further time and energy and money on tariff squabbles and other minor issues, to concentrate on the things that matter, the life-and-death issues of defence and foreign policy arid the restoration of peace.