Evening Post. MONDAY, APRIL 5, 1926. HOPE OF DISARMAMENT

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 80, 5 April 1926, Page 6

Evening Post. MONDAY, APRIL 5, 1926. HOPE OF DISARMAMENT

Writing in the "Observer" of I4th February in favour of the admission of Germany to the Council of the League of Nations "without grudging subterfuges," Mr. J. L. Garvin said:

Locarno was to be a beginning. Of what? Of reconciliation and of more general discernment. The preliminary conference on the latter question has been postponed because the nearer the chief nations come to the problem, the more they feel it to bo a business of incomparable difficulty. Yet until progress is made in that direction the great purpose of the League, in spite of its imposing structure, will not have made sure progress of any kind.

Disarmament is indeed accepted as the supreme test by which, the world's progress towards an assured peace is measured. It has always been so regarded at Geneva, and on this point Geneva has simply taken its cue from Versailles. In the Covenant of the League, which was incorporated in the Peace Treaty, international co-operation, peace, and security were declared to be the objects of the League, and Article VIIL recognised that the maintenance of peaco required "the reduction of national armaments to the lowest point consistent with national safety and the enforcement by common action of international obligations." The United States, which, after playing a leading part in the shaping of the Covenant and its inclusion in the Treaty, declined to ratify the Treaty or to join the League, made some amends by summoning the "Washington Conference and persuading it to adopt a solid instalment of naval disarmament. But the labours of -the Loague on 'the much more difficult problem of military disarmament have so far been fruitless.

From the standpoint of Germany this failure on the part of the Powers which dictated the Treaty of Versailles has been a serious injustice.- The military and naval impotence to which she was reduced by Part V. of the Treaty wag subject to an implied promise.

In order, said the opening words, to render possible the initiation of a general limitation of the armaments of all nations, Germany undertakes strictly to observe the military, naval, and air clauses which follow.

Germany has carried out her obligations under this part of the Treaty, but tho other parties are still in default. One result of that default has been to make it much more difficult to get Germany into tho League. It was only natural that an almost completely disarmed State should hesitate to incur the military obligations in which she might be involved under the Covenant against neighbours still fully armed. But, partly, through a declaration by the other Powers represented at Locarno regarding their interpretation of Articlo XVI. of the Covenant, Germany's reluctance was overcome. She signed the Locarno Treaties and presented herself at Geneva last, month for the admission to tho League upon which the operation of the Treaties had been made contingent. And it is through no fault of Germany's that her application has failed.

But if, as Mr. Garvin says, the chief Powers concerned postponed their negotiations on disarmament two months ago because the closer they came to the problem the moro insuperable did its difficulties appear, with what heart can they approach it now? Locarno was, in Mr. Garvin's Words, to be a beginning of reconciliation and of more general disarmament. But it has beon made instead the beginning of renewed disappointment, jealousy, and strife. If disarmament seemed a good subject to postpone when the hopes of Locarno wore at their zenith, what chance is there of tackling it effectively now? We have been told by Sir Austen Chamberlain and others that ' the Locarno front is still unbroken. If this means that Brazil received no encouragement, direct or indirect, from Italy or France in the tactics which rendered the work: of Locarno abortive by ■ blocking Germany's admission to the League, it is certain, that an escape from the impasse will be provided at the ordinary meeting of the League of Nations in September. But, so far as Italy is concerned, the fear of trouble is not removod with the suspicion of her diplomacy at Gcu-, eva. The foundation of that suspicion was the warlike utterances of her Prime Minister against tho very Power with which the Locarno Conference sought to

make a lasting peace. At Locarno Signor Mussolini signed the treaty which was to guaranteo Franco and Germany against mutual aggression in February. But he attacked Germany twice in the Italian Chamber in a manner which under ordinary conditions might easily have led to war, and these attacks lie followed up with the suggestion in a Trench paper of a Franco-Italian alliance against her. Nothing lia3 changed in Germany (he said). Military roviews continue, and preparations everywhere for aviation, ostensibly civil, are being developed and perfected. A railway militia has been re-established by means of the General Staff, which is again controlling the railways. The possibility of a common danger should bring France, and Italy together, their eighty millions equalling the Germanic bloc, and thus establishing a balance of masses. A few days previously Herr Stroscmann had been writing in the "Morn-

ing Post" about "tho gateway of a new era," and this was Mussolini's answer in the "Petit Parisien." This aspect of the problem was necessarily ignored by Commander Loeker-Lamp-sou, Under-Secretary of Foreign Affairs, in his statement on the subject to the House of Commons, but he referred iv a single sentence to another grave danger. _ "Ho regretted that Bussiahad declined to participate in" tltrTe""preparatory conference on disarmament." How much, disarmament can be expected from Poland or Czechoslovakia if Russia's Red Army remains at its present strength or continues to grow? ■ Even larger and more distant States may not like the prospect; But the Under-Secretary's assufanec of his Government's readiness "to assist wholeheartedly in any international steps leading to a general measure of disarmament," and to send Lord Cecil to Geneva prepared with a definite scheme, should be welcome. The Government's willingness to extend to submarines the principles applied to warships by the Washington Treaty and to welcome any scheme for the reduction or limitation of air forces is also gratifying, but it will not be very eagerly, greeted in Paris..