Evening Post. THURSDAY, JULY 5, 1928. GERMANY'S FOREIGN POLICY

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 4, 5 July 1928, Page 12

Evening Post. THURSDAY, JULY 5, 1928. GERMANY'S FOREIGN POLICY

The main features of die General Election which was held in Germany on the 20th May were well described in our cabled reports. The Socialists had made great gains, the Nationalists had suffered _ heavy losses, and in its effect upon external relations the general result was considered l& be highly satisfactory. It distinctly favours peace, we were told, as the advocates of a war of revengo were numerously defeated. The strongest party will be the Socialists of the Gorman variety, who are much less extreme than the British. The most important feature is the fading of the Holienzollerns. Germany is definitely turning from Monarchist to Republicanism. But the details which are now to hand by the English mail naturally give a much more vivid impression of the moral effect than the figures, even when supplemented by this general statement, had made possible. The Berlin correspondent of the "Manchester Guardian," for instance, telegraphed as follows on the day after the poll:— This is a day of mourning for Potsdam. The stalwarts of tho Old Germany emerged from the election more soundly beaten than their bitterest enemies had dared to hope. The German Nationalists have a healthy contempt for the electoral system. This will now stand them in good stead. For if there be any meaning in that system, and if a nation can truly manifest its opinions at the urns, then Monday's results must be taken. to signify a national condemnation of the party which for the last year has controlled the internal policy of Germany. That control will now cease. The possibility of another Right Coalition Government with Nationalist participation is quite excluded. In view of the fact that the Nationalist strength in the late Reichstag was only a little more than 20 per cent., it is surprising to read that for the previous year the party had "controlled the internal policy of Germany." They had, however, be.en given four seats in the Coalition Cabinet formed by Dr. Marx on the Ist February, 1927—a number which represented proportionally just double their Parliamentary strength, and from that vantage ground, unencumbered by too punctilious a regard for the spirit of the compact, they had been able to embarrass the Chancellor very seriously,; especially in relation to domestic policy. The "'Manchester Guardian's" correspondent represents them as "spluttering with wrath" because the electors had disapproved of this two-faced procedure. The Nationalists are, indeed; he writes, in a pitiable situation.' They have fallen between two stools. They wanted to be in the Republic and not of it, to govern and to bear no responsibility for the form of government or for a large branch of the policy pursued. They took office in a Government which perforce followed the Locarno line of foreign policy and in home policy worked, for the consolidation of the Republic. Yet in the Press and from tho platform they denounced Locarno and the Republic. The youth of Germany had no use for such equivocal tacticians. The young men of Conservative leaning simply did not vote, so say, at least, the election specialists. That it was against the Nationalists and not against their partners in the Coalition which they had thus been able in large measure to dominate that the wrath of the electors was directed, was shown by the fact that both these partners slightly improved their position—the People's Party rising from 44 to 54 and the Centre from 65 to 69. It was, however, inevitable that the bourgeois Government which Dr. Marx had constructed at President yon Hindenburg's call should go, and that the Socialists, who at the 1924 elections had only beaten the Nationalists, the next largest party, by a head (100 to 90) but now were more than twice as strong (160 to 70), should be given a chance. The President accordingly accepted the resignation of the Marx Cabinet about three weeks ago, and commissioned the Socialist leader, Herr Hermann Mueller, to form a new one. His ambition was to form "a grand coalition," but we are told that it has failed "owing to the insistence of the People's Parly that a 10-000-ton cruiser must be built and that the Socialists shall not dictate taxation legislation." One may sympathise with the People's Party on both points, and yet fail to see how with their 54 seats they could expect to dictate to a party with 160. The Socialists at any rate took that view, and the People's Party has elected to stand out, but fortunately without preventing their leader, Dr. Stresemann—who for international purposes is worth all the rest of them put together—from co-operating 'without committing the party. Herr Mueller then transferred his hopes to "a Cabinet of the Weimar coalition, consisting of Socialists, Democrats, and Catholics." This hope also has evidently been disappointed, but we are not told to what extent. It was reported a week ago that • as the result of a striking suggestion by Dr. Stresemann. Herr Mueller is likely to solve the pressing problem by forming a Cabinet of personalities. So completely is it apparently regarded as "a Cabinet of personalities" that it has not been considered necessary to tell us anything about party affiliations at all. There is, however, welcome evidence of continuity in the fact that no less than five members of the Marx Cabinet have agreed to serve under Herr Mueller and to accept the

same portfolios tliat they previously held. As the Nationalists are out of it, these five portfolios must be divided between the People's Party and the Centre, with a presumption in favour of the latter, both as the larger of the two and as the one which did not wreck Herr Mueller's previous attempt by extravagant demands. The participation of the Centre or Catholic Party in every previous Coalition since the introduction of the Parliamentary Government after the Revolution supplies an additional ground for supposing that it is well represented again, and the inference is made stronger still by what the "Manchester Guardian" correspondent declares to be a lesson of the General Election, viz., that "the Catholics have identified themselves with the Right more than the structure of their parly permitted," and that "the remedy must be sought in a shift to the Left." Regarding the rest of the Cabinet we are told nothing but the names, but the Chancellor's statement of its foreign policy which is reported suggests that he has made a wise choice. Herr Mueller's speech, says our London message, set at rest any fears of a change in foreign policy. The remarks relating to it may be summarised by the names Locarno, Geneva, and Kellogg. It is a promising start, but the prospect will be better still when Dr. Stresemann is well enough to take personal charge.