Evening Post. MONDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1935. THE CHANGE OF PILOTS

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 151, 23 December 1935, Page 8

Evening Post. MONDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1935. THE CHANGE OF PILOTS

■ Following the resignation gf Sir Samuel Hoare, there has been, in Italy, rapid manoeuvring for position, and the important statement of the Grand Fascist Council is being closely analysed. There is a good deal between the lines. Firstly, the communique of the Grand Council finds that "the Paris terms," now declared to be dead, were "due to French initiative," and were repudiated by Britain, fn plain language, French diplomacy invented them and British public opinion killed them. This appears to be substantially true, although for a moment, prior to the House of/Commons debate, there was a tendency of their critics to place both their origin and acceptance with the Btitish Government; and ( the Grand Fascist Council's finding is at any rate an answer to that. As to the ..question "Who killed Cock Robin?" Mr. Neville, Chamberlain, Chancellor of the Exchequer, is care-' ful to .point out that "the Paris terms" have been "buried at Geneva," which is true; but the Fascist Grand Council, for it* own purposes, emphasises what is equally true: that an outburst of that curious thing—British? public opinion—which is more than ever peculiar in the eyes of the dictatorship capitals of Europe, had passed death sentence before thei Geneva executioner was called on to act. "-

Observe, now, that what is a cursed thing in London, and, covertly a blessed thing in Rome, is given by the Grand Council the honour of French birth and British burial. The Grand Council, it is true, did not approve'"the Paris terms," but it did not disapprove them. The Grand Council leaves it to be assumed that terms which might have ended the wary and which the Council had "examined at length," were killed by Britain, if they are dead, and therefore "the choice of peace or war is made to lie in Britain's hands." This piece of sophistry is valuable solely for the fact that it is a good specimen of the work of the modern Machiavelli, and that it expresses as concisely as may be the position which the new Secretary for Foreign Affairs, Mr. Anthony Eden, must face.. A nimble Roman 'diplomacy is straining every nerve to put Britain technically in the wrong, to imply that League -action tending to war < is British action, and that Paris proposals tending to - peace are French action killed by Britain. That a Covenant-breaking aggressor, should | thus seek to let the aggressor's mantle ' fall on Britain seems to be the height of audacity, but it is nevertheless a subtle sophistry that Mr. Eden must meet, and his past performances sug-1 gest that he will meet it through Geneva, not through Paris, by making the League itself responsible for both the birth and the death of any more peace babies that come along. What is to be the new policy? The new Secretary for Foreign Affairs has not spoken aa these lines are being written, but Mr. Neville Chamberlain sounds the note "back to sanctions." He does not say what new/ sanctions. But he does say a very significant thing when one re*' members'how Germany was stopped I in Morocco before the Great War and how other past international crises have been decided by a single gesture:

It must be remembered that whatever form of pressure the League exercises in the future on the aggressor the ultimate fundamental fact is force. Unless the aggressor is satisfied he will be opposed'by a potential force too great to be withstood you will never have security.

If Mr. Anthony Eden takes the same view of fundamentals, he will no doubt equally endorse Mr. Chamberlain's other remark that League nations; must show "that they are prepared to make themselves ready to resist any attack that may be made on any one of their number." The words "make themselves ready" show that this sentence was constructed with regard to Sir Samuel Hoare's striking comment last Thursday. Compare with Mr.. Chamberlain's speech,the cabled statement that die Little Entente and the Balkan League have had a joint meeting and that in January the League . will consider whether "material force," if necessary, "will have a greater-moral effect -than the imposition of further sanctions." Could, any Foreign Minister take up, a more difficult problem? The League crusade is not following history but is making it. Foreign policy sails in completely uncharted seas. ; ' ■'-;•.;\"' v.

: "There is not the slightest hint," says the "Berliner Tageblatt," as to "how the British Government proposes to avoid the calamity." The calamity to which the-German paper is referring is "an armed struggle in the Mediterranean fin; which Britain and Italy would be chief figures." ; Sir Samuel Hoare proposed to avoid it by "provisional assent" to peace, terms which British public opinion condemns as rewarding an aggressor. Another preventive measure might be an assurance from the Mediterranean Powers that they will not only help (as stated in the cablegrams), but will give "ready" and effective help. That factor of fundamental force emphasised by Mr, Chamberlain connotes powers preventive of- war, but success depends very largely on the skill with which the powers are used, and on whether a-League of "Nations is so

constituted as to make statesmanship and opportunity meet. But Paris having, failed, there is the more inclination to look to Geneva, whatever the machinery defects of Geneva may be. Apparently the dualism by which two British Ministers had a say in Geneva, and by which the Big Two (Britain and France) tried to manage things in Paris for the Sanctioning Fifty in Switzerland, has gone. If it is true, as stated in Fiance, that the Emperor of Abyssinia is now prepared, on his own -initiative. to make some territorial concessions, the fact is of. cardinal importance as' giving the League freedom to manoeuvre, without being reproached' in terms of strict compliance with the Covenant.