AFTER THE HAGUE, WHAT?

Evening Star, Issue 18021, 15 July 1922, Page 4

AFTER THE HAGUE, WHAT?

11 After Genoa, what?” was the burning question when the representatives of thirty nations held their conference in the city of Columbus. The success or failure of that great gathering was to have the pro* foundest influence alike on the fato of Europe and (a more important matter to his chief foes) the political fortunea of ilr Lloyd George ip the nejt British eloc*

tiona. Mr Lloyd George claimed a triumph for hia oonlorenoo. It was a bold claim, when the collapse of it was only averted by suspending tho discussions, to bo resumed at The Hague when, after a, month for calm reflection, it might bo hoped that the enomioa of agreement would have come to a bettor mind. Now Tho Hague Conference haa bean broken up, or, if hot broken up, with the elimination of all chance of a Russia i settlement, has been robbed of its chief prospect of usefulness. Tho failure of the Russians and other experts to reach any sort of an understanding will not come as a surprise to Mr Lloyd George. The differences of outlook which threatened to be an insuperable bar to agreement between Bolsheviks and the world at largo were summed up by him at the final cession at Genoa with a frankness and a clarity neither of which, could possibly have been surpassed. If Russia was to get help, 3m explained, Russia must not outrage certain sentiments or prejudices of the world, all of which she had tramoled on in the memorandum of May 11.

■ The first prejudice w<J hare in Western Europe is that if you sell goods to a man you expect to got paid for them. The se'Cond is if you lend money to a man, and ho promises to repay you, you expect that ho will repay you. The tim’d is that if you go to a man who has already lent you money and say “Will you lend mo more?’’ ho will say to you “ Do you propose to repay mo what I gave?’’ and you say “ No, it is a malt or of principle with me not to repay,” there is a most extraordinary

prejudice in tho Western mind against lending any more money to that person.

The Western prejudices bavo been unintelligible to tho Bolsheviks, and all hope of an agreement with them has had to bo abandoned. The seven months’ truce from aggressive warfare which was agreed to at Genoa still stands, but for fidelity to that compact most people will trust more to tho weakness and, the weariness of Europe than to the promise of M. .Tchitoherdn, for example. Tho Hague Conference, meant to complete Genoa, is doomed already to failure. "After Tho Hague, what?” is now the question. In their attempt—or the attempt of tho more enlightened of them—to bring the two pariahs of Europe into a common brotherhood the Powers of Europe have found that it is impossible for them to deal directly with Russia, Her rulers prefer that she should bo an outcast to the end. But the peaceful safety and the financial rehabilitation of Europe never can be established with Germany and Russia, its two largest countries, both outside the scheme. Repulsed in their attempts to find a basis of agreement with Russia, it would seem inevitable that tho Allied Powers must be driven more and more to find one on which they can co-operate with Germany, leaving her, so far as she is able, to lift her fdlfaw pariah, out of the mud, under a supervision which will ensure that the co-operation so permitted will not be directed to their injury. On tho principle of setting a knave to catch a knave, tho two Power’s that have alike been outlaws should bo best fitted to understand each other. Frenzied partisans will be eager soon to toll us what the effects of The Hague must be on British politics.