HOW MUCH CAN GERMANY PAY?

Evening Star, Issue 18173, 13 January 1923, Page 4

HOW MUCH CAN GERMANY PAY?

LLOYD GEORGE OH REPARATIONS.

ASPECTS OF TREATY DISCUSSED.

PLEA FOR MODERATION.

AMERICAN COUNSELS NEEDED

Press Association— By Telegraph— Copyright.

LONDON, January 11

(Received) January 13, at 8.5 a.m.) 1 The following and all of Mr Llovd George’s articles are copyright by the United Prcja Association in America (all countries), copyright in Australia and New Zealand by the Australian Press Association, copyright in Bntain_ by Hi a ‘ Daily Chronicle.’ Reproduction in full or part is prohibited.] Mr, Lloyd Gcorgo continues:--“What is tho reparation problem? Why docs it appear further from solution than ever? Tho public in all lands are perplexed and worried by its disturbing insolubility. The real trouble is not the solving of tho problem itself, but in the satisfying of publio opinion which suiv rouucls if. Ido not mean to suggest that it is easy to ascertain what Germany can pay or for Germany to keep on paying these sums once they aro ascertained, ihe difficulty is purely financial, and it could ho overcome. The heart of the problem lies in the impossibility of at present convincing tho expectant, yidignant, hardhit. ami heavily-burdened people ot Franco that the sums fixed represent all that Germany is capable of paying. At first it was too readily taken for granted that tho wealth which could boar a war debt of £8,000,000,000 could surely afford, an. indemnity of £6,000,000,000, provided it was made*a first charge on tho national revenues. H took time for the average mind, to appreciate tho fundamental difference between payment inside and transmission outside a country. “ When I think of tho estimates framed in 1019 by highly-trained experta as to Germany’s capacity to pay cash over the border. I am not disposed to complain ol the French taxpayers' impatience at the efforts of successive conferences to cuU down these sanguine estimates to_ feasible dimensions. I am. content to point with pride to Urn fact that the coramonsenso of tho more heavily-burdened,' British taxpaver lopg ago taught him to cut his loss and keep his temper. When his_ example is followed all round the reparations problem is already solved, andi the financiers can then soon find a way out. “It is always assumed by those who have not read the Versailles Treaty and tho letters accompanying it that this much-abused and little-perused document fixed a fabulous indemnity. The treaty may have defects, but that is not one of them, for it fixed no payment. It stipulated that tho Reparations Commission should asserts the damage and compensation, also that the Commission—and' this is always overlooked—should ascertain how much of that claim Germany was capable of paying. Even so fair a eontroyeisialist as Signor Nittl ignores the latter provision, and treats every alteration m the annuities fixed in May, 1921, as a departure from tho treaty to the victors detriment, whereas every modification was effected under tho treaty s machine!}. “But there has undoubtedly been a fundamental departure from the treaty, and tho whole trouble has arisen by tins departure. Tho .treaty provided that Lie Reparations Commission should in elude an American representative. With the exception of America, all the Powers were pecuniarily interested in the verdict. Therefore it was not a very impartial ii ibunal. Still Britain, as a great trading community more interested in a settlement (ban in a"few millions more or less of an indemnity wrung out of Germany, would, with America’s presence on the Commission have constituted a .guarantee immoderation. Now tho only disinterested party has retired from the tribunal, white the 'most interested party is m the chair with a casting vole on certain questions. That not H lO treaty which Germany signed. The balance of the treaty lias been entirely up&et. “What ia really ueodod is to restore me balance and to secure a fair verdict on tho only question, which is: 4 How much can Germany pay?’ You must make up your mind whether yen wish to ruin a or to recover the cash. If you want heei from a cow ..'you must forego tho milk. You must find out what_ your debtor can pay and then proceed judiciously, patiently, and firmly to recover tho amount. I do not mean what be can pay by condemning him to life servitude and poverty. No brave man can stand that for long. * “If you scrape butter from the bread of every German child for thirty years you may add a milliard or two of gold marks to the indemnity, is not what tho treaty intended. Ytou must fix what Germany'can pay without condemnin* a generation of workers io Egyptian bondage and their children to seini-slar-vation. Every oppression, if persisted in, ultimately ends in ruin. Tho oniy hope of a fair and final decision is to secure a : representative of .America on the huindicating body. Unless America takes a hand the real settlement will be postponed until the hour of irreparable mischief strikes. If America cannot occupy fho vacant chair 1 despair of any real piogress being made. “The Allied Ministers can accept decisions from a body representing the leading Powers wiio won tho war, which they f dare not take on their own responsibility. Thai, is tho essence of the position. Statesmen could accept the judgment of an international tribunal without being taxed with, f,bo responsibility for its conclusion. 3 . British"'opinion will not accept a, settlement based on the assumption that abatements in reparations must lie discounted by the British taxpayer. .She is willing to stand in with tho Allies for loss as well as for profits. Britain would re.rent hitler] v lb at the loss must necessarily bn her share whilst such profit as there is belongs to others. Tho Americano also will not reo the force of a nsttlement at their expense, ns if they had been condemned, to pay an indemnity. Tho offer to hand oyer bonds to British' is an insult to the mtelligeiico of tho British public. “ Let us get back to the treaty. .1 here is no need, to revise it. All that is needed in to restore it.. If America, reappears on the tribunal sho need not accept the rest of the treaty.'’—A. and N.Z. Cable,