CONTINENTAL IMPRESSIONS

Evening Star, Issue 18925, 27 April 1925, Page 5

CONTINENTAL IMPRESSIONS

GERMAN FEARS AND FRENCH BAYONETS SHADOW Dll EUROPE In tin’s article from the ‘ Sunday Chronicle,’ a well-known Labor Leader, Mr Tom Shaw, M.P., gives impressions of real conditions on the Continent, I liavo recently visited four capital cities of Europe, and have had an opportunity of comparing conditions with those which existed a year ago._ I also have had the privilege of speaking with a fairly large number of keen French, German, Belgian, and Austrian politicians. I know how dangerous it is to argue from a particular experience to a. general conclusion. I cau claim, however, that I did my beat to get ns unbiased a view as possible, and to form opinions as far as possible on definitely ascertained facts. Vienna I found as beautiful as ever, biit strangely lacking in brilliance and color compared with the days of the proud and haughty Court of the Hapsimrgs. Tho brilliant uniforms, tho gay dresses, and the lavish display of wealth of tho immensely rich Hungarian landowners have all gone. With them, too, have disappeared tho frightfully long hours of labor of tbe people, and the almost servile attitude! towards ell that was rich and powerful. In the old days it was common to sco women laboring in tho building trades —carrying hods of bricks and doing manual labor quite hard enough for strong men. It is not so common now. Military display has disappeared, and although it was never so arrogant ns in Berlin, there was enough, and to spare, under tho old regime. Perhaps the (differ ranee is best seen at the opera. I was present at a performance of * The Prophet,’ ono of Meyerbeer’s operas. Before tho war, the stalls and boxes would have been full of uniforms and costly dresses. Now, evening dress is the exception rather than tho rule. But every seat seemed to ho full. Tho high standard of opera in Vienna is too well known to need description.

On tho political side I heard hitter complaints about tho methods adopted under the League of Nations scheme, which the Socialists say Inis given what stability there is largely at the expense of tho workers. AUSTRO-GERMAN FUSION.

Tho mast disquieting feature is the unemployment, which is taxing the capacity of both tho Government and the trade unions. It is to me, a marvel that an empire which formerly was an economic unit, carved now into separate States, leaving Austria almost literally one big city without o territory round it capable of either supplying the needs of tho city or of absorbing the products of the city’s industries, is still, able so successfully to prevent actual destitution. It seems to mo inevitable, whatever treaties may now he in force, that some day Austria and Germany will come together and group tho German-speaking peoples of tho two countries into a. homogeneous whole. I think a very largo majority of Austrians would welcome a fusion. That brings me by a natural step to Berlin. The stabilisation of tho German currency lias worked wonders. There is no question whatever about the tremendous improvement which has taken place since tho Tlcntenmark was introduced. I am told that the workers are now getting on tho average, about 80 per cent, of their , real pre-war earnings, 'i he mad scramble to get rid of money as soon as it is received has gone. THINKING IN BILLIONS. May I just give an example of what the collapsed exchanges meant? One of the branches of the textile workers sent a month’s contributions of its members to headquarters. When the money,arrived it was worth less than the cost of receipt stamps and the postage of a letter of acknowledgment. A calculation made for mo shows how utterly useless it is to attempt to realise what a billion means. The German bank notes at the lowest point of the collapse were for billions. If one changed a twenty-mark gold piece of pre-war days into five-mark notes at tho collapsed rates five thousand railway trucks, each carrying ten tons, would be needed to carry the notes away! How over final collapse was avoided is still a mystery to me. The speech of M, Herriot, which apparently was understood in Germany to mean indefinite occupation of the Rhineland, was bitterly resented. I think the general argument might be summed up in this way : First of all (say the Germans) we had a. treaty of peace which did not give us any finality, gave no hope that onr payments would ever finish; we were to have no opportunity ever again to rise. Now we have a series of a negations about secret armaments, and when we ask where they are we are not told. The whole thing is a humbug; France has gone mad with military desire, and will find one excuse after another to keep the Rhineland. All this talk about security is moonshine. Franco has the greatest and best-equipped army in the world. In guns, aeroplanes, men, and munitions she is tho military mistress of Europe. Not only that, she has also allies—Poland and Czechoslovakia, for instance—armed to the teeth. Those countries arc merely military satellites of France. If there bo a powerful Nationalist movement in Germany it has grown out of the domineering attitude of France towards a defeated enemy. The great majority of the German people after the war were willing to do anything in their power to meet their responsibilities, but France did not want that; she was anxious to have an excuse for holding on to German territory. France is not in the slightest danger from

Germany. I must frankly admit that it seems to mo there ia a great deal of truth in the Gorman arguments. I do not believe any serious British student of Continental politics can find any excuse for tho ."Ruhr adventure, which was a colossal failure if tho real object of the French was the object they stated publicly. But when I gp to Brussels and Paris —then I hear another story. Of one thing I am perfectly certain. Whether Foch and the military staff believe in the danger from Germany or not the French and Belgian peoples do. I think it would be impossible for any Government to live a week in either country if it did not put in the very forefront of its activity the question of security. Even the most advanced politicians, those who fought Poincare with all their might when he was all-powerful, desire ardently some settlement of the vexed question of security. One distinguished French politician of my acquaintance, who believes that tho action of tho French against the Germans has been a profoundly mistaken one, and who offers no excuse for it, told me there was a double reason for their keen desire to have tho question settled once for all. In tho first place tho fears of the population would be removed, and all excuse for holding German territory would disappear. Secondly, the power of the military caste, resting as it does on the fears of the “ man in the street,” would he. smashed, and the real France, the peace and liberty-loving France, would he able to show her face. TOWARDS DEADLOCK.

Certainly all those of us who desire peace will continue earnestly to hope for some agreement which’will remove French fear. Whatever German militarism was before the war, there is nothing gained if we simply replace one militarism hy another. Ho is, indeed, blind who docs not see what a hold militarism is getting —nay, has got—in France.

The day the French people feel safe will probably mark the beginning of the decline in French armaments, and the possibility of world reduction. It is worth while to take risks to reach that object. I hope our Government will try to achieve it by being willing to accept in principle the idea of the Geneva Prd-

tocol, even if they desire many alterations in detail and many precisions and do limitations of responsibilities. It seems to me that we have not only the right, should that become necessary, to ask France to remember the things this country did during the war, but it is onr duty, politely but firmly, to tell her that occupation cannot be contained eternally, and that a Rhineland in permanent occupation by France will inevitably mean another Alsace-Lorraine.

I know tho French would say at once they have no desire to attempt such a ruthless seizure of German territory. But everyone knows what the_ military chiefs havo said, and millions of Germans have no faith in French declarations of good faith so long as French bayonets are on Gorman soil. Millions of Frenchmen do not believe in tho word of the Germans.

Unless some mediating body can come between ami remove these doubts based as they often arc on tear—we seem to he moving towards a deadlock, and finally to a calamity. What is wrong with the League of Nations? Unless some force be found to reconcile the two peoples, nationalism will become triumphant in Germany, militarism will be enthroned in France, and calamity and chaos will be in active preparation.