GERMANY’S DEMANDS

Evening Star, Issue 21220, 29 September 1932, Page 9

GERMANY’S DEMANDS

ARMAMENTS ACCORDING TO NEEDS

REJOINDER TO M. HERRiOT

£ress Association—By Telegraph—Copyright

BERLIN, September 28

Herr Von Papen, in a statement, declared : “ M. Herriot’s speech on Sunday places the facts upside down. Germany has never demanded to arm herself to the same extent to which France and other nations are armed, and her demand amounts to nothing more than what is within the limits of the Disarmament Convention, Germany must have the same freedom to adjust her armaments to her needs as is enjoyed by every other State. The question is merely Germany’s parity of rights and equal treatment at the Disarmament Conference. Is it evidence of disarmament that the French military expenditure has risen 100 per cent, in six years? Germany is ready now, as before, to accept any solution of the disarmament problem compatible with her honour and security. Germany has waited patiently for twelve years, and cannot wait longer and stand by and ,w»tc!h the Disarmament Conference falsifying the whole idea of disarmament by a wrong assessment of disarmament factors and the application of two different yardsticks to individual States.”