FRENCH PRIDE.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLII, Issue XLII, 13 August 1923, Page 7

FRENCH PRIDE.

j WILL NOT ADMIT BLUNDER. I SITUATION IN THE RUHR, BAD LOOKOUT FOR EUROPE. i ■ THE ONLY REMEDY. tr CABlijß—Pfi,Eßß ASSOCIATION—CUI'YIiXGm ; Received Aug. 13, 8.5 a.m 1 - ±A)i\DON, Aug 9. ! r ■ , (Copyright.) iVir. Lloyd George writes: What a muadie ie all is! Jbranee and Germany are both anxious to settle, but are too proud to. say so. Belgium is sorry that she ever entered the Ruhr, but cannot get out of it. Every time she tries to get away France pulls her back roughly by the tail of her coat, so she has to do sentry at Essen while her'friend is leading a wild life at home. Italy has forgotetn that she ever sanctioned occupation, and her moral indignation is mounting rapidly, although it has not yet risen to a' height which is visible across the Alps. Britain is growling futile notes of dissatisfaction, with everybody, France and Germany alike. The confusion of tongues is deafening and paralysing. No one.is quite happy except the spirit of mischiet, who is holding his sides with laughter. He never had such a time —not since the Tower of Babel — and this time it may end in a second deluge. The horror of the great war seems to have unhinged the European mind. The blood pressure is still very high, and the excitement over the Ruhr does not seem to improve It. When the diligent historian, a generation hence, reads some of the articles written and the speeches delivered, he will recognise the ravings of a continent whose mental equilibrium has been upset by a great shock. The real issue involved in all this struggle is comparatively simple. How much can Germany pay, and how can she pay? America, Britain, Italy, and Germany' are all agreed that the only way to settle the question is to appoint competent experts to report upon it. The Pope has also blessed this obvious suggestion. France, on the contrary, says it is a question to be determined j by guns and generals., both equally well: fitted for that task. . Germany must' present her account to a mitrailleuse and argue her case before a "seventyfive." Although I have no fear in re-1 caJling my predictions in previous articles. I hesitate to hazard a fresh; forecast; but one may .review pos&i-. bilities and note the drift of the whirl- ' ing current in assessing the chances, but must begin with some knowledge of the man who will decide the event. M. Poincare is a man of undoubted ability and patriotism, '.but he is also a man who lives in a world: of prejudices so dense that they obscure facts. In his last note he says that. the conferences and ultimatums; of'"-the past four years have got nothing out of Germany. What are the facts ? During the three and a half years preceding the Ruhr invasion Germany paid to the • Allies in cash and kind over ten milliard gold marks—a considerable effort for a; country just emerged from an exhausting war and whose ioroigcn trade was down 70 per cent. You might imagine that a man who takes the grave step of ordering armies to invade a neighbour's territory would have taken the trouble to ascertain the elementary facts of the case. Will the next three and a half years bring anything approximating thi't amount? It is a safe statement to make that ho one in charge of the French movements anticipated a resistance approaching in stubbornness to thati-.which lias been encountered. The friendly press, both in France and here, foretold, the. speedy collapse of the German opposition, and all the French plans were based on that assumption. Soldier's estimate resistance in terms of material and trained men. Too often they have built tneir hopes on the same shallow foundations. They never allow for the indomitable reserves of the human heart, which do not figure in the army lists or statesmen's annuals. The resistance of Paris in 1870 was as great a surprise to Bismarck .as the stubbornness of the Ruhr miners is to M. Poincare to-day. There were few men in England who thought the Boer peasants would continue resistance for, three years after our armies reached South Africa. The! northern States of America never con- ' templated the possibility of a five years' struggle with a blockaded, starved, and overwhelmed confederacy. The war of 1914-19 was littered with miscalcula-! tions, attributable to the blind refusal ■ of rulers and their advisers to recognise the human element as a factor in the reckoning. The tragedy is not the first, nor will it be the last, to be initiated by facile memoranda framed by general! staffs and civilian functionaries, drawing inspiration from pigeon-holes. ! Whatever becomes of this episode, it is already clear that the estimates have been hopelessly falsified. There are already as many Frenchmen in the Ruhr as Napoleon commanded at Waterloo, j As to coaJ, they have sent across the j frontier in six months about equal to one month's delivery by the Germans ; during the period of default which pro- I yoked the invasion. Desperate efforts have been made to satisfy French and foreign opinion that German resistance in the Ruhr, is gradually breaking down. Rubbish had been shovelled into ; waggons in order to swell the quota of j coal seized. Everywhere, even in the streets, Monsieur Trocquer., in charge of the transport arrangements, breezily j challenges critics to look at the mount- \ ing pyramids of his dust, part of the j collections, and rejoice with him in the triumphs of French organisation. Alas, I M. Trocquer's Celtic fire, even when ■ fed by the sweepings of the Ruhr, cannot keep going the Lorraine blast furnaces, so there is disappointment and discontent among the masters of France. All the same, there must be a limit to. human endurance. Eithe.r France or j Germany must give way in the end. In answering these questions one must remember that France's honour is involved in success. Every French- \ man knows her prestige will be damaged if she failed, and that is why states-' men who disapprove of the invasion support the Government to bring it to a successful end. And here France has a legitimate complaint l-egarding her allies. It is all very well for Ttaly tocounsel wisdom. Signor Mussolini was present at the hush conference which sanctioned the invasion! He fixed the price of his assent in coal tonnage, and that price has been regularly paid. Belgium is petting. scared at the magnitude of the venture, but she has committed her own honour as well as that of France to carrying it through. I am sorry to think that Britain is not free of some of the responsibility in the matter. It is true thnt her representatives disapproved of the enterprise, but not on the grounds of right or justice. On the contrary, while expressing p-rave doubt as to nl+i. mate success, they wished France'"? "Government well in the enterprise. N"t one of the, Allies is in a position, with a clear conscience, to urge France to haul."Sown the flfie;.- There is-oaJv one ■ coulee which could be urged on France consistent with- FrencE honour, and