Manawatu Evening Standard. SATURDAY, AUGUST 31, 1940. A PACT THAT FAILED.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 234, 31 August 1940, Page 6

Manawatu Evening Standard. SATURDAY, AUGUST 31, 1940. A PACT THAT FAILED.

lTiWas ! ‘appropriate tliat the Arnericaji: 'Secretary for State (Mr Cordell Hull) should use the anniversary of the signing of the Pact of (Paris, commonly known as the Kellogg-Briand Pact, to again denounce the forces of aggression that have brought untold suffering and loss of life into thousands of homes in Europe. To spare the world the horrors of' another conflict the pact was devised and signed with genuine feeling,' That was ten years after the last war ended, when the nations were still imbued with the desire to make peace permanent. There was then no sign of the evil force which was to restore Germany to a warlike nation, trample upon the rights of weaker States, and destroy at one blow the efforts of men genuinely desirous of preserving civilisation from the catastrophes of war. The Pact of Paris was launched on August 27, 1928, with such radiant hope that M. Briand was able to.say that the signatory nations would now gradually forsake the habit of associating the idea of national prestige anil national interests with the idea of force. On the tenth anniversary of America’s entrance into the war M. Briand had addressed a Note to Washington proposing a bilateral peace treaty with France. Mr Kellogg urged a multilateral phct and after certain difficulties had been smoothed away Britain, Germany, Italy, and Japan received a draft form of Ueaty the United States was prepared to sign. On August 27, 1928, no fewer than fifteen nations signed the document which came into force eleven months later, and within three years had been accepted by all the important nations. To the people themselves the pact came as hope for the future, even though some of their Governments hardly gave it lip-service. War was formally renounced as an instrument of national policy and another means had been devised. to prevent the awful cataclysm of a world conflagration. But Hitlerism was to come to power in Germany to smash this hope and extol war. The Locarno Pact made by the Western European Powers, the Pact of Paris, and the Four Power Pact of 1933 (devised as an aid to bringing about a reduction in armaments), apart from the Covenant of the League of Nations, were all destroyed by the man who talked of peace and built for war. The Locarno Treaty held similar high aspirations by “strengthening peace and security in Europe,” and providing “supplementary guarantees within the framework of the Covenant of the League.” Germany, France, Belgium, Britain, and Italy were the signatories who agreed to settle all their disputes by peaceful means. The position to-day is eloquent of

the evils of totalitarianism. Belgium and France are under Hitler’s iron heel and Britain remains the last bastion in Europe for Democracy, fighting desperately to destroy Nazism and Fascism. Other States since 1928 have deliberately chosen to ignore their, solemn obligations under tKe Paris Pact and have upheld war as an instrument of national policy. But, Mr Cordell Hull says, the soundness of the pact’s underlying principles is not impaired by what has happened ; sooner or later they must prevail as the unshakable foundation of international relations, unless war with its horrors and ravages is to become the normal state of the world, and mankind relapse into chaos and barbarism. In a word Britain is fighting to uphold the new order which these pacts promised at their signing.