THE BASIS OF DISARMAMENT

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIV, 6 August 1931, Page 9

THE BASIS OF DISARMAMENT

WIIAT STANDS IN THE WAY Addressing n meeting in London recently, Lord Cecil of Chelwood said that as soon as the League of Nations was formed, preparations were made for formulating the plan for disarmament, and those preparations lasted for some ten years. Thu preparatory stages wero now concluded. Tlicv had reached n. stage at which it had heon possible for the League of Nations to summon next February the greatest international conference that had ever come together, a conference of all the civilised nations of the world, whether tlicv were members of the League or not, to consider the necessary plans for beginning the reduction and limitation of the armaments of the world by international agreement. There were circumstances in the world which made that decision extremely timely, At this period of widespread distress if was, he believed, actually true that more money was being spent by the. nations of the. world on armaments even than spent, in the year,-, preceding the war. That could only he described as a wicked waste of money. He was not advocating any unilateral reduction of armaments. He was asking for a general reduction of armaments by all the civilised nations. If they were 10 per cent, of Christianity in the international relations of the, world the difficulties of disarmament would vanish like mist, before the sun. It was the jealousy, suspicion, misunderstanding, evil speaking, lying, and slandering that. went, on between the. nations of the world that was really the difficulty in the way of disarmament.