THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. TUESDAY, MAY 9, 1905. GERMANY'S POLICY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLII, Issue 12861, 9 May 1905, Page 4

THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. TUESDAY, MAY 9, 1905. GERMANY'S POLICY.

Germany's foreign and colonial policy is not. only creating uneasiness in the Pacific, hostility in America, revolt in Africa, and unrest in Asia ; it is threatening Europe with another war between two great civilised nations. In the Pacific, we have visibly before us the results of the determination, of the Kaiser to obtain, at any cost, markets for German goods, trade for German merchants, ami cargo for German ships. Finding the treaty legality of the prohibitive restrictions placed upon Australian trade with the Marshall* challenged by our Imperial Government, Germany has waived them, but has secured the same ends by an agreement— called " voluntary"— in which the German planters and traders bind themselves to ship only through the German liners. On all fours with this is the recent grant to the Kord Deutcher Lloyd Company of a five years' monopoly of produce transport from Xew Britain to .Sydney and Hongkong. British ships are thus being shut completely out of the German Pacific Islands while German ships are allowed to trade freely with the British Pacific Islands, a policy which obviously depends for its success upon British tolerance anil forbearance. The German motive is made somewhat clear by Mr. Staniforth Smith, one of the Federal Senators, who has been spending some months among the Islands of the Western Pacific. He points out, in an article to the Sydney Daily Telegraph, which we quote elsewhere in this issue, that since ISB-1 Germany has volecfno less than £17,000,000 for the. assistance of her colonists and the development of her colonies. In spite of this enormous direct expenditure, constituting only a part of the gross cost of her colonial ambition, German's trade with her colonies "barely exceeds the subventions annually voted by the Reichstag.'' The Kaiser's colonial policy is therefore .on the verge of acknowledged failure. With Germany itself weighed down by the burden of taxation, and the Socialist Party making steady progress among the German electors, he must make some display of advantage to German commerce and industry if he would avoid the renunciation of his extensive schemes. Or failing such advantage he must divert attention by securing as the prize of war a trade and commerce that he has been unable to foster by any less drastic measures. For in every quarter of the globe the German colonial policy has either met with defeat or has cost more than it has gained. The United States has effectively barred with the Monroe Doctrine any territorial designs upon South American territory. The administration of the German colonies in Africa has stirred into flame the ever smouldering embers of native war. In supporting Russia beyond the limits of neutrality the Kaiser undoubtedly made a mistake, and lost ground in both China and Japan. In the Pacific, the active resentment of the British colonics has been aroused. As if this were not enough, the Kaiser has deliberately set himself to cross the path of a legitimate French move- ■ ment upon Morocco, and is apparently placing the French Government in the most irritating, position of having either to withdraw or to fight.. Nor is the cause of the Moroccan trouble left unexplained. , We are informed that Germany objects to French military instructors in the Moroccan army because they i will send orders to France, whereas German instructors would buy guns ! and war material from Germany. j The Kaiser fights always for the shop I and is prepared to dragoon the whole world if thereby he can gain a few ! customers. The success of such bust' ; ness methods depends wholly upon his | dragooning strength, for sooner or : lata other nations must resist the I application in the Twentieth Ceni tiny of the methods of the ! Eighteenth.

Between Germany and England, as between Germany and America, there is no immediate ground for any appeal to force. Even if Germany should exclude British trade from every inch of German territory we could strike her a crushing blow by commercial retaliation, and leave her to resort to any remedy she chose. America can waif for German aggresion to take a concrete form "with the happy consciousness that every decade adds to the standing of the Washington Government. But France is tho unfortunate neighbour of a Sovereign who is being impelled to smother internal dissatisfaction by foreign wa., and who has picked upon a quarrel in much the spirit of the fabled wolf though the fable breaks down if we proceed to speak of France as a defenceless lamb. As has been over and over again pointed out, the atrociously misgoverned country of Morocco is legitimately within the French sphere, and the splendid results of the occupation of Algeria give to France a clear right of entry and domination. After the matter has been cordially arranged with the Powers primarily interested, and after French arrangements are practically completed, Germany steps in and blocks the way. Not only this, but she treats in a cavalier fashion the friendly approaches of the French

Foreign Minister, and since M. Delcasse, the shrewdest statesman in Europe, has publicly stated that he approached Germany only under pressure from his colleagues and against his own judgment, it is plain that he regarded her attitude as deliberately provocative. There are rumours that Germany is merely indulging in a little political blackmail and will withdraw her opposition upon obtaining " compensation'' elsewhere. But on the other hand there is a very general European feeling that Germany will bear watching, a feeling that finds expression in the unfriendliness of. the Italians to the visiting Kaiser, and possibly in the postponement of the British naval manoeuvres. King Edward not only visited President Loubefc when recently in Paris, but was closeted for some hours villi M. Delcasse. The announcement of the postponement, immediately followed his subsequent meeting with Mr. Balfour and Lord Lansdowne. England has no quarrel with France,_ for the neutrality question, though irritating 10 Japan, would not. be allowed to embroil them, while England and France are in the closest harmony on the Moroccan question. It must therefore be inferred that it is in support of France that the British naval squadrons remain in their customary strategic positions .instead of being temporarily withdrawn for their annual combined manoeuvres. And it is easy to see that Germany, relieved of any fear of Russian pressure on Iter eastern frontier and believing that France, would be left to bear alone the brunt of an unprovoked attack, might consider the present time a grand opportunity for repeating the invasion of 'TO-'7l. The penalty to be exacted from France, in the event of German victory, would certainly be the surrender of various French colonics, including New Caledonia, the abandonment of French claims in Morocco, and the, acquiescence of France in the spoliation of Holland, whose rich East Indian possessions are viewed in Germany with hungry eyes. Those British colonists Aviso consider world-politics as of no importance and imagine that Imperial statecraft drags them into quarrels in which they have no concern, ought to bethink them that in the Courts of Europe the destinies of the Pacific are still settled, and that upon our Imperial diplomacy depends the; checkmating of German schemes that are fraught with danger to our colonial interests. For German ambition in the Pacific would not rest content with the stripping from France of her colonies ; our own future, independence may depend upon a British determination that no territorial gain shall follow a German raid upon France.