THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 1931. FRANCO-GERMAN ACCORD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20990, 29 September 1931, Page 8

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 1931. FRANCO-GERMAN ACCORD.

Berlin has welcomed two eminent men of France, the two who just now mean most to Germany. For one is head of the French Government and the other the man who has directed his country's foreign policy for more years than it has been given to most Frenchmen to play a part in public affairs of any sort. M. Laval has spoken words promising a pact of mutual aid in a time of economic stress generally suffered. M. Briand has apparently been content as yet with silence. He has said much on many occasions about the need for France and Germany to get together, and lias always said it well. That he should be in Berlin at all, on an official errand of courtesy and peace, probably is satisfaction enough without the exercise of his silver tongue. To see and to bo seen there thus, as these two bear a message of goodwill, is certainly remarkable, when history is remembered; and on both sides, French and German, there are long memories and not over-pleasant. The welcome has been cordial on the part of Berlin's people, but a little rift has shown in the plaudits; they have been broken by Herr Hitler's warnings to his followers to be watchful lest they be stirred to hostile demonstration—an event to be feared, he says, as giving occasion to France to ask apology and make political demands. Berlin is not Germany. It never was. There are cross-currents now in the turbulent tide of popular feeling, and some of them are ready to foam and swirl at slightest provocation. Which makes this visit and M. Laval's words the more noteworthy. The memories now stirred go back full sixty years, to the ruthless struggle that woke in France the cry "On to Berlin!" —and ended, so swift and ordered was the German campaign, with a threat of ruin to Paris by German gunfire and a humiliating treaty of peace at Frankfurt-on-Main, where Jules Fevre met Bismarck and signed away Alsace and Lorraine despite the urgent protests of the people of both provinces. It was an ugly exaction from a prostrate foe, and Bismarck's pretext, when asking the endorsement of other Powers, made it uglier still. To make of these provinces a rampart against French invasion, he said, was essential to Germany's security. He received a majority approval, but Britain and Russia would have none of it. The Duke of Wellington clearly voiced the British opinion "these lai'ge cessions," so far from ensuring peace, would mean only that the operations of war would be deferred until the French found opportunity of endeavouring to regain what they had lost. The hurt rankled in every French breast, and in our own day the wheel turned full circle, bringing like resentment in Germany. So has it been also with indemnities, then and now. The rights and wrongs of the settlements matter less than the leaving on both sides of the Rhine thereabouts, and far through the neighbouring realms so vexed by events, an unneighbourliness menacing all Europe and the world. It will not be wholly exorcised by this official rapprochement in Berlin. Yet it is well that the effort should be made, there more than anywhere, to create a positive enterprise of co-operation. At least it gives a new and friendlier tone to "On to Berlin!"—echoed with fierce zest in a very recent day—and holds out the hope that even habitual enemies may be constrained, by their own volition as well as the pressure of circumstance, to break through the limits of a selfishly national outlook.

In this effort, M. Laval has pointed to the unprecedented economic crisis as a compelling reason for FrancoGerman accord, and he has offered the suggestion of a committee, representative of both nations, to examine the particular economic questions affecting France and Germany. This is not to assume that either is immune from the influence of general, worldwide conditions, for he has clearly implied that these have to be taken into account. But it rightly asserts that these two great neighbouring countries can do something toward a universal betterment by combining to discuss the economic problems common to them. Both are vast regions. Between the south of France and East Prussia, across the Polish "corridor," there can be little community of economic interest. Between those extremes, however, are regions with much economically in common. Products are similar, transport by the Rhine is a common necessity, and there are districts near the new frontier drawn by the Treaty of Versailles wherein no marked racial distinctions exist. To investigate the possibilities of an economic modus vivendi advantageous to both countries has become a duty to share. The details of a mutual understanding in this sphere of interests ought to be capable of clear and amicable statement. In its broader aspect, the proposal has two outstanding merits. It takes the relations of these two peoples out of the murky and electric atmosphere of war, and there need be no trenching on the wider international ground of reparation annuities. No reverberation of rival military ambitions need enter the conversations. This means a decisive step away from the old friction-point of national thought. The other merit is a clear-cut departure, in the economic sphere itself, from competing projects that recently exercised Europe anxiously—the proposed fiscal union between Germany and Austria, and ]\l. Briand's plan for a "United States of Europe" of an industrial and commercial kind. Each of these aroused antipathy. France suspected the good faith of the first; Germany likewise regarded tlie second. One has been abandoned ; the other is being academically considered. The way, at present, is clear for this very different proposal, and it deserves a trial.