BRITAIN’S AIM

Southland Times, Issue 19157, 29 January 1924, Page 5

BRITAIN’S AIM

NEW INTERNATIONAL POLICI STATEMENT BY THE NEW PREMIER - “A FRANK TALK WITH FRANCE.” “A frank talk with France,” is the description given by London newspapers to a remarkable interview with Mr Ramsay MacDonald, which is published in the Paris Quotidian, a cooperatively owned journal devoted to “defending and protecting Republican institutions.” In it, the British Labour Premier expresses the uneasiness and irritation felt in Britain at France’s policy, which might compel her to make military preparations and seek new alliances. Britain was frankly alarmed at France’s great aerial armaments. Mr MacDonald looks to the deliverance of Europe by the abandonment of the prejudices and tricks of the old diplomacy and the substitution in their place by frank and sympathetic discussions. To assist in removing the dangerous clouds now apparent, the existence of which suggests the inevitability of another war, Mr MacDonald also favours the admission of Germany and Russia to the . League of Nations.

IMPORTANT DECLARATION BY MR MACDONALD. STRAIGHT TALK TO FRANCE. (Reuter’s Telegrams.) PARIS, January 27. (Received January 28, 7.15 p.m.) The Paris newspaper Quotidian, the organ of the Left Bloc, publishes a highly important interview with Mr Ramsay MacDonald concerning the relations existing between Britain and France. BRITAIN UNEASY. In it the new Premier declared that British public opinion was uneasy in regard to the French policy. The two peoples at heart were most friendly but the dangerous clouds today were due to misunderstandings, which frank and sympathetic explanations would clear up.

REVIEW THE WHOLE EUROPEAN SITUATION.

The Expert Committees appointed by the Reparations Commission would not, Mr MacDonald thought, be able to find a satis factory solution within the narrow limits laid down in their orders of reference, while the question of France’s debt to Britain could not be broached without discussing the whole European situation. Similarly in regard to an Anglo-French guarantee pact, the Socialists did not believe that the safety of a nation should depend on armaments or alliances. The British Government would work for the admission of Germany and Russia to the League of Nations. Germany’s entry into the League would be the best guarantee of safety for France. An entirely new international policy ought to be inaugurated, the prejudices and tricks of the old diplomacy being abandoned. EUROPE’S DELIVERANCE. The Premier refused to believe that they would fail to establish a friendly entente with France. He was relying on the good sense and peaceful intentions of the French people who would support the policy of Labour in delivering Europe from the hatreds and fears now prevalent.

The Premier added that Labour would favour the accession to power of the German democrats who were certainly sincerely pacifist and disposed to pay Reparations. The Separatist movement did not concern Britain, but the Labour Government would not recognise any Separatist Government engineered by a foreign Power.. FRANCE’S POLICY OBJECTED TO. Mr MacDonald added that Britain’s criticism of France was directed against the occupation of the Ruhr, on the ground that it was causing economic distress in Britain, and against the French financiers who were encouraging the smaller nations to increase their armaments.

Britain, cohcluded Mr MacDonald, was considering whether she should not make military preparations and seek new alliances. The British public was frankly alarmed at France’s great aerial armaments. CAUSE OF BRITISH IRRITATION. Replying to the interviewer’s inquiry for the reasons for the widely prevalant irritation felt by the English people against France, Mr Ramsay MacDonald said: “The British people repreach France: (1) With the occupation of the Ruhr, which they believe to be the principal cause of Britain’s economic distress; (2) with not having enough consideration for the general interests of Europe or the particular interests of Britain; and (3) with giving moral and financial encouragement to the smaHer nations in the matter of armaments, which action tends inevitably to lead to another war.” BRITISH PEOPLE ALARMED. Mr Ramsay MacDonald said that he did not wish to emphasise the British business men’s anxiety regarding the prospects of the French industrial combinations or the wide scope for the peoples’ fears arising out of the extent of French aerial armament, but the British people were alarmed and beginning to ask whether alliances should be sought elsewhere, though the Labourites did not believe that armaments and alliances made for security. NEWSPAPER TRUSTS. Mr MacDonald, in concluding, referred to the newspaper trusts which had recently sprung up in Britain, Germany, France and America and before long these doubtless would tend to work internationally. He believed that some measures ought -to be taken to make it impossible to poison public opinion. The news agencies ought not to be able to circulate falsified news intended to create opinion. The Government eventually would have to act to preserve the Press from corruption or control by oligarchies. PARIS’S NEW PAPER. The references to the Press are specially significant. The Quotidfen is the first co-operatively owned, non-party newspaper published in Paris. Its motto is “founded by 40,000 French men and women to defend and protect Republican institutions.” It was only established in 1922 in the teeth of the big dailies which attempted to boycott it. The paper now has a circulation of 2,000,000 weekly. FEATURED BY BRITISH PRESS. LONDON, January 27. (Received January 28, 8.15 p.m.). The London newspapers feature the reproductions of parts of the Quotiden’s interview with Mr Ramsay MacDonald, describing it as “the Prime Minister’s frank talk with France.” REVISION OF PEACE TREATIES. LABOUR PARTY’S POLICY. LONDON, January 27. The Vienna correspondent of the Morning Post says that Mr Philip Snowden, Chancellor of the Exchequer, in an article in the English supplement to the Neue Freie Presse, expresses the Labour party’s aversion to alliances and policies of equilibrium. He demands world disarmament based on universal agreement. Mr Snowden says that I the party advocates the thorough revision

of peace treaties as indispensable to the economic reconstruction of Europe. The party demands an immediate general settlement of reparations and mutual cancellation of the inter-Allied debts. The party has no sympathy with the theories and practices of the Bolsheviks, but favours unrestricted recognition of the Soviet Government.

Mr Gooch, editor of the Contemporary Review, contributes an article in which he predicts Anglo-American and German ententias will result from France’s lack of judgment. He says France’s dictatorship is approaching its end. Britain’s power will rise in the same degree as France’s. THE NEW EUROPE.

Reviewing the condition of Europe, the Round Table says:—“Nationalism has been exalted to the dignity of a universal religion, and in its defence the armies of Europe can boast, on a peace footing, of one ;md a-half million men more than -in 1913. The spirit of nationalism is insatiable; no sooner has it made political bounderies coterminous with those of race, than it is driven by a restless fever to absorb alien peoples. It infects present minorities with a yearning not so much to be free as to become themselves the oppressors. Peaceful co-operation between men of different races within the same State—perhaps the highest achievement of humanity in its political life is not even sought as an ideal, but is rejected as an absurdity. The new frontiers have not only given free scope to the extravagances of nationalism; they have profoundly changed the economic structure of Europe. In time Europe will no doubt adapt itself to many of these changes, but up to now they have added another obstacle to the recovery of an impoverished world. The forms of political life have been even more completely revised than the economic. The old autocracies were swept away by the war which was to ‘make the world safe for democracy.’ Within four years Europe seems reconciled to the belief that it is safe only for the mailed fist. Not merely in the new democracies but in many of the old, democratic government has proved unequal to the great tasks of the age. Continental democracy has scored since the war only one important success. It has effectively obstructed the application of the principles of sound public finance, and it seems likely to perish from the completeness of its own triumph.”