The Daily News. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1023. ISOLATING THE RUHR.

Taranaki Daily News, 6 February 1923, Page 4

The Daily News. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1023. ISOLATING THE RUHR.

Amid all the maze of conflicting and contradictory cabled 1 messages, the one outstanding feature of the situation in the Rhineland is that the Ruhr has been effectively isolated from the unoccupied part of Germany and all coal supplies diverted from that country. To the unbiased mind /which probes causes and effects it must seem incomprehensible that the German authorities' should be so foolish as to penalise themselves, deliberately and - obstinately, rather than meet a crisis, with calm intelligeiiee and resourcefulness. By coming to an agreement (duly guaranteed) with. France and her Allies, the Germans, while suffering in the matter of pride, would have benefited in all other ways. Little can be said of their methods of reasoning or powers of perception if they failed to realise that France was thoroughly in earnest in taking full advantage of her rights in relation to reparations. The policy of the German Government in persistently defaulting both as to monetary- payments and the supply of raw materials was bound to provoke French reprisals. As the country which had been devastated and grossly outraged by the wilful destruction of her industries and plant, France was virtually driven to desperation by Germany making her first, and practically sole consideration the restoration and expansion of her own industries, leaving those whom she had so terribly crippled to wait and hope until they despaired of justice. Unhappily the feeling in France in consequence of Germany’s evasion of her reparations 5 obligations became so strong that the Government took the responsibility of acting against British advice, and set out on its own initiative to gather as much reparations as it could—by force, if necessary, but absolutely in one way or another. Germany’s contention that to enable her to fulfil her obligations it was necessary to expand her industries was one of those specious arguments that contained a modicum of logic while covering a policy that was as selfish as it was monstrously unjust, not only to France and Belgium but to Britain and the other Allies. Even when the crisis came and France took steps to collect the reparations herself, it was not too late for Germany to alter her tactics, but instead she got deeper into the mire and practically defied the French to do their worst. As a result, not only is Germany piling up her debts by the increased cost of the French army of occupation of the Rhineland, but the total collapse of her industries is threatened for the lack of raw material. The anomalous nature of the position is that although Germany has been persistently proclaiming her inability to pay, yet she has deliberately cut off her supply of raw material from the Ruhr, and is finding the money wherewith to buy it in Britain and elsewhere. Of course France is quite alive to this phase of the trouble, but that she is in thorough earnest over the measures she is now adopting admits of no question. Vulgarly speaking, Germany is “cutting off her nose to spite her face,” and the sooner she throws off such dementia the better it will be for all concerned. Especially is this injurious policy adversely affecting the German population in the Ruhr, while the friction caused by the short-sighted and irascible orders relative to railway traffic make the German authorities appear as if they had quite lost their heads. Neither France nor Germany can afford to fritter away

either money or raw material, besides impoverishing. the workers. The situation, apart from its serious aspect, is a veritable Comedy of Errors. Germany, as the cause of the original trouble might well pause before, the position gets out of hand, because in the end she will have to give in) and it would be much to her advantage not to delay overtures for a settlement on just and equitable terms. At the same time France is risking the continuance of the Entente, and that, for her, is of supreme [ importance.