EFFORTS FOR PEACE

Taranaki Daily News, 27 November 1934, Page 7

EFFORTS FOR PEACE

CONTROL OF ARMAMENTS MUCH LOOSE DISCUSSION THE COLLECTIVE SYSTEM MR. BALDWIN’S OPINIONS British Wireless. Rugby, Nov. 25. A speech by Mr. Stanley Baldwin, which was delivered before 4000 Scottish Conservatives at Glasgow, was devoted mainly to the question of peace, in the desire for which, he said, no country had given such practical proof as Britain.

Referring to the question of the private manufacture of armaments Mr. Baldwin said there had been much loose and uninformed talk on the subject. He. was convinced that the cessation of private manufacture would lead not to a decrease but an increase in armaments, and the only method of dealing with existing malpractices lay in control. In that field Britain’s record was one of which they had no need to be ashamed.

Referring to the recent support given to what he called the collective system, Mr. Baldwin remarked that such a system was imupracticable in view of the fact that the United States, to Britain’s unbounded regret, was not yet a member of the League of Nations, and in the last three years two great Powers, Germany and Japan, had retired from it. A collective peace system would never be undertaken without those countries, and never would he sanction the British Navy being used for an armed blockade of any country in the world until he knew what the United States of America was going to do. Meanwhile Britain’s defence must be adequate to protect the country in any emergency. Anything less was a waste of time, money and life.-