The Timaru Herald FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 1939 DEMOCRACY’S WEAPONS OF DEFENCE.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLV, Issue 21279, 24 February 1939, Page 6

The Timaru Herald FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 1939 DEMOCRACY’S WEAPONS OF DEFENCE.

Tf it is true as Mr Chamberlain suggests that the easing of the international tension which made itself felt, after Herr Hitler’s speech, produced instantaneous improvement in trade in Great Britain, it should be obvious to all who direct the affairs of world democracies that they have within their grasp a greater bargaining weapon supported by adequate defence measures, in negotiations designed to bring peace than any weapon in the armoury of totalitarian States. The United Kingdom and the United States are the two most important trading nations in the world. What then if the Empire as well as France are included? If it can be shown that aggressor States cannot maintain their stupendous armament programmes which really inspire the outbursts of dictators, without an uninterrupted supply of raw materials as well as the continuance of normal trading relations, the avenue along which thd threat of the aggressors can lie countered is obvious. It is pertinent to recall in this connection the reactions to trade agreements concluded in November last between the United Kingdom and the United States, the first for 123 years. Almost at once the political significance of the agreement was realised in Germany. The Frankfurter Zcitung, for instance, complained that:

“According to Secretary Hull the negotiators would see, as the fruit of their efforts, international democratic trade theories set up against the theories of the totalitarian States. Such a division of the world is hardly compatible with the frequently proclaimed object of reviving world trade in the interest of political stabilisation.’

From another angle The Nachtensgabe sought to undermine the value of the treaty by arousing, racial hostility: "Jewish agitation against Germany has been a very opportune help for those in Washington who wanted to overcome the last minute difficulties in the negotiations with Great Britain and Canada.”

All obstacles were overcome and the treaty stands. Nevertheless the political significance of the agreement was no less keenly recognised in the two countries directly concerned. According to The New York Times:

“The Treaty marks a closer union between the two most powerful democracies, achieved at a particularly decisive moment in the world’s history.”

This view was strongly supported by another influential American journal, The New York Herald-Tribune, which said:

“It is a sign of solidarity between the English-speaking democracies addressed plainly to Berlin.’

And on the other side of the Atlantic The Economist, viewing the agreement from the broadest angles, observed:

“The immediate effect of the Anglo-American Trade Agreement is not to be measured in terms of diplomatic reinforcement, still less of a strengthening of the military or economic defences, of either of the signatories. But its long term effects in the purely political field can be negatively assessed by imagining the derisive joy in certain European capitals and the profound depression in others that would have been produced by a failure of the negotiations.”

Here is a common front behind which the democracies of the world, if they care to. consolidate their immense resources, and at the same time extend mutually helpful trade reciprocity, can compel dictator countries to think twice before they challenge the defenders of world peace.