LONGER TRADE ROUTES

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 19767, 15 February 1927, Page 7

LONGER TRADE ROUTES

NEED MORE PROTECTION BRITAIN AND THE NAVAL QUESTION FBANCE’S CO-OPERATION IN DISARMAMENT. [By Telegraph—Per Press Assn.—Copyright.] Received Feb. 14, 11.5 p.m. LONDON, Feb. 14. The “Daily Chronicle” says, with regard to President Coolidge’s message: “We should welcome a self-denying ordinance which would relieve an overtimorous Government from the temptation to build beyond needs and means, but we do not mean that we can afford to overlook the fac* that with respect to cruisers and destroyers for policing trade routes, there is obviously a big ger demand in Britain and the Dominions than falls to any other single country. Such an obvious point could be settled by any conference which really meant business, but the co-operation of France is essential. If France consented to reduce submarine construction, we would gladly follow by reducing the number of cruisers and destroyers, which are the principal defence against them.” FOR PERMANENT PEACE OLD DREAMS MUST GO. RUSSIA, CHINA AND BRITAIN LONDON, Feb. 13. Mr J. L. Garvin, in the “Observer,” says : I “The destiny of Russia itself is being fought out in China. A Bolshevist failure there will do more than anything else to complete the stabilisation of the world. The future of Germany depends upon this, for the German monarchist and militarist minority rest upon the assumption that the Bolshevist and Chinese Nationalist forces combined will ruin the British Empire in Asia and that Russia will help to overturn the existing system in Europe. Restoring Confidence. “This is the old dream of insuperable antagonism between Britain and Russia which brought the Kaiser to his doom and Germany to the ground, but until it is finally dispelled no solid confidence in the preservation of peace can exist in Europe, and until confidence is destores what hope can there be for President Coolidge’s proposal or the League hope for general disarmament? 11 Can Britain’s naval power be crippled in the Far East while Bolshevist Russia is free to send to China by land agents and munitions without" restrictions? Hope Centres on America. r ‘Nevertheless, President Coolidge’s proposal is welcome. The presence of Americans at Geneva will ensure the baring of the whole truth regarding armaments and security. Only American leadership and concerted action in the Far East can steady the Chinese situation, bring Moscow to settled in tercourse with the rest of civilisation, extinguish the mirage of world revolution, and advance the whole disarmament and peace movement.”