THE KELLOGG PLAN

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 20151, 21 May 1928, Page 7

THE KELLOGG PLAN

General Smuts Discusses Proposal From New Angle WORKING WITH THE LEAGUE AN INTERESTING SUGGESTION [ By Telegraph—Per Press Assn.—Copyright ] [ United Service. J Received May 20, 11 p.m. CAPE TOWN, May 19. General Smuts has made an important suggestion, uu the Kellogg declaration. lie regards it as reinforcing the League Covenant but to be reasonably reliable it ought to be followed up by an additional undertaking, more or less on lines of Article 16 of the Covenant, or ought to be looked upon as a supplement to the League, based on t.hc economic sanction of that article.

He said that with the support of the United States behind this economic sanction, the prospect of future peace on the double basis of the Covenant and the declaration would be far brighter and more stable. ‘•A complementary declaration with tho enthusiastic backing of America may well mean the rescue of the League from becoming a special concern and tho almost private property of any particular group of Powers,” General Smuts said. He pointed out that special defensive groups had arisen in Europe, not harmonising with the spirit of the League, and involving war obligations. The Locarno system might, in the last resort, mean war and war obligations on its members and, it was against these pacts and this system that tho outlawry of war under the declaration bumped violently. The way out ot this would make all signatories not only of Locarno but of other defensive pacts , parties to the declaration. Locarno and the other pacts must necessarily stand, but they would all be covered with the umbrella of tho declaration. The effect then would be that if the declaration were violated, the defenders would still be able to fall back on Locarno and the other pacts as their second line of defence, but it was quite possible that the umbrella might prove effective against the storm, safeguarding the peace of central Europe even more effectively than the patched up arrangements of the last ten years. In that way helped out, Locarno would also prove to be but a stop towards ultimate peace. General Smuts urged that it was vain to organise for world peace and leave out Russia. With all central and eastern Europe and Russia in the League. or in the declaration, or in both, The dis.-.nnament movement would enter an entirely new and most promising phase. He added that if diplomatic correspondence failed to bring oboul unanimity, America should call a conference of the Powers concerned.