DISARMAMENT

Wairarapa Daily Times, 5 March 1934, Page 5

DISARMAMENT

BRITAIN’S ATTITUDE A BLUNT HINT. Press Association Electric Telegraph—Copyright BERLIN, Saturday. A blunt hint that it is useless for Britain further to attempt to mediate on disarmament, in Berlin is contained in a statement issued from official sources, declaring that the possibilities of German concessions arc exhausted, and Paris is the proper place to seek an agreement. It adds that when Britain obtained concessions from Germany, Franco accepted them, but adhered to her old standpoint, leaving Britain again to approach Germany. Franco thereby grossly misused Britain’s indefatigability, as fair mediation was possible only ■when both sides were prepared to make concessions. “Herr Hitler’s minimum programme for bringing German armaments level with others is a compact and constructive solution from which nothing can be taken,” it states. - BRITISH PLAN REJECTED. PARIS, Saturday. The Foreign Minister, M. Barthou, explaining the French rejection of the British disarmament plan, declares that by lacking a test period it would lead to disarmament by France and rearmament by Germany. He praised Mr Eden, whom he put on guard against the danger to Britain of German rearmament. Germany demanded half France's number of chaser aeroplanes, while the conversion of the German commercial fleet into bombers would confer an immediate superiority. France was determined to uphold the peace treaties, and also considered that Austria’s problem should be treated internationally. AMERICAN VIEWPOINT. WASHINGTON, Saturday. The State Department published a memorandum to-day reiterating and amplifying tlic President’s views on disarmament in relation to the recent British memorandum. The American viewpoint, given to Sir Ronald Lindsay, British Ambassador, by the Under-Secretary of State, Mr H. Phillips, on 19th February, expressed sympathy with the principles of the British suggestion, but stated that they were not completely adequate. The United States favoured supplementing any agreement reached at Geneva with a world-wide non-aggression pact, as propounded in the President’s message on 16th May, 1933. It noted the probability that the British attitude was “draftecl in view of meeting the complexities? present in political Europe,” and added, “while America is in no way a participant in such problems, it is nevertheless vitally interested in the maintenance of European peace, and therefore welcomes the effort of the British Government to bring about an agreement.”