The Washington herald., 1919-08-24

w
system go on rising. More liberal
French opinion recognizes the weak.
ness OF the government in not in
Producing drastic taxation; but no
taxation can now be more than a
drop in the bucket. What is the
remedy?
French Seek More Loans.
Before left France, every states
man you met guardedly hinted that
renunciation OF the debt owed by
France to America would help put
things straight More loans were also
desired. Recently the French ex-
change has been breaking faster and
faster, and this means only one thing.
France, producing little that she can
sell in America. is buying great guam
titles of American goods. AS the
francs moves downward from five
francs to dollar to six and seven
and now nearly eight francs, 1t be-
comes harder and harder for French
men to pay for American goods in
francs. He must pay seventy-nine
francs for a SO steel rail that before
the war, IL priced at SO would have
cost him 50 francs.
This cannot continue. If francs go
on down, France will stop buying in
our markets. True she must have
the goods" as our business men say.
But she cannot get them, for she can
not pay for them, unless we extend
great loans to the sister republic who
bore the brunt of the war. That we
are now leaving her to shift for her
self, the course of exchange shows.
Nothing has been said heretofore
about Germany. Aside from fears for
their own economic future, the other
countries of Europe are all much
afraid that any sort Of a smash-up
among themselves will give Germany
her chance to turn defeat into victory.
On paper, Germany Is worse on than
any one. She is saddled with great
indemnities; her exchange is down to
seven cents for the mark But Ger
many is more self-supporttns than
any other European nation; she
proved that during the war; and
across her Eastern frontier in well
ter of chaos lies the greatest poten-
tial market and the greatest supply
of raw materials in the world.
-wouId Assist Germany,
From political viewpoint. our late
associates in the war fear that a
refusal by the United States to ratify
the peace treaty Without radical mod
ifications will be turned to good ad-
vantage by Germany. Another peace
conference, if our Senate forces one
to be called, will be more quarrel
some and less likely to agree than the
-. iV,cy
authority of President Wilson will
have vanished. If we refuse to ratify,
the ratifications of any other powers
which happen to be dissatisfied may
be declared by them null and void.
In the economic sphere, Germany
also has much to gain by failure OF
America to help Europe out of her
hole. Here I am pleading the case of
my European friends, as they put 1t.
without taking sides myself. What
they are asking. Of course, is that we
make great sacrifices to help them,
and before doing so we have the best
of rights to ask what they are doing
to help themselves. Small powers
that ask US for coal and are too busy
fighting about coal fields to mine
their own may ind it difficult to meet
our question.
The case of those who desire Amer
lea to take hold OF Europe, furnish
credits, send her food and raw mater
iaIs and stand her on her feet again
without counting the cost to our pre-
sent generation, is simply that IL this
be not done Germany will yet secure
the economic rulership OF Europe and
We shall all of us hive lost the war.
German Peace Plans.
An American, Professor George T.
Heron. writing in Geneva, Switzer-
land, takes this ground. Professor
Heron, early in the peace conference.
was appointed by Wilson American
delegate to the abortive conference
of Russian factions that was to be
held on the Island Of Principe.
From the frontier OF the new"
Germany. Professor Heron wrote:
Germany will not proceed in the
open and directly. Her plans for pro-
curing the new peace will be of the
precise moral order Of her prepara-
tions for war before August. 1914 She
will subsidize and intensively culti-
vate now, as she has hitherto sub
sidized and cultivated. every subver
sive or disintegrating movement
throughout Europe, Asia and Africa
and in America also.
The BoIshevism which she fostered
in Russia, and which keeps for Ger
many her Eastern gates, will be
secretly spread abroad by her agen-
cies. China. Afghanistan and India
are examples of Bolshevik propa-
ganda resourced by Germany which
may permeate and persuade the en-
tire Mohammedan world. Her policy
now. as before, will be to ruin the
world in order to remake it according
to German pattern. to exploit and rule
it according to the German mind. If
America refuses to confirm the peace
thus practically nullifying the total
work of the Paris conference, then