The New York herald., 1921-10-02
will provide work and subsidize
home industries

lent. Practically 1t Is very danger
Gus. What the labor leaders fail to
understand is that the financial re-
sources of Great Britain after the
war are just as incapable of support
ing great armies of workless men
or of providing work for them as are
the local authorities. Only in the
revival of foreign trade. which is
Great Britain's main source Of
wealth, can this problem be solved.
and at present, owing to the collapse
of foreign markets and exchanges,
Great Britain has about half her nor
NAL imports and exports.
Foreign Trade Big Factor.
British wealth also was largely
due To the carrying force of her great
mercantile marine. which carried
half the cargoes of the whole world
before the war. British food sup
plies depended on that mercantile
marine, for out of every hundred
loaves consumed in Britain eighty
were made from sea borne wheat.
The coal exports paid largely for the
food imports, but now British coal is
too dear for many foreign markets,
and British ships travel with light
cargoes.
Labor in Great Britain does not
see as far as those ships travel to
foreign ports. 1t does not yet see
that foreign policy directed to
European peace, disarmament and
reconstruction as well as greater in
dustry and efficiency at home is the
only remedy for unemployment and
poverty. Men of high intellectual
reputation do not see it either.
Archibald Hurd, well known naval
expert, says. for instance, that Great
Britain will adopt suicidal policy
If she cuts down her programme for
Zig battleships, for defence is Of su-
preme Importance to the mercantile
marine, as Great Britain could be
sarved to death in few months II
her ships could no longer bring her
food supplies.
That is true il we were in danger
of destruction at sea. But If we
have to compete in battleships with
enemies real or mythical it is equally
certain that our mercantile marine
will rust for lack of cargoes, because
we shan't have the money to pay for
the food.
The workingmen at the Woolwich
Arsenal would like great orders for
armaments, because this would pro.
vide them with work and wages. For
the same reason the Clyde shipbuild.
ers are glad to have orders for new
battleships costing f40,O00,000 and
indirectly for new naval bases cost
ing f100,0O0,000 more. They do not
stop to think that f4O, ,000, 900 for four
battleships lasting four years would
build 10000 houses to last a century.
They cannot have both, it is certain.
For Europe generally the problem
may be simply stated. 1t is disarma.
ment or ruin. Take France, for ex.
ample. In the year before the war
her army cost f37,000,0OO. This
year, three years after the victory, It
costs f13O, 100000. Germany, forcibly
disarmed, has an enormous advant
age, being relieved of such burdens
though otherwise crippled.
| If WOrkingmen Knew the Facts.
If these facts could get into the
heads of the laboring men, the sue
cess of the Washington conference
would be more assured; but they are
as a mass uninterested in foreign
policy, and are absorbed in their
domestic difficulties, which they
think in their ignorance to be due to
the selfish wickedness Of the State.
British communists, who are only
small group of fanatics, are com.
ing out of their lairs to prophecy a
winter Of revolution in Great Bri.
tain. Starvation and police brutal
ity," they say will lead to helpless
riots. Then the ex-soldiers will re-
member their training and we shall
be flung into a new revolutionary
crisis"
Such prophecies have been made
too often before to curdle any British
blood except that Of old ladies in the
country. There will be no civil war
in England this winter, but increas-
ing distress for the workless men,
with senseless spasmodic riots which
won't help any one. Undoubtedly
next year this will be followed by
wave of emigration to Australia,
which is making elaborate plans to
receive hundreds Of thousands of
new settlers.
The enormous difficulty OF the
Washington conference will be to
carry out plans for the limitation of
armament at time when widespread
distress in Europe is causing intensi-
fication of economic rivalries and
many political troubles owing to the
desperate temptation for nations to
Il