Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1922-09-12

| Aristide BRAND left the helm Of French
politics. He was not only an intense
patriot but also discerning one, who deem
ed it no service to his country to ignore reaIi
| ties. That Germany should pay for her wal
wrongs and pay to the limit of her capacity
was maintained by none more firmly than by
him; but he did not propose in pursuing that
policy to bring wreck and ruin upon large
! part of the continent and disappointment to
! the whole worlds highest hopes. He agreed
with the craftsmanship of England and Italy
| and with competent observers everywhere
| that reparations must be collected not as ii
it were merely the working out of formula
in mathematics, but with regard for condi-
tions as they actually are in these most IN
mathematical and troublous times. Many an
aggressive gesture would he make, true to his
Breton type, but his drift was toward con-
structive solution of international problems
and with the facts of the case ever in view.
Had he remained Premier of France as
Lloyd George did of England, what happy ad-
justments might the two not have accom-
plished? But instead Poincare took the
helm, and now behold the multiplied con-
fusion!
The depreciation of German money to such
an extent that whereas in August six hun
dred and thirty marks would buy one dollar,
in September fifteen hundred hardly will do
So evidences trend of affairs which, how
ever lightly politicians in Paris may consider
it, elsewhere gives grave concern. And GER
tainly none has more cause for concern or
better reason for counteractive measures
than a nation that looks to Germany for
large indemnities. Such claimant, it would
tide toward bankruptcy, decentralization,
revolution and quite unpredictable after
seem, would wish to check, not accelerate a
math. From even the coolest, the harshest
point of view it would seem good policy to
bolster up Republican Germany for the tasks
and obligations to which she is committed
rather than to precipitate crisis from which
a monarchist or Bolshevist Germany may
emerge.
Denmark with inerasable memories of
Schleswig- Holstein, can hardly be called Ger
manophile. Consider a few facts set forth
by leading journal of that country Re-
marking of those who insist upon one aspect
of reparatons to the exclusion of all others
that it is Gas if they were struck with
blindness in the face of this huge storm
which is advancing upon Europe, this OBJ
server presents an example in point. eve
are thinking of the deliveries Of German coal
which amount at present to 1,725,000 tons a
month. The situation is as follows: Ger
many, which through the peace treaty, has
lost twenty-six per cent of he~ coal produc-
ton is suffering now from coal famine, and
was obliged to import in June 100000 tons
mostly from England, that is to say more
than she is obliged to deliver to the Allies
France and Belgium, on the contrary, have
much COAL So that German coal is now sent
at great expense from the Ruhr to France ant
Belgium, from whence some of it is often
sent back again to the Ruhr. At the same
time the Rhine barges which have taken the
coal to Rotterdam, to be sent on to French
ports, load up again in Rotterdam with Eng
lish coal and take it back to the Ruhr to re-
place the deliveries made. 1t is difficult tt
imagine anything more absurdly stupid from
an economic point Of view. The German gov
eminent even asked to be allowed to make
some of it's deliveries in English coal, to
avoid sending the Ruhr coal to Rotterdam
which is substituted then by English coal. The
request was refused"
Sympathy is due not so much to Germany
who, as matter of abstract justice, deserves
what she receives, but to France whose war
time valor and virtue are being so Ill recon-
pensed by her present political leadership
Happy for the French people, happy for the
world if their wontedly vigorous and prac-
teal wisdom assert itself, not too late.