Evening star., 1925-04-05
Continued from First Page.)

carry out the disarmament provisions
of the treaty of Versailles offer an
adequate excuse to delay evacuation
for the presen' at least.
The British, for their part, would
prefer to give no guarantee, but they
perceive that without a guarantee
France will not leave the Rhine, and
thus peace will not be actually re-
stored. Moreover, they are becoming
more and more convinced that guar
entee to France involves little real
risk, for they are satisfied that Ger
many has no intention of attacking
France. Thus all British policy aims
at giving France some relatively
anodyne pledge, and thus arriving at
A general Rhine settlement between
Hrance, Germany, Belgium and per-
haps Holland, and agreement of these
nations to respect each others from
tiers and also to submit all disputes
TO arbitration. Such a pact Britain
would also join, and thus. in a
measure, become it's guarantor.
Limits on British Policy.
But what the British are not pre-
pared to do is to guarantee French
security in the west, while France
guarantees Polish and Czechoslovak
security in the east, for then the
the Slav frontiers too, and particular
~ those of Poland, against both Ger
many and Russia. In this situation
the whole effort of British policy is
directed at divorcing France from
Poland. and thus putting Poland in
the position of having to make con-
cessions to Germany or risk a con-
fict. At the moment when l reached
Warsaw the whole question had be-
Coma acufe becauEp of c0nyersa
tions going forward between London,
Paris and Berlin.
Now the British policy is obviously
based upon the notion that if Ger
many were assured of an ultimate
revision of her frontiers in the east
she would abandon her western
policy, as it existed before 1914:
would agree to regard Alsace-Lor-
Taine lost forever and seek to re-
coup herself by the annexation of
Austria and of the remuneration of
Upper Siesia, Danzig and the corri-
dor. Thus Franco German relations
would gradually improve, thanks
perhaps later to economic settle
ments, and the danger to Britain of
A new war just across the channel
: which would involve her would dis
appear.
France, on the other hand. sees that
IL Germany were allowed thus to go
east and south, she would become at
once the economic master of both
Poland and also of Czechoslavokia,
for the annexation of Austria would
cut off all the Czech outlets to the
world; that thus two countries with
forty millions of people would be-
come economically and ultimately
politically dependent upon Germany,
while Hungary would in the end
drift into the same constellation, if
she it did not come at once.
Revives Old Domination.
This would be to create the Mittel-
europea which did exist for moment
in the victorious phase of German
operations during the war. 1t would
be to make Germany actually the
dominating power in Europe to an
extent never approached since Roman
times by any one nation. Moreover.
II would lead eventually to resump-
tion of German advance, both to the
Adriatic and to the AEGEAN. Such
progress would mean that Germany
would in the end win the war or at
loast all of the things which meant
most to her during the war and in
fluenced her policy for the years be-
fore the great struggle.
Thus France takes the position that
there is no difference between the
treaty of Versailles as II affects west
ern Europe and eastern; that the right
way to insure peace is not to purchase
German acceptance of western from
tiers by the issue of a tacit permits
sion to revise eastern, but to demand
from Germany equally strong pledges
to respect the status quo in the east