Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-08-17
The Bigger Stake.

In such a crisis as mas arisen III
the Young plan conference at The
Hague delay is worth its weight in gold.
On the eve of definitely foreshc lowed
breakdown the council meeting OF the
conference financial committee, sched-
uled for today, has been postponed.
Time is to be granted to permit Great
Britain an opportunity to examine con-
crete proposals submitted by the other
creditor nations whereby the British
share of German reparationS would be
increased. The compromise figures
offer some, but not all, of the advance
over the Young plan percentage, for
which Chancellor Snowden is so valiant
ly contending.
BY next week the Macdonald gov
eminent will have made up its mind
whether or not to accept the PROPOSE
ton projected by France, Italy, Belgium
and Japan as an eleventh-hour counsel
of desperation. The current week end is
therefore not unlike one of those cool
ing-off periods" contemplated by the
Bryan arbitration treaties, amid which
quarreling governments are allotted time
to let discretion temper valor and COM
mon sense supplant passion.
Some London dispatches of the past
"a hours hint that Premier Macdonald
has already signaled that Britain is
ready to climb down. That may be a
premature forecast of coming events,
but it is nevertheless Accordingly in
teresting, especially to Americans, to
learn of the reputed cause of Labor S
reported readiness to apply the soft
pedal to Mr.. Snowden'S fulminations at
The Hague.
1t is asserted by prophets of John
Bulls impending Cancellation on the
Young plan that the Macdonald cab
met is not inspired by the fear that
persistence in its Hague reparations
program-if successfully maintained
would jeopardize the prospects of naval
limitation. In this connection strong
word of caution comes from Mr.. Snow
den's own camp. H. H. BrailSford, one
of the leaders of the Independent Labor
party, after pointing out the economic
consequences of failure at The Hague,
goes on to say: But that is not the
worst. What prospect would there be
for our larger purposes of reconciliation
and disarmament in this atmosphere OF
anger and disappointment? Who, after
this, would accept the Labor govern
ment as leader on the road to peace?
Mr.. Snowden has taken risk which
may endanger Ill the larger purposes of
the government which has so lightly
allowed him to stake its greater ambi-
tons for few millions"
We have been little too prone, in
this country, to look upon naval limita-
ton as a purely Anglo-American family
affair. 1t is far from that. From the
British standpoint it is very much Of
European affair. 1t is in particular an
Anglo Franco-Italian affair. 1t con-
Germs, in other words, those two CONT
mental powers which are at this moment
opposing British reparation demands.
France and Italy it was, at the
Washington Conference in 1922,
that frustrated all attempts to limit
cruisers, destroyers and submarines
because these auxiliary types Of war
craft were held to be the only weapons
of defense against British fleet
otherwise supreme in Europe. The
motives here seven years ago-their
respective positions and requirements
as Mediterranean powers with vital
colonial interests in Northern Africa
are as well founded today as they were
then. The Paris and Rome govern
ments have not renowned the claims
on which their case at Washington
rested. Britain must have the French
and Italian navies in mind when she
negotiates with the United States Tor
curtailment of cruisers. 1t is obviously
the duty of British statesmen, at "a
crucial hour like this, to count well
the future cost of engendering fresh
resentments and suspicious among sis
ter Mediterranean powers, already in
sistent, as they are, upon full place
in the naval sun, as far as so-called
auxiliary ships of war are concerned.
Mr.. Brailsford, in the passage above
quoted, hints at the bigger stake which
the Macdonald government, ere many
more hours are past, may decide to
play for.