Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-05-25
BY WILLIAM MARTIN,

(Foreign Editor of the Journal de Geneve)
- ENEvA. -. Aristide Brands
r federation has been received at
~ Geneva with mixed sentiments
Brands loyalty to the
League of Nations is well known and
his ideas of basing peace on security
for all states are also those OF the
League, yet 1t Is felt that his European
plan endangers the Leagues very
existence.
At the present moment most of the
Leagues activities are European. Coun-
tries of other continents are neverthe-
less interested in the League because
it gives them an opportunity to play
an international role, influence Euro
pean affairs and increase their own
prestige. But II the League were TO
begin merely to register the decisions
taken by an European federation, It's
meetings would lose all Importance.
BRAND Appreciates League.
None knows better than BRAND the
Leagues value. It Is here that he made
friends with DR.. Gustav StreSemann
and prepared the liquidation of Franco
German war problems. Yet BRAND Is
primarily European with French, even
provincial, mind who has not Travelled
much and whose visit to Washington
in 1922 left him no good memories.
Several events have strengthened MS
idea that before organizing the entire
world he should begin with Europe
The partial failure of the London Naval
Conference seemed to him to be que
to the impossibility of agreement with
the United States on the security ques-
ton. Partial failure OF the conference
for a tariff truce seemed to him TO be
proof of the Leagues impotence IN the
economic domain. And Europes re-
sentiment at the increase in the Amerl-
can tariff is interpreted by him as
sign of Europe's need to organize 1or
self-defense.
Unless Europe reacts, he thinks. Eu-
rope is lost. And the occasion OF the
launching of the Young plan and the
international bank simultaneously Win
the evacuation of the Rhineland seemed
to him propitious for the launching
also Of his plan for European federa-
ton.
One method of procedure would have
been to seek European agreement
on certain definite points and problems
This was the Locarno method. The
other way, which BRAND finally chose,
was to try to create an entirely new
ideas OF Count Coudenhove- kalergi OF
Vienna and Edward Benes, Czecho-
Slovakia's noted foreign minister.
This choice greatly embarrassed the
League of Nations. 1t cannot very Wen
oppose a policy SO closely allied to Its
own, yet it can hardly support policy
which, If it succeeded, would doubtless
mean its own death. 1t is not that the
League is animated by spirit OF rivalry
1t favored the Washington Naval Con-
ference, the Genoa Reconstruction Con-
ference, the Locarno treaties, the Kei-
logg pact and the international bank.
But in what way could European fed
Grafton accomplish something which
the League Is unable to accomplish?
Economic Difficulty Remains.
The economic difficulties thus far en-
countered come from the disagreement
between the industrial and agricultural
states of Europe. This difficulty would
subsist entire in a European federation.
With regard to security, the great Oh
stacle Is the absence of the United
States, which a European federation
would not in any way overcome.
BRANDS idea seems to be that the
League is paralyzed In certain respects
by its universally. 1t is believed here,
however, that not single case can
be shown in the last 10 years In which