Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-11-24
Germany Gives Notice.

To those American financial authori-
ties all over the country, before whom
DR.. Hialmar Schacht has recently been
preaching the gospel of impoverished
Germany, 1t does not come as q sur
prise to learn that the Reich may
have to seek a reparations moratorium.
DR.. Curtius, the foreign minister, blunt
ly foreshadowed that prospect in an ad-
dress before the Reichsrat, in Berlin
on Thursday evening. Germany would
be within her covenanted rights under
the Young plan in asking a period Of
grace. She has now served notice that
she may be compelled to take advantage
Of the privilege.
Even for a country less burdened
with economic and financial woes than
Germany, an annual stipend Of four
hundred and fifty million dollars a
year would be a considerable load to
carry. The Dawes plan, which in many
respects was an even more arduous
task for the Germans to shoulder, was
carried out by them TO the last gold
mark. The Hindenburg- Bruening gov
eminent, in whose good faith the world
has strong confidence, has come to the
conclusion that the tolls to be exacted
from the Reich under the Young plan
may become insupportable.
Germany, Of course, has not escaped
the ravages of the times any more than
other countries. She has a gruesome
unemployment problem. She has been
living on borrowed capital to an alarm
ing extent, much Of 1t derived from
the United States Her reparation pay
Inents thus far could hardly have been
met except with the aid Of foreign
loans. Rigid retrenchment is now the
order of the day and the government,
practicing what it breaches, has Just
ordained q heavy cut in the wages Of
the civil service. OF the Berlin au-
thorities' intention to do what is within
their power to meet q grave situation,
there can hardly be any doubt.
Foreign Minister Curtius couples with
his moratorium warning a repetition of
Germany's demand for general dis
armament in Europe. He indicates that
the Reich will not rest indefinitely con-
tent in her present relatively helpless
state while states all around her
strengthen their military and naval
establishments. It has not escaped no.
tice that on the very day that DR..
Curtius made his poor mouth" the
Reichstag Budget Committee approved
q first installment of two and q half
million dollars for the second Ersatz
Preussen, the mystery battleship which
Germany has laid down, to the con-
sternation Of naval powers throughout
the world. The Ersatz Preussen with
her ten thousand tons Is said to be the
equal Of any two ten-thousand-ton war
ships now built or building for any
other feet.
The Reich's readiness to spend money
on battleShips may seem inconsistent
with her proteStations Of poverty and
her demands for disarmament. Yet
Justice requires it to be said that gov
ernments all over Europe have set Berlin
exactly that kind of an example. They
have induced Uncle shylock," for ex-
ample, to white down his war-debt
requirements Of them on the ground of
incapacity to pay, and have then turned
around and lavished pounds, francs and
liras on the maintenance of vast fight
ing machines ashore, anoat and aloft.
Americas most direct interest in a
possible German moratorium is the
effect on allied war debt payments to
the United States Treasury. These
amount to something more than two
hundred million dollars a year. Auto
matically under the Young plan our
European debtors are at liberty to cease
their payments to us If Germany ceases
her payments to them. At a time when
the Hoover administration is busily fig-
uring on revenue and expenditure with
a view to the effect on the income tax,
Germany's vicissitudes may turn out to
have prompt reflex influence upon the
pocketbooks Of American taxpayers.