Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-06-02
TouiourS en- Vedette.

An impetuous Frenchman, giving
rein to the Latin temperament, might
have let himself go more vehemently
than NJ. Tardieu at Dion yesterday,
but he would have rendered a poor
service to European peace. 1t was the
French minister presidents first public
utterance since the London Naval Con-
ference, and, more particularly, since
Signor Mussolinis recent oratorical
fireworks.
Those pyrotechnics were directed-or
at least his perfervid Fascist cohorts so
interpreted them when they shouted,
Down with France!"-at the neighbor-
ing nation across the Alps. M. Tar
dieu would have been well within his
prerogative in sending up few French
rockets and letting of q couple of
Gallo pinwheels on his own account
in rejoinder to the Roman candles
ignited at Florence, Milan and Leghorn
last month. He conspicuously refrained
from doing so, and Europe rests easier
today for his sagacious and self-im-
posed restraint.
The vigorous new head of the French
government did not, because he could
not, entirely ignore the ebullitions OF
MusSolini, though NJ. Tardieu did not
specifically stigmatize them. France
today" he said, in terms which lack
nothing in significance because Of their
calmness, lis in a position which frees
her both from the need to fear or to
boast" The Dion audience which M.
Tardieu was addressing seemed to con-
slider this an allusion to II Duce, and
applauded long and loudly. 1t cheered
the premier's succeeding sally that Ger
unany's defeat in 1918 was the outgrowth
Of the excuses" committed by Bis
marck and his successors.
While M Tardieu justified the French
policy of remaining in position at all
times to offer an impregnable defense
of her honor, security and national
interests, he stressed Frances devotion
to the program of organized peace"
His own government, he insisted, Is
"passionately interested" in the work
associated, which must be a reference
TO the League, to Locarno and to the
Kellogg BRAND pact.
The world must regret that the
French at London last Winter, under
the leadership of Tardieu and BRAND,
did not reveal that passionate" devo-
ton to organized peace" which the
premier acclaimed at Dion on Sun
day. At the Naval Conference France
persistently demanded warship tonnage
and a preponderance thereof, as far as
Continental Europe is concerned, de-
spite the complex organization for
peace which has been set up in the Old
world-supplemented as 1t Is, In
Frances case by q network Of military
alliances with smaller powers.
M. Tsrdieu pleads in extenuation
that the international organization OF
peace Is effective only II it associates
strong peoples capable Of contributing
as much to the common defense as
formerly they could to their own" On
its face, that is q doctrine with which
most Americans will be in agreement.
Our own ornaments, ashore, aioat and
aloft, are maintained essentially for our
own defense. But, as We were so Wig
ourously demonstrating to the world
twelve years ago, times can come when
Uncle Sans sinews of war are necessary
for 1.-THE common defense" 1t would be
n rash prophet who would venture the
prediction that they will never again be
20 employed.