Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-03-09
INADEQUATE PREPARATION
BLAMED FOR FARLEY FALL
Macdonald Forced by Political Back
ground to Hurry Calling of
Conference.

clans who represented the various ma
tionS
At the outset there was a surprising
show of good feeling on all sides, which
gave to the uniformed a notion that
Macdonald'S idea of curing interna-
tional differences by conference might
work. But this atmosphere lasted only
until minor questions had been dis
cuSsed. Once the conference came to
the main business and actual tonnage
demands were introduced it became
clear that every country was standing
Just where it had always intended to
stand and every delegation just where
1t had in advance promised its home
public it would stand.
Increased Armament VisiOned.
Moreover, these tonnage figures took
the world by surprise because. save In
the case of Britain, they disclosed a
purpose which of itself automatically
transformed a reduction and limitation
conference into meeting which seemed
condemned in advance to raise the limit
of armament to almost astronomical
heights And as each national program
was presented each public opinion dug
in behind it. AS consequence each
head of delegation was confronted with
the political consequence of surrender.
He was in sense the captive hence
forth of those demands which he had
been compelled to present.
There was then an immediate clash
OF national purposes. Britain took
alarm at the French figures, France be-
came excited over the italian demand
for parity, the United States entered an
emphatic negative to Japan's requests.
Thereupon the atmosphere of conflict
could no longer be disguised. The no
ton that a general world opinion would
operate to compel all nations to con-
form to universal desire for disarma-
ment and Cancellation, the fundamental
notion OF Macdonald, and it would seem
OF Hoover, too, proved ineXact.
In point of fact, world opinion was
not angry at one nation because it
seemed alone to block the way to sue
cess. On the contrary, world opinion,
perceiving the enormous building pro-
grams presented by all powers save the
British, who had already done their
building, turned not against a nation,
but against the conference. In all the
confusion and turmoil, In all the angry
and violent recriminations which were
precipitated, the world saw nothing but
the solid fact that the taxpayer was not
going to get economy and the pacif1St
was not going to get peace.
National Policies Assailed.
Then the French government fell and
the conference was condemned to sit
idly by for three weeks, during which
the press of the world united In assail-
ing the now impotent meeting for its
armament program, and the press of
each nation assailed the policy program
OF every other country. And the acci-
dent to French politics resulted in al
most completely destroying the illusion
that either international disarmament
or international amity could be adj
vanced here at London.
There, after all, is succinctly the
story Of what has been wrong at Lon
don. There was no international polit-
ical preparation. Macdonald, having
become prime minister, rushed to Amer
lea and made an agreement with Hoo
yer and then rushed back to London
and called an international conference.
Had he undertaken to find some basis
liantly succeeded in doing in the case of
the United States: had he directly or
through America sounded out Japan, he
would have discovered either that an
agreement here was possible or i'm
possible.
WiIsonianism Revealed.
But politically, given his home sit
nation, he could not wait. He was in
the same mood which led him six years
ago to journey to the Assembly Of the
League of Nations and agree to the
protocol, only to have his country re-
pudiate his acceptance a few months
later. All his trained advisers sought to
restrain him; the foreign Office and
diplomatic corps looked on in positive
horror, because they knew the realities
of the situation. As for the mass of the
public, they were fired with the Mac
donald idea, caught his enthusiasm,
were delighted beyond measure with his
American success. They believed he
must know what he was doing, while
he believed that once the meeting was
assembled it would be dominated by
world opinion. And here, after all, is
the final proof of the Wilsonianism Of
the British prime minister.
But nothing having been done to re-
move or accommodate any OF the diff
ficulties, they all came up, and the Lon
don Conference took on the appearance
OF little Paris peace conference. And
when every disagreement had been dis
closed at its maximum size the French
cabinet fell and left every national
claim in sharp opposition to every
other Up-to-date, that is where we have
arrived.
| tCopyright. 1900
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