Evening star., 1934-04-22
Continued From First Page.)

NColIIIIlueQ fTOIN tlTSL Page.)
and the place of the attack, would have
provided himself with them all. One
can imagine the helpleSsness of an
attacked state, forced to resist the in
vader with inadequate means and tc
postpone all offensive counter-move-
ments until its industries had man.
aged TO make good the deficiency. An
uphill fight that in the end would
probably be lost.
But. you might ask, suppose that
no nation, not even an aggressor
dared to infringe upon the clauses for
bidding the use of offensive" weapons
what then? Such a hypothesis is
very difficult to entertain as whoever
breaks major law doesn't pay much
heed to a minor one. But If such
should be the case. the practical re-
suit OF such a strange and unac-
countable discretion would only be to
transfer military omnipotence to the
widest. to the most primitive crowd of
men. In an extreme case of this ma
ture the Russians might override the
European continent with stones and
pocket knives?
Principle and Limitation.
Let us. then. infer and keep in mind
that the principle of equal rights
cannot be -arried into effect merely
by the disarmament of the so-called
armed states" down to the military
level which was assigned to the van
qulShed in the peace treaties of 1919.
Some scope must be allowed for the
rearmament of Germany and her
former allies of the great war.
But here again the undertaking
bristleS with gigantic obstacles that
may well be called insuperable.
To start with, it is still impossible
for any impartial authority to ascer-
tain to what degree Germany and the
other "disarmed" states have already
rearmed. There is no regularly pub
lished military budget worthy OF the
name to inform us, and at any rate
in the case of France. spying services
in recent months have been swept off
the board as result of the very
strict discipline now being enforced in
Germany. But as regards military
effectives, the same impenertable veil
cannot be SO easily thrown over the
situation. We all know that the
Reichswehr by now must be 10000
men strong, if not more, and that the
multitude trained in military societies
total about 2500,000.
When pressed for explanations on
the subject Chancellor Hitler alleges
that those 2,500000 men are not to
be regarded as soldiers, but are rather
to be compared to the forces of the
Salvation Army; that only 1000 of
them are supplied with rifles, ETC. But
on the French side that argument is
met by the rejoinder that, to say the
least, the young people in the military
societies are soldiers in the sense that
they are trained to march. to live in
the open and even to shoot. and that
with such a foundation they might
easily be transformed within a few
weeks, into full-fledged warriors.
The practical conclusion of the
French and, I believe, of the British
General Staff is that in a few days
after the opening OF warfare Germany
might be able to send 100000 men.
at the lowest estimate, over the French
frontier. To sum up, owing to the
militarist and to the revengeful spirit
which runs through the whole people,
it is impossible for any serious OBJ
server to find OUT where the army ends
and where the civilian population be-
gins in Germany.
The French Hrmy bears striking