PEACE FRONT AIM

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20007, 4 August 1939, Page 8

PEACE FRONT AIM

MOSCOW DELAYS DIFFICULT PROBLEM MET “INDIRECT AGGRESSION” HOPES OF AGREEMENT COMING ARMY MISSIONS (Klee. Tel. Copyright—United Press Assn.) (British Official Wireless.) Reed. 1.45 p.m. RUGBY, Aug. 3. During his speech in the House of Lords to-day in reply to the debate on foreign affairs, the Foreign Secretary, Viscount Halifax, referred to the negotiations with Soviet Russia. He said that the effort to negotiate an agreement with Russia was a continuation of the endeavour to organise a combination in resistance to aggression. The Government was blamed for the delay, but he suggested that not sufficient allowance was made for the difficulties of preparing an instrument .that would cover every possible contingency. That task was very complicated in any case and.was further complicated by the necessity for meeting the new technique of aggression—or providing, that was to say, for what was called “indirec,t aggression.” Lord Halifax made it clear that the chief cause of delay in finally reaching agreement, on the necessity of which both, sides were convinced, was the question of the precise form to be given to the definition of indirect aggression—“this elusive shadow” as he called it. Quest for Formula The object was to find a formula to cover indirect aggression without encroaching on the independence or neutrality of other States. It was no secret that the proposals which Britain and France had made appeared to the Soviet insufficiently comprehensive, whilst the formula favoured by .Russia appeared to Britain and France to go too far in the other direction. Lord Halifax said that it had been assumed in some quarters that if Britain had been represented by a Cabinet Minister, instead of the Ambassador at Moscow, a quick agreement would have been secured. He did not think experience supported it. The fact that Britain and France had decided to dispatch military missions to Moscow was evidence of the determination to bring these negotiations to an early and successful conclusion. Appeal for Unity “On the eve of adjourning, I cannot encourage anyone to feel eontplgcent about the international situation,” he said. “That would not be in accordance with the facts and possibilities bs we believe them to exist to-day

“Indeed, it may be that the next weeks or months may prove critical. Britain’s policy is, I hope, sufficiently clear and so generally accepted that I need not recapitulate it.

“I myself tried to define it in a speech something over a month ago. To that speech I have nothing to add, and I certainly have nothing to withdraw from it.

“We have tried to make the position of this country crystal clear. We have no aggressive designs. Our alliances and understandings have not been framed with any aggressive intent. It only remains for us to keep calm, as far as we may, to be united, to avoid exaggerated attention to rumour and to be neither over-confident nor too pessimistic. “A united nation which knows exactly where it stands and knows itself to be strong can meet the future, whatever it may hold, with confidence.”