“Taranaki Central Press” SATURDAY, MARCH 27, 1937. THE OLD DIPLOMACY.

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 393, 27 March 1937, Page 4

“Taranaki Central Press” SATURDAY, MARCH 27, 1937. THE OLD DIPLOMACY.

KING LEOPOLD’S visit to London presents a new phase of the old diplomacy. It is the personal phase of getting together. as the Americans put it, in an intimate discussion of the international situation. It has its merits and it is being practised to a greater extent than before. There can hardly be any doubt that recent visits by British trade and naval experts to America, and by French financial experts, too, have had much to do with the fact that the day of international conferences is over for the time being. There is much that may be said in favour of the “man to man relationship, especially when it is undertaken by a king.

Belgium is in disgrace diplomatically to-day, because she tore up her treaties last October in a public announcement that she had severed her military alliances and was resuming her pre-war neutrality. Evenly a purely defensive alliance, King Leopold said at the time, did not achieve its purpose for Belgium, because aid might come from an ally only after an onslaught by an invading army. Thus the Franco-Belgian alliance was torn up, collective action was revoked, and Belgium declared that she would take no part in any new security pact.

This has been hailed as a distinct victory for German and Italian diplomacy. Belgium has. been frightened by Communist activity in the French Government, and the possibility that the FrancoRussian alliance might drag her into a European conflict. In brief, Belgium fears Hitlerism less than Bolshevism. If she withdrew from the League of Nations, France and Britain could not operate through Belgium against Germany in meeting a war of aggression The situation is dangerous and comparable in some respects with that of 1914, although it brings French, Russian and British interests closer. What pledges or explanations King Leopold has to offer in London may not be disclosed, but he is likely to come away empty handed if he persists in his October manoeuvre.