MOROCCO

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 75, 19 September 1911, Page 3

MOROCCO

THE GF.RMAX DKMAXDS. Writing 'concerning the German de-' mands, the Paris correspondent of the Times remarked on the l!)th of last month:—"The proposed bargain is so monstrously unfair that its proposers cannot seriously have believed that it would be entertained in Paris. What, then, can be their object. The opinion is spreading here that Germany desires to narrow the practical choice for France to relinquishment of the Agadir enclave by the Sultan of Morocco in favor of Germany. The solution would .have two advantage* from the German point of view. It would satisfy Pan-German and naval ambitions in Germany, and by directly compromising British interests it would put perhaps a fatal strain upon the Anglo-French entente. Kindred suggestions, such as the establishment of a 'chartered company' or companies in the Hinterland of Agadir, would, if realised, be mere steps towards the radical solution of a German acquisition of territory. They fc any case amount to a violation of the integrity and independence of Morocco, since the rights of a 'chartered company' imply the local exercise of independent authority. It is true that on all sides the assurance is given here that France, both in her own interest and in that of her partner in the entente cordiale,, will never consent to any of these solutions at the expense of Moroccan territory. In that, case she is left face to face with tiie impossible German demands in the French Congo or with the alternative of the continued 'demonstration' at Agadir and -the possibility of a German landing and occupation in force, which its effects upon the natives may at any moment produce. There is, however,' another set of suggestions which have been tentatively put forward by the Frankfurter Zeitung, and which represents a re-, turn to the German aims which were frustrated by Prince Bulow's policy of 'blufP in 1905 and at the Algeeiras Con- ■ | ference. These suggestions amount to » nothing lesß than a general reconciliation i of France and Germany on the basis oi the unreserved opening of the French money market for the benefit of German national credit and German industrial p-nternrises at home and nhrnn/1. T am

assured that at this time of day this project is not favored in any influential quarter in France —not even among those who may be called the political heirs of the late M. Eouvier. It Ims now been universally recognised that the political consequences of a settlement on this scale would be too far-reaching, and that, quite apart from the question of AngloFrench relations, it would mean the death-blow to the Russian Alliance. And behind these and other insuperable objections there remains the vital question of Alsace-Lorraine.