The Daily News. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1918. WHAT ALSACE-LORRAINE MEANS TO FRANCE.

Taranaki Daily News, 13 December 1918, Page 4

The Daily News. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1918. WHAT ALSACE-LORRAINE MEANS TO FRANCE.

At last the world blunder Ol 1870 in allowing Germany to take Al-sace-Lorraine has been rectified. The impressive scene at S trassbm'sj when the Major handed the keys of the pity to the French President should ever be memorable in the annals of the recovered provinces, it was for that day that Frenchmen had long awaited. for the. insistence on the ; restoration of Alsace-Lorraine was the chief essence of the aims of Fraaae in the world war. There are some who may think this was mere sentiment, and so it was in one way—a very, intense senti-' ment; but it was far more vital to France than a sentiment, for Alsace-Lorraine meant life or death to France. The French had no illusions about these provinces. The terror stood at their doors, its claws upon the latch, day and night. It is perfectly clear why Germany coveted Alsace-Lor-raine. She needed the twenty one hundred million tons of iron (the iron'of Lorraine is the best iron for producing steel) that Lorraine yields—three nut of every four tons of Germany's steel—hence the strategic significance of the territory. Major Haldane Macfall, in his interesting book entitled "Beware the Germans' -Peace,'* says: "If Germany can make a paper peace and sign paper treaties galore that will satisfy everybody,; out she can—and will—tear up treaties as "scraps of paper/' No statesmanship can prevent it. But if Germany needs twenty-eight hundred millions of tons of iron before she can carry on a World War, or any war on a great scale such as modern life compels to be fought, and if Germany can only get seven hundred million tons of iron, she cannot make her war. - ' As long as Germany held AlsaceLorraine, she had not only an ideal jumping- ofl: ground westward of the Rhine for attacking P'rance under every advantage, but she held the French iron wherewith alone she could de stroy the French armies, and without which the French could not destroy her. Major Macfall thus sums up the position: "It is with the iron of Lorraine that the German fires three out of ■four shells into the Allied trenches and devastates the land, and blots out the lives of our men. It is with the iron of France's Lorraine that lie can batter down the French democracy. It is with the iron of Lorraine that he has fought this vast war. It is the iron of Lorraine that enabled the beaten German armies to entrench for three years by gunnixig their defence. It is the iron of Lorraine that scatter,-, death from the night sky in London streets when the Gorman Iron Cross heroes alay Women and children in our midst. It is the iron 'of Lorraine that sends the submarine under the deep and enables German piracy to sink defenceless - folk and drown neutrals with impunity. It is with the iron of Lorraine that he can gun his crimes, and intends to uestroy that sublime and chivalrous democracy of France that stands for all that he hates, that France that he would compel to 9peak the German tongue. With the German in Lorraine, France cannot sleep except with the rifle at her side. Peace with Germany in Alsace-Lorraine menu the conquest of France by German commerce as surely as war means her assailing. But with France in Alsace-Lorraine the German octopus in the steel-yards would have its tentacles amputated, just as in war the weight of metal would then be on the French side. France has no designs on the dominion of the world; Germany lives for no other design." It is not only France that is interested in Alsace-Lorraine, the loss of which to Germany is the heaviest blow to her great war ambitions and to her dream of world domination. It is weighted with vast issue to America and Britain, as to the rest of the civilised world, all our future safety or future punishment being involved in the possession of these provinces. "We can therefore be genuinely thankful that Germany no longer holds this mighty weapon. She ought not to have been allowed to hold it , at all, for without this vast metal supply she could not. have entered upon the war which has taken such a heavy, toll of humanity. The weight of metal is now on the side of France, and henceforth it ' should be used to promote the in 1 dustrial prosperity of our gallant i ally, and be of service to the world instead of an ever-present menace. 1 The feelings of the French people , oyer the issue of the great struggle ; can better be imagined than described. They have suffered terribly at the hands of Germany., ; but they have npw gained their hearts' desire, while Britain, America and all other civilised na- ! tions cannot but feel a greater se- , curity in theirs by reason of the : reversion of Alsace-Lorraine to ' France. It is one of the great com- J pensations of. the war that the , arts of peace will now have a fair f chance of being stimulated. To '■ France this means much, for her 1 industries will expand by leaps J and bounds, there being, it is to he ( hoped, no war clouds in the future J < to mar prosperity. The Allies have ' irighted the fveat tvrocg that was!l

done to France, and they may justly claim; this as a worthy tribute t) French loyalty and zealous aid in the great fight against—and the complete defeat of—the military despots who terrorised Europe for so long.