The Daily News. FRIDAY, MARCH 4, 1921. REPARATIONS.

Taranaki Daily News, 4 March 1921, Page 4

The Daily News. FRIDAY, MARCH 4, 1921. REPARATIONS.

No surprise can be felt at the manner in which Dr. Simons presented the German case at the London Conference on reparations. Again and again the German war lords boasted that there would be “no peace but a German peace.” There has been no material divergence from that attitude by Germany; no repentance; no genuine recognition of defeat, and no disposition to consider ariy interests other than those of the Fatherland. Although Dr. Simons stated that the German people were willing to make sacrifices, and were prepared to submit to definite instead of indefinite propositions, he added that the German people feared to see their children and grandchildren overburdened. Thus has it been all through the piece. Germany’s enemies may suffer from generation to generation as the result of that shameless spirit of slaughter, devastation, oppression and arrogance which even now wanders at large and dominates the German people; yet the latter must not be burdened or made to suffer even 'by repairing the ravages committed deliberately on enemy countries with the object of totally ruining their industries, and making them absolutely dependent on Germany. In this connection a recent cablegram stated that the French Commission, which is selecting from Germany, material carried off from Northern France, had found 400,000 machines, worth eighty millions sterling, forming seventy-five per cent, of the stolen machinery, while an enormous quantity was viciously destroyed. Yet Dr. Simons has the amazing audacity to endeavor To whittle down the six milliards of annuities imposed by the Paris Conference to a paltry one and a half milliards, of which he suggests the Allies should subscribe the first rour hundred millions by way of loan, so that Germany would merely pay interest, totalling fifty millions sterling a year, instead of annuities amounting to five or six times as much, while, as if to add insult to hijury, the offer is dependent on the granting of certain conditions by the Allies, the principal of which are the retention of Upper Silesia, and Germany’s freedom from all commercial restrictions This is quite in accord with the

German dictum that “there would be no peace but a German peace.” The only wonder is that Dr. Simons did not put in a counterproposal that the Allies *hould make financial reparation to Germany in order to prove that that country had not been defeated in a “just” war engineered by France and Britain—more especially the latter. The German proposals were so preposterous that the Allies practically dismissed them off-hand, a fate that even the Germans must have anticipated, the only question now to be decided being how Germany is to be made to pay. The nature of the measures to be taken ajmit of little elasticity. That there must be decisive action is inevitable, for if Germany refuses to pay Willingly) then coercion must be applied. The Allies mean business, and will no longer tolerate manifest evasions. Germany must be made to realise that “After ‘The Day’ there’s a price to pay.” Her real wealth is her great natural resource*, and these can always be drawn upon for reparations. It must be remembered that while the Germans ruthlessly devastated enemy countries, their own country suffered little, if any, damage. Justice demands that the claims of the countries Germany has ravaged should have- precedence over the claims of the German people, and the time to carry out this principle has now arrived.