MR CHAMBERLAIN DEFENDS HIS POLICY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 7 October 1938, Page 5

MR CHAMBERLAIN DEFENDS HIS POLICY

Survey of Treaty Obligations CZECHOSLOVAKIA SAVED FROM DESTRUCTION (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 11 a.m.) RUGBY, October 6. The last speaker in the House of Commons debate was the Prime Minister (Mr Neville Chamberlain) who was given a great ovation. Mr Chamberlain said he wasiconvinced that by his action, although he claimed no credit for it, he had averted war. Discussing the principal arguments which he considered had been directed against the policy the Government had pursued, the Premier said that first there, was a suggestion, despite the fact that Britain had no treaty obligations in the matter she should have declared at an early stage that if Germany had resort to force against Czechoslovakia, Britain would fight. For any such action, the Premier maintained, it would have been impossible to secure the support of the electorate. The other suggestion was that if the Government had felt from the first that this was impossible, it should have told Czechoslovakia long ago that in no circumstances would she get any help, so that she could have come to terms herself with Germany. But the issue was not so simple, Mr Chamberlain continued. France was under treaty obligations to Czechoslovakia and it was not to be expected that she should repudiate these beforehand, and so long as there was a risk of France having to honour her obligations, it was impossible to say that Britain would in no circumstances be involved. When the Government became convinced that nothing could any longer keep Sudetenland with Czechoslovakia, it agieed that Czechoslovakia should cede that territory. He claimed that the Government deserved the approval of the House for its conduct, which had saved Czechoslovakia from destruction and Europe from Armageddon