ARMAMENTS & PEACE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 3 November 1938, Page 7

ARMAMENTS & PEACE

AIMS OF THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT PRIME MINISTER’S DECLARATION NO WAITING TILL CRISIS BECOMES ACUTE. AGREEMENT AND CO-OPERATION SOUGHT. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, November 1. In the House of Commons the Prime Minister (Mr Neville Chamberlain) said that review's of the military, naval and air defences were not finished, but, in the meantime, he reiterated the unwillingness of the Government to accept the proposal for a Ministry of Supply, which, he argued, would cause dislocation of the existing arrangements without guaranteeing any improvement and would involve the use of compulsion, which employers and workers would not normally accept in peace iime. He made the point that they were only in the third year of ihe rearmament programme, which had been undertaken and organised as a five-year programme. Tc argue that because everything was not completed in three years the programme had broken down was therefore foolish. He doubted if it would have been possible to squeeze a five-year programme into three years, but admitted that the review had shown the special urgency of certain parts of ihe programme for which certain practical reinforcements were necessary if they were not to jeopardise the whole scheme. The. Government would therefore direct itself to those parts, and he reminded the House cnce more that there would undoubtedly be an addition to the total cost of the programme.

REARMAMENT STANDARDS. Finally, Mr Chamberlain turned to some adversicns which had been heard abroad on British rearmament, and asked why a different standard was being applied to Britain in this matter. However, he added a repetition, which he clearly thought should have been unnecessary, of the assurances of Britain’s peaceful intent. “I would repeat here categorically that we have no aggressive intention against Germany or any other country,” he said. “Our sole concern is to see our country and her Imperial communications safe, and, that we shall not be so weak relatively to other countries, our diplomacy cannot enter upon discussions upon an equal basis. There is nothing further from our minds than to enter upon a new armaments race.”

This brought the Premier to the joint declaration with Herr Hitler after the Munich agreement, which, he said, seemed to have dropped out of sight. “Yet I myself feel,” he said, “that in that declaration, if properly followed up, lies the chance for a new era of peace in Europe. I believe —indeed, I am convinced —that Herr Hitler meant it when he signed it, and I am equally convinced that the views expressed are the ‘views of the majority of people both in Germany and in this country.

FIRM DETERMINATION. “That being so, let there be no mistake as to our policy and our intention. It is our firm determination that there shall be no sitting still waiting for peace to come. “We shall not wait until a crisis becomes acute,” said Mr Chamberlain. “We shall try to consolidate the goodwill of the four Powers which assembled at Munich and endeavour to restore European confidence by the removal of fears and suspicions. “We shall not get far unless we get the idea that the democracies and the totalitarian States are not to be ranged against each other in opposing camps, but that they can, if they choose, work together, not merely for the settlement of differences after they have arisen but also in consideration of a constructive programme which will facilitate the' international exchange of goods and improve international relations in various ways for the good of all. “That is what is sometimes called a policy of appeasement. That is the policy to which the British Government intends whole-heartedly to devote itself.

“PUZZLED & BEWILDERED” LIBERAL LEADER’S DOUBTS. VALUE OF HITLER’S SIGNATURE. RUGBY, November 1. The Leader of the Opposition Liberals Sir Archibald Sinclair, who followed Mr Chamberlain, urged the Government to extend a more general asylum to refugees from the Sudetenland. Sir Archibald, like Mr Attlee, argued that the House ought to think very carefully before deciding to give a guarantee to Czechoslovakia in the new circumstances which had arisen out of the Munich settlement. Mr Chamberlain’s speech left him puzzled and bewildered. The Premier had no right to ask them to have faith in Herr Hitler’s signature to the Munich declaration as long as the German and Italian signatures to the non-intervention agreement were not implemented. Sir Archibald next asked about the Government’s policy on colonies. Were they going to raise the question or wait until Herr Hitler raised it? A solution of the colonial problems must be founded on the principle of trusteeship and must be part of a general settlement, the acid test of sincerity in regard to which would be an agreed disarmament. LABOUR ATTACK OBJECTION TO VAGUE OBLIGATIONS. ECONOMIC CONSEQUENCES OF LATE EVENTS. RUGBY, November 1. Opening the debate in the House -vf Commons today, Mr C. R. Attlee, Leader of the Opposition, said that they would have an opportunity tomorrow, in discussing the Government’s proposal to ratify the AngloItalian Agreement, to state their objections to that course, and explain their position on the very large questions of international policy which it raised —particularly on the vitally important question of Spain. After criticising a number of details of the application of the Munich agreement and asking for fur-

ther information on the proposed guarantee of the new frontiers of Czechoslovakia, Mr Attlee said that he was opposed to committing Britain to vague obligations outside the framework of the League. He called attention to the economic consequences of recent events, and contended that, through the absence of economic planning, the Government nad left the country, despite its great economic resources, in no fit condition to meet the challenge of a trade drive by Germany. Mr Attlee said that they had heard talk of a national register, but there already was a national register of people who wanted work, but could not find it. Unemployment was an example of how the country’s immense potential strength was not be,ng brought into play. The same lack of planning was seen in the Government’s defence measures. There had been a failure to decide on a plan, as a result of which the vital need for passive defence against air attack had been neglected and subordinated to the needs of the fighting services.