Abstract

Editorials

This article presents information on various political developments in the world. Ten years, since the armistice, since the overwhelming defeat and disaster, since the days when, overnight, Kaiser and kings, princes and grand-dukes fled, ancient governments came crashing down, a couple of millions of German soldiers came stumbling home. Beaten, betrayed, outraged, eager for revenge, they found only starvation, utter spiritual and physical misery, brother shooting down brother, murderous marines, monarchists and Spartacides, battles in the streets, enemy troops in the beloved Rhineland, utter chaos, utter despair. Upon these foundations it was necessary to rear the German Republic. The seeming innocence of the official text of the Anglo-French naval accord, which was published on October 22 in London and Paris, will deceive no one who goes behind the formal documents. Ostensibly Great Britain and France followed out the suggestion of the American Minister to Belgium, Hugh Gibson, and held a friendly little meeting of their own to facilitate agreement at the next disarmament conference. The official result of these conversations was an agreement to discuss the limitation of certain classes of cruisers and submarines at the next international gathering, the actual result was the creation of a new military alliance in which Great Britain wins a more secure control over European waters in exchange for France's right to dominate the Continent with a large conscript army.