Mr. Baldwin is more needed at Stresa. For all the
general acceptance of a National Government, it is mere affectation to assume that parties are obliterated, and for this country to have at what is perhaps the most important international conference since 1919 no repre- sentative of the party which holdi 75 per cent. of the seats in the House of Commons is, to put it at the lowest, unfortunate. Sir Robert Vansittart's inclusion in the Stresa delegation is significant, for it is an almost unbroken rule that the Foreign Minister and the Permanent Under-Secretary shall not be out of the country at the same time—though Lord Curzon and Sir Eyre Crowe were both abroad for a few days at the beginning of 1923. Sir Robert may be assumed to be, like Mr. Baldwin and Mr. Eden, a convinced believer in a " Security through the League " policy.
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