27 SEPTEMBER 1935, Page 17

SANCTIONS , FOR WHAT ?

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] Sin,—The League Committee of Five, faced with overwhelming evidence about the last stronghold of slavery, have recom- mended that Abyssinia should be deprived her of heractivities must sacrosanct independence, and that a

must be controlled by white men. A veto on the choice of these Foreign controllers, however, it is proposed to reserve

to the Negus (on British Negus will consent tortt:dt)hebecause appo

is well known that the appoint- ment of any Italian. The false cry that we must at all costs preserve the noble h independence of Abyssinia, having been thus abandoned without apology, a section of British opinion still demands war upon Italy if she moves to substitute her own control for League control. That is to say, we are to risk a general European conflagration and the loss of millions of young men (including our own untrained citizens) merely to substitute a body of controllers of mixed nationality, necessarily inefficient because mixed, for a homogeneous crew of Italians whose efficiency and humanity in Libya are admired by every com- petent observer. A number of escaped Abyssinian slaves have already become happy cultivators in Italian East Africa ; why not welcome the extension of that happiness to the re- ;mining millions of slaves and serfs of the Abyssinian petty tyrants ?

The needless quarrel has involved British pledges quite un- realised by our people. At Geneva, on September 11th, our Foreign Secretary said that " to suggest or insinuate " that British acceptance of the " obligations " of the League were " peculiar to the present question at issue " would be to underestimate British " good faith." M. Laval nailed this on September 18th as a pledge that Britain undertook : " Re- sponsibilities of all kinds, in all circumstances of time and place." Doctrine for Italy is therefore doctrine for Germany. The British workers are pledged as soldiers to France, without their knowledge or consent, by a Government assuming absolutism even while opposing a " dictator."—Your obedient

servant, Royal Societies Club.

LEO CHIOZZA MONEY.

1(1) The League Committee of Five has most expressly safeguarded the independence of Abyssinia ; otherwise that country could not remain a member of the League. The report, accepted readily by the Emperor, nowhere speaks of control or controllers (except of .pledges for loans). (2) There is not a shred of evidence for the suggestion that Sir Samuel Hoare has given pledges going beyond those embodied in the •League Covenant, known and assented to by British workers since 1919, and the Treaty of Locarrio, known and assented to by British workers since 1925.--EO.

The Spectator.] •