The meeting of the League of Nations Council which ended
at Geneva on Saturday was followed by two useful discussions. In its first meeting since the spring of 1935, the Bureau of the Disarmament Conference on Tuesday decided to ask the Governments represented at the con- ference whether they are prepared to accept a system of publicity for armaments budgets based on the draft con- vention drawn up by the Bureau ; it will meet at a later date to discuss the replies and decide what measures .to adopt. It is a meagre harvest, just distinguishable from the absence of any harvest at all, but it serves at least to keep a body charged with watching disarmament possibilities alive. On the same day, at a secret meeting of the rapporteurs on questions of League reform, M. Paul-Boncour is reported to have made proposals for a double system of sanctions—of economic sanctions obligatory on all members of the League, and of military sanctions to be imposed through regional pacts of mutual assistance, which should be open to all States and thus be preserved from assuming the character of exclusive alliances. That is a proposal the adoption of which by a League including all the States of Europe would be a firm guarantee of European peace—provided its adoption denoted a genuine resolve to carry it out. If even the obligation to join in economic sanctions is repudiated every aggressor has an open road before him.
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