We are no think-and-thin friends of the system of publie
diplomacy, but it seems to us that this is one of the cases in which the Government should have explained the situation exactly to the country, and have warned it of what was meant by Germany's " try on," and what were likely to be the consequences. If we are told that this was impossible because it would have provoked immediate war, our answer is that the Government's secretiveness did not prevent war. In all probability if we had laid our cards upon the table at that time there would have been no war. However, we have no desire to cry over spilt milk, and we fully acknowledge that the new White Paper shows that the Government were not themselves in the least taken in by Germany, but maintained a strong and altogether worthy line in the actual negotiations.
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