NEWS OF THE WEEK
SINCE these lines have of necessity to go to press while Herr von Ribbentrop is making his statement of Germany's case before the League of Nations Council, nothing but tentative comment is possible on a situation which that statement may substantially change. Hopes were raised by the, announcement made at the end of WedlieSday's midnight" meeting of the Locarno Powers that notable progress had been achieved, but if the goal of a leW.European -peace settlement is to be attained understanding not only between the Locarno Powers but _befWeen those Powers and Germany is necessary. And that is not yet in sight. While the Locarno Powers are, Understood to have insisted that Germany should agree to submit to abide by the decision of the Hague Court. regarding the compatibility of the Franco-Soviet Pact with the Locarno Treaty, Herr Hitler is understood to have forbidden Herr von Ribbentrop to agree to any such submission. The British proposal, moreover, for an international police to guard, temporarily at any rate, a narrow demilitarised zone on both sides of the Franco- German- .frontier, appears to have been modified under French pressure, and to provide now only for policing on the German side. To assume that Germany will consent to the presence of foreign troops on her soil for the first time since the Ruhr occupation (the case of the Saar was quite different) seems optimistic. Every hope must be clutched at. Provided safeguards are adequate, and goOd faith is sufficiently tested, a great opportunity to stabilise peace is presented. But the bridge between Germany and France is very far from being built yet, and the position of this country as bridge-builder is singularly difficult, for there is undeniably some substance in the French contention that when we sign a treaty of guarantee with her our primary role must be that of guarantor, not of honest broker.
