MR. CHURCHILL AND GERMANY ,

Arms and the Covenant. By the Rt. Hon. Winston S. Churchill. Compiled by Randolph S. Churchill. (Harrap. 1,8s.) MR. RANDOLPH CHURCHILL has admirably selected and edited a number of the speeches made by his father during the lifetime of the National Government : a sort of recapitulation which most other statesmen of today would pay large sums to prevent. Mr. Winston Churchill triumphantly passes

this severe test, both by the wit and vigour of his manner, and by the astonishing consistency of his appeal and argument.

This argument falls into three parts, the first of which relates to the pre-Hitler period, the period of the Disarmament Conference, which he deplored not only as a " positive cause of friction and ill-will," but because it postulated a permanent acquiescence by Germany in the rigours of the Peace Treaty. Mr. Churchill thought that those rigours should have been mitigated in the days of Dr. Bruning, and upon our own terms. This is what he said in 1932 : " The removal of the just grievances of the vanquished oughr to precede the disarmament of the victors. To bring about anything like equality of armaments while those grievances remain unredressed, would be almost to appoint the day for another European war—to fix it as if it were a prize-fight."

The chance went by, and no concessions were made. Hitler and his " bands of sturdy Teutonic youths " rose to power upon the ruins of Germany's legitimate hopes ; and at once Mr. Churchill turned to his second. theme—the repetition of insistent warnings against. Germany's new aims. Again he found no echo. In 1933, the Air Estimates were again. reduced ; fresh disarmament proposals were put forward ; the Fulham by-election reflected a public mood of abject indifference ; and Sir Herbert Samuel left the Government when two cruisers were " with much regret " laid down.

Mr. Churchill did not succumb to this easy-going spirit : " I dread the day when the means of threatening the heart of the British Empire should pass into the hands of the present rulers of Germany. . . . If you wish to bring about war, you bring about such an equipoise that both sides think they have a Chance of winning. If you want to stop war, you gather such an aggregation Of force on the side of peace that the aggressor, whoever he may be, will not dare to challenge."

In those days it was not too late for Britain to stand up- to Germany alone ; but that we might do it, Mr. Churchill demanded the adoption of a rule of parity in the air, insisting as early as 1934 that German aviation might be stronger than ours within a year. Sir Herbert Samuel de-scribed this alarming language as " the language of a Malay run amok " ; but Mr. Baldwin reacted otherwise, and solemnly pledged the

National Government to " see to it that in air strength and air power this country shall no longer be in a position inferior to any country within striking distance of our shores."

The history of that pledge, and its declining value, is' the most important part of the history of the last few years. 1934 went by, with the Socialists still censuring 'the rearmament they now censure as too slow. Mr. Churchill, drawing upon considerable supplies of expert information 'which • was for some reason not available or acceptable to those in office,

indulged in a series of forecasts and criticisms none of 'which have been much impaired by the events. When, in November, 1934, Mr. Churchill gave explicit estimates of the German rate of progress in the air, Mr. Baldwin was as •eicplicit in his; denials ; and his official assurances of " considerable superiority " were reiterated even in March, 1935, within a • week of the interview at which Germany acknowledged that she had caught us up.

It was easy for his opponents to depict Mr. Churchill as a mere fire-eater, so long as he persisted in his ugly and often technical criticisms of military preparations ; but there was another motive in his utterances, which was less easy to evade. He demanded armaments because without them we could not play a part as " good Europeans " : " The idea that we can usefully intervene in sustaining the peace of Europe while we ourselves are the most vulnerable of all, is one which cannot be held firmly by any man who looks at this in the faithful discharge of his duty."

The point could scarcely have been more neatly illustrated than by the events of 1935, and - the ignominious. manner. in which we were compelled to think better of our attempt to intervene in saving the peace of Africa. At a time when the public was obsessed with the ethics of the Abyssinian situation, Mr. Churchill refused to take his eyes off Germany's designs. Immediately before the General Election, he came forward with a reckoning that Germany was spending L800,000,000 a year on warlike preparations—a figure the Government for once did not deny. He declared that the whole of Germany was " an armed camp " " We have no speedy prospect of equalling the German air force whatever we may do in the near future.. . We see them witi their grievances unredressed, with all their ambitions unsatisfied, continuing from strength to strength, and the whole world waits from week to week to hear what are the words which will fall from the heads of the German nation."

Despite these warnings, Mr. Baldwin—and there could IA no shrewder judge—decided that the electorate was not ready

to face up to the needs of the moment, and gave his word that there would be " no great armaments." Nor were there, for a long and crucial period. Even the re-occupation

of the Rhineland provoked no more vigorous retort than the appointment of Sir Thomas Inskip, whose dread of " dis- location " and insistence on peace-time _conditions have since made him the butt of Mr. Churchill's attacks. " Is this peace in which we are living ? " he demands :

" Why should paralysis be paraded as phlegmatic composure, and havering between half a dozen policies be acclaimed as sobriety and wisdom ? . . . We are the incredulous, indifferent children of Centuries of security behind the shield of the Royal Navy, not yet able fo wake up to the conditions of the modern world.. . . The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of ' soothing and baffling expedients, of delays, is coming to its dose. In its place we are entering a period of consequences."

. How to confront the consequences of the revolution we have imposed upon Germany, and of the impotence we have imposed upon ourselves, Mr. Churchill has envisaged very distinctly in the third branch of his argument, which is a plea for the re-birth of collective security.

" All the nations and States that are alarmed at the growth of German armaments ought to combine for mutual aid in pacts of mutual assistance. . . . I desire to see the collective forces of the world invested with overwhelming power. . . . Unless there is .a front against potential aggression there will be no settlement. All the nations. of Europe will just be driven helter-skelter across the diplomatic chess-board until the limits of retreat are exhausted, and then out of desperation the explosion of war will take place."

. It was not until after Mr. Churchill bad begun on this more constructive line of thought that the Government was

converted to his earlier views upon rearmament. The enor-... =US estimates of 1937 showed, an immediate return in the diplomatic sphere ; and. Mr. Churchill acclaimed the, success of the Nyon Conference, and the " stiffening, and surge of resolution " that accompanied it, with as much warmth as if the success had been his own. And it was with corre-

sponding dismay that he accepted the victory of Signor. Mussolini over Mr. Eden.

It is not difficult to see why the period immediately after the seizure of Austria should have been chosen for the publica- tion of this . book. • Mr. Churchill believes that the Sibylline books are to be proffered to us for a third time, and that the fate- of -Czechoslovakia is to decide the fate of the British Empire. He protests against .vague declarations of policy, which are entangling without being deterrent. He points to the collective force of the countries of the Danube Basin and beyond, " all of whom have powerful armies, who together aggregate 75,000,000 of people, who have immense resources,. who all wish to dwell in peace within their habitations, who individually may be broken by defeat and despoiled, but who, united, constitute an immense resisting power. . . . In the next few months all these substantial countries- will be deciding whether they will rally, as they would desire to do, to the standards of civilisation which still fly over Geneva, or whether they will be forced to throw in their lot and adopt the system and the doctrines of the Nazi Powers."

Such is his appeal ; and it comes from one who, up till now, has been consistently right, and has for that reason incurred the particular mistrust of the German authorities.

Mr. Churchill presents a brutal dilemma, and demands an

immediate. decision one way or the other : for that very reason, one can scarcely doubt that his advice will go un- heeded. But if our civilisation is to go down before the tide of barbarism, with a bucket of sand in one hand and

a spade in the other, it will at least be of interest to some historian of its downfall to discover that for six years before the catastrophe there had been an eloquent and a compelling voice to tell us, over and over again, exactly where we stood. • CHRISTOPHER HOBHOUSE.