INTERNATIONAL: I Shall not admit . . . War

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INTERNATIONAL

"I Shall not admit . . . War"

In the stuffy League Assembly, hothouse of Europe's statesmen in more senses than one, sprouted suddenly last week a solemn Jack-in-the-Pulpit.

Once an iron moulder, later a Nonconformist Wesleyan lay preacher, today Foreign Secretary of Great Britain, plodding "Uncle Arthur" Henderson has played until last week something less than second fiddle to Prime Minister James Ramsay MacDonald in shaping the Empire's foreign policy. Dramatic therefore was his sprout. The League clock had just struck drowsy 4 p. m. Less than half the delegates were in their seats. The big speech of the day had already been made —so it was thought—by Europe's greatest orator, foxy, cello-throated Aristide Briand, Foreign Minister of France.

As he mounted the rostrum "Uncle Arthur" looked strangely thin. No wonder. He had just lost a "stone" (14 lb.). Under doctors' orders he and Mrs. Henderson spent most of August gulping down the slimming waters of a Welsh spa (Llandrindod Wells), from which they hastened via London to Geneva. In pulpit tones, measured, slow and once or twice ringingly fervent, Mr. Henderson made last week the speech of his life, successfully courted fame by demanding that the League act to achieve Disarmament, cease piddling about "Security," the Frenchified nebulosity upon which M. Briand is trying to erect his famed "United States of Europe" (TIME, Sept. 16, 1929 et seq.)

Pacemaker Henderson. "We who are gathered here are custodians of the Peace of the World," preached Uncle Arthur solemnly. "Need I remind this great assembly that two years have gone by since we resolved that, due to the Locarno agreements, it had become possible to hold a Disarmament Conference. We have not as yet assembled that great convention. Our pace is slow and the peoples of the world are growing impatient, doubtful of our good faith."

Every September such pleas for Disarmament have been heard in Geneva from the minor nations, from Sweden, Norway, Holland, Bulgaria. But not in many a year has a Great Power galvanized the League Assembly with such demands as Jack-in-the-Pulpit proceeded to spout.

"Security is Impossible!" Attacking directly M. Briand's "United States of Europe," a scheme predicated on a round-robin guarantee of Security, Mr. Henderson cried:

"Security is impossible of achievement if competitive military preparations continue as they are going on today! Disarmament and security are interlocked. The whole system of the [League] Covenant rests upon that. Therefore, in accepting new instruments [i.e. Briand's scheme] which are designed to strengthen the machinery of the Covenant on the side of security, we shall insert a condition that our acceptance of such measures shall only become effective when, on the other side, disarmament has ceased to be a mere phrase and has become a reality.'