The French and Belgian governments have slapped another opportunity in the face. To make that slap resound as well as sting, they have accompanied their rejection of the German offer by a savage sentence of fifteen years' imprisonment on the head of the greatest industrial concern in the Ruhr, if not in Europe. What for? Because he ordered the works' syren to sound "cease work" for one day when the French troops occupied the place. There is a swagger of brutality about that sentence which betokens recklessness. It came at a moment when the German government had just made an offer of peace, and when that ally of France who had made the deepest sacrifices in the war to save her and Belgium from ruin was urging the French government to regard that offer at least as a starting-point for discussion. The answer was to treat the German note as an offence, to promulgate that penal sentence which outrages every sense[Pg 192] of decency throughout the world, and to refuse to permit an ally, who had been so faithful in the time of trouble for France and Belgium, even the courtesy of a discussion on the tenor of the reply to be given to a note that so vitally concerned the interest of all the Allies without exception. Prussian arrogance in its crudest days can furnish no such example of clumsy and short-sighted ineptitude. It gives point to Lord Robert Cecil's observation in the House of Commons that it is very difficult to reconcile the French attitude with a conception that the French government, with the opinion behind it, desires a settlement.  
What is the German offer? It proposes to limit the total obligations of Germany in cash and in kind to thirty milliards of gold marks (￡1,500,000,000) to be raised by loans on the international money markets at normal conditions in instalments of:—
 
20 milliards up to July 1, 1927.
5 milliards up to July 1, 1929.
5 milliards up to July 1, 1931.
There are provisions for payment of interest from July, 1923, onward, and the agreements entered[Pg 193] into for delivery of payments in kind on account of reparations are to be carried out in accordance with the arrangements already made. Then comes this important provision. After a paragraph in which it is argued that the above figures would strain the resources of Germany to the utmost it adds:—
 
"Should others not share this opinion, the German government propose to submit the whole reparations problem to an international commission uninfluenced by political considerations, as suggested by State Secretary Hughes."
 
They further state that the German government are prepared to devise suitable measures in order that the whole German national resources should participate "in guaranteeing the service of the loan." Guarantees are also offered for deliveries in kind. In order to ensure a permanent peace between France and Germany they propose an agreement that all contentious questions arising between them in future should be referred to arbitration. The note finally stipulates that the evacuation of the Ruhr "within the shortest space of time" and[Pg 194] the restoration of treaty conditions in the Rhineland constitute "an essential leading up to negotiations on basis of above ideas." The above represents the substance of the German proposals.
 
The French and Belgian governments in their reply stand by the May, 1921, schedule of payments and decline to forego even the very problematical "C" bonds of ￡4,250,000,000. Hitherto it has been common ground that ￡2,500,000,000 is the figure which Germany can be expected to pay. The French and Belgian governments are now insisting on the full measure of the ￡6,600,000,000 award. The Hughes proposal they scoff at and treat its putting forward by Germany as part of "an expression of a systematic revolt against the Treaty of Versailles." The real temper and purpose of this intransigeant attitude is to be found in two sentences. Here is the first. Alluding to the resistance offered in the Ruhr to the French attempt to exploit its resources the note says: "The Belgian and French governments cannot take into consideration any German proposal whilst the resistance continues." That is, however complete and satisfactory a proposal may be in itself, it would be rejected unless preceded by abject surrender to[Pg 195] French designs in the Ruhr. Then later on comes this significant sentence emphasising the moral of the first:—
 
"The Belgian government and the French government have decided that they will only evacuate the newly occupied territories according to the measure and in proportion to the payments effected. They have nothing to alter in this resolution."
 
An impossible payment is to be insisted upon—costs of occupation are to be added to that, and until both are liquidated French armies are to remain in possession of the richest areas in Germany. Meanwhile the British Empire and the United States of America, who, at a prodigious cost in life and treasure, saved France from a similar humiliation to that which she is now inflicting on Germany, are practically told when they venture to offer suggestions to mind their own business. No interference will be tolerated from meddlers of any sort.
 
The sum offered by Germany in settlement of reparations is no doubt inadequate. It cannot be accepted by any of the Allies in discharge of the[Pg 196] German obligations under the treaty. The German government must make a very substantial advance on that offer before they can hope to come to terms with the Allied governments. I have no doubt the German government fully realise that fact, and I am sure they did not put forward these figures as their final tender. They meant them to be taken as a beginning and a basis for negotiation. In fact they say so. When you enter into negotiations your lawyer, if he knows his business, never starts with the figure he is authorised ultimately to propose. Nor does the client always communicate to his advocate the last figure he would be prepared to pay if he had to decide between that and a continuation of the struggle, with its costs and its complications. Once pourparlers begin the original figure disa............