PRACTICAL POLITICS?

While American War Mothers learn the technique of hand grenades near the graves of Belleau Wood, and while Mussolini considers the beauty of machine guns, Aristide Briand has given European diplomats another opportunity to write their names on a piece of paper. Long featured in frayed journalese as the canny apostle of the Quai D'Orsay, Briand has dragged an ancient skeleton from the diplomatic closet placarded "Pan-Europe" and rattled its bones from the lake front of Geneva to the austere marble of the Hague.

This recent plan for European union differs from most of its predecessors in that its basis is political, not economic. Tariff and customs cooperation is placed in a secondary position to political unity. The replies from the Powers which have been asked for July will largely determine its career. Germany holds the deciding cards, Should Germany effectively cooperate with France, Europe would come under Franco-German control, London would see its century-old balance of power slip through its fingers, and Mussolini could cry vainly for fanfares and sword-play. If Germany refuses to see this organization within the League, the main object of the Union would be lost.

The relation of Briand's Pan-Europe to the United States is vague and unpredictable. It can be said, however, that the proposed plan constitutes a definite threat against the present American tariff concessions in the individual nations of Europe. A united Europe would be in a position to refuse more liberal tariff terms to the United States than the United States at present offers to Europe. The vision of world cooperation thus suggested is still a vision; the first fragments are in the hands of Germany until July. It is significant that the suggestion should arise from one of the most practical politicians in international history.