Reviving Chivalry

Enthroned in the white and gold Throne Room of Buckingham Palace, facing the Primate of England* and the Primate of All England/- and facing an immense conclave of British bishops and clergy, His Majesty King George exclaimed in ringing tones last week:

"I share to the full the fervent hope and prayer of the Archbishops, Bishops and clergy for the success of the Disarmament Conference at Geneva. I am confident that my governments throughout the British Commonwealth will exert themselves to the uttermost to secure the largest possible measure of general disarmament, and their endeavors will be greatly assisted by your wholehearted support and prayers. I pray that Divine guidance may be with those who, in these anxious days, bear the great responsibility of directing the affairs of our own and of other nations."

Those who chiefly bore the great responsibility last week were the seven Chief Delegates of the Big Seven powers at the Geneva Conference. Of these the Chief British Delegate, Sir John Simon, was in London, hastily summoned by the Japanese crisis; and the Chief French Delegate, Andre Tardieu, was in Paris, hastily summoned by the French Cabinet crisis. The Chief German Delegate, Heinrich Bruening, was in Berlin; and the Chief U. S. Delegate, Henry Lewis Stimson, was in Washington. The acting Chief U. S. Delegate, Hugh Simons Gibson, was not only in bed with a bad cold three days of last week in Geneva but apparently communicated this affliction to Captain Kent Churchill Melhorn, U. S. N., the U. S. Delegation's staff physician. Several other U. S. delegates were in bed with colds and Swiss doctors were hastily summoned.

New and powerful men who appeared at the Geneva Conference last week were Col. William Taylor, representing the du Pont interests; and bluff "Big Navy Bill," Mr. William B. Shearer. At the Geneva Conference of 1927 to which President Coolidge sent a particularly strong U. S. Delegation, Mr. Shearer, according to charges made in the Press, was able to organize an anti-disarmament lobby so powerful that it wrecked the Conference. Du Pont's Taylor sat a while in the Conference gallery. But "Big Navy Bill" disdained for the most part to watch so paltry a show as the Conference was putting on.

With 57 nations participating (each represented by numerous delegates) there were at one time last week only five delegates present in the Conference hall while ostensibly important work was going on. The longest speech of the Conference thus far was made by Haitian Delegate Constantin Mayard who, in the course of 7,000 words, happily said that in Haiti, "the Hoover good-will policy has been instituted."

Tribute in glowing terms to "the great figure of President Wilson, founder of the League of Nations and initiator of this Conference" was paid by Egyptian Delegate Mahmoud Fakhry Pasha. He declared that with respect to President Wilson he was adding Egypt's homage "to the unanimous homage of the World!"

"I may say," said His Highness the Aga Sultan Sir Mohammed Shah,* speaking for millions of Indian Ismailiah Moslems, "I may say that the United States has a long record of success in combining Peace with Prosperity. Hers is a record that fitly entitles her to take the active part she has already taken in our deliberations."

The only U. S. woman delegate, Dr. Mary Emma Woolley, began to take her active part in the conference last week. Her great speech was made the day before King George spoke in Buckingham Palace but in much the same vein. Fervently, Dr. Woolley exclaimed:

"May material and moral disarmament advance together in the days and weeks and months perhaps lying before us!"

Other speakers (to the never more than half full Congress hall) were those of Argentina, Australia, Austria, Bulgaria, Estonia, Finland, Jugoslavia, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Persia, Portugal, Rumania, Turkey, Switzerland, Uruguay.

Of the Big Seven only Germany spoke. Cheer on cheer greeted German Chief Delegate Chancellor Bruening when he made the initial German proposals in general terms. Last week dead silence greeted the presentation of Germany's specific proposals by the German Ambassador to Turkey, Rudolf Nadolny.

The British Delegation were infuriated, and showed it by their expressions, when Herr Nadolny specifically intimated that the British bases at Gibraltar and Singapore are not police outposts but war bases. Everyone seemed to be furious with the German delegate before he sat down. Yet he had merely proposed with an enormous wealth of German detail the sweeping and almost complete disarmament already proposed by Italian Signor Grandi who drew thunderous cheers and by Russian Comrade Litvinov who drew cheers (TIME, Feb. 22).

That evening Le Temps of Paris, often the mouthpiece of the French Government, called Delegate Nadolny "clumsy," added, "The sole surprise in the German plan is that it does not stipulate outright for revision of the military clauses of the Treaty of Versailles."

The unique and courageous act of President Hoover's close friend Hugh Gibson last week was to take his stand as chief of the only delegation at Geneva opposed to abolition of the battleship. All the other 56 nations without exception agreed that the battleship is a purely offensive weapon and should be abolished.*

A way out of this impasse, and many another, seemed dimly to appear as the Geneva Conference started talking about "humanizing war." If this, instead of "disarmament" or "limitation" should be set up as the Conference's goal, argued many delegates, then the Conference might succeed. Its members would all sign a "Pact Humanizing War," promising each other not to wage bacteriological warfare or chemical warfare and not to bomb civilian populations. A Pact Humanizing War, as one Geneva paper said, "might have the effect of reviving chivalry."

After tracing back the World's history 3,421 years, the Society of International Law announced last week that during that period 8,000 peace treaties were signed, each lasting an average of two years. Of the 3,421 years surveyed, the Society found that 268 were "years of peace."

*The Most Rev. William Temple, Archbishop of York (son of a former Archbishop of Canterbury).

/-The Most Rev. Cosmo Gordon Lang, Archbishop of Canterbury (formerly Archbishop of York). *i.e. The Aga Khan. *Explanation No. 1 (strategic): the U. S., having few war bases while Britain has many, feels that the U. S. can only be defended by ships of the largest, fastest, most gun-powerful type having the longest possible cruising radius.

*Explanation No. 2 (monetary): the other 56 nations lack sufficient money to compete successfully with the U. S. in building ships of the utmost battle power and maximum cost.

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