Very good. We will have an opportunity of discussing that afterwards if necessary. I know no power at the moment which will prevent a Mexican boat from going into Spain. I do not know how this committee can prevent it. I do not know how this committee can search it, or how any man who is a searcher can board that particular vessel. There may be an agreement between the 27 Powers by which, among themselves, they will allow the right to search, but how that can be made applicable to a Power which is altogether outside the 27 has not been made clear. The question, then, that I put is as follows; I have never heard it dealt with. I put it now again to the Minister. What is to prevent the U.S.S.R., the Soviet Government, from sending supplies to Mexico, and then those supplies being sent back to Spain?
Let us take another example. There was an agreement entered into by the Powers under which they all agreed amongst themselves not to send material or men, or to allow fresh volunteers even, to go into Spain on either side. The Minister and the House will remember that we passed a Bill making it criminal for anybody to take such an action—to leave this country, or even to take the first step by going into a railway station for the purpose of leaving this country, to join either of the fighting forces in Spain. That agreement, as the Minister knows, was made. Still, rightly or wrongly—this is what I want to call attention to, because a semi-war atmosphere is being worked up in connection with it—accusations are made on the one hand that reinforcements are going to General Franco and, on the other hand, that reinforcements and material of all kinds are still being poured into the Red Government of Spain. As I say, if you listen to the English radio or read the extracts from some of the English Press, you will get the idea into your head that that accusation is merely being made against the Italians, but, of course, that is only because we are being kept ignorant of the charge that is being made on the other side. It was only a couple of nights ago I heard very definite charges being made from the Italian side, over the radio—which, as far as I can see, is to a large extent an official business there—that the agreement was being violated by two countries, by France and by Russia. On the particular night on which I was listening they were dealing with France. They said that at Marseilles boats were being loaded and material sent to Spain; in the same way men were being sent into Spain from France.
I am not in a position—I hope the Minister is in some position, because after all, it is the business of the Government to give us information, or, if they have not got it, to try and get it—to weigh the value of those charges, but surely anybody who has followed this controversy even to a small extent of late will know the way in which what I might call a pre-war atmosphere is being worked up. Deliberate propaganda is working it up. What I do not like is this: the very agreement that was made between the Powers is being used as one of the weapons to spur on a war feeling. I think, Sir, that the House is entitled to some assurance that this agreement, which was intended to preserve the peace, will not become a method of bringing war nearer. The Minister refers to a scheme that has been agreed to. He said that the scheme has not yet come into operation. Therefore, I cannot ask the Minister how it is working. I cannot ask the Minister that, but at least we can be told what the scheme is. How does he think it is going to work?
Let me take the particular instance that I mentioned. We are told that at Marseilles arms are being loaded, camouflaged as something else: no person at the present moment openly loads arms, or at least none of the Powers that have deliberately promised not to do such a thing. Supposing a boat of that kind sails from Marseilles to one of the ports that are at present under the control of the Red Government in Spain. What is the method of thoroughly examining that particular boat? Who can board it? Who can compel the boat to halt? Supposing it is a German or Italian ship. If it is not, there are a lot of people in this country who are rather suspicious as to the character of the examination, and as to its thoroughness. It would be, to a large extent, making yourself your own searcher, almost as though you would expect the Commissioners of Revenue to accept without the slightest examination a declaration of income, simply a lump-sum without any details of any kind. Supposing a right of that kind was handed over to a German or Italian ship; does the Minister think that that is likely to promote the cause of peace? Is there no danger involved there?
So far as the actual carrying out of this policy of non-intervention is concerned, I should be much easier in my mind if I felt that there was goodwill behind it; if I did not realise as I fully realise, the extraordinary nature of the propaganda that is going on. I am particularly interested in the propaganda on one side. I will confess that. I have followed that propaganda for years. I know its efficiency. It is really remarkable. Nowhere, I think, has its efficiency been demonstrated more clearly than in what it has been able to carry through in connection with the civil war in Spain during the last six months. On whom have we to rely really for the carrying out of this agreement, and making effective the policy of non-intervention, which, if it could be made effective, probably would be the safest course for Europe, as we have pointed out on more than one occasion? Take France and Russia. One of them is the chief centre of propaganda. It is a country that, as one can see in the papers I get from there —and I get some—has been boasting for years of its preparedness for war. It now comes forward, notwithstanding that, as the great apostle of peace.
The main cause of disturbance, I am convinced, where European and world affairs are concerned, is the activities of the U.S.S.R. masquerading under the banner of peace. The first people to start the policy of intervention in Spain are masquerading now under the policy of non-intervention, the people whose action, whose intervention and propaganda to a large extent are responsible for the whole trouble, are now using the same propaganda under the pretence that they want to preserve the peace of Europe and under the pretence that they are in favour of non-intervention. From what I know, and, as I have said, I have given a number of years' study to this particular problem, other protestations made by that Power in favour of peace and in favour of non-intervention only drive home, to my mind, its complete insincerity so far as it is concerned.
I am not going to discuss the present Government in France. I do not believe in its desire for neutrality. It is geographically in a remarkably good position to evade these particular rules. Coming to England, I do not know what the policy of the British Government is on this. I believe in that particular case there are statesmen there, as there are in other countries, who do not realise the seriousness of this particular menace of Communism. Whether there or elsewhere, you have statesmen of that kind. I doubt if these statesmen will carry, or will be able to carry, an effective policy of this kind through. It is not that I believe that the present British Government has any sympathy with Bolshevism or Communism. I do not believe they have. It would be absurd to think so. I am not suggesting for a moment that they are on the same level as the other two Governments I have mentioned, but what I am convinced of, so far as we can judge by their actions, is that they and others have no conception of the seriousness of the menace. They see the immediate aim that they have before them, the danger of the European outburst, and are genuinely in favour of peace. They see an international strategic position, and possibly are to a large extent governed by that.
On what then can we rely for the effective carrying out of this policy? What steps, for instance, have we taken? We are members of this committee. We are contributing to it. What steps have we taken, or what suggestions have we ever made, or are we still in the position so blandly, almost boastfully, acknowledged by a colleague of the Minister that we are mere "yes men"? Our business is not to open our mouths and not to see that the bond that we are entering into is honoured! Is that our position? Is our position in regard to international conferences to be that of "yes men" or absentees? That seems to be the position to which the present Minister for External Affairs is reducing this country.
Now, I should like to know what the scheme is. The Minister says there is a scheme, and that that scheme is designed, by measures to be taken on land and sea, to prevent intervention. Well, we have not the slightest evidence; we have no information of any kind supplied to us by the Government to indicate whether the scheme is capable of bringing about, or can be considered even as likely to bring, results of that kind. It is quite obvious, if you have a scheme framed in order to prevent intervention, that that scheme must operate on both land and sea, and that measures must be taken on land and sea to see that non-intervention is carried through. I suggest that a repetition of such an obvious truth gives us no information. As I have said, what I want is some indication that this scheme is not mere pretence if the pretence itself can work, and very often it can. If you get a scheme going, even though it is not an effective scheme—I want to be quite fair and I am ready to admit that if you can fool people with it for a while it may achieve a good purpose and postpone an outbreak—prevent it perhaps altogether. It may be that this scheme has nothing more effective than that, and that some people do not expect anything more from it. Well, if it does that it does something, but again the House is in the unfortunate position of having committed itself to this policy and of not knowing how that policy is to be carried out.
As I say, I for one have very little confidence in some of the principal Powers that are engaged in putting this scheme into effect. We are not now discussing whether you can rely on the faith of the Powers. If you could there would be no necessity for this scheme. If you could rely on the goodwill of citizens there would be no necessity for a police force. If you could rely on the uprightness and fairness of all nations there would be no necessity for the League of Nations. If you could rely on the good faith of the different Powers that have committed themselves to the policy of non-intervention, there would be no necessity for this scheme. Therefore, at the basis of this scheme is fear and, apparently, well-grounded fear that the agreement would not be carried out by the Powers if the Powers could evade it. Otherwise, why the scheme? We, therefore, must assume, and so far as I am concerned I have not the least doubt that I am correct in assuming, that bad faith is to be feared on the part of some of the Powers, and here is a scheme that will have to combat that bad faith. Is it capable of doing it? How can I answer?
As you, Sir, pointed out, the Government is here introducing an entirely new Estimate. The Estimate, I admit, is one that follows logically from what was previously done in this House. I am not quarrelling with the amount of the Estimate, but it is one in respect of which we are certainly entitled to have a great deal more information about than we have got up to the present. The Minister indicated that the only thing holding up the working of the scheme to the present was the question of getting the various observers and so on. Now, what is the scheme and can the Minister show me how far it will effect the various things that I have asked him about.
I am mainly interested in two things. The great bulk of the people of this country are interested in two things, and these are: (1) the avoidance of a European catastrophe, and (2) the defeat of the Communist Government in Spain. I supported the policy of non-intervention because I thought it was the only method at the moment that I could see open to secure these two great ends. The House agreed with that particular policy, possibly not from the same motives that actuated me, but they agreed to that policy. We now want to know whether the machinery that is being set up will give reality to that policy, or whether it may not itself contribute to more bitterness and misunderstandings between the Powers. I am afraid that this Vote, from the manner in which it is put before the House, was looked upon as a purely formal affair. I do not know why the Government should be under any such impression. It is a matter in which the Opposition has shown the keenest interest all along and in which the country is exceedingly interested. A much fuller explanation is therefore demanded from the Minister.