The Final Reparations Settlement

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THERE could have been no peace in Europe until the problem of reparations had been settled. That is the reason why the Conference of Experts which sat at Paris last year from February 11 until June 7 was of such surpassing importance. That is the reason why its conclusions were received with relief and approval by the world generally.

For ten years the question of reparations had been a thorn in the flesh of all Western Europe. The trouble began at the Peace Conference itself. During all those months in Paris, ten years ago, the American delegates had urged the importance of fixing Germany's obligations and reaching a final settlement. But the view of the British and French Prime Ministers, Mr. Lloyd George and Mr. Clemenceau, was that war-time passions were still running so high that their respective peoples would reject any reparations figures which they and the conference experts realized were within Germany's capacity to pay. Those were the days when certain leading men in England declared that Germany could be made to pay a capital sum equivalent at present values to £24,000 million, say 120 billion dollars; and some of the French put the figure at 200 billion dollars...