NEWS OF THE WEEK.
MR. LLOYD GEORGE replied for the Allies, on Thursday, March 3rd, to Dr. Simons's counter-proposals for a trivial war indemnity. The counter-proposals, he said, mocked the Peace Treaty. Germany could not repudiate her responsibility for the war, and must consider the question of reparation in the light of that fact. The Allies did not ask to be repaid the cost of the war forced upon them ; they asked only for reparation for damage done, especially in France and Belgium, where factories and mines were deliberately destroyed, not for military reasons, but in order to prevent those countries from competing with Germany after the war. German industry had not suffered at all. France and Great Britain were each paying yearly for war pensions thrice as much as the whole annual payment offered by Germany in reparation—not a quarter of the sum required to repair the damage. Mr. Lloyd George confessed that he could not understand the psychology of a people whose representatives came with such terms. He regretted that the counter-proposals had been made, as they showed a desire to evade obligations and thus were frankly "an offence and an exasperation."
